Sunday, April 28, 2013

Receiving welfare while on a terrorist watch list

From Snopes, one of the accused Boston marathon bombers had apparently received welfare benefits while on a terrorist watch list

I'm rather surprised at the tone of outrage, because it seems to me that continuing existing welfare payments to someone you want to watch is a good way to help keep track of them.

 It means they have to tell you where they live.  It means you'll know at least some of their banking information, either from direct deposit or from them cashing cheques, and with bank records and stuff you might be able to track what else they're doing with their money.  It means they have a strong incentive to be where they told you they'll be at least once a month.  If you're trying to track them physically, you can stake out their mailbox on the day that cheques arrive, or track where the debit card affiliated with their bank account is used to get a sense of their usual haunts.  If your jurisdiction has social workers monitoring or assisting welfare recipients, you've got a known person who is not a criminal associate but has spoken to them regularly and perhaps asked them some more personal questions.  Plus, the fact that they're receiving government benefits might lead them to led their guard down - they might think "Surely they wouldn't be paying me welfare if they thought I was a terrorist!" 

In contrast, if you discontinue their benefits, they know you're watching them.  They now have no incentive to ever be where they told you they are, or to maintain any bank accounts that the government knows about.  It also decreases their overall contact with public authorities, and increases their incentive to earn money through illegal means, which might put them in touch with a broader range of criminal element.

All in all, from a purely strategic viewpoint, I'd say it's worth the pittance.

1 comment:

laura k said...

People seem to love to be outraged about welfare. They seem to think it's like hitting lotto.