Good afternoon folks - 

It's that time again...

As you know, every month I identify areas of waste, abuse and inefficiencies and give out the Squeal Award, which recognizes a government expense, program or concept that has proven to be wasteful and must be cut. Continue reading below to hear the latest.


Squeal Award: Duplicate Social Security Benefits

Think you can’t take your money to the grave – and then some? Think again. 

new audit report released by the Office of the Inspector General at the Social Security Administration (SSA) found that the agency has issued approximately $171 million in incorrect payments as of 2015.

So why exactly is this happening? According to the report, there are nearly 5 million people with more than one Social Security Number. Many of these individuals have two numbers as a result of being victims of identity theft or fraud, however, they should not receive Social Security benefits under both numbers.

Unfortunately, in more than 5,000 instances, the SSA issued payments to folks under both of their Social Security Numbers. To make matters worse, the Office of the Inspector General estimated the SSA issued approximately $115.4 million in incorrect payments to around 930 deceased beneficiaries.

If the SSA fails to fix these issues, the Office of Inspector General estimated that the SSA will continue to incorrectly issue approximately $21.2 million in payments over the next year!

Due to the astonishing recklessness on display when it comes to taxpayer dollars’, I hereby present this month’s Squeal Award to the Social Security Administration.


Do you have an example of government waste or inefficiencies that I should take a look at? Send me an email by clicking here.

Thank you!