Howto Game the System

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I heard something this weekend that I thought was kinda interesting...

I actually know someone who lost their job in the last year (who doesn't?! lol) Let's call him by a fictitious name, say Bob...

Bob's wife isn't in very good health... Bob was attempting to get unemployment but had not yet secured it... During that process his wife had filed for social security disability...

As it turns out Bob's wife did qualify for social security disability...

Then Bob's unemployment insurance came through...

The fact that Bob began receiving unemployment insurance disqualified his wife for disability due to income restraints!

So here you have a guy who lost his job with a disabled wife, as defined by the government of the United States, whose wife is then penalized for her husband drawing unemployment insurance after losing his job...

So this particular couple ran into another family member who explained to them what some people have been doing to remedy their own situation...

It seems there are people out there, in this situation, who simply file for divorce... In that way they can receive both the unemployment check from the government and also disability &/or welfare... While continuing to live together as a couple...

My observation is that the government itself is encouraging this behavior by having so much complexity and so many contradictory regulations that it's impossible to sort it all out...

My question is... Is this fraud? And if so how?

There is no law against living with someone that you have just divorced, as far as I know... Hell I guess you could go find 6 or 8 disabled people to live with if you wanted... I don't see how it would be illegal to do so...

For decades now we have had citizens who get every child in their family on disability if at all possible... If you have 4 or 5 kids all drawing a monthly check from the government plus food stamps you can actually generate a pretty nice income stream...

There are uncountable ways to game the entitlement state in the United States of America... If you don't believe me just ask the illegal aliens in our country...

I wonder how many people may be to the point of 'if you can't beat them... join them'?

Politicians 'talk' about getting our financial house in order in the United States but the fact is we are nearly as much of a socialist entitlement state as is Greece... And just about as broke...

And I don't see that changing any time soon...

I dare the government here to even talk about attempting to cut union wages or reduce the unionized work force... Talk about violence in the streets...

By the way, Bob and his wife are still married and plan to stay that way ;)

Greg