The Welfare Case Story

I sat and read through this Swedish article this morning on Nyheteridag's news page.

So this guy comes up to the police and says there's welfare fraud going on.  The cops are obligated to investigate.

What they find is that there's this Iraqi-converted-to-Swedish citizenship (2015, four years ago) that got himself onto Swedish welfare.  Note, it's for both himself and the wife.  It's for a sum around $950 to $1000 in Kroner.

The suspect?  Well, he's the Defense Minister of Iraq (currently), and resides mostly all year-round in Iraq....showing up in Sweden when necessary to prove he's still unemployed and living there.....then returns to his 'day-job' in Iraq.

For the cops, there's some legal problems here.  First, by Swedish law....every time you move....you have to go to the city-hall and note the new address.  So he hasn't done this since 2015.  His income there in Iraq?  It's not being reported, and that's another legal problem.

The apartment provided to the welfare couple?  Well, that got brought up....he's sub-leased it onto someone else.  So he's making income off that welfare situation as well. 

What'll happen?  No one says much from the news site. My guess is that the cops will hand the evidence to the local prosecutor and he'll have to stage some type of court situation....requiring the Iraqi guy to show up.  My guess is that the Iraqi guy and his wife will refuse to show up in Sweden.  Then quietly, the welfare payments will stop, and the payment for the apartment rental will close out. 

The end?  Well, maybe....except you notice that this guy's kids are also in Sweden, and you kinda wonder if they are welfare as well, or just attending the university there.

No jail time?  Typically, if you were Swedish.....conducting welfare fraud....well over a year or two, you'd be doing some type of jail-time (maybe just a few months).  But if he doesn't show up to court, they really can't proceed on. 

So this brings me to the obvious question.....how many more fake welfare cases like this exist in Sweden?  A hundred?  A thousand?  You just don't know.  We might all agree that it might be smart to stage a 24-hour period for every single welfare case in Sweden to show up with a 12-hour warning (on a Monday). The odds of this?  Zero. 

But here's the thing....as long as you have a tax revenue bucket overflowing.....you really don't care about strict rules or enforcing them.