Melissa K. Smith

I was not living in Michigan when Leroy Fick infamously defended his receipt of food assistance after winning the lottery. Fick set the state, and the country, on fire. Michigan’s governor and Legislature obviously stood up and took notice, but I was shocked when I heard Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin (you might remember him as the guy who caused quite a stir with his budget proposal a few months ago) mentioned Fick’s acts in a phone conference I was on. Thanks to Mr. Fick, the image of all those lazy, cheating, cash assistance spongers is back in circulation.

The anecdotes abound.  My neighbor told me yesterday that he knew someone who had 8 kids, was on “welfare” and drove a Lamborghini.  My sister, a nurse, tells me of one patient who has a ton of kids on Medicaid always in the hospital for something or another. She laments about her abusing the medical assistance program.  My former co-worker’s sister-in-law was reportedly on unemployment for five years (completely impossible by the way). he media reacts and the Legislature acts – drug testing, time limits, asset tests, fingerprinting, and limiting places recipients can use ATMs.

While we need to be careful stewards of our tax dollars, let’s not get caught up in the drama.  For every one Leroy Fick there are millions of Michiganders on cash assistance who need it and are not abusing the system. DHS reports 5,000 prosecutions a year for fraud in ALL assistance programs; that is less than one in 500 participants – about the same odds as catching a ball at a major league baseball game and 2 ½ times the odds of being audited by the IRS. Ifact, nationwide, 50,178 recipients were disqualified from the Food Stamp Program in 2009 for fraud.  Sounds like a big number, right?  Well, that is out of 33.5 million recipients – one-tenth of one percent!

Of course, you don’t have to be low-income to participate in fraudulent activity.  Consider this: in 2009, there was $33.5 billion in retail fraud mainly due to shoplifting and employee theft – more than 100 times the amount of overissuance of food assistance due to fraud nationwide (much of which is eventually recouped from the recipient). More than 6 percent of all households were the victims of identity theft in 2008 – that is 11.7 million people and $17 billion in financial losses.  And how about those tax evaders?  Every year approximately $300 billion goes uncollected by the federal government (budget solution anyone?).   While 30 percent to 40 percent of Americans don’t pay all they owe, about 15 Percent of them are intentionally evading the tax system.

Individuals are not the only ones guilty of making mistakes.  Overpayment of Food Assistance benefits was due to agency error in 46.6 percent of cases nationally and 54.3 percent of cases in Michigan in 2009.  So, when we start screaming foul at all the supposed criminals defrauding government assistance, remember that none of us humans are infallible and most of us try to do the right thing; if it wasn’t for that one bad apple….

-Melissa Smith

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Categories: Blog: Factually Speaking, Human Services | Tags: caseload, cash assistance, food assistance, poverty, safety net