February 18, 2011 7:23 PM
Federal fraud: Healthy workers took disability
By Sharyl Attkisson
(CBS News) You have no doubt noticed it when you get your paycheck, the deduction for Social Security taxes.
Some of the money goes to pay workers when they become disabled, meaning they are unable to work, but some are continuing to collect disability payments even after they’ve returned to work.
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.
By the government’s own estimate, fraud and other improper payments ate up $25 billion in disability payments between 2005 and 2009.
One case involved a Michigan woman. She qualified for disability because of mood and personality disorders. Seven months later, she found work as a letter carrier but kept on taking disability checks, a total of $37,000.
A Pennsylvania woman collected disability checks even as surveillance video showed her working as a mail clerk. Total cost: $19,000 in fraudulent payments.
Adding insult to supposed injury, nearly all the people the GAO tracked down had gotten a little extra bonus: $250 in federal stimulus money — intended for disabled people.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/02/18/eveningnews/main20033639.shtml
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.
Still looking for answers, CBS News went to the White House budget office. They wouldn’t agree to an interview either.
Due to privacy protections, CBS News hasn’t been told the ultimate fate of the TSA agent in California. By the time investigators caught up with her, she’d defrauded taxpayers out of $108,000, all while earning $50,000 a year at her federal job, collecting a $250 stimulus check and living large in a house listed for $1.8 million.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/02/18/eveningnews/main20033639.shtml