We talk about balancing a budget every year and Congress best reaction is to kick the can down the street. The fight is always between Entitlements and Defense spending, yet fraud is a major factor in the dwindling government bank account. Unfortunately when we talk about fraud, the majority of people focus on those collecting unemployment or SSI.- PB/TK
More Than 10 Percent of Federal Medicaid Payments Last Year Were Improper – Peter Suderman|
Every year, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) releases a report putting a dollar figure on the amount of improper payments in Medicaid. And every year, it shows that the program, a jointly funded federal-state program for the poor and disabled and one of the nation’s biggest budget items, spends a substantial portion of its annual budget in ways that it shouldn’t: On fraud, on waste, on services not rendered, not medically necessary, or incorrectly billed.
Last year, for example, the GAO found that about 9.8 percent of federal Medicaid expenditures, or about $29 billion, was spent improperly. That was up from the previous year, and the increased error rate was the main driver of an overall increase in improper payments across the federal government.
This year, the total has risen once again. About 10.5 percent, or $36 billion, of federal spending on the program isn’t up to snuff, according to a GAO report released this morning.
Continue to reason.com article: https://reason.com/blog/2017/01/31/more-than-10-percent-of-federal-medicaid
