Achievement is the kind of word that provokes an assortment of potential definitions. Some might argue that success alone defines achievement, even if that success involves unimportant problems. Others might suggest that success is trivial unless it occurs on important problems, even if those problems are easy to solve. Still others might maintain that achievement is a word best reserved for success on important, difficult problems that the private and nonprofit sectors simply cannot solve on their own.

The term becomes even more difficult to define when it is linked to government. Some would argue that government should only engage in endeavors that show the promise of impact, others that government should reserve its energies only for important goals, and still others that government should concentrate its effort on important, difficult problems that no other sector can tackle.

This study draws a bit of insight from all three arguments, scoring the list of government’s greatest endeavors by putting the heaviest weight on success, while awarding extra credit for tackling important, difficult problems. Toward that end, government achievement is defined as six parts success, three parts importance, and one part difficulty, with the final score a sum of the weighted ratings on each of the 50 endeavors. Although the emphasis here is undeniably on the government’s actual impact, this scoring method declares a basic preference for aiming high. Using this scoring approach, the federal government’s top ten achievements, or greatest hits, emerge as follows (more on methodology):

1. Rebuild Europe After World War II. Rebuilding Europe is the oldest endeavor on the top ten list, and is anchored in the Foreign Assistance Act of 1948, better known as the Marshall Plan. It is also the only endeavor on the top ten list that is no longer active. Launched with the Bretton Woods Agreement of 1945, the nation could declare success by the end of the 1950s.

2. Expand the Right to Vote. Ten statutes comprise this broad effort to protect and expand the right to vote. Although the Voting Rights Act of 1965 is the flagship on the list, it shares the endeavor with three extensions in 1970, 1975, and 1982, three earlier statutes (the 1957, 1960, and 1964 Civil Rights Act), and two constitutional amendments (the Twenty-Fourth outlawing the poll tax, and the Twenty-Sixth lowering the voting age to 18), making it an endeavor of notable endurance.

3. Promote Equal Access to Public Accommodations. This three-statute endeavor originates in the Civil Rights Act of 1964, expands with the Open Housing Act of 1968, and is capped with the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990. As such, it shares one of its three statutory foundations with the effort to eliminate workplace discrimination and expand the right to vote, confirming the enormous impact of the Civil Rights Act as a core statute for the top ten list. It is arguably the single-most important statute on the original list of 538.

4. Reduce Disease. The Polio Vaccination Act of 1955 is the starting point for the most eclectic group of statutes on the top ten list. Alongside vaccination assistance, the effort to reduce disease also includes targeted research on heart disease, cancer, and stroke, bans on smoking, strengthening the National Institutes of Health, and lead-based poison prevention. Despite this dispersion, the endeavor reflects a clear commitment to reducing disease, whether through specific interventions or broad research investments.

5. Reduce Workplace Discrimination. Seven statutes anchor this effort to prohibit workplace discrimination based on race, color, religion, gender, national origin, age, or disability, most notably the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Age Discrimination Act of 1967, and the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990. The endeavor is a classic example of how an initial breakthrough statute such as the Civil Rights Act can provide a wedge for further expansion over time.

6. Ensure Safe Food and Drinking Water. Nine statutes comprise this long-running bipartisan effort, including the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act of 1947 (signed by Harry S. Truman), Poultry Products Inspection Act of 1957 (signed by Dwight D. Eisenhower), Wholesome Meat and Poultry Acts of 1967 and 1968 (signed by Lyndon Johnson), Federal Environmental Pesticide Control Act (signed by Richard M. Nixon), the Safe Drinking Water Act of 1974 (signed by Gerald R. Ford), and the Food Quality Protection Act of 1996 (signed by Bill Clinton).

7. Strengthen the Nation’s Highway System. Eight statutes underpin the ongoing federal effort to augment the national highway system, most notably the 1956 Interstate Highway Act. The multi-billion dollar expansions of highway aid under the 1991 Intermodal Surface Transportation Act (ISTEA) and 1998 Transportation Equity Act for the Twenty-First Century make this endeavor the most recently amended endeavor.

8. Increase Older Americans' Access to Health Care. Medicare is the flagship of this highly concentrated, three-statute endeavor, which also includes the relatively small-scale Kerr-Mills 1960 precursor to Medicare and the now-defunct Medicare Catastrophic Coverage Act of 1988. As such, this is the only endeavor on the top ten list that involved a single breakthrough statute.

9. Reduce the Federal Budget Deficit. Six statutes fall under the effort to balance the federal budget through caps, cuts, and tax increases, including the Gramm-Rudman-Hollings Anti-Deficit Act of 1985, and the 1987, 1990, 1993, and 1997 deficit reduction/tax increase packages that contributed to the current budget surpluses. Launched in the mid 1980s as budget deficits swelled, this is the most recent endeavor on the top ten list.

10. Promote Financial Security in Retirement. Twenty-one statutes comprise the effort to reduce poverty among the elderly through expanded benefits, pension protection, and individual savings, including 12 increases in Social Security benefits and two broad rescue attempts, the 1972 amendments to the Social Security Act that created the Supplemental Security Income program, and the Employment Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA).