The shocking truth about how state governments and their private
industry partners are profiting from the social programs meant to
support disadvantaged Americans
Government
aid doesn't always go where it's supposed to. Foster care agencies
team up with companies to take disability and survivor benefits from
abused and neglected children. States and their revenue consultants
use illusory schemes to siphon Medicaid funds intended for children
and the poor into general state coffers. Child support payments for
foster children and families on public assistance are converted into
government revenue. And the poverty industry keeps expanding, leaving
us with nursing homes and juvenile detention centers that sedate
residents to reduce costs and maximize profit, local governments
buying nursing homes to take the facilities' federal aid while the
elderly languish with poor care, and counties hiring companies to
mine the poor for additional funds in modern day debtor's prisons.
In
The Poverty Industry, Daniel L. Hatcher shows us how state
governments and their private industry partners are profiting from
the social safety net, turning America's most vulnerable populations
into sources of revenue. The poverty industry is stealing billions in
federal aid and other funds from impoverished families, abused and
neglected children, and the disabled and elderly poor. As policy
experts across the political spectrum debate how to best structure
government assistance programs, a massive siphoning of the safety net
is occurring behind the scenes. In the face of these abuses of power,
Hatcher offers a road map for reforms to realign the practices of
human service agencies with their intended purpose and to prevent the
misuse of public taxpayer dollars.
With
more Americans than ever before seeking unemployment benefits, it is
essential to remedy the nefarious practices that will impede them
from receiving the full government support they are due. The
Poverty Industry shows us the path to rectify this systemic
inequality to ensure that government aid truly gets to those in need.