Not that we needed any additional evidence that the government wastes money in truly spectacular fashion, but this story from the Detroit Free Press is especially disgusting and outrageous.
A man who won $2 million on a Michigan lottery show has told a TV station that he still uses food stamps. Leroy Fick of Bay County admitted he still swipes the electronic card at stores, nearly a year after winning a jackpot on “Make Me Rich!” He told WNEM-TV in Saginaw that more than half the prize went to taxes. Fick says the Department of Human Services told him he could continue to use the card, which is paid with tax dollars. He told WNEM: “If you’re going to … try to make me feel bad, you aren’t going to do it.” The TV station says people have seen Fick driving a new Audi convertible.
Normally I fell sorry for people who have 50 percent of their money confiscated by the tax authorities, but in this case I’ll make an exception.
The real lesson is that the federal government should get out of the redistribution business. State and local governments are far less likely to be this profligate. And if they do waste money, migration is a feedback mechanism that will penalize them for excessive handouts.
(h/t: Amanda Carpenter)
