Government Spending Archives - Page 4 of 27

Debt Deal Eliminates Graduate School Loan Subsidies

USA Today: A federal subsidy that aids graduate students would be eliminated to boost funding for Pell grants that help low-income undergraduates, under the compromise debt-ceiling bill moving through Congress. That trade-off is one of the few program changes specified in the bill.

The maximum Pell grant of $5,550 would be preserved for an estimated 9 million undergraduates, according to the White House.

To pay for that, graduate students who get federally subsidized loans would see the interest on those loans begin to accrue while they’re still in school, beginning July 1 next year. Currently, that interest doesn’t begin accruing until the students graduate. That saves lots of money for doctoral candidates, medical school students, law students and others in long-term graduate programs.

Feds Apparently Unaware of Economic Crisis – Continued Hiring, Never Firing

The Washington Examiner: A new analysis of federal workforce data shows that even in this time of retrenchment and downsizing, the federal government almost never fires or lays off workers. In fact, in many corners of the federal government, it is virtually impossible for an employee to be fired. “Federal employees’ job security is so great that workers in many agencies are more likely to die of natural causes than get laid off or fired,” writes USA Today, which conducted the survey.

The paper reports the federal government “fired 0.55% of its workers in the budget year that ended September 30.” For the private sector, the figure is about 3%. And for some parts of the federal workforce, the firing rate was even lower. For example, USA Today found that federal workers in the Washington, DC area have 99.74% job security. Some agencies, like the Federal Communications Commission and the Federal Trade Commission, did not fire or lay off anyone in the last year.

U.S. Has Enough Revenue To Send Out Social Security Checks Despite Obama’s Claim

The Washington Examiner: President Obama told CBS News today that he “cannot guarantee that those

[Social Security] checks go out on August 3rd if we haven’t resolved this issue. Because there may simply not be the money in the coffers to do it.”

But wait just a minute. If Washington receives about $200 billion in monthly revenues and sends out roughly $50 billion worth of Social Security checks and the same amount of Medicare payments, why is Obama claiming the checks may not go out?

Isn’t $200 billion minus $100 billion still $100 billion?

EPA Funds Groups Who Sue

Hot Air: The EPA gets sued on a regular basis by environmental groups complaining about a lack of enforcement, a process that routinely requires legal settlements and significant taxpayer expense. Investors Business Daily’s report today suggests that taxpayers may be funding more of the process than they know. Among the recipients of grants from the EPA are some of the same groups it faces in courtrooms…

How Social Security Payments Have Already Been Cut

Yahoo! Finance: Policy experts have focused on alternative ways of eliminating Social Security’s 75-year financing gap, but lost in the debate is the fact that even under current law Social Security will provide less retirement income relative to previous earnings than it does today. Combine the already legislated reductions with potential cuts to close the financing gap, and Social Security may no longer be the mainstay of the retirement system for many people.