Big Bureaucracies Beget Bad Behavior

One of the problems with big government is that it stimulates the worst sort of behavior from people and attracts legions of cheaters on the inside and outside. On the outside, the more than 2,300 federal subsidy programs are under constant assault by dishonest individuals, businesses, and criminal gangs. The improper payment rates for the earned income tax credit and school breakfast programs, for example, are more than 20 percent. Medicare and Medicaid are ripped off by tens of billions of dollars a year. It’s a sad reality that when the government dangles free money, millions of people will falsify application forms to try and get some of it. On the inside, the bad behavior of some federal bureaucrats never fails to amaze me. The official responsible for recent security failings at the TSA apparently bent the rules to line his own pockets and bullied his subordinates to silence any dissent. Kelly Hoggan was the person in charge when “undercover agents from the inspector general’s office … were able to penetrate security checkpoints at U.S. airports while carrying illegal weapons or simulated bombs, 95 percent of the time.” The Washington Post describes how Hoggan filled his pockets with an extra $90,000 on top of his regular salary of $181,500: The downfall of a top official in the Transportation Security Administration this week came amid allegations of under-the-radar bonuses and targeted retribution at the highest levels of the agency. One of the practices th...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - Category: American Health Authors: Source Type: blogs