[chadwickthebold]

To be clear, this article is advocating forcing people in poverty into gig economy jobs where there have been issues of low pay, terrible working conditions, and few if any employee protections. As a civilized country we should not demand that people give up their basic rights to earn a living.

[pjc50]

Yeah, it's worked out pretty badly in the UK.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Workfare_in_the_United_Kingdom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R_%28Reilly%29_v_Secretary_of_...

(the latter is particularly odious; having been told by a court that it owed people £130m in back-dated benefits, the government retroactively changed the law to avoid paying them. This is almost certainly a human rights violation but that litigation has not finished yet).

[crystalmeph]

Yeah, making people work for free at for-profit businesses is not a valid precondition for welfare. I didn't see that in this article though.

There has to be a social safety net, but I think it's a valid goal to encourage welfare recipients to work if they are able. One thing we should definitely do is reform the "vertical cliff" of payments, where once you make above a certain threshold, you stop receiving all benefits. That's a definite disincentive to get a better job past a certain point.

[maxerickson]

So why not better regulate the gig economy?

[yummyfajitas]

This is an extreme misrepresentation of the article. Anyone who doesn't want to work is free to stop telling the welfare office they want work but can't find it.

No one is forced to do anything.

[astazangasta]

I vehemently dislike when people say "no one is forced to do anything" in situations where, say, you will lose your food stamps if you do not do something. That is a force, the force of starvation.