Pull: The U.S. government’s waste is always put upon the taxpayer. Money doesn’t grow on trees, but apparently, for the deceased, it just might.
Last week a variety of sources, including the Associated Press, reported that nearly $18 million of stimulus money went to approximately 72,000 people currently six feet underground.
Even more unbelievable, half of the money is nowhere to be found. The Associated Press reports that only half of the money was correctly returned.
The payments were part of the massive economic recovery package meant to stimulate the economy by increasing individual spending.
It should come as no surprise that the government is spending itself into oblivion.
Even The Washington Post reported that federal spending had increased 9 percent for the fiscal year of 2010.
The burden of the government’s waste is always laid upon the taxpayer.
In this situation, the about $9 million dollars of stimulus money that is seemingly nowhere to be found is bound to come out of someone’s tax returns.
Many people seem to forget that it is the American taxpayer who funds these absurd relief programs; as Washington Post columnist Charles Krauthammer said in a Fox News interview about the Cash for Clunkers program, “It’s not as if this cash comes via stork.”
But for the government in the 21st century, no matter which party is in charge, spending just keeps increasing and increasing and increasing.
Much of the spending isn’t even relevant spending, and this is personally what gets me so upset and disappointed.
ABC News and other outlets reported that $71,623 of stimulus money went to the Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center to support research efforts to study monkeys under the influence of cocaine.
Still not convinced?
According to the Washington Examiner, $3.4 million of the stimulus money was spent in Florida building small tunnels under highways to help local animals, such as turtles, pass safely across state roads. Keep in mind, these are our tax dollars, and these are only a few bullet points on a ridiculous list.
I realize that some of the stimulus programs truly are helpful and actually do stimulate the economy —particularly the sections of the package that actually went to the industries that were so crushed by the recession.
What I don’t understand, however, is when organizations report these wasteful experiments, and the economic cost they’ll have on the average, hardworking American family.
As much as you may want to deny it, this ties in with the so-called “crazy” Republicans that insist that the stimulus package was just a massive spending program in disguise that finally lets Democrats shove money into their nonsense programs.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi certainly doesn’t help the cause when she insists that we “must make the most out of this recession.”
Yet there’s bound to be a breaking point.
Whether it’s a grassroots fiscal takeover of either party or a significant rise in public concern regarding the national debt, so much so that politicians feel they can no longer spend in order to get elected, I believe the spending trend will eventually conclude.
As the famous economic philosopher Milton Friedman once said, “There is nothing so permanent as a temporary government program.”
Send stimulating dialogue to spmccaul@asu.edu
