Josh Gay
👤 SpeakerAppearances Over Time
Podcast Appearances
It was the centerpiece of his entire fraud investigation there.
It was a big gotcha moment.
It was the thing he built his whole case around.
But there was a problem.
The reason it was unheard of is it literally never happened.
The number was completely wrong.
The Fiscal Policy Institute caught it.
It was just a basic math error, essentially moving decimals the wrong way.
Not some complex statistical modeling disagreement.
Not a difference in methodology.
Just a math error.
The kind of thing that a calculator could have fixed.
The kind of thing that if a fourth grader turned it in, the teacher would write in red pen, check your work.
We are so not a serious country now.
I mean, there's analysts out there that are saying that the numbers could have been cleared up in a phone call.
One phone call, call it up and go, hey, is it really 5 million?
Nope.
Oh, okay, thanks, we'll fix it.
It's all it would have taken.
But they didn't make the call because the point isn't accuracy.