A July report from the Data for African Development Working Group found that most national statistics offices in Africa lack reliable funding and, in fact, depend on aid donors for their budgets. The aid donors are generally happy to fund their statistical priorities, like household surveys, but not so keen on national statistic "building blocks" like births and deaths, growth and poverty, and taxes and trade. Governments aren't stepping in. Still you can't insulate data from politics, the report argues. "To the extent that data is used to hold people accountable, it will be misreported," says Amanda Glassman, an author of the report and a researcher at the Center for Global Development, a think tank in Washington, D.C. Another study she co-authored this summer found that across Africa, when school administrators are paid by the pupil, they report higher enrollment rates. Surprise, surprise.