Finance
NASA spends millions to fly first and business class with little oversight
NASA officials say they’re working to resolve “widespread” errors in travel disclosures dating back to at least 2009, according to a report from Scripps News. Problems range from lax oversight – some NASA travelers booked upgrades costing thousands of dollars – to missing or error-riddled reports. The federal agency is required each year to disclose all upgraded…
Read MoreExtra Extra Monday: Secret settlements, data breaches and university lobbyists
Mizzou did not pursue alleged assault | ESPNThe University of Missouri did not investigate or tell law enforcement officials about an alleged rape, possibly by one or more members of its football team, despite administrators finding out about the alleged 2010 incident more than a year ago, an “Outside the Lines” investigation has found. The…
Read MoreUnaccountable: The high cost of the Pentagon’s bad bookkeeping
For two decades, the U.S. military has been unable to submit to an audit, flouting federal law and concealing waste and fraud totaling billions of dollars, a Reuters investigation found. At the DFAS offices that handle accounting for the Army, Navy, Air Force and other defense agencies, fudging the accounts with false entries is standard operating procedure,…
Read MoreThe Scholars Who Shill for Wall Street
“Academics get paid by financial firms to testify against Dodd-Frank regulations. What’s wrong with this picture?”
Read More$1,100 an hour? Part-time service at little agencies means big bucks and benefits for politicians
“Even the elected officials who benefit were surprised by the hefty hourly rates, which this newspaper calculated through an analysis of government meeting minutes and the Bay Area News Group’s public salary database.”
Read MoreFacing Foreclosure: Oklahoma’s mortgage settlement program benefits attorneys
“So far, the largest financial beneficiary of Oklahoma’s mortgage settlement program is a young attorney who used a system of vouchers and possibly a family connection to acquire dozens of clients.”
Read MoreN.Y. tax checkoff funds for cancer research sit idle
Since 2005, New York taxpayers have donated $1.8 million through their income tax returns to aid the fight against prostate cancer, but researchers have yet to see a dime.
Read More15 Years Later, Where Did All The Cigarette Money Go?
Fifteen years after tobacco companies agreed to pay billions of dollars in fines in what is still the largest civil litigation settlement in U.S. history, it’s unclear how state governments are using much of that money.
Read MoreSome N.J. private schools for disabled students cashing in on taxpayers
A two-month Star-Ledger investigation found Somerset Hills and schools like it operate in a twilight zone of the state education system, under a unique set of rules that allows them to spend taxpayer money in ways few would tolerate of public schools.
Read MoreStimulus Funds Paid For Trees For Wealthy Homeowners
“Stimulus funds aimed at jump starting the economy paid for about 4,000 trees in Denver, with many ending up at million dollar homes in Denver’s priciest neighborhoods where residents acknowledge they could have paid for their own trees, but the government was giving them out for free, so why bother?”
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