Federal Fiscal Follies: Unemployment Compensation – A Follow-Up
I’ve written previously here about Unemployment Compensation (UC) here and here. Longtime TAH readers know I don’t think very highly of the UC program. I’ve long held it’s rife with abuse.
I hate to say I told you so, but . . . a recent study confirms that last fact. The study estimates that in 2011 alone, there was an estimated $3.3 billion or more in outright fraud nationwide concerning UC.
The study was conducted for the St Louis Federal Reserve. It indicated that $108 billion was paid out nationwide in UC in 2011. Of that amount, approximately $3.3 billion – or about 3% – was found to have been paid out fraudulently.
Personally, I think that 3% number is almost certainly way low. I’m guessing the study’s authors were conservative and only used “slam dunk” cases of fraud in their study. That almost certainly grossly underestimates the actual level. I’d guess the actual percentage is easily 2 or 3 times that.
The details are sickening. One guy used UC to build a house. Another guy had friends in various HR departments covering for him, primed to say he was looking for work but “wasn’t a good fit” for any of their jobs when in fact the man was not looking for work at all.
And even better: approx $2.2 billion in UC – or about 2/3 of the documented fraud total – was paid out to people who actually were working, but who “forgot” to report that fact. Hell, we’ve seen one guy doing that honored here at TAH.
Wonderful. Just freaking wonderful.
Oh that aint workin
Thats the way you do it
Get your money for nothin . . . .
Category: "Your Tax Dollars At Work", Crime
I vote for the “or more” fraud option. LOTS more. So many folks I’ve run into with carts loaded up with crap, pay for it with EBT, then whip out the cash from unemployment check for booze and smokes, then haul it out to the new “dualie” pickup and bitch about how hard it is to get work under the table, yet they still do it.
I was thinking on average the 5-10% rule applies almost universally in every application. Meaning that in the United States a 5-10% corruption of everything positive takes place. I would not be surprised to learn the actual rate of fraud was north of 5 billion.
UC is not in and of itself a bad thing, as with all things however the program was extended to so many other scenarios that in many states you can quit a job and collect UC.
Covering workers for a short period of time when the government allows their jobs to be exported through favored nation trading status treaties keeps people in their homes for a little while why they try and discover how to pay their bills working for far less than they were used to receiving. Ideally we will eventually discover that giving free trade status to a nation where the average worker earns in a year what the average US worker earns in a week is hardly an ideal trade treaty for the general good of the Republic.
Unless an ever widening gap between the rich and the not-rich is a good thing for the Republic, although it’s never been a good thing for any other nation in the entire world, but I suppose there’s always a first time…coupled with an increasingly undereducated population it doesn’t seem like a recipe for a successful outcome.
I used to work at the Unemployment Office in California. You wouldn’t believe the fraud. The rules in California pretty much encourage it. You can certify for your benefits online and the money goes directly to an Electronic Benefits Card.
So you could be on the beach in Hawaii and be getting your Unemployment…