It’s attractive enough to have lured private equity money:
Three years ago, the I.R.S. began offering bigger rewards — 15 percent to 30 percent of whatever money the government recovered — in a move that has turbocharged the agency’s whistle-blower program. …
Among the lawyers, hedge funds and investors who may provide the financing for class-action lawsuits and whistle-blower cases against government contractors, the reinvigorated I.R.S. program has attracted attention.
Two Winkler County nurses filed accusations of problematic practices against Doctor Rolando G. Arafiles Jr. before the Texas Medical Board in April; a prosecutor who was friends with the doctor has now charged the two with a felony, “misuse of official information.” Local and national nursing associations have protested and established a legal defense fund. (Kevin Sack, “Nurse to Stand Trial for Reporting Doctor”, New York Times, Feb. 6; KFDA (undated)). It’s possible that the nurses made false accusations maliciously, but that seems something that could be handled through civil suits and then only after the Texas Medical Board adjudicated the complaints. Such overreaching by doctors could backfire, as it would give credence to the proposition that medical malpractice lawsuits are a necessary check to incompetent doctors.
If you’re not reading my other legal site, Point of Law, here’s some of what you’re missing:
As if all the other problems with the law were not bad enough, Common Room notes that its provisions conferring new legal protections on disgruntled employees take us another step closer to being “a nation of informants”. 
Whistleblower provisions are frequently used as a weapon in hardball employment litigation, where “find something to blow the whistle about and they won’t lay a hand on you” is, unfortunately, often sound legal advice for an employee who’s at odds with the boss for other reasons. Maybe the stakes are so high in, say, an area like defense contracting, or where safety violations endanger actual lives, that it’s worth the high cost of some such rules. But for paperwork violations at makers of cardboard puzzles and baby hats?
(GRAPHIC: Zesmeralda at Flickr, some rights reserved, Creative Commons).
Assume a false identity and file a bogus misconduct complaint that gets your boss fired. Claim whistleblower protection and transfer to a nice job in another department. When the imposture is discovered, the state won’t be able to do more than slap your wrist. That’s been the happy experience of a lawyer with Connecticut’s state ethics bureau (!) in a case provoking considerable, though apparently futile, outrage in the Nutmeg State. (Point of Law, Nov. 25; Dan Schwartz, Nov. 17).
Andrew M. Grossman and James L. Gattuso analyze the CPSC Reform Act, S. 2663 (the update to S. 2045). We discussed Feb. 20 and Feb. 25, as well as briefly Jan. 1. Update: After the jump, Senator DeMint’s office provides the “Top Ten Reasons to Oppose the CPSC “Reform” Act (S. 2663)”