The Federal Procurement Data System (https://www.fpds.gov) provides on-line access to information about U.S. Government purchase orders. Registration is required, but is free.
A search for records of fiscal year 2004 contracts with the three major manufacturers of polygraph instruments (Axciton, Lafayette, and Stoelting) revealed the following purchases:
Axciton
$32,000 (FBI)
$81,000 (DoD)
Subtotal: $113,000
Lafayette
$15,360 (ATF)
$56,791 (DoD)
$60,276 (DoD)
$4,510 (DoD)
$12,390 (US Army)
Subtotal: $149,327
Stoelting
$3,626 (DoD)
$7,122.50 (DoD)
$59, 785.80 (DoD)
$12,310 (DoD)
$84 (DoD)
$6,412 (DoD)
Subtotal: $89,340.30
Total US Government Purchases from Polygraph Manufacturers in FY 2004: $351,667.30
Mattel markets a product called a Magic 8-Ball (http://8ball.ofb.net/) that has about the same validity as a lie detector as does the polygraph. But the Magic 8-Ball has the advantage that, unlike the polygraph, it is not susceptible to countermeasures. With a manufacturer's suggested retail price of $5.99, for the amount paid to polygraph manufacturers in FY 2004, the US Government could have obtained some 58,000 Magic 8-Balls at retail prices, roughly enough for every federal investigator to have his or her very own personal lie detector/truth verifier. No doubt, even more Magic 8-balls could have been obtained with a wholesale discount.
;)
will the feds discontinue this stupid practice of polygraph?
<<shake shake shake>>
"It seems doubtful"