“A MILCH COW with 125 million teats” is how H.L. Mencken once described the United States government, but that was 70 years and 165 million teats ago. And anyway, I think he might have been wrong. Back in Mencken’s day it was still possible to imagine an American citizen who had not yet affixed himself to his own personal bureaucratic mammilla–some man or woman, somewhere, whom the government had not yet uplifted or improved or beguiled or pacified by means of a subsidy, a tax break, or an all-out, full-dress federal program. After the New Deal, however, not to mention the Fair Deal, the New Frontier, the Great Society, the New Federalism, Putting People First, Pragmatic Idealism, the Empowerment Society, and Compassionate Conservatism, it is simply impossible to imagine such a person.
If you don’t agree with me, I suggest you try the little experiment that I tried myself last week, in honor of Tax Day, April 15. This is the second year in a row I’ve tried my experiment. I worry it’s getting to be a bad habit. Having just posted my taxes, and feeling tired, woebegone, and cranky as hell, I got on the computer and signed on to www.govbenefits.gov, an Internet service provided by your federal government. According to its press releases, govbenefits provides Americans with “a one-stop shop to find out whether they’re eligible for government benefits. . . . Whether it’s a direct payment, a loan, insurance, training or other service–there may be government benefit programs available to help.”
Having undergone an upgrade earlier this year, govbenefits looked different from the last time I visited it–there’s a bit more color in the interface, a livelier clickability, a cheerier tone all around. But its essence is unchanged. Govbenefits.gov was conceived as part of “egov,” a government-wide initiative, begun two years ago, whose purpose is to hasten the arrival of the digitized Utopia by applying the marvels of the Internet to the functions of government. It sounds a little Al Gorish, but the Bush administration has pursued egov with gusto. And since the primary function of government, as currently understood, is to give as much stuff away for free as expensively as possible, govbenefits was quite naturally the first of the egov initiatives to get up and running.
And it’s been a huge success. Since its launch in late 2002, more than 8 million eager citizens have paid a visit. In the beginning, govbenefits.gov listed only 55 benefit programs offered by the federal government–mere chicken feed (literally: some of the benefit programs were designed for poultry farmers). Today, it lists more than 420 federal programs and has begun incorporating state benefit programs into its service as well. Pretty soon, if it keeps going like this, there won’t be anything you won’t be able to get on govbenefits.gov. Which is the whole idea.
“There’s a total universe of more than 1,500 federal benefit programs out there,” the site’s administrator, Denis Gusty, told me when I spoke to him last year. “Those programs, in total”–here Gusty paused, and I heard a sharp intake of breath–“well, we’re looking at a total of 2.1 trillion in benefit dollars.”
In answer to the question, Who is eligible for all this government money? the website answers, in effect: Who isn’t? You may already be a winner–in fact, you almost certainly are. Govbenefits can tell you what you’ve won.
The opening screen invites you to fill out a questionnaire; the number of questions ranges from 23 to more than a hundred, depending on the answers you give. The screen also offers a master list of the benefits available–as a way of getting the folks into the tent, as they say on the Midway. The list offers programs for the very young (Early Head Start Program) and for the very old (Geriatric Academic Career Award); for the very smart (National Gallery for America’s Young Inventors) and the not-so-smart (Vocational Education Basic Grants); for the merely unlucky (National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program) and for the extremely unlucky (Assistance to Torture Victims). There are programs for those who till the earth (Farm Storage Facility Loans), for those who labor beneath it (Coal Mine Workers’ Compensation), and for those who sail its seas (Fishermen’s Guaranty Fund); for those who want kids (Adoption Assistance Program) and for those who don’t know what to do with the kids they already have (Child Care Resource and Referral Services).
There are programs for you, whoever you are, and programs for me. I’ve never been a wealthy fellow, but I’m comfortably middle-class, and I’ve been working, if you call this working, pretty steadily for many years. So when I first filled out the govbenefits questionnaire last year, I wasn’t optimistic. I gave my age, sex, and annual income, listed my previous jobs by category, enumerated my children, admitted I was not qualified to practice geriatric medicine, grudgingly acknowledged the number of graduate schools I’ve attended but never graduated from, and answered “no” when I was asked whether I suffered from hemophilia (“Only on Tax Day,” I mumbled to myself, making a little joke).
As it happens, when I finished the questionnaire last year and hit SUBMIT, govbenefits told me–in a flash–that I might be eligible for 47 different benefit programs. This year, with another 12 months of Compassionate Conservatism under our belts, I was told I might qualify for 53! There seems no end to the amount of help the federal government might offer me that I don’t need. The Ferguson Fifty-three, as I call my programs, are remarkable for their variety. Among them are a Poison Control Emergency Services Cooperative Agreement, a Wildlife Habitat Incentives Program, a Dental Expenses Tax Credit, plus a National Heritage Fellowship. There’s a Literature Fellowship waiting for me, too, apparently, or perhaps even Family Violence Prevention Services (Norman Mailer qualifies for both). I might lay hands on no fewer than 12 kinds of mortgage insurance. And Bioinformatics Research Grants. And American Jazz Masters Fellowships. And Cultural Exchange Programs in the Performing Arts. Maybe I could be a ballerina.
Gusty told me last year that the govbenefits site lacked one crucial element, and when I visited last week it still wasn’t there–a click-through service that would allow the benefit-hungry citizen to gain access to his benefits directly from the website. Someday it may offer features even more precisely tailored to fit the individual citizen. Imagine a 24/7 click-through to your own personal government employee, who could come to your house and deliver your benefits directly, and maybe give the dog a bath, and mix you a drink if you’re feeling blue.
I kid. I like govbenefits.gov, and will probably go back again next year. It offers a different kind of experience for those left woebegone by April 15. All day, all around, if you listen closely to casual encounters or tune in to radio chit-chat, you hear people bitching: about taxes, about Big Government, about the special interests that are eating us alive with their insatiable appetites. Govbenefits offers a different sound entirely. Come, it says. Come and suckle. Hear your milch cow let out its long, mellow moo of pleasure.
Andrew Ferguson is a senior editor at The Weekly Standard.
