LT/ Universal >>>Targeted

Leah Hamilton 20 (Associate Professor of Social Work at Appalachian State University, Executive Committee member for the Basic Income Earth Network, President of the American Civil Liberties Union of North Carolina, Ph.D. of Public Policy from University of Arkansas), “A Two-Tiered Welfare State,” 2020, Welfare Doesn't Work: The Promises of Basic Income for a Failed American Safety Net, pg. 93-106

Though poverty programs constitute a relatively small share of the total government budget, applicants have historically faced significant bureaucratic hurdles, which are unseen in programs more frequently used by middle- and upper-income households. In the 1960s, for example, mothers receiving AFDC were required to answer questions about their sexual activity and menstruation, and have their homes inspected for any sign of a man’s presence. Multiple legal challenges to these practices were unsuccessful, with the courts determining that welfare applicants waive their constitutional rights to privacy (Piven & Cloward, 1993). These rules were eventually overturned, but applying for welfare continues to be a burdensome and intrusive process.

Today, needy families face a lengthy eligibility determination process (which is reauthorized at regular intervals), often requiring birth certificates, tax returns, pay stubs, proof of any asset holdings, and submission to intrusive, dehumanizing interviews. A mother speaking of her experiences with her local welfare office told researchers that “it seems like they look at us like we’re beneath them because we need the help. And then they talk to us in a kind of way. No one wants to go through that” (Black & Sprague, 2017). Another mother in the same study described the experience of waiting hours to be seen by welfare caseworkers.

[After work] you got to go to the welfare office, the social security office, these places that are there to help you, and you go there and you’re already tired, you’re already frustrated, you’ve already been sitting there 3–4 hours before you’re even being seen, and then you finally get up to a person and all they got for you is attitude […] then the next time you gotta come you don’t even want to come. (Black & Sprague, 2017)

One MTurker described their experience with SNAP offices as follows: “Sometimes the people who are supposed to be helping you are very rude and condescending because you need help.”

Further, many recipients explain that the disorganization of welfare offices means having to produce the same documentation repeatedly or else risk losing benefits.

After numerous experiences supplying duplicative paperwork to apply and recertify for programs, ‘Tracee’ applied her characteristically methodical troubleshooting skills and began keeping a stack of her family’s birth certificates handy so she could just grab them when needed. Ultimately, though, she was investing time and energy in a system designed to devalue both. ‘Well, when I went to recertify, I gave the lady all my stuff that she asked me for. And I asked her did she need anything else. She was like, ‘No, Miss C, I don’t need anything else. That’s it.’ So I didn’t receive my SNAP benefits on my card, and I called and asked why. She was like, ‘Well, you didn’t bring me what I told you to bring me.’ And I was like, ‘Remember, I came to your office.’ She denied everything because she didn’t want to get in trouble with her supervisor. And I don’t know what happened to my papers or whatever, but I just don’t like going in there at all because it’s always something.’ (Black & Sprague, 2017)

An MTurker and former SNAP recipient told me, “The overall experience was really stressful and complicated at times like when filling out the application online, renewing, or reporting changes. When having to call your caseworker I would never get a response the same day it was always a day or so later and even then, the issue would not be resolved.” While these examples are anecdotal, it is difficult to conjure similar cases when middle-income families deduct their mortgage interest from annual tax filings or sign up for their employers’ 401k plan.

Even in Canada, recipients of social assistance report intrusive eligibility rules. One basic-income recipient in Ontario explained that when she received traditional assistance,

There [were] too many rules. Just if, like I had a roommate J∗∗∗ actually, we were roommates. They gave me a thing I had to fill out. J∗∗∗ was on assistance too but he didn’t have to, I did. Want to know about our relationship; did we have any kids together? Did we share the same room? Were we intimate? Very intrusive stuff like that. Even though we weren’t, like I had no problem answering, it’s just very intrusive, very personal information that they want. Which I don’t think is really any of their business. (Hamilton & Mulvale, 2019, p. 591)

These bureaucratic hurdles can be so time-consuming that they interfere in a recipient’s ability to move toward independence. One MTurker, a former recipient of TANF and SNAP, explained, “The check-ins and reporting requirements were sometimes in the way of actually finding work or expanding my educational opportunities.”

The eligibility determination process ostensibly serves to ensure that only the truly needy receive assistance, but has the unintended (or possibly intended?) consequence of deterring a great number of needy applicants from even applying. It also comes with a significant administrative price tag. Workers must spend considerable time conducting intake interviews, processing applicant paperwork, and recertifying current recipients. Of the total TANF budget, for example, 11% is spent on administration, compared to less than 1% of the Old Age, Survivors and Disability Insurance program (more commonly known as Social Security) budget (Schott & Floyd, 2017; Social Security Administration, 2019). This difference is because Social Security is a universal program: everyone is eligible once they reach a certain age, so no caseworkers are needed to investigate applicants or reauthorize their eligibility regularly. For this reason, basic-income advocates have long argued that universal programs, like Social Security, are more effective at addressing poverty and simultaneously come with significantly lower administration costs (Bell & Bushe, 1975; Hamilton & Martin-West, 2019). “Without Social Security benefits, 39.2 percent of elderly Americans would have incomes below the official poverty line, all else being equal; with Social Security benefits, only 9.2 percent do,” making it the most effective and efficient anti-poverty program in the United States (Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, 2019b).

BI would be more efficient than existing welfare---less of a bureaucratic disaster

Michael D. Tanner 14 (Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute where he heads research into a variety of domestic policies with a particular emphasis on poverty and social welfare policy, health care reform, and Social Security.), “The Basic Income Guarantee: Simplicity, but at What Cost?,” 08/26/2014, CATO Unbound, https://web.archive.org/web/20211017094956/https://www.cato-unbound.org/2014/08/26/basic-income-guarantee-simplicity-what-cost

Our current welfare system is clearly a mess. The federal government currently funds 126 separate anti-poverty programs, at least 72 of which provide either cash or in-kind benefits to individuals. For example, there are 33 housing programs, run by four different cabinet departments, including bizarrely the Department of Energy. There are currently 21 different programs providing food or food purchasing assistance. These programs are administered by three different federal departments and one independent agency. There are eight different health care programs, administered by five separate agencies within the Department of Health and Human Services. And six cabinet departments and five independent agencies oversee 27 cash or general assistance programs. All together, seven different cabinet agencies and six independent agencies administer at least one anti-poverty program. This maze of overlapping bureaucracies is difficult to navigate for those in the system and perhaps even more difficult to supervise and evaluate.

And obviously we should be concerned that the existing welfare system has utterly failed at its primary mission: lifting people out of poverty and enabling them and their children to become independent and self-supporting members of society. Last year alone, the federal government spent nearly $700 billion to fund anti-poverty programs. State and local governments kicked in an additional $300 billion, bringing the total to roughly $1 trillion. Since the Start of the War on Poverty in 1965, we have spent nearly $19 trillion. Recent studies suggest that welfare programs did help to reduce the worst deprivations of material poverty, especially in their early years. But they have long since reached a point of diminishing returns. We may have reduced the discomfort of poverty, but we have failed to truly lift people out of poverty.

Therefore I am sympathetic to the argument that some form of guaranteed basic income would be an improvement over what we have today. For example, while I am skeptical of some of the predicted administrative savings, there would be clear advantages to a simplified system. Second, it would treat poor people like adults, expected to save and budget, rather than doling out small allowances for those specific goods and services that the government believes they should have. Third, as Zwolinski notes, it helps break up the entrenched constituencies that support the welfare state.

Eliminating the safety net is inevitable and good---reduces federal spending and solves poverty

Lois M. Collins 16 [Collins covers policy and research that impact families for the Deseret News National team, 9/27/26, “Economic policy experts debate universal basic income instead of welfare programs,” ] //mh

What if each American adult was given a chunk of money — a universal basic income of around $10,000 in disposable cash — and welfare programs were eliminated?

It's a concept that got a firm "no way" in 2006 when political scientist and author Charles Murray wrote a book about the idea. But it's now being experimented with in some European countries: Sweden just held a national referendum on providing basic income in lieu of welfare programs and Finland is trying it out on a limited, experimental basis as a demonstration project.

In America, the concept is gaining more attention and is being discussed as a potential alternative to the existing social safety net of welfare and other "money transfer" programs.

At the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, D.C., earlier this month, Murray and his frequent sparring partner Jared Bernstein, senior fellow at the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities, argued good-naturedly whether abandoning the country's safety net programs in favor of universal basic income (UBI) would be a great thing or a disaster.

Murray, author of books like "In Our Hands: A Plan to Replace the Welfare State" and "Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010," believes safety net upheaval is inevitable, due to huge shifts in the job market and the rising cost of Social Security, Medicare and other programs. Safety net upheaval using a universal basic income is also a good idea, though, said Murray, who is one of the institute's scholars.

His UBI proposal would include getting rid of all money-transfer programs, including programs like Social security and Medicare, in favor of a roughly $13,000 annual payment, divided into monthly electronic deposits for adults. In his plan, about $3,000 of it would be used to buy health insurance, leaving roughly $10,000 disposable income. Murray is quick to note it's unlikely his suggestions would be implemented without some changes being made to it.

While $13,000 isn't enough for an unemployed person to live on, Murray said, adults who are willing to live together, cooperate and pool their resources could easily make it stretch. But the idea isn't that the UBI would be the sole income for an individual or family. It would supplement earnings and if someone worked, it about guarantees they won't be impoverished. Some of that disposable income could also be invested in the stock market, he suggested.

Help or hinder

Murray asserts that UBI would solve involuntary poverty, encourage work, boost the likelihood of retiring comfortably and avoid breaking the national bank, which programs like Social Security and Medicare will do.