Covid Fraud Cost Vast Fortune
Covid cost us a lot more than it needed to, but at least we bought some valuable lessons. Not to trust technocrats like Anthony Fauci is one. Not to entrust children to public schools is another. A third is that flinging $trillions of public money to the four winds is not a viable economic policy. The waste on fraud alone has been staggering:
The Government Accountability Office (GAO) estimated that total fraud in four federally-run COVID relief programs was over $60 billion “and perhaps much higher” during the pandemic, adding that the Labor Department has yet to implement an appropriate anti-fraud strategy to combat the problem.
No doubt the Biden Regime will get around to it right after it solves the more pressing issue of too many white guys being allowed to work in the construction industry.
The GAO’s report came out on the same day the Labor Department’s Office of Inspector General told the House Ways and Means Committee that “at least” $191 billion in emergency unemployment benefits paid out during the pandemic were likely lost to fraudsters.
The flood of COVID relief money from the federal government in 2020 overwhelmed state agencies charged with doling it out, according to Larry Turner, the inspector general. He said COVID created a “perfect storm” for fraud, explaining people were allowed to self-certify that they were eligible to receive Pandemic Unemployment Assistance, which went to millions of people who were not traditionally eligible for unemployment insurance.
The problem was already there; Covid hysteria just allowed it to spin out of control. According to the GAO report,
“DOL reported an increase in estimated improper payments from $8.0 billion (9.2% estimated improper payment rate) for fiscal year 2020 to $78.1 billion (18.9% estimated improper payment rate) for fiscal year 2021. For fiscal year 2022, DOL reported estimated improper payments of $18.9 billion (22.2% estimated improper payment rate).”
Then there is the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP):
About 15% of the total funds that Congress appropriated in total for PPP was projected to have been obtained fraudulently, according to a 2021 study.
That same year, the House Coronavirus Oversight Committee found that some $84 billion in PPP loans were potentially fraudulent.
What the government reports is just the tip of a titanic iceberg of waste that will sink the US economy, in accordance with the Cloward–Piven strategy for imposing socialism.
On a tip from MrRightWingDave.
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