Federal officials said states had used accounting gimmicks to reduce their contributions to far below the shares specified by law.
Computer Associates, they say, has used accounting tricks to systematically overstate its revenue and profits for years.
Carbon steels are by far the most produced and used, accounting for about 90 percent of the world's steel production.
The firm, he told the crowd, had used "accounting ingenuity" to avoid large write-downs and remained tainted by bad commercial real estate investments.
Current and former employees have said that the company used accounting gimmicks to inflate its reported sales and profit during the 1990's.
Speculation -- prompted by the Enron scandal -- that companies have used accounting to overstate profits is overdone, said Edward Kerschner, chief global strategist at UBS Warburg.
But despite complaints from short sellers that corporations had used accounting gimmickry to inflate their profits, many investors thought the crisis at Enron was an isolated case.
And, like Greece and other E.U. countries, states have used accounting legerdemain to under-report the amount they owe, even while accumulating huge, unfunded pension obligations.
Investors have punished the stock prices of G.E., Tyco International and other companies, fearing that they used accounting legerdemain to spiff up their earnings.
Employees and former employees said last April that the company had used accounting gimmicks to inflate its reported sales and earnings.
Accounting lapses were not the only reason Enron failed, but it is only one of many corporations that has used accounting to inflate profits or hide losses.
