Imagine shirking duties at work (or embezzling funds from your employer) and still keeping your job. Apparently, federal contractors have enjoyed that bizarre privilege for years -- at the expense of us taxpayers.
Wednesday, a House subcommittee held a hearing on Wackenhut, Bechtel, and other contractors that have received new federal contracts "despite shoddy work, cost overruns and fraud." (New York Times) Transcripts haven't been published yet, so I don't know what happened at the hearing.
I do know that contractor fraud and abuse are not new issues. During the civil war, contractors reportedly billed the Union Army for dead mules and sold gunpowder cut with sawdust (among other things). In 1985, the Defense Department reported that 45 of the largest 100 defense contractors were under investigation for multiple fraud offenses. In the 1990s, Clinton's Justice Department ramped up prosecution of contractor-fraud cases. And yet, we still facing problems with contractors a decade later.
A recent GAO report stated that federal agencies can stop errant contractors from getting new contracts, but agencies haven't been effectively monitoring contractors. Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-NY) recently reintroduced a bill that would help improve monitoring.
Given that we've spent hundreds of billions of dollars on contractors over the last six years, the big question is: why didn't officials act sooner to stop contractor abuses and fraud? For examples of alleged fraud and abuse, see:
* DoD Rewarding Bad Contractor Performance (BNPolitics)
* About the $592 million Embassy Embarrassment in Iraq (WaPo & BNPolitics)
* Gov. Contractors Driving up War's Costs (BNPolitics)
* Contractor-Misconduct Database (Project on Government Oversight)
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