COVID-19 programs to help families and businesses stay afloat inadvertently diverted hundreds of billions to scammers who spent thousands on wish-list items like luxury cars and plastic surgery.

The actual amount of pandemic-related fraud, however, is unknown not only to us but also to the federal government. What’s more, the amount that the federal government has recouped makes up a scant 0.47% of the government’s fraud guestimate.

The difficulty of recouping these ill-gotten gains makes it even more critical that government programs are designed with far better guardrails in place. Scrutiny on the front end, even at some added investment, is imperative; the Covid era demonstrated that once money has left public coffers, it’s incredibly challenging to recover all or even much of it.

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