Reader's Digest reports:
A dead man farming? That was the unsettling image that came to mind last November, when a Miami television station analyzed records of federal farm subsidies paid to South Florida residents. By cross-referencing payments against death notices, the reporters found that at least 234 people listed as deceased were still getting checks from Washington; some had been dead for as long as eight years. All told, about $9.5 million in farm subsidies went to folks who were pushing up plants, not harvesting them.
And then there are the rich phonies taking handouts. A government audit found that of the 1.8 million so-called farmers who received federal funds between 2003 and 2006, 2,702 of them had adjusted gross incomes of more than $2.5 million. The list included the co-owner of an unnamed sports team who hauled in $200,000 a year, as well as wealthy residents of the United Kingdom, Saudi Arabia, and Hong Kong—people who are generally not eligible for U.S. government handouts. In all, these millionaires have enriched themselves to the tune of $49 million in taxpayer money.
There's more:
members of Congress have profited from subsidies directly. Arkansas Democratic senator Blanche Lincoln’s family received more than $700,000 over a ten-year period, and Republican Iowa senator Chuck Grassley, a millionaire deficit hawk, reaped $238,000 in federal dollars from 1995 to 2006.
Rent seeking for fun and for profit!
