• While this indicator was being updated with information for fiscal year (FY) 2022, Congress approved a $207 million appropriation for FY 2023. In current dollars, this is the largest amount ever appropriated for the agency and a $27 million increase over the previous year (Indicator IV-01a). Due to data limitations, a reliable estimate of the inflation-adjusted increase cannot yet be calculated.
• Inflation plays an important role in assessing funding for the agency over time. In FY 2022, the NEH received an appropriation of $180.0 million, the second largest ever given to the agency in nominal value. After taking inflation into account, however, the NEH’s FY 2022 appropriation, while the highest since 2011, was still lower than for the majority of the agency’s history.
• From FY 1968 through FY 1979, the agency experienced substantial, uninterrupted growth in its annual inflation-adjusted appropriation, which increased from $29.9 million to $472.2 million. In nominal terms, the appropriation continued to rise from 1979 to 1981, but it lost substantial value because of the high levels of inflation in those years. The nominal appropriation then experienced a 14% cut for FY 1982 (a 19% reduction in inflation-adjusted value). In most of the subsequent 13 years, the nominal value of the agency’s appropriation held steady or increased, but its inflation-adjusted value increased substantially less or declined. The appropriation was then cut by more than a third, with a decline in inflation-adjusted value from $295.7 in FY 1995 to $185.8 million in FY 1996.
• From FY 1997 through FY 2022, most years saw an increase in the nominal value of the agency’s appropriation, which brought it somewhat above its early 1990’s high point. In inflation-adjusted value, however, the agency’s FY 2022 funding level was 38% of its 1979 apex.
• Throughout the NEH’s history, the president’s budget request for the agency has tended to exceed the appropriation it receives (Indicator IV-01b). Notable exceptions occurred during the 1980s (particularly in the early years of the Reagan administration) and again from 2018 to 2021, when the Trump administration proposed shutting down the agency and requested only enough funding to cover closure-related costs.
• Indicator I-01c indicates the amount of funding received from the NEH by each state, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico in FY 2021. The total for each jurisdiction includes funding for new grants, supplemental grants, program contracts, and other program-related purposes. Grant monies include those distributed by formula1  to the state’s humanities council plus discretionary funding awards made to entities and individuals in that state. In FY 2021, each jurisdiction received funds from both the NEH’s base appropriation and the appropriation the agency received under the American Rescue Plan (ARP) legislation. For most jurisdictions, ARP funds constituted a substantial proportion of their funding for FY 2021: 42% on average.
• By a wide margin, New York received the most funding from the agency’s FY 2021 base appropriation ($16.3 million). California and Massachusetts received the next largest amounts, $8.5 and $7.0 respectively.
• When the number of people residing in a jurisdiction is taken into account, however, less populous jurisdictions rise to the top. The District of Columbia had the highest per capita funding level in FY 2021, $3.80 (in base appropriation only, as for all the amounts given in this paragraph). The District  is unusual, however, in that some 40% of its total funding was for a $1.1 million contract with the National Museum of African American History and Culture. Hawaii and Wyoming had the next highest per capita funding, $1.50–$1.60. Alaska, Montana, and North Dakota were also among the top 10 jurisdictions for per capita funding from the NEH. The median FY 2021 per capita funding level by jurisdiction was 38 cents.

Endnotes

• 1The NEH provides each of the state humanities councils with an annual supporting grant through its Federal/State Partnership program, created in 1987. The funding formula directs $200,000 to every council, with the remainder of the appropriated monies being distributed in the following manner: 44% is allocated equally among councils that serve a population of 200,000 or more; 22% is allocated to all councils according to population; and 34% is allocated to councils according to the wishes of the NEH chairperson.