White House reports $98B in bad payments

[The Straight Story]

White House reports $98B in bad payments


WASHINGTON, Nov. 18 (UPI) -- U.S. President Barack Obama will issue an executive order to reduce the amount the federal government makes in improper payments, a White House official said.

Peter Orszag, director of the Office of Management and Budget, said the federal government made improper payments of more than $98 billion in fiscal 2009, with improper payments for Medicare accounting for nearly a third of the total, CNN reported.

Ninety-nine agencies and programs received $1.98 trillion in 2009, with $98 billion of the money -- or 5 percent -- coming in the form of improper payments, Orszag, the administration's budget guru, said during a Tuesday evening news conference. The 37.5 percent increase in the total over 2008 was due in part to improved detection, he said.

..
Among the larger amounts of improper payments CNN listed were:

-- $24 billion for Medicare fee-for-service, out of a total of $308 billion received.

-- $18 billion for Medicaid healthcare for the poor, out of a total of $188 billion received.

-- $12 billion for Medicaid Advantage, out of a total of $77 billion received.

-- $12 billion for unemployment insurance, out of a total of $119 billion received.

-- $12 billion for the Earned Income Tax Credit, out of a total of $48 billion received.

http://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2009/11/18/White-House-reports-98B-in-bad-payments/UPI-18691258560007/

[lunatica]

1. How do they know this? Or has it always been know and just ignored?

fraud is everywhere and at every level and evidently quite lucrative.

[Bitwit1234]

2. Well one thing they can't blame the Obama Administration

because the people that work at the place where the checks were processed and mailed had been there during bush's term also. So it was just one of those incompetent foul ups.