Government mismanagement of money? Who could have seen this coming?

Approximately 18.9% percent of pandemic-related unemployment insurance payments have been improper since 2020, according to a report from the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO).

(Improper payment is when someone receives benefits for which they do not qualify.)

The current improper payment rate (18.9%) more than doubled from its 2016 to 2020 rate (between 9% and 13%). The Department of Labor (DOL) estimates the current rate will continue through the 2022 fiscal year.

"The GAO said antiquated state UI systems, low staffing and inexperienced staff hired to handle the unprecedented surge in claims also played a role," ZeroHedge reports.

GAO added the U.S. unemployment insurance (UI) system to its federal programs list for "high risk" of waste, fraud, abuse, and mismanagement.

"The full extent of the UI system's improper payments is not presently known because DOL and states have struggled to reliably report improper payments information, and DOL has not yet estimated amounts of improper payments for [two temporary pandemic UI] programs," GAO reports.

"The magnitude of potential financial loss during the pandemic has likely weakened public confidence in the integrity of the UI system," GAO added.

GAO said three temporary UI programs -- Pandemic Unemployment Assistance, Federal Pandemic Unemployment Compensation, and Pandemic Emergency Unemployment Compensation -- made existing problems of fraud worse and even created new problems. These programs were created by the CARES Act for $723 billion.

"Identify theft schemes were the most common, with criminals using stolen personal information to file a single claim or big bundles of them," ZeroHedge reports.

For example, California says it paid around $810 million for claims made under the names of 45,000 prison inmates:

And just think... we don't know how bad it really is. 😬

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