GAO Report Finds That Medicaid Providers Have $791 Million In Unpaid Federal Taxes
- August 16, 2012 by Qui Tam
- Federal False Claims Act, Healthcare
The U.S. Government Accountability Office issued a report stating that 7,000 Medicaid providers in three states had approximately $791 million in unpaid federal taxes from 2009 and earlier. Medicaid providers from Florida, New York, and Texas received approximately $6.6 billion in Medicaid reimbursements during 2009 as a result of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. However, the report notes that the amount of unpaid federal taxes identified by the GAO is likely understated because IRS taxpayer data only reflects the amount of unpaid taxes either reported on a tax return or assessed by the IRS through enforcement, but does not include entities that did not file tax returns or underreported income.
The GAO report is based on a review of 40 Medicaid providers and determined that they received $235 million in Medicaid reimbursements in 2009, but had unpaid federal taxes of approximately $26 million through 2010. The amount of unpaid federal taxes for each provider ranged from $100,000 to over $6 million.
For more information, please see:
http://www.gao.gov/assets/600/593095.pdf