A government entitlement program is one that provides personal financial benefits or sometimes special government provided goods or services. An indefinite amount of potential beneficiaries have a legal right when they meet eligibility requirements that are specified by the law supporting the government program. Beneficiaries of the entitlement programs are usually individuals, but sometimes
. organizations have special entitlements under certain programs. The most important government entitlement programs at the Federal level in the US include: Social security, Medicare, Medicaid, most Veteran's Administration services, federal employee or military retirement plans, unemployment compensation and food stamps. It is very hard to predict in advance how many people will apply and qualify for government entitlement programs in advance, so it makes it hard for the government to predict what the total cost to the government is gonna be when making budgets for the upcoming fiscal year.
