Saturday, February 4, 2012

Millionaires With Benefits

In case you missed it, Senator Tom Coburn and his recent report Subsidies of the Rich and Famous premium members, got a call out in President Obama's recent State of the Union address – "And my Republican friend Tom Coburn is right: Washington should stop subsidizing millionaires. In fact, if you're earning a million dollars a year, you shouldn't get special tax subsidies or deductions" (see An America Built to Last premium members).

In case you missed it, Senator Coburn and his staff put together a report about the use of public benefits by millionaires – a report that concluded that from 2004 through 2010 the United States government gave an annual average of $1.6 billion worth of benefits to millionaires (see 'Subsidies of the Rich & Famous' – Millionaire Earners Receive Billions in Federal Benefits premium members).

You may wonder as I did if this is significant or a rounding error. Here's what our team at OPEN MINDS found doing some quick math estimates.

• Social Security Retirement Benefits to millionaires from 2004-2009: $9 billion. (This is 0.26% of the : $3.446 trillion of total benefits paid by Social Security during the same period)

• Unemployment Insurance to millionaires from 2005-2009: $74 million. (This is 0.03% of the $219.486 billion paid during the same period)

• Farm Program Payments to millionaires from 2003-2009: $316 million. (This is .16% of the $200.1 billion paid during the same period)

• Conservation Program Payments to millionaires from 2009-2010: $89 million. (0.9% of the : $9.6 billion paid during the same period)

• Disaster Housing Payments to millionaires from 2007-2010: $7.5 million. (0.03% of the $25.93 billion paid during the same period)

The question of how significant these payments to "millionaires" are (and whether these benefits should be means tested) will be an increasingly contentious issue as we look at bringing our health and human service spending in line with our budget. With the state of Pennsylvania proposing to limit access to food stamps (see Pennsylvania Department of Public Welfare Proposes New Asset Test Limits for SNAP), expect Senator Coburn's report to get more traction in the days ahead.

Sincerely,
Monica E. Oss
Chief Executive Officer, OPEN MINDS

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