this post was submitted on 01 Jul 2023
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[–] Evkob@lemmy.ca 38 points 1 year ago (20 children)

It would have been so much simpler and cheaper to just make CERB apply universally instead of still chasing after people who "cheated" the rules three years after the fact.

I know a lot of people who thought they were eligible and learned come tax season that they weren't. The communications surrounding CERB were messy and unclear, with eligibility criteria seemingly changing daily.

[–] Macaw@lemmy.ca 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Sure, give CERB to millions of people who don't need it. Brilliant idea. That program was rolled out as fast as humanly possible and people expect perfection....

[–] Evkob@lemmy.ca 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

What are your arguments against doing so?

[–] PortableHotpocket@lemmy.ca 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

The cost would have been a lot higher. Either you have to reduce the dollar value for each recipient to keep the total amount the same, or, more likely, keep the dollar value the same for each recipient, "create" more money overall, and spike inflation significantly worse than it already has been.

You can't just put so much money into circulation like that at once. The amount we already put in for covid relief is a big contributor to the inflation we have seen over the past few years. It devalues savings like mad, hurting tons of middle and retirement age people who have to live off of those savings for the rest of their lives.

[–] Rediphile@lemmy.ca 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

For anyone curious, 6.5m out of the 38m total population claimed it. So it would cost close to 6x as much if given to everyone (if even children included).

I support the concept of basic income in general, but this was a different situation specific to COVID job loss.

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