Posted on 09/09/2012 6:33:14 AM PDT by Kaslin
Today, we're going to demonstrate that the policies of multiple agencies of the U.S. federal government are responsible for enabling criminal disability fraud in the United States, with the cost of the fraud accelerating the pending insolvency of Social Security's Disability Insurance Trust Fund, which will put the program's legitimate beneficiaries at high risk of having their benefits cut after the fund has been exhausted.
Current projections indicate that the Social Security trust fund for disability will be fully depleted in 2016, just four years from the present. The projections from the previous year had indicated that would not happen until 2018. The large shift in the timing of the projected trust fund depletion toward the present in just a year's time indicates a strongly deteriorating fiscal situation for the government "safety net" program.
In Part 1 of our series, we discovered that the U.S. Social Security Administration has effectively established a "no-challenge" policy for disability insurance claims made by applicants over the age of 50, which allows these individuals to obtain Social Security disability benefits far more easily than individuals Age 49 or younger. This arbitrary policy is what enables these individuals to receive Social Security disability insurance payments, even though they might not otherwise be able to obtain those benefits if they were held to the same standards as those under Age 50.
We observe the likely greater incidence of disability fraud as we more closely examine the surge in the number of Social Security disability beneficiaries in the years since 2007, which coincide with the Great Recession. Here, we found that approximately 695,000 more individuals have been added to the nation's government disability rolls during this time than the level that would be consistent with those of pre-Great Recession years.
The chart above, showing the number of "surplus" or "excess" Social Security disability beneficiaries added in each year since 2007, indicates that the recession is the driving factor behind the increased number of individuals obtaining government disability payments, as the timing of the surge coincides with the expiration of government unemployment insurance benefits for individuals who were negatively impacted by the economic contraction, which officially ran from December 2007 through June 2009. The nation's sluggish economic recovery accounts for the decline in the number of surplus or excess Social Security disability program beneficiaries measured in 2011.
That connection between unemployment insurance benefits and disability insurance benefits brings us to where outright fraud is taking place today:
As many as 117,000 Americans simultaneously collect unemployment benefits and federal disability each year, a form of double-dipping that investigators say costs taxpayers $850 million annually and should be ended.
To understand why such "double-dipping" constitutes fraud, please note the following general requirements for each program:
While there can be some small overlap in the detailed eligibility requirements for these programs that would legitimately allow a handful of individuals to receive benefits from both simultaneously, the vast majority of individuals currently receiving both unemployment insurance benefit payments and disability insurance payments do not fall within that narrow category and are therefore committing acts of fraud. In general, legitimate beneficiaries of these social safety net programs can draw funds from one program, or the other, but not both at the same time.
That multiple government agencies are involved in enabling this form of fraud is confirmed because the U.S. Department of Labor is responsible for administering the unemployment insurance program, while the Social Security Administration administers the Disability Insurance program. But worse than that is the reason why the fraud has been allowed to continue:
The reason for the double-spending, investigators at the Government Accountability Office reported this week, is good old-fashioned lack of communication.
Put simply, the Labor Department that funds unemployment benefits and the Social Security Administration that funds disability payments don't compare notes, leavings tens of thousands of Americans each month to collect two checks from a stretched-thin government treasury.
It would seem that the bureaucrats and politicians who are responsible for overseeing these programs learned nothing from the failure of government agencies to share information among themselves that enabled the criminal terrorist murders of 2,996 Americans on 11 September 2001 to proceed unchallenged.
This time however, the Government Accountability Office's report indicates that the annual savings that might be realized by ending this kind of fraud adds up to $850 million.
That's a savings of roughly 1 dollar out of each $1400 that is currently projected to be consumed in the nation's projected deficit of 1.21 trillion dollars for 2012! And it would be painless, because the people who are honestly playing by the rules would not be affected!
This is exactly the sort of thing that should be a no-brainer for a fiscally responsible politician - it's as close to low-hanging fruit as there is to be found anywhere in the U.S. federal government's budget. We wonder if any political candidate will rise to the occasion of acting to end the government's practices and policies that enable such costly fraud.
I personally know people who are able-bodied who are on disability. They make up stuff like back problems, knee problems, etc.
But they can pull an engine out of a vehicle, go fishing, or do odd jobs for friends whenever.
I have another close friend, paralyzed from a motorcycle accident 9 years ago, who won’t miss a day of work unless he’s got a life-threatening pressure sore on his bottom.
That list would be easily turned in to cancelation notices.
Problem solved.
I too notice all these peeps parking in DISABLED and jumping out and running into the Walmart or whatever.
Except for those who collect under various names.
In a totally unrelated item - Hispanic family tradition carries the surname of of both parents.
In another totally unrelated item - unmarried and “non-traditional” partnerships can result in more than one eligible recipient per household, or make the earnings of one partner not count towards the resources of the other.
Totally unrelated /s
Oh, one more totally unrelated item:
Transient families can collect under their old address when they move to another state (fraudulently, but since it’s so totally unrelated who cares? /s)
Can't have anything that simple in government.
First you have to have a "study", which means you have to hire more government employees. The "study" of course lasts several years because they don't have enough resources to conduct it thoroughly. Once the "study" is complete then they need to form a commission to determine what to do with the results of the "study". There again, more government employees will be needed.
Then you have the "consultants". They decide who gets to actually write the software. Of course that company will need to have an oversight committee created by...you guessed it, the government. But, no matter. It's the way things are done in government.
And it just goes on and on and on and on...
This is intentional. Putting people on disability removes them from the unemployment statistics. Obama is bankrupting SS to create a temporary illusion of lower unemployment and an economic recovery.
That is usually thanks to the fact we have technology available to re-attach retinas.
So, what does GET AROUND really mean? Well, it means you are able to dress yourself and take care of your hygiene without a guide dog to show you where the toilet is. You might even be able to shop if you have third party transportation available.
Then, the ultimate, you can use your handy dandy wide screen HD TV as a computer screen and enlarge those letters big enough that you can come here to Free Republic to tell folks what "get around" means.
BTW, thanks to the surgery, and the elimination of any need to take more eyeball medications I can see quite fine with my left eye but if left with only my right it'd be GET AROUND time all day long.
I still use a 24" computer screen though ~ and I do have some problems editing what I write ~ but otherwise I look healthy, uninjured and ready to run alongside boxcars and hop transcontinental freights.
...and failing miserably at that as well.
ALL the New Deal programs required that you go visit a caseworker if you moved ~ you can find out who has a forwarding order on file by cranking up a computer program that handles Move Update ~ see https://www.usps.com/business/move-update.htm
“I personally know people who are able-bodied who are on disability...But they can pull an engine out of a vehicle, go fishing, or do odd jobs for friends whenever.”
“Problem solved.”
One other point that is related... If you go on SS disability at 62 you get the FULL payment of SS. Once you turn 66, you go off disability and on regular SS, but at the full rate as if you retired at 66.
SSI Disability seems to be where the unemployed go who run out of unemployment benefits.
A guy I know who ran thru his 99 weeks was told by the counselor that he could apply for disability (back pain I think would have been the justification).
It could just be a mental disability.
I hate to admit it, but my brother is among them. He got the disability awarded some years ago and makes sure he only works enough hours at WalMart to ensure he doesn’t go over the cap. He has pulled engines and trannys from his vehicles in the front yard of his run-down trailer during NY winters and never been incapaciated by the labors even thought they are far more strenuous than what a normal job would require.
You have the concept right except but in order to get consultants onboard, rigorous and time consuming procurement processes must also be followed, which of course needs even more government employees to manage.
The real kicker is that the process takes so long that by the time the contract is awarded and the work is finally done, everything else has changed so much the software is already obsolete. Time to start the process all over again... LOL
And they all go on long holidays to the Greek island of Zakynthos.
Greece's island of the 'blind' revealed Nick Squires Published: April 30, 2012 - 6:52AM http://www.smh.com.au/action/printArticle?id=3256759
EVEN by the extravagant standards of Greek corruption, the scam uncovered by Stelios Bozikis is so brazen it is hard to credit.
Nearly 600 people on the Ionian island of Zakynthos - where Mr Bozikis was recently elected mayor - had themselves falsely declared blind to obtain state benefits.
They included taxi drivers, shopkeepers and restaurant owners. ''Out of 650 registered blind people on the island, we estimate that at least 600 are fraudulent claims,'' the mayor said. That represents nearly 2 per cent of the island's population of 35,000 - nearly 10 times the average rate of blindness in Europe.
The claimants were receiving monthly payments of at least €350 ($A442). Those who supposedly needed carers received more.
Known to the Venetians during the heyday of their trading empire as ''the flower of the Levant'', Zakynthos is now mocked as ''the island of the blind'' by the media.
Fraudulent benefit claims, including bogus cases of leprosy, cost Greece €111 million last year, according to the government. Nearly one in six disability allowances were found to be fraudulent.
Minus the fact that Uncle Sugar merely funds UI, which is then administered by 50 different states with 50 different legacy operating systems...
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