How much money does the US Social Security system lose to corruption and waste?

He stressed that “the vast majority of government spending is entitlement” and claimed that the waste could be as high as $600 billion to $700 billion a year. The White House quickly responded, pointing out that Musk was only referring to cutting fraud and corruption.

Elon Musk holds a chainsaw as a symbol of cost cutting at the Conservative Political Action Conference in National Harbor, Maryland on February 20. Photo: X/elonmusk

The GAO estimates that the amount of money lost to “fraud” from 2018 to 2022, including pandemic relief programs, will range from $233 billion to $521 billion per year. That represents about 3 to 7 percent of total federal spending. The White House Office of Management and Budget has given a much lower estimate of $4.41 billion to $7.31 billion per year.

Budget expert Joshua Sewell cautions against taking these numbers as absolutes, as fraud and corruption during the COVID-19 era could significantly inflate the estimates. Whatever the true figure, the extent of the budget loss is significant, said Bob Westbrooks, director of the Pandemic Response Accountability Commission.

In the Social Security program alone, the inspector general’s report found that there were about $71.8 billion in incorrect payments from 2015 to 2022, but most of the overpayments were due to administrative errors, not intentional fraud. Some cases were found to involve recipients who had died but were still receiving benefits.

Musk said the U.S. government has had many good audits but has not fully implemented recommendations to reduce losses. The Social Security Inspector General made 280 unimplemented recommendations that could save as much as $18.4 billion. Some of the recommendations call for improving data systems and modernizing technology to reduce errors.

The bigger problem for Social Security is its financial imbalance due to an aging population. Projections show that the program’s trust funds will be depleted by 2035, leaving the government unable to pay its full benefits. But because the issue is politically sensitive, politicians from both parties have generally shied away from proposing drastic changes.

Ngoc Anh (according to AJ, Fox Business)