Ten Guidelines for Reducing Government Waste

• While this paper by the Heritage Foundation may be a few years old, it is thorough and can only have gotten worse since it was written.  The size and scope of the federal government is made crystal clear in this study.

  Some of the most egregious findings include:

  - Medicare overpayments totaled $12.1 billion in 2001.
  - Congressional investigators were able to receive $55,000 in federal student loan funding for a fictional college they created to test the U.S. Department of Education
  - $273,000 to help Blue Springs, Missouri, combat teenage “Goth culture”;
  - $1,500,000 for a statue of the Roman god Vulcan in Birmingham, Alabama;
  - $1,000,000 for an “Intelligent Transportation” grant for Moscow, Idaho—population 22,000;
  - $50,000 to fund a tattoo removal program in San Luis Obispo County, California;
  - $26,000 to study how thoroughly Americans rinse their dishes; and
  - $4,572 to Las Vegas Helicopters (LVH), which performs airborne weddings officiated by Elvis Presley impersonators, as part of the post-September 11 package of aid to airlines.
  - In 2003, there were:
  # 342 economic development programs;
  # 130 programs serving the disabled;
  # 130 programs serving at-risk youth;
  # 90 early childhood development programs;
  # 75 programs funding international education, cultural, and training exchange activities;
  # 72 federal programs dedicated to assuring safe water;
  # 50 homeless assistance programs;
  # 45 federal agencies conducting federal criminal investigations;
  # 40 separate employment and training programs;
  # 28 rural development programs;
  # 27 teen pregnancy programs;
  # 26 small, extraneous K-12 school grant programs;
  # 23 agencies providing aid to the former Soviet Union;
  # 19 programs fighting substance abuse;
  # 17 trade agencies monitoring 400 international trade agreements;
  # 12 food safety agencies;
  # 11 principal statistics agencies; and
  # 4 overlapping land management agencies.

  To put spending in perspective, in 2003 alone -

  

  All of this just goes to show that when politicians talk about how they “need” more revenue, “need” higher taxes”, or services will suffer, they aren’t telling you the truth.