Benford’s Law is an observation that certain real-world datasets have unbalanced distribution of leading digits. It is applied by forensic accountants and is formally studied by accountants; it has been used to identify possibly forged data in science experiments.
Let’s explore the San Diego City Budgets from 2011-2018 to see if they appear artificial.
Data
San Diego City Budgets, 2011-2018
Code
Results
Individual Year Graphs all pretty much look like the ideal distribution. For example, here’s FY2015:
And FY2018:
Conclusions
The San Diego City Budgets all match the expected distribution very closely, for each individual year as well as cumulatively.
