Brian Riedl of the Manhattan Institute looks at the stunning amounts of government waste in the pandemic-relief programs:
The numbers are staggering. Approximately $80 billion of the $800 billion disbursed by the PPP program was likely fraudulent. Added to that, the Small Business Administration also disbursed as much as $80 billion in fraudulent Economic Injury Disaster loans. And on top of that, the unemployment-insurance system lost as much as $163 billion of its $1 trillion in pandemic-era disbursements to fraud and overpayments.
Overall, waste, fraud, and overpayments may reach $320 billion of the $2 trillion disbursed from these key pandemic programs.
How much is $320 billion? It is enough to send each family in the U.S. $2,400 or eliminate the employee half of the payroll tax for six months. It is also as much as Washington annually spends on international affairs, farm subsidies, natural resources, environment, energy, science, space, technology, unemployment benefits, training, employment, social services, general commerce, air transportation, water transportation, disaster relief and insurance, community and regional development, general-purpose fiscal assistance, general retirement and disability insurance, and the postal service — combined.
Read the whole thing here.