National accounts are traditionally the concern of the élite. It was when men and taxes were to be levied for the king's service that enumeration became a prerequisite of government. Consecutive millennia may have separated the Roman census takers who required Mary and Joseph to return to Bethlehem to be taxed from the Norman authors of the Domesday Book, and from the Russian local government statisticians of a century ago, but they were all driven by the same imperative of state. Their censuses of population and wealth all contributed to the calculation of national resources potentially available to government.

Quantities are the essence of high level decisions. Generals in charge of operations decide how many thousand soldiers and guns they need, and how many casualties can be expected. Chancellors decide sums to be spent, raised in taxes, and borrowed. Police officials base their deployments (in numbers of personnel) on numbers of crimes reported and awaiting detection. Hospital administrators wrestle with numbers of patients, beds available, and the length of waiting lists for admission.

The view from below is often very different. Popular views of national statistics commonly embody distrust. The distrust has at least two distinct origins. One is the use of statistics by officials to claim authority for a self-serving lie. The lie may serve the legitimacy of the government (for example, to support a claim that unemployment has fallen when, on a consistent definition, it has actually risen).