'Corporate Welfare' Costs Taxpayers Almost $100 Billion in FY 2012, Cato Report Finds

Subsidies to businesses in the federal budget in Fiscal Year 2012 cost taxpayers almost $100 billion, according to a new report from the Cato Institute. “That includes direct and indirect subsidies to small businesses, large corporations, and industry organizations,” the libertarian think-tank said in its latest policy analysis. The subsidies are handed out from programs in many federal departments, including the departments of Agriculture, Commerce, Energy, and Housing and Urban Development, the report noted. According to Cato, the most spending on “corporate welfare” programs in the federal budget -- more than $25 billion -- went to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. A majority of the department’s farm subsidies go to the largest farms, the report noted. The Department of Energy is responsible for nearly $18 billion in corporate welfare in FY 2012. Other programs to make the list: the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD)’s Community Development Block Grant program ($285 million); the Commerce Department’s Broadband Technology Opportunities Program ($2.2 billion); attempts by Transportation Department policymakers to develop a high-speed rail network ($1.2 billion) and the Interior Department’s Bureau of Land Management ($1.4 billion) land-use programs...more