According to the federal government's inspectors general, those agencies which lose or waste more than $1 billion a year form quite a club.

• Medicare heads the list for squandering $20.3 billion in 1997.

• Roughly $4.4 billion was paid out in false earned-income tax credit claims in the 1994 fiscal year.

• The Supplemental Security Income program has lost $5.5 billion over the years -- while the Food Stamp program shelled out $1.4 billion in overpayments in 1997, mostly to prisoners and the deceased.

• Last year, the first consolidated federal financial audit revealed that bureaucrats couldn't account for more than $100 billion in taxpayer money.

Critics contend the problem will only be solved when government agencies get less money, or better still, when unnecessary programs are eliminated altogether.

Source: Editorial, "Fighting Waste With an Ax," Investor's Business Daily, February 19, 1999.