Correspondence issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Since the fall of 2010, State has sanctioned 13 foreign firms under the ISA—2 for investments in Iran’s energy sector and 11 for supplying refined petroleum products."

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Actual trust-fund revenues fell short of FAA’s revenue forecasts for 9 of the past 11 years, contributing to a decline in the trust fund’s uncommitted balance from over $7 billion in fiscal year 2000 to $770 million in fiscal year 2010. Inaccurate forecasts for the taxes related to domestic passenger tickets, which account for over 70 percent of trust-fund revenues, drove the aggregate overforecast, but inaccurate forecasts for other taxes also had an effect. This inaccuracy is largely attributable to unexpected events affecting aviation, such as the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, and the recession in 2009; the budget process requiring the forecasts to be developed over a year in advance of the fiscal year; and lags in recognizing structural changes in the airline industry, such as airlines’ increased reliance on ancillary fees for which excise taxes for the trust fund are not collected. Changes in the methodology for forecasting trust-fund revenues and the assumption of forecasting responsibility by Treasury, begun in fiscal year 2011, may also affect the future accuracy of forecasts, but it is too soon to tell what effect the changes will …

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "FDA has not taken sufficient steps to ensure that antibiotic labels contain up-to-date breakpoints. FDA designates certain drugs as “reference-listed drugs” and the sponsors of these drugs play an important role in ensuring the accuracy of drug labels. Reference-listed drugs are approved drug products to which generic versions are compared. As of November 2011, FDA had not yet confirmed whether the breakpoints on the majority of reference-listed antibiotics labels were up to date. FDA contacted sponsors of 210 antibiotics in early 2008 to remind sponsors of the importance of maintaining their labels and requested that they assess whether the breakpoints on their drugs’ labels were up to date. Sponsors were asked to submit evidence to FDA showing that the breakpoints were either current or needed revision. As of November 2011, over 3.5 years after FDA contacted sponsors, the agency had not yet confirmed whether the breakpoints on the labels of 70 percent, or 146 of the 210 antibiotics, were up to date. FDA has not ensured that sponsors have fulfilled the responsibilities outlined in the early 2008 letters. For those submissions FDA has received, it has …

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "DOD’s Arctic Report, submitted May 31, 2011, addressed three and partially addressed two of the elements specified in the House Report."

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The Navy relied on its 2009 Radar/Hull Study as the basis to select DDG 51 over DDG 1000 to carry the Air and Missile Defense Radar (AMDR) as its preferred future surface combatant—a decision that may result in a procurement of up to 43 destroyers and cost up to $80 billion over the next several decades. The Radar/Hull Study may not provide a sufficient analytical basis for a decision of this magnitude. Specifically, the Radar/Hull Study:"

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins ""

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins ""

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The 1,002 exempt financial institutions make up a small percentage of the assets of the overall banking system—about 7 percent—and include industrial loan corporations (ILC), limited-purpose credit card banks, municipal deposit banks, trust banks with insured deposits, and savings and loans (S&L). Although exempt from the BHC Act, S&L holding companies are regulated by the Federal Reserve System Board of Governors (Federal Reserve) under the Home Owners’ Loan Act as amended. Excluding S&Ls, the number of exempt institutions drops to 57 that comprise less than 1 percent of banking system assets and there is a 3-year moratorium on the approval of federal deposit insurance on select exempt institutions that ends in 2013. These institutions vary by size, activities, and risks. Larger institutions such as ILCs provide banking services similar to those of commercial banks and carry many of the same risks. Other exempt institutions are smaller, provide only a few services such as credit card loans and related services, and thus have lower risk profiles."

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "USCP generally has enhanced retirement benefits, a higher minimum starting salary, and a wider variety of protective duties than other federal police forces in the DC metro area that GAO reviewed, but has similar employment requirements. Even though USCP, Park Police, Supreme Court Police, and Secret Service Uniformed Division are federal police forces, they provide enhanced retirement benefits similar to those offered by federal law enforcement agencies that have additional investigative duties. These enhanced benefits allow their officers to retire early and accrue retirement pensions faster than other federal police forces. USCP and these three forces also offered among the highest minimum entry-level salaries—ranging from $52,020 to $55,653—than the other six forces GAO reviewed, which had minimum entry-level salaries ranging from $38,609 to $52,018. USCP reported routinely having a wider variety of duties than most other forces. These duties ranged from routinely protecting members of Congress to protecting buildings. USCP and most of the forces generally have similar employment requirements, such as being in good physical condition."

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Since 2004, DHS’s use of its CBRN risk assessments to inform its CBRN response plans has varied, from directly influencing information in the plans to not being used at all. DHS guidance states that response planning and resource decisions should be informed by risk information. GAO’s analysis showed that DHS used its CBRN risk assessments to directly inform 2 of 12 CBRN response plans GAO identified because planners considered the risk assessments to be more accurate than earlier DHS planning assumptions. For another 7 of the 12 plans, DHS officials said that the assessments indirectly informed the plans by providing background information prior to plan development. However, GAO could not independently verify this because DHS officials could not document how the risk assessments influenced the information contained in the plans. GAO’s analysis found general consistency between the risk assessments and the plans. For the remaining 3 plans, DHS officials did not use the risk assessments to inform the plans; for 2 of the 3 plans DHS officials told GAO they were not aware of the assessments. DHS officials also noted that there was no departmental guidance …

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "As of January 2012, GAO identified seven alternative models for compensating NRSROs (see table below). These models generally were designed to address the conflict of interest in the issuer-pays model, better align the NRSROs’ interest with users of ratings, or improve incentives NRSROs have to produce reliable and high-quality ratings. However, the amount of detail currently available for each model varies and none has been implemented. According to some of the authors of the models, there is little incentive to continue developing these models because it appears unlikely they will receive attention from regulators or legislators. For example, these authors noted that SEC had not reached out to them to further discuss these models as part of its ongoing study of alternative compensation models for credit rating agencies."

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The average cost to count each housing unit rose from $70 in 2000 to $97 in 2010 (in constant 2010 dollars). While the U.S. Census Bureau (Bureau) made changes to its budget structure from 2000 to 2010, they did not document the changes that would facilitate comparisons over time and cannot identify specific drivers of this cost growth. According to GAO’s Cost Estimating and Assessment Guide, an agency can strengthen its ability to control costs by using available cost data to make comparisons over time and identify and quantify trends. The Bureau faces the fundamental challenge of striking a balance between how best to control costs without compromising accuracy. However, the Bureau’s inability to identify specific actionable factors affecting past growth will make it difficult for the Bureau to focus its efforts to control costs for the 2020 Census."

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins ""

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "From fiscal year 2007 through fiscal year 2010, DOD activities for the treatment and research of PH and TBI received more than $2.7 billion. In fiscal year 2007, funding for these activities totaled $900 million; in fiscal year 2008, it was $573.8 million; in fiscal year 2009, $395 million; and in fiscal year 2010, $838.6 million. GAO found, however, that the reports DOD provided to Congress on these activities did not include expenditures, as required by law, and that the obligations data they contained were unreliable. Governmentwide policies call for agencies to have effective internal controls to assure accurate reporting of obligations and expenditures. However, the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs has not developed quality control mechanisms to help ensure that data on PH and TBI activities are complete and accurate. Further, although DOD listed patient care among reported costs, it did not specify what those costs included, making it difficult for decisionmakers and Congress to fully understand the costs."

Correspondence issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Our analysis showed that DOD’s Fiscal Year 2010 Annual Energy Management Report fully addressed two, did not address one (issue 4), and partially addressed five of the eight expanded reporting requirements. In some cases, it was difficult to determine the extent to which DOD had addressed an issue because information related to a specific reporting requirement was fragmented or scattered throughout the report. With regard to the one issue not addressed, DOD indicated it had plans to address it in a separate report tentatively scheduled to be published in early 2012."

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Support function costs at NNSA and Science sites for fiscal years 2007 through 2011 are not fully known because DOE changed its data collection approach beginning in 2010 to improve its data and, as a result, does not have complete and comparable cost data for all years. In fiscal years 2007 through 2009, total support costs for NNSA and Science sites grew from $5 billion to about $5.5 billion (nominal dollars). Costs for fiscal year 2010 are unknown because DOE was pilot-testing its new reporting system and only collected data from some sites. For fiscal year 2011, the data are more complete, but changes to DOE’s definitions for support functions make it difficult to compare costs across all years. DOE has taken some steps to ensure the quality of the data in its new system and plans to fully implement a quality control process, such as peer reviews, to ensure data can be compared across sites, but has not yet done so."

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "ARPA-E uses four selection criteria, such as the potential impact of the proposed technology relative to the state of the art, and other considerations in awarding funds. Other considerations include balancing a variety of technology approaches and the likelihood the technology would be brought to market. GAO identified 18 out of 121 award winners through ARPA-E’s first three funding rounds that had received some prior private sector investment, and ARPA-E took steps to identify and understand how this funding was related to proposed projects. Beginning with the third funding round, ARPA-E began requiring that applicants explain why private investors were not willing to fund proposed projects. However, ARPA-E did not provide applicants with guidance, such as a sample response, to assist them in completing this requirement, and responses were generally limited. Some applicants provided general information about prior research but did not specifically explain why private investors would not support their projects. When applicants provided little prior funding information, ARPA-E’s program directors spent time and resources to determine the extent of such funding for proposed ARPA-E projects. One applicant included a letter from its venture capital …

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Since first receiving an appropriation in 2009 in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, ARPA-E has awarded $521.7 million to universities, public and private companies, and national laboratories to fund 181 projects that attempt to make transformational—rather than incremental––advances to a variety of energy technologies, including high-energy batteries and renewable fuels. ARPA-E borrows from the model of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), an agency created within the Department of Defense (DOD) in 1958 to direct and perform advanced research and development projects. Award winners must meet cost share requirements, through either in-kind contributions or outside funding sources."

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The Justice Management Division (JMD), the component responsible for managing the working capital fund, effectively tracks fund functions to ensure adherence to applicable fiscal laws and sound management practices. For example, JMD has well-established policies and procedures for tracking and monitoring the four working capital fund functions so that the fund adheres to authorized purposes. Further, JMD structures its reimbursable agreements with customers to facilitate adherence to the Economy Act—the statutory authority underlying most of JMD’s customer orders. JMD also clearly delineates roles and responsibilities, which allows customers to know who to contact with questions and clearly assigns responsibility for obligating and expending funds. Justice also ensures the fund’s self-sufficiency by recovering total costs for the provided services. These actions are consistent with two of the four key operating principles for working capital funds.Customers noted positive benefits from Justice’s shared services but seek more information on rate structures and want assurances that fund costs are equitably distributed. For example, customers said they valued the breadth of services offered as well as the experience of fund staff but wanted to better understand the basis for shared services …

Guidance issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins ""

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Tier 1 hybrid capital instruments, particularly trust preferred securities, have been heavily used by bank holding companies because of their financial advantages, but they are not as effective in absorbing losses as traditional forms of Tier 1 capital, such as common equity. As of December 31, 2010, almost two-thirds of all top-level bank holding companies that were subject to capital requirements included hybrid instruments in their Tier 1 capital, for a total value of $157 billion. Hybrid instruments such as trust preferred securities have offered institutions the benefit of lower-cost capital, largely because of their debt-related features—including tax-deductible dividends. These instruments also are accessible to a broader range of potential investors. However, trust preferred securities do not absorb losses like other Tier 1 instruments because of their obligation to repay principal and dividends. Trust preferred securities may provide limited financial flexibility in times of stress, but they may also hinder efforts to recapitalize troubled banking institutions."

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Our review identified articles that used varying approaches to estimate the savings associated with generic drug use in the United States. One group of studies estimated the savings in reduced drug costs that have accrued from the use of generics. For example, a series of studies estimated the total savings that have accrued to the U.S. health care system from substituting generic drugs for their brand-name counterparts, and found that from 1999 through 2010 doing so saved more than $1 trillion. A second group of studies estimated the potential to save more on drugs through greater use of generics. For example, one study assessed the potential for additional savings within the Medicare Part D program—which provides outpatient prescription drug coverage for Medicare—and found that if generic drugs had always been substituted for the brand-name drugs studied, about $900 million would have been saved in 2007. A third group of studies estimated the effect on health care costs of using generic versions of certain types of drugs where questions had generally been raised about whether substituting generic drugs for brand-name drugs was medically appropriate. Unlike the other …

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "For the 2010 general election, 35 states and the District provided voters at least one alternative to casting their ballot on Election Day through in-person early voting, no-excuse absentee voting, or voting by mail. Specifically, 33 states and the District provided in-person early voting, 29 states and the District provided no-excuse absentee voting, and 2 states provided voting by mail to all or most voters. Of the 9 states and the District where GAO conducted interviews, all but 2 states provided voters the option of in-person early voting in the 2010 general election, and 5 states and the District offered both early voting and no-excuse absentee voting. Implementation and characteristics of in-person early voting varied among the 7 states and, in some cases, among the jurisdictions within a state. For example, 5 states and the District required local jurisdictions to include at least one Saturday, and 2 states allowed for some jurisdiction discretion to include weekend days."

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins ""