It depends on what you mean by social welfare programs.
A basic income system requires very little administration, and what parts of it are required wouldn’t make sense to have it sitting outside the government.
I’d rather see a basic income than need non-profit food banks needing to exist. Grocery stores already exist, are reasonably competitive, and are enormously more efficient if people have the money available to use them.
For things like helping people with disabilities, where economies of scale are mostly irrelevant, ngos and non-profits can make more sense because they can specialize according to the need.
The administration of a basic income sitting outside of the government?
The government already has a list of every citizen registered via birth or immigration, and provides identification for people. They’re always going to need to do that. There’s really no reason to replicate that level of information outside of the government.
Most people would just go online and register where you’d like your money to be sent (Direct deposit, Mailed cheque)
However, you would still need a few call centers to handle issues, and If someone needs in-person support, the government already has common government service offices like DMVs and service centers that can provide in person service if required, saving significant money on needing dedicated service locations just for this one service.
Tl;dr Economies of Scale matter, and it doesn’t make any sense to replicate the parts that the government already does and has to continue doing.
BlameThePeacock@lemmy.ca 9 hours ago
It depends on what you mean by social welfare programs.
A basic income system requires very little administration, and what parts of it are required wouldn’t make sense to have it sitting outside the government.
I’d rather see a basic income than need non-profit food banks needing to exist. Grocery stores already exist, are reasonably competitive, and are enormously more efficient if people have the money available to use them.
For things like helping people with disabilities, where economies of scale are mostly irrelevant, ngos and non-profits can make more sense because they can specialize according to the need.
AfterNova@lemmy.world [bot] 9 hours ago
Why would it not make sense?
BlameThePeacock@lemmy.ca 8 hours ago
The administration of a basic income sitting outside of the government?
The government already has a list of every citizen registered via birth or immigration, and provides identification for people. They’re always going to need to do that. There’s really no reason to replicate that level of information outside of the government.
Most people would just go online and register where you’d like your money to be sent (Direct deposit, Mailed cheque)
However, you would still need a few call centers to handle issues, and If someone needs in-person support, the government already has common government service offices like DMVs and service centers that can provide in person service if required, saving significant money on needing dedicated service locations just for this one service.
Tl;dr Economies of Scale matter, and it doesn’t make any sense to replicate the parts that the government already does and has to continue doing.