WASHINGTON — Chairman Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) and the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee (HSGAC) held a hearing on Tuesday to discuss the Government Accountability Office’s latest findings about unnecessary duplication in the federal government.
“This is an area that we need to explore – figure out exactly how to implement more of these,” Johnson said in his opening statement. He paid tribute to former Senator Tom Coburn’s tireless work to reduce duplicative spending with his annual “wastebook.” In continuing that work, Johnson wrote in his opening statement, “Today’s hearing is just the first step in our responsibility to taxpayers to being good stewards with their hard earned money.” [AUDIO HERE]
During the hearing, “Reducing Unnecessary Duplication in Federal Programs: Billions More Could Be Saved,” Chairman Johnson and committee members heard from Eugene L. Dodaro, Comptroller General of the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO).
Johnson questioned Dodaro about the duplication in disability payments and unemployment insurance benefits. “In normal state unemployment systems, you simply cannot collect unemployment if you are also disabled, if you’re not available for work. Is that correct?” [AUDIO HERE]
“That’s correct,” Dodaro responded. “But in a lot of disability programs, the goal is for those people who can be rehabilitated and get back to work, they can get back to work.” Therefore there are some rules where constituents can work for limited periods of time and get off the disabled rolls. “So some people end up having employment status even though they’re receiving disability payments,” Dodaro said — meaning that people eligible for disability payment then become eligible for unemployment benefits as well. [AUDIO HERE]
“This is an unintended overlap … this is an unintended consequence?” Johnson clarified. [AUDIO HERE]
“That’s exactly right,” Dodaro said. “We think it could be easily rectified through legislation without unduly affecting anyone. CBO estimates about 1.2 billion dollars that could be saved.” [AUDIO HERE]
“A billion here, a billion there, you end up with real money,” Johnson replied. [AUDIO HERE]
Later, he asked Dodaro, “What prompts agencies to implement your recommendations? What are things that we can potentially do to get higher levels of implementation? What are roadblocks?” Johnson asked. [AUDIO HERE]
“A number of our recommendations require legislative action,” Dodaro responded. “I think more focused attention by the Congress could really help in this regard.” He further explained, “The big barriers … for actions that require one agency to take action, to reduce overlap and duplication, there’s a 40 percent take up rate for fully addressed; where multiple agencies have to act to address duplication or overlap across agencies, it’s only 25 percent take up, and this is where Congress and OMB come into play, and they need to take a more active role.” [AUDIO HERE]
Full video of hearing and information on witness Eugene L. Dodaro can be found here.
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