Fraud By The Numbers Series

  • Fraud By The Numbers 2023 – Sept. 10

    The SEC says fighting fraud is its number one strategic goal in the Commission’s FY 24 Congressional Budget Justification and FY 22 Performance, Report, page 7. We try to examine if their resources match the mission. Despite the progress made by the SEC Whistleblower Program and efforts by the Commission in general, not nearly as…

  • Fraud By The Numbers 2023 – Sept. 9

    There has long been concern that kickbacks sway healthcare providers to make decisions based on personal greed, as opposed to patient need. But for years, healthcare providers have argued that even illegal payments from outside sources have no material impact on their medical decision-making. Some courts believed these arguments and dismissed cases alleging illegal kickbacks…

  • Fraud By The Numbers 2023 – Sept. 8

    Private equity investment in the healthcare space continues at a breakneck pace, resulting in profit-driven corporations living in the shadows of medical offices and hospitals around the country. As we reported last year, estimates of private equity deals in the healthcare space nearly tripled in value—from $43 billion to $124 billion—between 2010 and 2019. According…

  • Fraud By The Numbers 2023 – Sept. 7

    Last year during Fraud by the Numbers, we discussed the huge surge in telehealth usage during the COVID-19 pandemic. Medicare telehealth services skyrocketed from 840,000 provided in 2019, to 52.7 million provided from March 2020 to February 2021. Though we have moved past the COVID-19 pandemic shutdowns and returned to more regular in-person visits, ,…

  • Fraud By The Numbers 2023 – Sept. 6

    Climate change continues hurtling towards us nonstop, causing wildfires in Canada and Maui and record heat everywhere. But the federal government is pushing back. During the last two years, Congress and the President have passed three laws designed to boost infrastructure spending, bring chip manufacturing onshore, and hasten the transition to green energy sources. The…

  • Fraud By The Numbers 2023 – Sept. 5

    The federal government is the largest purchaser of goods and services in the world. With big spending bills such as the American Rescue Plan ($1.9 trillion) and Inflation Reduction Act ($369 billion) dominating the headlines, state government spending is sometimes overlooked. But state governments are economic powerhouses in their own right, and state spending is…

  • Fraud By The Numbers 2023 – Sept. 4

    The False Claims Act dates back to the Civil War. Since then, states have added their own laws and the federal government has created other programs—for instance, to encourage reporting of SEC violations, financial fraud, and tax fraud. The success of all of these efforts to enforce regulations and stop fraud, waste, and abuse depends…

  • Fraud By The Numbers 2023 – Sept. 3

    The good news is that pandemic-related supply chain constraints are easing and car sales are picking up. Not only is the fleet growing, it is diversifying, adding engine types (including hybrids and electric) and dropping drivers. With all this production, sales, and experimentation, it is reasonable to expect safety issues to arise.   Precisely because of…

  • Fraud By The Numbers 2023 – Sept. 2

    Every year, the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) releases its annual statistics on settlements and judgments under the False Claims Act. Behind these statistics are the hundreds of brave whistleblowers who have risked their careers and reputations to report fraud on the government—and who depend on the DOJ to investigate their allegations and prosecute…

  • Fraud By The Numbers 2023 – Sept. 1

    The Security and Exchange Commission and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission Whistleblower Programs: More awards, more money recovered, more money returned to investors and more disclosures of fraud—It’s not an accident Today we begin our annual Fraud by the Numbers series with a look at the results obtained by the SEC and CFTC whistleblower programs.…