“Once verification of ineligibility and overpayment is provided, social assistance eligibility should be reassessed based on any new or changed circumstances.
A reassessment requires that any other change in circumstance also be assessed. For example, in some cases people must repay the CERB because they returned to work earlier than expected. In these cases, any earned income received that had not previously been recorded (along with any other change in the person’s circumstances e.g. shelter) must be considered.
In all cases, the CERB/CESB overpayment is attributed to the benefit month(s) where the payment was originally charged.”
ODSP directive from 2020 found on Reddit
For most of the twentieth century, Canada judged its social programs by a fairly simple standard: Did they improve people’s lives?
Old Age Security was designed to reduce poverty among seniors. The Canada Pension Plan was designed to replace lost earnings in retirement. Family Allowances were designed to help parents raise children. Social assistance existed because people needed enough income to survive.
The programs were never perfect, but the purpose was clear. Income security came first. Administration existed to support that goal. Somewhere along the way and without notice, the relationship reversed.
Today it often feels as though the primary purpose of social programs is no longer to provide income security. It is to provide administrative security in the Administration State.
| I use the term ‘Administration State’ to describe a style of government in which administration itself becomes the dominant public activity. Benefits are no longer simply delivered. They are continuously supervised. Residents are expected to report, verify, document, explain and re-establish their eligibility throughout their relationship with government. Success is measured less by whether people’s lives improve than by whether the rules have been followed correctly. In the Administration State, administration no longer serves policy. Increasingly, it becomes the policy. |
Success is increasingly measured by whether the rules have been followed rather than whether people’s lives have improved. For example, Ontario measures success by how quickly it can move people into employment from social assistance; any employment regardless of whether it provides a living wage
The paperwork has become as important as the poverty. Perhaps more important.
This transformation did not happen overnight. It happened one reporting requirement at a time. One verification process at a time. One eligibility review at a time. One audit. One reassessment. One residency declaration. One overpayment recovery.
Each change was justified on its own merits. Each sounded reasonable. But together they created something entirely different.
Government gradually became better at supervising poverty than reducing it.
Consider the experience of someone receiving social assistance. The monthly benefit is only part of their relationship with government. They must report earnings. Report gifts. Report changes in relationships. Report changes in address. Report changes in family composition. Report absences from Ontario. Report bank accounts. Report assets.
They have to report virtually every significant change in their lives. The income payment arrives almost as an afterthought.
The supervision never ends. The same pattern appears elsewhere.
During the pandemic, extraordinary income supports were created with remarkable speed. Millions of Canadians received assistance because governments quite rightly understood that delay would create hardship.
Then, once the emergency had passed, the emphasis shifted.
The conversation became less about helping people recover than about determining who had technically qualified. Years later, collection efforts continue.
Entire bureaucracies remain devoted to reconstructing decisions made during an unprecedented national emergency. Administrative correctness became the overriding objective.
The same philosophy appears throughout government. Disability benefits increasingly require repeated demonstrations of disability. Housing programs require extensive documentation. Tax credits require verification.
Every program develops its own reporting system. Its own definitions. Its own forms. Its own appeals. Its own compliance mechanisms. No individual requirement seems unreasonable yet collectively they become overwhelming.
We usually think of poverty as a shortage of money but perhaps it is also a shortage of time.
Affluent Canadians spend their time building careers, raising families, volunteering, travelling and planning for the future. People living on low incomes often spend extraordinary amounts of time proving they remain eligible for the help they already receive.
They wait.
They phone.
They appeal.
They complete forms.
They gather documents.
They explain.
They explain again.
The bureaucracy consumes hours that could have been spent working, caring for children, improving health or simply living. I wrote a paper called ‘Why is it so tough to get ahead?’ almost 20 years ago. In that paper, I found that some social assistance recipients spent about 44% of their daily hours tending to their ongoing eligibility for programs.
This means that administrative burden becomes another integral form of poverty.
The irony is striking. Governments regularly speak about reducing barriers yet they rarely measure the barriers governments themselves create. No ministry would deliberately design a program to exhaust its users. Yet exhaustion often becomes one of the program’s defining characteristics a built-in feature of programs seemingly to minimize uptake.
We have become remarkably sophisticated at measuring compliance. Far less sophisticated at measuring dignity. This change affects more than individuals.
It affects public debate. Community organizations increasingly spend their time helping people navigate government systems. That work is essential. But it also means more resources are devoted to managing administrative complexity rather than questioning why the complexity exists in the first place.
Food banks become experts in food distribution. Housing organizations become experts in tenancy. Financial empowerment agencies become experts in budgeting.
Someone still needs to ask whether the underlying income supports are adequate. But that voice has become muted and perhaps that is no accident.
Perhaps our public conversation has gradually accepted administrative excellence as a substitute for policy success. A program can be impeccably administered while failing the people it was created to serve.
We seldom ask that question anymore. Instead, we ask whether the forms were completed correctly.
Whether reporting requirements were met.
Whether eligibility rules were properly enforced.
Whether overpayments were recovered.
Administrative success often means human uncertainty. Some readers may think this is an argument against accountability. It is not.
Public money should be managed carefully. Fraud should be addressed. Programs need rules.
But rules are instruments. They are not the purpose. The purpose is to improve lives. Somewhere along the way we seem to have forgotten the difference.
Good administration should make programs easier to use. It should increase trust and reduce unnecessary reporting. It should simplify eligibility and allow public servants to exercise judgment to improve peoples’ lives.
Most importantly, it should disappear into the background, allowing people to focus on rebuilding their lives rather than maintaining their files.
When administration becomes the dominant experience of receiving assistance, something fundamental has changed. Government has ceased to be primarily a provider of security. It has become a supervisor of eligibility.
That is not the same thing.
It is certainly not what Canada’s great architects of social security imagined. Perhaps it is time to judge our programs differently.
Not by how efficiently they detect errors.
Not by how completely they recover overpayments.
Not by how many forms they process.
But by the oldest question of all. Do they leave people more secure than they found them? If the answer is no, then no amount of administrative perfection can compensate for policy failure.
Because the purpose of income security has never been to create well-managed poverty. It has always been to reduce the need for it.