Many public contracts are shrouded in secrecy. Government contracting, which involves billions of dollars in public funds each year, has become one of the least transparent systems that state and local governments maintain, according to an investigation by Reveal from The Center for Investigative Reporting. Under the guise of protecting “trade secrets,” state and local governments are withholding critical information about public spending. That allows private entities to claim that some information is proprietary and its disclosure would harm their business.
And it is far from the only way governments and companies keep the public in the dark about government spending.