It's always good to see federal employees hard at work. That is, unless they're collecting a check for being totally disabled at the same time. That's fraud. In one case, the double-dipper is a Transportation Security Administration screener in California, CBS News investigative correspondent Sharyl Attkisson reports.Federal disability -- about $170 billion per year -- is intended for those with medical conditions so severe they can't work at any job. Today, so many people claim to fit that definition, 17.9 million people are getting checks. ...
The head of Social Security, Michael Astrue, wouldn't agree to an interview. Instead of explaining how he's fighting fraud, he criticized the GAO. Last year, he told Congress that the screening tool that detects when someone's gone back to work generates too much information.
"That we can't possibly follow up on 'the leads' that would come from that in any- certainly not in my professional lifetime in the agency," Astrue said on Capitol Hill Aug. 4, 2010.
According to Social Security there are actually 13.3 million people on Social Security disability benefits not 17.9 million and the yearly benefit total is about $105 billion not $170 billion.
"That we can't possibly follow up on 'the leads' that would come from that in any- certainly not in my professional lifetime in the agency,"
ReplyDeletePure BS. SSI gets S2 alerts on posted wages, in some cases (depending upon the time of the year) literally within 30-60 days of the hiring date the claimant started to work. I've seen cases recently with work reported by the state unemployment departments as recent as 4th quarter 2010.
However, for some inexplicable reason, the agency refuses to extend this type of process to recipients receiving only Social Security disability based benefits.
You'd think that they actually WANT people to be overpaid....
It is simply what happens when you put a bunch of career politicians in charge of a program.