State profileFiscal year 2025Federal awards
How much federal money does Tennessee get?
Tennessee received $78.0 billion in federal money in FY2025: $10,666 per person, 39th of 51.In fiscal year 2025 (October 2024 to September 2025), federal agencies obligated $78.0 billion in contracts, grants, loans and direct payments with a place of performance in Tennessee, or $10,666 per resident.
Tennessee ranks 39th of 51 per resident
Federal awards per resident, FY2025, 50 states and DC, highest to lowest. Dashed line: US average.
What the money is
That is up 7.3% from FY2024 ($72.7 billion). Compared with FY2019, the last year before pandemic relief, it is up 42.6%. The largest share came as direct payments ($46.3 billion, 59.3% of the total). The agency obligating the most was the Social Security Administration with $36.6 billion, and the biggest single program was Social Security Retirement Insurance (Assistance Listing 96.002) at $28.0 billion. Among the 50 states and DC, Tennessee ranks 17th by total and 39th per resident (full ranking).
For FY2026, which ended on 30 September 2026, $77.5 billion has been reported so far. That figure will rise as late reports arrive, so the comparisons on this page use FY2025, the latest complete year.
These are award obligations recorded on USAspending.gov, the official source for federal award data. They include Social Security and other direct payments, Medicaid and other grants to the state, and federal contracts performed there. They do not include federal salaries, interest on the debt, or tax refunds.
Medicare is left out. USAspending records Medicare benefit payments (Parts A, B and D) at the location of the contractor that processes the claims, not where patients live, so they would distort this state. In FY2025, $43.4 billion of Medicare payments was recorded in this state; it is not in the figures on this page.
Federal money to Tennessee by year
Tennessee: $78B in FY2025, up 43% on FY2019
Federal award obligations by fiscal year and type, FY2018–FY2026, nominal dollars. FY26* is preliminary and still filling in.
- Insurance and other
- Loans (subsidy cost)
- Direct payments
- Grants
- Contracts
View every year as a table
| Fiscal year | Contracts | Grants | Direct payments | Loans | Insurance and other | Total | Per resident |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| FY2018 | $8.6B | $12.1B | $29.1B | $50.1M | $1.5B | $51.4B | – |
| FY2019 | $8.4B | $13.7B | $31.0B | -$22.4M | $1.6B | $54.7B | – |
| FY2020 | $10.0B | $15.7B | $36.9B | $9.4B | $1.6B | $73.6B | $10,620 |
| FY2021 | $10.8B | $23.6B | $43.2B | $4.6B | $1.7B | $83.9B | $12,047 |
| FY2022 | $11.4B | $17.0B | $37.2B | $128.9M | $1.8B | $67.6B | $9,564 |
| FY2023 | $11.2B | $17.0B | $41.7B | -$28.7M | $709.9M | $70.5B | $9,861 |
| FY2024 | $10.8B | $19.2B | $42.5B | -$6.1M | $191.9M | $72.7B | $10,028 |
| FY2025 | $11.0B | $20.4B | $46.3B | $215.9M | $164.7M | $78.0B | $10,666 |
| FY2026* | $12.2B | $20.2B | $45.0B | $6.6M | $138.8M | $77.5B | – |
Source: USAspending.gov (U.S. Treasury).
How Tennessee compares
Federal money per resident: Tennessee and its neighbouring states
FY2025, dollars per resident. Grey bars are other states; the dark bar is the US average.
| Virginia | $23,047 |
| Kentucky | $13,805 |
| Alabama | $13,236 |
| Mississippi | $13,055 |
| Missouri | $11,837 |
| US average (50 states + DC) | $11,781 |
| North Carolina | $11,312 |
| Arkansas | $11,072 |
| Tennessee (this page) | $10,666 |
| Georgia | $9,290 |
Who pays and for what, FY2025
The agencies that obligated the most to Tennessee, and the largest federal programs. Programs are federal Assistance Listings (formerly CFDA numbers); contracts have no listing number, so they do not appear there.
Top awarding agencies
| Agency | FY2025 | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Social Security Administration | $36.6 billion | 46.9% |
| Department of Health and Human Services | $14.4 billion | 18.4% |
| Department of Energy | $6.9 billion | 8.9% |
| Department of Veterans Affairs | $6.2 billion | 8.0% |
| Department of Agriculture | $3.5 billion | 4.4% |
| Department of Defense | $2.7 billion | 3.5% |
| Department of Education | $2.1 billion | 2.7% |
| Department of Transportation | $2.1 billion | 2.6% |
| Department of Housing and Urban Development | $1.2 billion | 1.5% |
| Department of Homeland Security | $709.7 million | 0.9% |
Top programs
| Program | FY2025 | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Social Security Retirement Insurance Assistance Listing 96.002 | $28.0 billion | 35.9% |
| Grants to States for Medicaid Assistance Listing 93.778 | $11.5 billion | 14.7% |
| Veterans Compensation for Service-Connected Disability Assistance Listing 64.109 | $4.7 billion | 6.1% |
| Social Security Disability Insurance Assistance Listing 96.001 | $4.4 billion | 5.6% |
| Social Security Survivors Insurance Assistance Listing 96.004 | $2.7 billion | 3.5% |
| Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program Assistance Listing 10.551 | $1.6 billion | 2.0% |
| Highway Planning and Construction Assistance Listing 20.205 | $1.5 billion | 2.0% |
| Supplemental Security Income Assistance Listing 96.006 | $1.4 billion | 1.8% |
| National School Lunch Program Assistance Listing 10.555 | $815.6 million | 1.0% |
| Federal Pell Grant Program Assistance Listing 84.063 | $789.6 million | 1.0% |
Where the money goes inside Tennessee
Cities and universities with their own pages, by FY2025 federal awards.
Universities and colleges in Tennessee
- Vanderbilt University$218M
- University of Tennessee (Knoxville)$180M
- Tennessee State University$74M
- University of Memphis$69M
- University of Tennessee (Memphis)$58M
- Meharry Medical College$56M
- Middle Tennessee State University$54M
- East Tennessee State University$51M
Questions and answers
- How much federal money did Tennessee get in 2025?
- In fiscal year 2025, federal agencies obligated $78.0 billion in awards with a place of performance in Tennessee, according to USAspending.gov.
- How much federal money does Tennessee get per person?
- About $10,666 per resident in FY2025, using the Census Bureau's July 2025 population estimate of 7,315,076.
- Which federal agency spends the most in Tennessee?
- The Social Security Administration, with $36.6 billion in FY2025 (46.9% of the total).
- What is the largest federal program in Tennessee?
- Social Security Retirement Insurance (Assistance Listing 96.002), with $28.0 billion obligated in FY2025.
- Has federal spending in Tennessee gone up?
- Yes. FY2025 obligations of $78.0 billion compare with $54.7 billion in FY2019, a change of 42.6%.
Sources and notes
- USAspending.gov (U.S. Department of the Treasury), API endpoints spending_over_time and spending_by_category, filtered by place of performance state = TN, fiscal years 2018–2026. Amounts are obligations in nominal dollars. Data retrieved 2026-10-04. Public domain.
- U.S. Census Bureau, Vintage 2025 population estimates (July 1 of each year). Per-resident figures use the estimate for the July inside the fiscal year.
- How the figures are built, and what they leave out: sources and methods.