How Dependent Is Your County on Washington?
Every U.S. county measured by federal spending there: federal benefits paid to its residents, the pay of federal workers and troops stationed there, and the contracts and grants for work done there, set against what its residents earn.
01The Map
How to read the figures: each one is federal spending in the county set against its residents' income. It is not the share of household income that comes from Washington, and it is not the income that would disappear if the spending stopped: contracts pay companies and their workers, many of whom live elsewhere, and contract figures are money committed in the year, not necessarily paid out. That is why a county with a large lab, shipyard or base can be above 100%.
Each county is shaded by that measure. Switch to one kind of federal money, or to dollars per resident. Click a county, or find it by name, for its full breakdown, how it has changed since 2008, and the largest contractors and grant recipients working there. The address bar keeps the view you pick, so it can be shared as a link.
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The United States
Benefits in earlier years are an approximation: the federal share of Medicaid is each state's fiscal 2024 share applied to every year, although federal shares were higher during the pandemic years.
Benefits, pay and residents' income are for 2024 from the Bureau of Economic Analysis; contracts and grants are for fiscal 2025 (October 2024 to September 2025) from USAspending.gov; federal jobs are 2025 annual averages from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. In Virginia, BEA reports most independent cities together with a neighboring county, so they share one set of figures here.
02The Counties Most Dependent on Washington
Counties ranked by federal money as a share of residents' income. Small counties swing the most, so the list starts with counties of 10,000 or more people; change it below. Click a row to see the county on the map.
| # | County | People | All federal money | Benefits | Federal pay | Contracts | Local grants |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Los Alamos, NM | 19,675 | 283.8% | 8.5% | 2.5% | 272.6% | 0.2% |
| 2 | Anderson, TN | 81,449 | 156.4% | 22.1% | 3.2% | 130.9% | 0.3% |
| 3 | Southeastern Connecticut, CT | 282,602 | 141.3% | 19.6% | 2.3% | 119.2% | 0.2% |
| 4 | Christian, KY | 71,006 | 136.8% | 25.9% | 101.2% | 9.7% | 0.0% |
| 5 | Geary, KS | 35,459 | 125.3% | 17.9% | 97.8% | 8.7% | 0.9% |
| 6 | Dale, AL | 50,067 | 111.2% | 29.1% | 40.0% | 41.9% | 0.2% |
| 7 | Sagadahoc, ME | 37,582 | 110.6% | 19.2% | 2.9% | 88.2% | 0.2% |
| 8 | King George, VA | 28,816 | 110.3% | 14.4% | 61.7% | 34.1% | 0.0% |
| 9 | District of Columbia, DC | 702,250 | 109.5% | 10.7% | 53.3% | 40.3% | 5.2% |
| 10 | Portsmouth city, VA | 96,482 | 104.6% | 27.4% | 58.4% | 18.7% | 0.1% |
| 11 | Liberty, GA | 68,607 | 103.9% | 26.2% | 71.4% | 6.1% | 0.2% |
| 12 | Des Moines, IA | 38,411 | 101.6% | 23.0% | 0.9% | 77.5% | 0.2% |
| 13 | Norfolk city, VA | 231,105 | 99.7% | 23.2% | 49.5% | 26.2% | 0.7% |
| 14 | Jackson, MS | 147,002 | 97.8% | 23.1% | 4.2% | 70.3% | 0.3% |
| 15 | St. Mary's, MD | 116,469 | 96.5% | 14.2% | 27.8% | 54.4% | 0.0% |
| 16 | Newport News city, VA | 183,056 | 91.8% | 22.7% | 16.5% | 52.3% | 0.4% |
| 17 | Prince George + Hopewell, VA | 66,559 | 90.8% | 25.9% | 53.2% | 11.5% | 0.2% |
| 18 | Madison, AL | 423,355 | 88.2% | 16.1% | 13.4% | 58.1% | 0.5% |
| 19 | Pulaski, MO | 53,964 | 87.8% | 22.5% | 53.6% | 10.5% | 1.3% |
| 20 | Pike, OH | 27,065 | 87.4% | 30.7% | 0.9% | 55.2% | 0.5% |
| 21 | Cumberland, NC | 338,430 | 84.6% | 30.6% | 46.9% | 6.7% | 0.4% |
| 22 | Oglala Lakota, SD | 13,360 | 83.8% | 42.0% | 14.3% | 13.8% | 13.6% |
| 23 | Vernon, LA | 45,819 | 81.1% | 24.9% | 43.1% | 12.6% | 0.5% |
| 24 | Arlington, VA | 239,807 | 76.8% | 4.8% | 23.8% | 47.5% | 0.7% |
| 25 | McCreary, KY | 16,824 | 75.9% | 51.2% | 11.7% | 12.7% | 0.2% |
Each kind of federal money as a share of the county's personal income in 2024. The national figure is 22.2%.
03Where the Money Comes From
Estimated federal benefits are by far the largest piece: $4.02 trillion in 2024, 73% of the federal money counted here, against $743 billion in contracts, $638 billion in federal civilian and military pay and $118 billion in grants to local recipients. Benefits rose from 13.9% of all personal income in 2008 to 16.1% in 2024. That shapes the map. In 670 of the 768 counties where federal money equals a third or more of residents' income, benefits are larger than every other kind combined: these are mostly older, poorer and rural places where Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid make up a large share of what people live on. The very top of the ranking is different. There, a national laboratory, a shipyard or a large base brings in contracts or federal pay out of all proportion to the local economy.
The four kinds of federal money
Latest available data: 2024 income, benefits and pay; fiscal 2025 contracts and grants.
| Kind | Amount | Share of income |
|---|---|---|
| Estimated federal benefits paid to residents | $4.02 trillion | 16.1% |
| Federal civilian and military pay | $638 billion | 2.6% |
| Federal contracts, fiscal 2025 | $743 billion | 3.0% |
| Grants to local recipients, fiscal 2025 | $118 billion | 0.5% |
| All federal money counted here | $5.52 trillion | 22.2% |
What the benefits are made of, 2022
BEA discontinued its county program detail after the 2022 figures, so this is the last detailed mix it published; the split of later years on this page is an estimate based on it. Medicaid is the federal share only.
04Military Towns and Federal Workers
Federal pay matters most where the government is the main employer: Army and Marine Corps posts, Navy and Air Force bases, and the federal office corridors around Washington. These counties have the highest federal civilian and military pay as a share of residents' income, next to the counties with the highest share of jobs in federal civilian agencies (uniformed military are not in the job counts).
Federal pay, share of income
| County | Federal pay | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Christian, KY | $3.6 billion | 101.2% |
| Geary, KS | $2.0 billion | 97.8% |
| Liberty, GA | $2.2 billion | 71.4% |
| King George, VA | $1.2 billion | 61.7% |
| Portsmouth city, VA | $2.8 billion | 58.4% |
| Pulaski, MO | $1.5 billion | 53.6% |
| District of Columbia, DC | $42 billion | 53.3% |
| Prince George + Hopewell, VA | $1.6 billion | 53.2% |
| Norfolk city, VA | $5.9 billion | 49.5% |
| Cumberland, NC | $8.3 billion | 46.9% |
Federal civilian jobs, share of all jobs
| County | Federal jobs | Share |
|---|---|---|
| King George, VA | 5,686 | 41.7% |
| Portsmouth city, VA | 13,688 | 31.8% |
| District of Columbia, DC | 185,546 | 25.0% |
| Pulaski, MO | 3,121 | 23.8% |
| Martin, KY | 411 | 23.2% |
| Houston, GA | 15,050 | 23.0% |
| Kitsap, WA | 20,982 | 22.3% |
| Meade, SD | 2,013 | 21.9% |
| St. Mary's, MD | 10,152 | 21.2% |
| Grant, LA | 695 | 20.4% |
Counties with 10,000 or more people. Federal pay is wages, salaries and benefits counted where the job is; federal pay in a county can therefore be large next to its residents' income when many workers commute in.
05Federal Contracts: Where the Work Is Done
Federal agencies committed $743 billion in contracts for work done in U.S. counties in fiscal 2025. Contract money is the most concentrated kind: the 15 counties below took 40% of it. This page counts a contract where the work is done, not where the company is based. A contractor with its headquarters in one county often does most of its work in others, and counting by headquarters address would move billions of dollars toward a few office parks. Veterans' and military health-care purchasing contracts are left out, as explained under How This Page Works.
| # | County | Contracts, fiscal 2025 | Share of income | Per resident |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Fairfax, Fairfax City + Falls Church, VA | $45 billion | 32.9% | $37,668 |
| 2 | Tarrant, TX | $35 billion | 22.3% | $15,607 |
| 3 | District of Columbia, DC | $31 billion | 40.3% | $44,836 |
| 4 | Dallas, TX | $31 billion | 13.8% | $11,710 |
| 5 | Los Angeles, CA | $23 billion | 2.8% | $2,343 |
| 6 | Southeastern Connecticut, CT | $22 billion | 119.2% | $77,305 |
| 7 | Madison, AL | $17 billion | 58.1% | $40,139 |
| 8 | Arlington, VA | $15 billion | 47.5% | $62,496 |
| 9 | Pima, AZ | $14 billion | 22.1% | $13,329 |
| 10 | San Diego, CA | $14 billion | 5.2% | $4,362 |
| 11 | Orange, FL | $11 billion | 11.4% | $7,169 |
| 12 | Montgomery, MD | $10 billion | 9.0% | $9,475 |
| 13 | Middlesex, MA | $9.7 billion | 5.2% | $5,806 |
| 14 | St. Louis, MO | $8.9 billion | 8.6% | $8,979 |
| 15 | Montgomery, PA | $8.5 billion | 9.3% | $9,697 |
Contract obligations (money agencies committed in the year) for work done in each county, from USAspending.gov, in dollars of each year. Obligations can be cut back later, so a year's total can be revised.
06State by State
The same measures for each state, with one more: all federal grants to the state per resident, including the grants to state governments that this page cannot place in a county. Click a column heading to sort.
| State | All federal money | Benefits | Federal pay | Contracts | Local grants | All grants per resident |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| District of Columbia | 109.5% | 10.7% | 53.3% | 40.3% | 5.2% | $19,687 |
| New Mexico | 39.6% | 22.8% | 5.0% | 11.0% | 0.7% | $5,940 |
| Virginia | 36.2% | 14.4% | 7.6% | 13.9% | 0.3% | $3,204 |
| Alaska | 35.5% | 17.7% | 9.0% | 6.4% | 2.4% | $11,252 |
| Mississippi | 34.9% | 25.3% | 3.7% | 5.3% | 0.5% | $3,579 |
| Alabama | 34.3% | 22.4% | 3.8% | 7.7% | 0.5% | $2,844 |
| West Virginia | 34.2% | 27.1% | 4.3% | 2.1% | 0.7% | $4,681 |
| Hawaii | 32.3% | 15.7% | 10.8% | 5.4% | 0.5% | $4,785 |
| Maryland | 31.7% | 13.9% | 8.5% | 7.9% | 1.4% | $4,434 |
| Kentucky | 29.5% | 23.5% | 3.4% | 1.6% | 0.9% | $5,101 |
| Maine | 27.8% | 20.4% | 2.9% | 4.1% | 0.5% | $4,472 |
| South Carolina | 27.7% | 21.7% | 2.8% | 2.5% | 0.6% | $2,800 |
| Oklahoma | 26.7% | 19.6% | 3.8% | 2.6% | 0.6% | $3,468 |
| Louisiana | 26.3% | 21.5% | 2.4% | 1.8% | 0.6% | $4,958 |
| Arizona | 26.0% | 18.5% | 2.3% | 4.7% | 0.6% | $3,393 |
| Missouri | 25.4% | 18.8% | 2.6% | 3.6% | 0.4% | $3,247 |
| North Carolina | 24.5% | 19.4% | 3.3% | 1.3% | 0.5% | $4,015 |
| Arkansas | 24.3% | 21.1% | 2.1% | 0.8% | 0.4% | $4,046 |
| Connecticut | 24.0% | 12.5% | 1.0% | 10.1% | 0.3% | $4,096 |
| Delaware | 23.2% | 20.1% | 2.2% | 0.5% | 0.4% | $3,944 |
| Michigan | 23.2% | 19.8% | 1.4% | 1.5% | 0.5% | $3,383 |
| Pennsylvania | 23.1% | 17.8% | 1.7% | 3.3% | 0.3% | $3,686 |
| Rhode Island | 23.0% | 17.7% | 3.3% | 1.2% | 0.8% | $4,920 |
| Vermont | 23.0% | 18.1% | 2.6% | 1.9% | 0.4% | $5,110 |
| Tennessee | 22.7% | 17.9% | 2.1% | 2.4% | 0.3% | $2,825 |
| Montana | 22.7% | 17.1% | 3.2% | 1.5% | 0.9% | $5,080 |
| Idaho | 22.6% | 17.0% | 2.1% | 3.2% | 0.3% | $2,930 |
| Georgia | 22.5% | 16.9% | 3.5% | 1.7% | 0.3% | $2,494 |
| Ohio | 22.4% | 18.8% | 1.9% | 1.3% | 0.4% | $3,574 |
| Indiana | 22.2% | 18.4% | 1.4% | 1.9% | 0.5% | $3,429 |
| Florida | 21.9% | 17.6% | 2.0% | 2.1% | 0.2% | $2,126 |
| Iowa | 21.8% | 17.9% | 1.3% | 2.3% | 0.3% | $3,637 |
| Kansas | 21.8% | 16.3% | 3.4% | 1.9% | 0.3% | $2,578 |
| Oregon | 21.3% | 18.6% | 1.6% | 0.7% | 0.4% | $4,752 |
| North Dakota | 21.0% | 13.5% | 3.9% | 1.4% | 2.2% | $4,922 |
| Texas | 20.4% | 13.4% | 2.3% | 4.4% | 0.3% | $2,143 |
| South Dakota | 20.3% | 15.4% | 3.0% | 1.2% | 0.8% | $3,611 |
| Wisconsin | 20.3% | 16.9% | 1.2% | 1.8% | 0.4% | $2,736 |
| Nevada | 20.1% | 15.7% | 2.3% | 1.8% | 0.3% | $3,045 |
| New Hampshire | 18.8% | 14.3% | 1.4% | 2.9% | 0.3% | $2,588 |
| Colorado | 18.6% | 11.8% | 3.0% | 3.3% | 0.6% | $3,118 |
| Illinois | 18.5% | 15.0% | 1.7% | 1.4% | 0.4% | $3,168 |
| California | 18.4% | 14.3% | 1.8% | 1.8% | 0.5% | $4,358 |
| Washington | 18.3% | 12.7% | 2.8% | 2.3% | 0.5% | $3,096 |
| Nebraska | 18.1% | 14.5% | 2.4% | 0.9% | 0.4% | $3,557 |
| Wyoming | 18.1% | 13.4% | 3.1% | 1.0% | 0.6% | $3,465 |
| Massachusetts | 18.1% | 13.0% | 1.2% | 3.2% | 0.6% | $4,196 |
| Minnesota | 17.5% | 15.0% | 1.3% | 0.7% | 0.5% | $3,698 |
| New York | 17.5% | 15.0% | 1.2% | 0.8% | 0.4% | $5,626 |
| Utah | 17.2% | 11.9% | 2.7% | 2.3% | 0.3% | $2,261 |
| New Jersey | 15.7% | 13.2% | 1.2% | 1.2% | 0.2% | $3,030 |
Shares of each state's personal income in 2024. All grants per resident is every federal grant for work in the state in fiscal 2025, divided by its population; most of it goes to the state government, with Medicaid the largest piece.
07How This Page Works
Residents' income is personal income from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA): everything a county's residents receive in a year, from wages and business income to interest, dividends, rent and government benefits. It is the yardstick every share on this page is measured against.
Estimated federal benefits are built from BEA's current transfer receipts of individuals from governments: Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, veterans' benefits, Supplemental Security Income, SNAP, the refundable Earned Income Tax Credit, federal unemployment programs and smaller programs. BEA counts Medicaid in full, but states pay part of it, so this page counts only the federal part, using each state's federal share of Medicaid spending in fiscal 2024 from MACPAC, the congressional Medicaid and CHIP Payment and Access Commission. State unemployment insurance is left out. BEA discontinued its county program detail after 2022, so for later years each county's Medicaid amount is an estimate based on its 2022 mix, and the same state shares are applied to every year. Smaller state-funded pieces, such as state general assistance, remain in.
Federal pay is BEA's earnings of federal civilian employees and the military (wages, salaries and employer-paid benefits), counted in the county where they work. In a few small counties BEA withholds part of the figure to protect confidentiality, and only the published part is counted.
Federal contracts and grants come from USAspending.gov, the government's official record of federal awards, counted by place of performance: where the work is done. In Connecticut, which replaced its eight counties with nine planning regions for federal statistics, USAspending's county totals leave out awards coded to the new regions, so this page asks USAspending for each planning region by its code: those awards are located by USAspending's own place-of-performance coding, not reassigned. Older Connecticut records still coded to an old county are assigned to the planning region holding most of that county's people, which is an approximation; they were about $2.0 billion of the $35 billion in Connecticut contracts in fiscal 2025. Grants are counted only when they go to local recipients (businesses, nonprofits, universities, hospitals, local governments, tribes and individuals). Grants to state governments are left out because they are spent across a state and mostly recorded statewide or at the capital, and because the largest of them, Medicaid, is already in the benefits figure. For the same reason the national health-care purchasing contracts are left out of the contract figures ($44 billion in fiscal 2025): the Department of Veterans Affairs' Community Care Network and the TRICARE military health contracts are booked to the few counties where their administrators work, but they pay doctors, hospitals and pharmacies across the country, and TRICARE is already counted in the benefits figure as military medical insurance. Federal jobs are annual average federal civilian employment from the Bureau of Labor Statistics' Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages; uniformed military are not included.
The four kinds of federal money are added together and divided by residents' income. Two cautions apply. The money is not all income to residents: contracts pay for work and the companies doing it, and federal pay is counted where people work while income is counted where they live, so counties with labs, bases or federal offices can show figures above 100%. And the years differ slightly: BEA's figures are calendar years and USAspending's are federal fiscal years ending in September. Taxes residents pay to Washington are not netted out; this is money flowing in, not a balance of payments. Puerto Rico and the other territories are not covered, because BEA does not publish county income for them.
08Frequently Asked Questions
Which counties depend most on federal money?
Among counties with at least 10,000 people, Los Alamos, NM (284% of residents' income), Anderson, TN (156% of residents' income), Southeastern Connecticut, CT (141% of residents' income) top the list (2024 income and benefits, fiscal 2025 contracts and grants). Counties with national laboratories, large bases or big federal contractors rank high because of contracts and federal pay; poorer and older rural counties rank high because of Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.
How much federal money flows into U.S. counties?
About $5.52 trillion by this page's count: $4.02 trillion in government benefits paid to residents in 2024, $638 billion in federal civilian and military pay, $743 billion in federal contracts and $118 billion in grants to local recipients in fiscal 2025. That equals 22.2% of all personal income in the United States.
What counts as federal money on this page?
Four things: government benefits paid to the county's residents (Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, veterans' benefits, SNAP and the rest, counting only the federal share of Medicaid), the pay of federal civilian workers and military personnel who work there, federal contracts for work done there, and federal grants to local recipients such as universities, hospitals, nonprofits, businesses and local governments.
Why are grants to state governments left out?
Because they cannot be placed in a county. In fiscal 2025 about $1.03 trillion of the $1.23 trillion in federal grants went to state governments, which spend it across the state; USAspending records most of it statewide or at the state capital. The largest piece is Medicaid, which is already counted in the benefits paid to residents. The state table shows those grants per resident.
Why can federal money be more than a county's whole income?
Contracts are counted where the work is done, and a large laboratory, shipyard or base can bring in more contract money than the residents earn in a year. The money pays for the work and the companies doing it, much of it to people who live in other counties, so in those places the figure measures how much federal spending flows through, not what residents receive.
How often is this updated?
The page checks for new data every month. The Bureau of Economic Analysis publishes county income once a year (the 2024 figures are the latest), USAspending adds contracts and grants as agencies report them, and the Bureau of Labor Statistics publishes a full year of county job counts each autumn.
09Sources and Downloads
- U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis: Personal Income by County, Metro, and Other Areas (tables CAINC4, CAINC5N and CAINC35)
- MACPAC: Medicaid Spending by State, Category, and Source of Funds (federal share of Medicaid, fiscal 2024)
- USAspending.gov: federal contract and grant awards by place of performance (API)
- U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics: Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages
Downloads: every county (CSV) · every state (CSV). Free to reuse with a link to this page. Related: Foreign-Owned U.S. Farmland Map · The Dollar's Share of World Reserves · Sanctions Tracker.
Cite This Page
This page is free to cite and link. Its figures come from U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis (county personal income), USAspending.gov (federal contracts and grants) and U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (QCEW) and are kept current, so please include the date you accessed it.
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Source data: U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis (county personal income), USAspending.gov (federal contracts and grants) and U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (QCEW). Updates: Monthly check; yearly for income data. Page last updated November 7, 2026. How we build our data pages.