Top 10 Examples of Government Waste
President George W. Bush has proposed terminating or strongly reducing the budgets of over 150 inefficient or ineffective programs. This is a step in the right direction to pare back the runaway spending that has pushed the budget deficit over $400 billion. In less than three years, the first baby boomers will begin to collect Social Security: Lawmakers must therefore begin to reduce spending now to make room for the massive Social Security and Medicare costs that will follow.
The first place to trim runaway federal spending is in waste, fraud, and abuse. Congress, however, has largely abandoned its constitutional duty of overseeing the executive branch and has steadfastly refused to address the waste littered across government programs. In 2003, an attempt by House Budget Committee Chairman Jim Nussle (R-IA) to address wasteful spending was rejected by the House of Representatives, and similar calls in 2004 by then-Senate Budget Committee Chairman Don Nickles (R-OK) were rejected by the Senate. A small group of House lawmakers has formed the Washington Waste Watchers, but their agenda has not been embraced by the whole House.
Lack of information is not the problem. Today, government waste investigations and recommendations can be found in hundreds of reports, such as: