Waste. The word that comes to mind over and over when we think of our governmental policies is waste. Billions after billions are just wasted. Seriously wasted. Like just flush-it-down-the-toilet wasted.
Why does this happen? Because our government has become a bureaucratic Behemoth monster that will eventually strangle our ability to advance on any level. This is not a Republican-esque rant about the size of government, because theirs is a misguided argument. Contrary to their belief, size does not necessarily correlate to efficiency. Just because the federal government is smaller doesn’t mean it will automatically run more effectively. Some of the largest of companies run like a well-oiled machine while some of the smallest of companies are management disasters.
It’s not about size. It’s about efficiency. If we focus on being efficient, our government will be exactly the size it needs to be.
Amazon tops the Global Fortune 500 list with $717 billion in annual revenue and Walmart is second with $631 billion. Meanwhile, the U.S. government collected $5.23 trillion in revenue in FY2025.
The portion of that figure squandered is off the chain. From things like the two new Gulfstream private jets former DHS Secretary Kristi Noem ordered for herself at a cost of $172 million, along with the $220 million glossy “illegal immigration” ad campaign that featured her, among other things, in full make-up astride a horse to Pete Hegseth and the Pentagon spending $2 million on Alaskan king crab, $6.9 million on lobster tail, and $15.1 million spent on rib-eye steak in September 2025 alone to the IRS having to pay taxpayers over $3 billion in interest because refunds were late, waste permeates our federal government.
… and those types of things are just the tip of the iceberg. The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) reports that, in FY2025, 15 federal agencies reported a total estimate of around $186 billion in improper payments – or payments that should not have been made or that were made in incorrect amounts – across 64 programs, an increase of $24 billion from the prior fiscal year. Most of these improper payments were a result of overpayments.
In fact, the GAO estimates that federal agencies have made about $3 TRILLION in improper payments since 2003, which is likely a low number since not all federal agencies report improper payment data. Medicare, Medicaid, the Earned Income Tax Credit and SNAP are consistently the worst offenders.
SAY WHAT? 3 TRILLION DOLLARS? Is this a joke? And the Chinese and Japanese governments say, “Thank you, America!”
Unfortunately, bad management is not a one-off in our federal government. It’s the modus operandi for practically every single agency and department, and it’s been happening for decades. To demonstrate just how long this has been going on, let’s go back in time 14 years to FY2012, because it’s one of the craziest examples.
In FY2012, there were at least 92 federal programs designed to help lower-income Americans, for a combined cost of $799 billion to the American taxpayer. This included 28 education and job-training programs ($94.4 billion), 17 different food-aid programs ($105 billion), and over 22 various housing programs ($49.6 billion). There were seven federal agencies involved in “Education and Job Training” and seven involved in the category called “Social Services.”
There are many glaring red flags in that last paragraph, but the most egregious is that is shows just how incredibly inefficiently the federal government does things. Inefficient is not even the right word – we need an entirely new word for what this is. Seven separate agencies administering 28 separate employment and training programs? This is beyond absurd. It is imperative that we reorganize this mess and use our resources more effectively. The overlap alone is wasting so, so, so much money.
Then there’s the outright fraud. On March 27, 2020, President Trump signed into law the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (CARES Act), unleashing the largest flood of federal money into the American economy in U.S. history. The nonpartisan think tank Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget says that, as of July 2026 we had spent over $11 trillion in in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic and economic crisis – Federal Reserve ($4.7 trillion), legislative actions ($5.9 trillion); and administrative actions ($875 billion).
Because it’s the federal government, there were basic bookkeeping errors, naturally – like when the Government Accountability Office (GAO) found that stimulus payments were sent to nearly 1.1 million dead people, a mistake that totaled $1.4 billion – but the fraud associated with this money is epic.
In September 2023, the GAO issued a report that estimated between 100 billion and 135 billion dollars – or 11-15 percent of the total amount of unemployment insurance benefits given to Americans during the pandemic – was fraudulently obtained.
A follow-up GAO report in April 2025 acknowledged that “the full extent of fraud within the pandemic-relief programs will never be known with certainty. The scope of the pandemic-relief response; the inherently deceptive nature of fraudulent activities; and the resources needed for detection, investigation, and prosecution of fraud make it difficult to measure. However, estimates indicate hundreds of billions of dollars in potentially fraudulent payments were disbursed.”
“In reviewing Department of Justice (DOJ) case documentation, GAO identified different types of fraud schemes and fraudsters who defrauded at least 19 different pandemic-relief programs. In addition to more traditional and organized criminal groups, entities in a wide variety of sectors, and individuals from all walks of life, defrauded these programs.”