Thread by @donmoyn

Started my morning doing a zoom panel hosted by the OECD presenting research about US government performance improvement reforms to a group of international finance officials. What I didn’t mention is that Congress is no longer sharing the data that the research is based on.🧵

Bit more background. Every few years the GAO surveys federal employees about how they use performance data in government. Here is an example of a report based on those surveys. 2/ gao.gov/products/gao-2…

I have used that survey data to understand what sorts of factors make it more likely that public employees use performance data, and how they use it. The resulting studies provide insights into US government, and specific variables like the effects of ideology or training. 3/

My research based on this GAO data did not just generate papers, it was also used by policymakers. It was cited in a couple of President Obama's budget proposals, and is included in current OMB guidance to agencies about how to do their performance reporting. 4/

The same research has been used in World Bank and OECD reports, and when the Trump administration tried to gut performance reporting by federal agencies was the basis of advocacy to stop them (which the Biden Administration ultimately did). 5/ govexec.com/management/202…

GAO is part of Congress, and Congress is not covered by FOIA. So to request the data, which goes back to the 1990s, I would email the GAO after every new survey, and seek a de-identified version, which they would provide. Until this year. Response letter below. 6/

When I asked GAO why they would no longer share data that was previously released and had generated lots of good research I was told only that "We reached out to the committees of jurisdiction and were not authorized to release the data for this report." 7/ @HSGAC @OversightDems

I could try to replicate the research myself, but apart from the expense and effort, outsiders surveying federal employees get less than a 20% response rate, about a third of the response rate when the government itself administers the survey. 8/

Unless something changes this will be pretty much the end of the road for me doing this research on US federal government performance, and it's unlikely anyone else will step in. Its not a trivial loss for the community who is interested in empirical evidence about this topic. 9/

Politicians say they want academics to work on real-world problems but its not uncommon for them to refuse to share data when we try to. The committees of jurisdiction presumably have some interest in research on the topics they oversee, but are shutting down that research. 10/

If anyone has suggestions, insights, feedback (or friends on the committee staff!) would welcome that. In the meantime, I will move on to other research areas. 11/ @GOPoversight @OversightDems

So I don't sound too bitter, want to say thanks to @USGAO and @OMBPress staff who valued this research and made it part of the policymaking conversation.