According to the DOL's 2004 figures for participation in SCSEP among all 13 nonprofit groups that administer it, 36 percent of its 93,000 participants transitioned from the program into permanent jobs.
O'REILLY: Why -- why is the government giving the AARP money?
CARLISLE: Well, it's coming from five different federal agencies, but the biggest one is a $75 million grant from the Department of Labor to fund a program that's supposed to train low-income senior citizens for gainful employment. In reality, it is not a job-training program. It is a welfare program masquerading as job training.
O'REILLY: So you're accusing the AARP of not training senior citizens, low-income senior citizens? Is that what you're doing?
CARLISLE: Yes, the program has been around -- it's called the Senior Community Service Employment Program. It's been around since the 1960s. It spends over $440 million a year. And the way it works is that the Department of Labor will give most of the money to groups like the AARP and other nonprofits to supervise, to manage the program. The problem is that it has a very poor track record in actually placing seniors in meaningful jobs.
O'REILLY: Can you give me a stat on it? I mean, all right, we're getting $75 million from the federal government. How many senior citizens are they putting in jobs?
CARLISLE: They claim they have a 20-percent placement rate, but based upon what we're finding out is that in many cases, this placement rate is very low. For instance, the state of Minnesota --
O'REILLY: Twenty percent is low. If you're only placing one out of five people you're training for $75 million, that's low.
CARLISLE: Yes, and that's actually double what the Department of Labor requires. What we're finding out that when they are placed in jobs, oftentimes it's in a rather meaningless -- meaningless jobs in public agencies and so forth.
O'REILLY: So in your opinion, sir, it's a boondoggle?
CARLISLE: Yes, it's another wasteful program which should be abolished.