Noah St. AmandSep 24, 2024
Kyle Montanio

Means testing harms the mean household and is just plain mean, by design.

Study after study shows that providing social safety nets - benefits the vast majority of people support - is cheaper and more efficient when you get rid of the hurdles to prove you qualify.

Means testing punishes those most in need who are often least able to spend time and energy to complete the intentionally difficult process to access benefits, and results in higher costs.

https://www.peoplespolicyproject.org/2022/11/11/universal-benefits-cost-less-than-means-tested-benefits/

#UBI #BasicIncome

Universal Benefits Cost Less Than Means-Tested Benefits

The biggest welfare state controversy is driven by accounting games.

People's Policy Project
Sep 24, 2024 at 2:51pmWeb
Show threadDarwin WoodkaSep 24, 2024

@FantasticalEconomics

UBI! UBI! UBI!

Show threadDaniel LakelandSep 24, 2024

@FantasticalEconomics

Means tested benefits create a "poverty trap" as well. People who find a way to make more money and do better, wind up having their benefits taken away in such high measures that working can actually cost them significantly. The cost to society of keeping those people from working because work gives them negative benefits is huge. HUGE.

Show threadMisuse CaseSep 24, 2024
@dlakelan @FantasticalEconomics I know a couple people who managed to keep it together on benefits (Section 8, SNAP, Medicaid) and then were walking a tightrope without a net once they got above the poverty line. If something had happened they would have lost what little they had and would’ve been worse off than before because of how long it’d take to get on benefits all over again
Show threadAsbestosSep 24, 2024

@FantasticalEconomics

@blogdiva
Having knowledge of a friend who is applying for SSI disability. I have zero idea how people without the time, and the money to get some legal assistance, or people of even average intelligence do it.
Not being smart or a college grad is not a fault or character flaw.

Show threadVincarsiSep 24, 2024
@FantasticalEconomics I just wish more people understood that the entire concept of means testing came about because of the popularity of Malthusian philosophy among the upper classes and was a precursor to the eugenics movement. It was never actually meant to "prevent fraud" that was always propaganda. It's purpose was always explicitly to make sure that the poor either worked or died. Because the lower classes do not have value or humanity outside their labour in this paradigm.
Show threadAVILIFESep 24, 2024
@FantasticalEconomics it won’t happen till Ai takes most jobs
Show threadKevinOnEarthNov 3, 2024
@FantasticalEconomics
Those applying means-testing rules KNOW that a significant portion of people that would qualify will never get through the bureaucracy. (But that won't stop the politicians proudly waving the policies about for public Likes.)
Show threadJasmine - VA3PRR | VA3NBYNov 11, 2024
@FantasticalEconomics "What if someone gets it who doesn't deserve it." Sweetie what part of universal is confusing to you?
Show threadMemphisDaPlaya 🎲🎲Jan 17, 2025

@FantasticalEconomics

That's the method Asa Hutchinson, former Governor of Arkansas, used to kick nearly 20,000 working poor off Medicaid. He required them to use a computer program that was so complicated they couldn't understand how to enter the information and was time intensive. No live help was available to help them.

Show thread🦉Nýktıméηı ❌👑Jan 19, 2025
@FantasticalEconomics It's form of terrorism designed keep the labor force in a constant state of fear, compliance, desperate, willing to turn on each other to survive, instead of uniting in solidarity, working together for a shared common good.
Show threadAlanJan 19, 2025
@FantasticalEconomics not only for some of the bigger support net issues, but smaller ones too like free school lunches for all kids. It a good issue for people to start getting involved in because its smaller scale and local/+ maybe some state