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| Photo Credit: AP. |
A federal audit has revealed that U.S. states paid pandemic related unemployment benefit to about 200,000 beneficiaries who were already dead, according to a report by The Washington Times. An inspector general’s audit said Social Security numbers showed the beneficiaries who were dead had received billions of dollars in benefits.
The Washington
Times reported that nearly 1 million more claims were paid to Social Security
numbers that were submitted in multiple states. The law only allows someone to
claim the enhanced pandemic unemployment benefits in a single state at one
time.
Was there suspicious email fraud in unemployment claims?
About 1.7
million more claims were paid to people who filed from “suspicious email
addresses,” The Washington Times quoted the Labor Department’s inspector
general.
The claims
according to the audit were over $45 billion in fraudulent pandemic related
unemployment benefits during the first two years after COVID-19 struck the
nation.
An assistant
inspector general in the department Carolyn R. Hantz said the payment amounted
to nearly three times the estimate issued in June 2021, according to The
Washington Times.
“As of the
date of this alert memorandum, ETA has not taken sufficient action to implement
these recommendations,” she wrote expressing regret her recommendations were
not taken into consideration. “ETA’s lack of sufficient action significantly
increases the risk of even more [unemployment] payments to ineligible
claimants.”
The unemployment
program is supported by the federal government, but it is mostly run by the
states. A key reason for the payment loophole is that many states operated an
outdated system that allowed the bogus payment.
How much of the $875.2 billion spend on pandemic unemployment payment was received by fraudsters?
The fraud became
considerable because Congress had approved hundreds of billions of dollars in pandemic relief which
became a huge windfall for fraudulent unemployment schemes. Over $200 billion
of the $875.2 billion spent on pandemic unemployment payments landed in the pockets
of fraudsters, The Washington Times cited some estimates.
Responding
to the fraudulent scheme, the Labor Department said it has been trying to help
states deal with the issue.
“ETA agrees
with the OIG’s assessment regarding the significant increase in fraudulent
activity challenging state UI programs across the nation during the pandemic,”
said Brent Parton, acting assistant secretary, according to The Washington
Times.
How many dead person's Social Security numbers received unemployment benefits?
The payment involves
205, 766 claims to applicants using Social Security numbers for people listed
as dead, a payment totaling $139.4 million.
Separately
$267.3 million was paid to applicants using Social Security numbers of people
believed to have been in federal prison who were ineligible at the time.
The audit showed that payments were made to 992,793 Social Security numbers that appeared in multiple states running into about $28.9 billion, and 1.7 million in payments associated with suspicious emails which accounted for $16.2 billion, according to The Washington Times.