Contracts

What $4,975,819,796,721 of contract obligations measures

The contract headline is $4,975,819,796,721. USAspending.gov files that amount under the contract award_type_code family: procurement of goods and services. The government is the buyer. A vendor delivers a product, a construction job, a professional service, or another contracted output. That is a different legal instrument from a grant, a loan, a Direct Payment, or the residual other-assistance group. The $4,975,819,796,721 is the procurement family's obligation book, not a blended awards total.

An obligation on a contract is the amount the government has committed on the award action. It is not an invoice paid and it is not an outlay. Partial deliveries, options, and de-obligations can leave cash and commitment far apart. This page keeps $4,975,819,796,721 labeled as obligations from USAspending.gov. It does not recast the figure as money already spent.

11,255,726 contract records — volume vs dollars

Eleven million two hundred fifty-five thousand seven hundred twenty-six award records sit under the contract total. Procurement files generate many rows: delivery orders, task orders, modifications, and small purchases all increment the tally. Dividing $4,975,819,796,721 by 11,255,726 yields about $442,070 per record. That average is a scale check. It is not the price of a typical widget buy and not the value of a typical major system contract.

The 11,255,726 figure is not a vendor headcount. One contractor can hold thousands of actions. One parent vehicle can spawn many orders. This packet does not split the 11,255,726 by NAICS industry, awarding agency, or set-aside status. If the Contracts awards overlay shows those tables, read them there. This prose stays on the two facts.

Questions

How much does the federal government obligate on contracts?

USAspending.gov award files indexed on SpendingVault show $4,975,819,796,721 in Contracts obligations. That sum is an obligation total, not a Treasury outlay total. The same files record 11,255,726 contract awards. This packet does not name a fiscal-year window, so the dollars are the indexed procurement roll-up as loaded.

Why are there more than 11 million federal contract awards?

The indexed files count 11,255,726 contract records. Procurement files stack orders, task orders, and modifications, so the tally is a row count, not a count of unique vendors or unique solicitations. Dividing $4,975,819,796,721 by 11,255,726 yields about $442,070 per record as a scale check.

Are contract obligations the same as spending?

Not if spending means cash out the door. The $4,975,819,796,721 headline is obligations — legal commitments on contract award actions — not outlays. Invoices, options, and de-obligations can leave cash and commitment apart. This packet has no outlay column, so this page does not estimate amounts already paid.

What is a USAspending contract versus a grant?

A contract is procurement of goods or services. A grant is assistance for a stated purpose. USAspending files them as separate award_type_code groups. The $4,975,819,796,721 figure is Contracts only. Grant dollars live in a different group and are not included here.