How much money is actually lost by fraud, waste in the US? | Political news

The billionaire Elon Musk, the driving force behind the President of the United States President Donald Trump of the Doge Budget Department, examined the sensitive issue of saving social security costs in the FOX television channel business.

Musk told host Larry Kudlow, a former Trump economic adviser, that the government's reporting government official estimated in 2024 that the federal government's fraud was half a trillion dollar.

While referring to waste, Musk said: “Most of the federal costs are rights.

The use of the word “elimination” in the same breath as “rights” puts alarms among the democratic critics of Trump and Musk. White House press release secretary Carolyn Levitt said at News News briefing on March 11 that Musk refers to a waste reduction, deceit And abuse of these programs and Trump “will” protect social security “, Medicare and Medicaid.

At an event on March 11, promoting Tesla Cars in the White House, a reporter asked Musk if he could guarantee that there would be no interruption of social security benefits.

“We will be very careful with all kinds of benefits,” Musk said. “In fact, only by dealing with waste or fraud can we actually keep these programs for the future.”

“Fraud” and “waste” mean different things. Waste refers to negligent use, and fraud involves criminal misconduct.

Musk referred to a report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO), a non -party congressional auditor who examines federal costs. In 2024, the office estimated that it had $ 233 billion to $ 521 billion for fraudulent payments in the government annually.

The report went further than social security, Medicare and Medicaid, which make up about half of mandatory government spendingS It covers the entire government, including pandemic -related support programs that have led to record fraud.

Musk said the cut of fraud and waste would help his efforts to reduce $ 1 trillion from the federal budget. But his scam ratings are at the upper end of GAO's assessment or exceed it. For social security, the Inspector General in 2021 opened about $ 300 million in payments after the death of beneficiaries for about two decades, about one-third of which was restored. Although federal officials have long recognized incorrect costs as a problem, this is not the main cause of the heavy financial prospects of the program.

What does the government do for overall fraud?

In April, President Joe Biden's government's accountability service prepared what he calls “the first of its kind, an assessment of the state for federal dollars lost by fraud.”

The estimation of the $ 233 billion to $ 521 billion, lost in fraud annually, covered data for 2018-2022 in reports by the Agency's General Inspectors and Fraud Reports presented at the Management and Budget Office.

Musk quotes the high end of the range when he said “half a trillion”. The White House did not answer our question about the source of his figure from $ 600 billion to $ 700 billion.

The figures of the best lines of GAO include not only official findings for fraud from court proceedings, but also evaluations from the findings of individual fraud agencies. The agency is also extrapolated figures that it believes is an undiscovered fraud.

Estimated losses are about 3 percent to 7 percent of average federal costs.

The Management and Budget Office, the agency, which assists the president in the implementation of his budget goals, has found a smaller figure in the federal government fraud, from $ 4.41 billion to $ 7.31 billion a year, based on amounts confirmed through a court or trial.

Federal budget experts have said it is important to pay attention to the full analysis of government reports.

Joshua Suel, director of research and taxpayer policy for common sense, said taxpayers should look at these numbers with “massive grain salt”. The report is filled with warnings and is probably not representative for other years due to the increase in pandemic costs.

“This is a wonderful report to try to put an amorphous number, but you can't accept high -end numbers as a final statement about the amount of fraud in the dollar that exists in federal costs,” he said.

About 5 percent of the annual federal budget may be lost by fraud, and some programs have incorrect payment rates by more than 10 percent, said Bob Westbrooks, CEO of the Pandemia Committee, Congress of the Government Committee, established five years ago. But the phrase “wrong payments” does not necessarily mean fraud; It includes scenarios with insufficient documentation.

“Whatever the number, it is huge in absolute terms,” ​​Westbrook said, referring to all the fraud.

Westbrook said Musk is linked to fraud and waste and ignored that the Covid-19 era fraud is likely to push the Government's estimated range, as the report itself is noted.

The government's accountability service stated that the scope is “a reflection of both uncertainty related to the fraud assessment and the variety of risky environments present in the fiscal years 2018 to 2022.”

What do we know about social security fraud?

At the White House briefing on March 11, Levitus cites a general report from the Social Security Administration Inspectorate, which found more than $ 70 billion in fraud in this program alone.

The 2024 report did not conclude that it has more than $ 70 billion for social security “fraud”. It says that the program has sent nearly $ 71.8 billion to Incorrect Payments from 2015 to 2022, a period that includes Trump's first term. This is less than 1 % of the total payments during this period of time.

In the FOX business, Musk said “there is a huge amount of fraud” with people who present fake social security numbers to receive a number of state benefits, including social security, healthcare and unemployment assistance.

Most of the incorrect payments discovered by the Inspector General are overpayments with some disadvantages. This happens, for example, when the beneficiaries do not report the necessary information or the administration fails to update records, according to the report of the General Inspector since 2024. It is not a criminal intent.

The Social Security Administration has long been struggling to limit incorrect payments.

“Without better access to data, increased automation, systems modernization and policy or legislative changes, incorrect payments will continue to be a problem in the future,” the report said.

The Social Security Administration Inspector in 2021 opened $ 298 million after the death of about 24,000 beneficiaries from 1998 to 2019. These beneficiaries were at a payment state, but payments were still sent because the technicians did not follow the policy or were not looking for all available death records. The report states that “does not identify specific cases of fraud” and provides information on the death of the investigation service.

The government has been recovering about $ 84 million, the report said.

This year alone, the defendants were convicted or convicted of fraudulent cash checks sent to deceased beneficiaries, for theft of identity used to obtain social security benefits and to theft of social security payments intended for children.

How did the Social Security Administration attempt to deal with fraud and waste?

Musk said in an interview with Fox Business that the federal government had performed “very good audits”, but the agencies did not consistently apply the auditors' management.

On March 3, the General Inspector of the Social Security Administration submitted a report on the status of its most new recommendations.

Overall, the Inspector General found 280 previous recommendations that were not filled with potential savings of $ 18.4 billion. In some cases, the Social Security Administration does not agree with the proposals. Some of the unambiguous recommendations included more careful control of specific beneficiary groups for which the agency is aware of the possible discrepancies. Others have proposed changes to the computer system signals.

Some of the Government's Congress Accounting Office's recommendations remained unscrupulous. In 2022, GAO called for the Congress to amend the Social Security Act to constantly share full death data with the Ministry of Finance, but this has not yet happened.

Social security is financially in difficulty after a decade

Social security faces a difficult way forward. Its existential woes are more than the cases of dead people who receive the benefits check.

The most significant threats to the long-term viability of social security are a shortage of workers who feed their tax dollars in the system, and an increasing number of Americans in a pension that meets the requirements for benefits.

American life expectancy has grown since the establishment of social security in 1935, as well as the number of recipients of eligible. But since the Baby Boom generation (born from 1946 to 1964) enters a pension, less workers pay in the system.

Social Security Trust Funds will not be able to pay 100 percent of benefits by 2035, the Social Security Social Security Report said in the 2024 Social Security Report. The trustees have issued similar warnings for more than a decade.

Historically, most politicians on both sides were disgusting to offer changes in social security. Political experts often call it a “third railway line” in American politics -you touch it, you die, at least on the ballot, where older voters usually have the highest turnout.