The Department of Labor Office of Inspector General
Summary
Congress funded DOL-OIG at $97.4 million and 301 people in fiscal year 2025 -- about 28 cents per U.S. resident -- for the office whose investigators closed 133 cases and reported $810.4 million in fines, recoveries, and restitution in just the six months ending March 2026, while flagging another $912 million tied to pandemic unemployment fraud still unrecovered -- $720 million of it sitting untouched on dormant prepaid cards, the rest already moved to state unclaimed-property offices.
What is this organization?
What does it do?
In the six months ending March 31, 2026, - investigators closed 133 cases⧉ -- 118 program fraud (chiefly unemployment insurance and workers' compensation), 15 labor racketeering -- opened 71 new cases, and produced 131 indictments and 191 convictions. Its Office of Audit issued 8 audit and other reports⧉, yielding 3 recommendations and $8,436,366 in questioned costs. The period's marquee finding: after analyzing 6.5 million prepaid UI debit cards, investigators identified $912 million tied to pandemic-era fraud still unrecovered -- $720 million on dormant cards, $192 million already moved to state unclaimed-property offices.
What does it cost to run — money and people?
Congress enacted $97.4 million in total budget authority for DOL-OIG in fiscal year 2025⧉, funding 301 full-time staff -- a $91.2 million direct appropriation plus $5.8 million from the Unemployment Trust Fund and $373,000 from the Black Lung Disability Trust Fund. For FY2026 the requested $91.4 million and 290 FTE⧉, a cut of $6 million and 11 positions. Against the Census Bureau's 341.8 million U.S. residents⧉, FY2025's budget works out to about 28 cents per resident.
View data as table
| Labor Racketeering | 527,885,918 | 10 indictments, 18 convictions |
|---|---|---|
| Program Fraud | 282,508,387 | 121 indictments, 173 convictions |
Why is it good for society?
-'s own six-month numbers make the case: $810.4 million in fines, recoveries, and restitution⧉ -- $282.5 million from program fraud, $527.9 million from labor racketeering -- against a full fiscal year's $97.4 million budget. It is also structured to find money nobody else is looking for: its own prepaid-card analysis is what surfaced $912 million tied to stolen pandemic UI benefits, $720 million of it still sitting untouched on unused cards. Absent that independent arm, the counterfactual isn't zero fraud -- it's fraud nobody goes looking for.
- -'s six months of monetary accomplishments ($810.4M) already run about 8x its full fiscal year's enacted budget ($97.4M) -- and that excludes the $912M tied to pandemic UI fraud its investigators flagged but haven't yet recovered ($720M still on dormant cards, $192M already moved to states).
- Congress's FY2026 request cuts - by $6 million and 11 from FY2025's enacted level, even as its own report warns that pandemic-fraud statutes of limitations are beginning to expire.
Your handles.* Report suspected fraud, waste, or abuse in a program, or misconduct by a employee or contractor -- anonymously if you choose -- through -'s Hotline complaint form⧉. For press inquiries, testimony requests, or other official contact with the office, use DOL-OIG's Contact page.
Sources(6) ▾
- U.S. Department of Labor, Office of Inspector General, Semiannual Report to Congress, Volume 95 (October 1, 2025 – March 31, 2026) (2026-05-29) — -'s own statutorily required semiannual report to Congress (Inspector General Act of 1978, Sec. 5), covering the six months ending March 31, 2026 -- source for this entry's workload counts (cases closed/opened, indictments, convictions), audit statistics, monetary accomplishments, and the prepaid-UI-card fraud finding. oig.dol.gov · original document
- U.S. Department of Labor, FY 2026 Congressional Budget Justification: Office of Inspector General (CBJ-2026-V3-04) (2025-05) — 's own FY2026 congressional budget justification for -- the 'Summary Budget Authority and by Activity' and 'Amounts Available for Obligation' tables give the FY2025 Enacted budget authority and (this entry's KPI source) alongside the FY2026 Request for comparison. Direct dol.gov fetch returns HTTP 403 to automated clients; the Wayback capture above is the one-click original-document link. dol.gov · original document
- U.S. Department of Labor, Office of Inspector General, About OIG (2026-07-02) — -'s own charter page: cites the Inspector General Act of 1978 as its authorizing legislation and describes the Inspector General's statutory independence from the Secretary (personnel, procurement, legal counsel, unfettered records access). Direct oig.dol.gov fetch of this page returns HTTP 403 to automated clients; the Wayback capture (2026-07-02, close to the 2026-07-16 access date) is the one-click original-document link. oig.dol.gov · original document
- U.S. Department of Labor, The Labor Department in the Carter Administration: A Summary Report — Office of Inspector General (OIG) (1981-01-14) — 's own official 'History' page, hosting then-Secretary Ray Marshall's January 1981 summary report to the incoming administration -- states - was created in October 1978 and describes its formation from the prior Office of Special Investigations following passage of the Inspector General Act. Direct dol.gov fetch returns HTTP 403 to automated clients; the Wayback capture above is the one-click original-document link. dol.gov · original document
- U.S. Census Bureau, U.S. Population Growth Slows Due to Historic Decline in Net International Migration (Vintage 2025 national population estimate) (2026-01-27) — The Census Bureau's own Vintage 2025 national population estimate release, giving the U.S. resident population as of July 1, 2025 -- the per-resident denominator for this entry's cost-per-person KPI, per better_metrics.md's sourced-denominator discipline. Same document already sealed in the Artemis index (used by the good-citizen-gao entry); reused here with its existing sealed capture. census.gov · original document
- U.S. Department of Labor, Office of Inspector General, OIG Hotline (2026-06-30) — -'s own fraud/waste/abuse reporting form and instructions -- source for this entry's 'Your handles' block. Confirms the hotline's statutory basis (Inspector General Act of 1978) and scope ( program fraud, labor racketeering, employee misconduct). oig.dol.gov · original document
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The Department of Labor Office of Inspector General was created in October 1978 under the Inspector General Act of 1978⧉, which established independent inspectors general across cabinet agencies to police fraud, waste, and abuse in the government's own programs. Per DOL-OIG's charter⧉, the Act keeps its audits and investigations outside the Secretary's control -- the Secretary cannot interfere, and the holds its own hiring, procurement, and legal-counsel authority. It answers to Congress and the President, not the department it watches.