WASHINGTON – The US government made payments totaling in the billions to the wrong people in 2013.
The US Government Accountability Office (GAO)reported last week that after gathering data and information, an estimated $105.8 billion in improper payments were made in fiscal year 2013, a decrease from the prior year revised estimate of $107.1 billion. The fiscal year 2013 estimate was attributable to 84 programs spread among 18 agencies. The specific programs included in the government-wide estimate may change from year to year. A net of 10 additional programs were added to the government-wide estimate by OMB in fiscal year 2013 when compared to fiscal year 2012.
For fiscal year 2013, GAO identified the federal government’s inability to determine the full extent to which improper payments occur and reasonably assure that appropriate actions are taken to reduce them as a material weakness in internal control. In addition, existing internal control weaknesses at the agency level continued to increase the risk of improper payments occurring. In fiscal year 2013, four agencies did not report estimates for four risk-susceptible programs, including the Department of Health and Human Services’ (HHS) Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program.
GAO recommended a number of strategies across government, some of which are currently under way, which could help to reduce improper payments. Examples include: 1)Preventive controls involving activities such as up-front validation of eligibility through data sharing, predictive analytic tests, and training programs and 2) Implementing effective detection techniques to quickly identify and recover improper payments after they have been made is also important to a successful reduction strategy. Detection activities include data mining and recovery audits.
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This irresponsible Government is whom we are to entrust our health care too. They can’t do anything right. I think we should be in charge of our own healthcare period. Everyone can do as they want, we don’t need Uncle Sam dictating to is.
But, you want Uncle Sam to dictate to us everything that you’re for right? That’s what I thought.
Imagine that, all on the backs of the legal, working, tax paying US citizen.
BS, taxpayers aren’t paying this. The Chinese are. We just borrow it from the Chinese. Spend all you want, we’ll just print more.
Ya, I can tell government spending really bothers you. It’s why you wanted the US to spend 5 trillion on the Iraq war. You probably complain about your wife buying makeup while you make payments on a new boat that sits in the garage.