Jimmy Chen, a tech entrepreneur, recalled visiting a welfare office where people on food stamps had long waits to submit routine paperwork in order to receive their benefits.
They passed the time as people in lines do, staring at their phones, which has the potential to do the work online with greater convenience, accuracy and speed.
Critics say that the image of aid-seekers wasting time with a solution is an overlooked challenge for people in poverty, because administrative burdens make benefits hard to obtain and tax the time and emotional resources of those who need help.
Mr. Chen, whose start-up, Propel, offers a free app that five million households now use to manage their food stamp benefits, said that too much bureaucracy prevents people from getting the help they need.
Barriers to aid are as old as aid itself, and they exist for a variety of reasons, including concerns about fraud, bureaucratic tension between accuracy and speed, and hostility toward people in need. Red tape has drawn new attention since the coronaviruses caused millions of Americans to seek government help for the first time.
Huge increases in spending were approved by the government, but they struggled to deliver. Some programs reached most households quickly, but others buckled under soaring demand or were too complex.
Pamela Herd, a professor at Georgetown and an author, and Donald P. Moynihan, an author, wrote "Administrative Burden," which argues that excessive bureaucracy deepens poverty and inequality.
The share of eligible people receiving benefits varies greatly by program, with food stamps accounting for about 80% of eligible people, followed by the earned-income tax credit at 78 percent and Temporary Assistance to Needy Families at 24 percent. Billions of dollars go unclaimed.
On his first day in office, President Biden issued an executive order asking agencies to identify "systemic barriers in accessing benefits."
The movement to create a more user-friendly safety net was underway before the Pandemic showed the perils of bureaucracy.
Code for America created a portal that makes it easier for Californians to apply for food stamps. Michigan's application was shrunk by 60 percent thanks to Civilla.
The cry of civic tech, power to the portals, may seem obscure in an age of ambitious social movements, but Mr. Chen says democratizing technology's rewards is essential to social justice.
He said that a phone is like a magic wand for him. If I want to call a cab, there is an app, if I want to book a hotel, there is an app. It's unfair that we don't apply more sophisticated knowledge to the problems of lower-income Americans.
A single mother from North Carolina who has a 7-year-old son and cleans vacation rental homes is one of the people drawn to the app. She turned to food stamps when her work was interrupted by the swine flu.
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A single mother in Spindale, N.C., said that the app gives her the ability to check her food stamp balance.
Ms. Wilson likes the ability to instantly check her balance, which she does almost daily. She said it was a comfort to know she would be able to feed her child.
She said that the app helped her find a broadband subsidy that saved her $50 a month.
Ms. Wilson said that the app leaves her feeling respected.
She said that it makes her feel like she needs help because she has relatives who post meme that depict people on SNAP as lazy and overfed. It looks like someone is watching us. You feel like they care.
The app makes us feel like we're Americans, too, says a Providers user in Charlotte, N.C.
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Propel offers an account that can be used to receive paychecks and other government benefits, in recognition that most low-income households have multiple sources of income and need stable banking.
Conservatives disagree with the idea that aid is elusive. dependency is more important than red tape and they argue that administrative contact serves important goals like discouraging people who don't really need help or helping the unemployed find work.
The Secretaries Innovation Group, which advises conservative states on aid policy, believes that the system should strive to help individuals achieve self-sufficiency through employment. You make it harder to break free when you pile benefit on top of benefit.
Poverty has been linked to bureaucracy. Charles Dickens wrote a novel called "Little Dorrit" that poked fun at the Department of Circumlocution. One critic called the 1975 documentary film "Welfare" "unbearable in its depictions of frustration and anger" among caseworkers and clients.
Barriers to aid are created deliberately. The governor of Florida told CBS Miami last year that the previous administration tried to drive people away from the state. He said that people would just say, "Oh, the hell with it, I'm not going to do that." Both Mr. Scott and Mr. DeSantis are Republicans.
Poor people who lack political clout are the reason other programs are hindered. Administrative hurdles have been used to discriminate. Federal oversight can instill caution because states risk more penalties for aiding ineligible people than for failing to help them.
Civilla wanted to show that Michigan's application was too complex, so they turned to theater, walking officials through an exhibit with fake clients and piped-in office sounds. The company created a new application with 80 percent fewer words and is now working in Missouri.
Civilla co-founder Michael Brennan said that the Michigan work was bipartisan and that it saved time for the client and the state.
He said that change is possible.
Code for America's California portal cut the time it took to apply for food stamps by three-quarters or more. The portal was designed for mobile phones and offers chat functions in English, Spanish and Chinese. In counties with the technology, applications increased by 11 percent.
Code for America built portals to help the poor claim their tax credits. The latter delivered over $400 million. David Newville quoted a colleague who explained why web design matters.
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Mr. Chen and Jeff Kaiser are at the company's office in Brooklyn. Propel has landed investments from the venture capital firm and the sports stars.
Mr. Chen, the founder of Propel, was the son of immigrants from China. In a happy Kansas City childhood, there wasn't always enough to eat. Mr. Chen doesn't know why the family didn't get food stamps. He left Facebook at the age of 26 and went to New York to work on software for people in poverty.
Mr. Chen founded Propel with just a few thousand dollars from a Kickstarter campaign, but went two years without a paycheck. He was going to work on the SNAP applications, but decided to focus on people who were already Enrolled.
The existing technology allowed people to check their balances, but it did not work well on mobile phones and a phone line needed a 16-digit number. Mr. Chen saw poor people buying cheap items to check their balance on their receipts. It was one more hassle that they did not need.
The balance display was not a special feat, but reaching the recipients was. Mr. Chen said the app users checked it on average 17 times a month. Ms. Young said she checked it more often.
She said she checks it all day. It makes me feel reassured that I will have food. Ms. Young, who has a disability payment of about $800 a month, said she had run out of money at the register and had to throw away items.
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Ms. Wilson said that the app made people feel like they belonged.
Ms. Wilson keeps her balance in her head, because she's so concerned about it.
She said that the app created a sense of belonging for those who felt stigmatized. She said that it made her see a group of people in the same situation.
The app tells people how much they have spent and where they spent it, as well as offers recipes and budgeting tools. Mr. Chen said the goal was to align the company's financial interests with those of its users.
The app had a few thousand users. It had about 200,000 a year later. Propel received investments from a top venture capital firm and sports stars. The company was estimated to be worth $100 million by Forbes.
During the Pandemic, Propel distributed $180 million to randomly selected app users, giving them $1,000 each. It added a feature that lets users ask their members of Congress to extend the temporary child tax credit expansion.
The app now allows for an account that can be used to receive government benefits, because of the difficulties that the poor households had in getting their money.
Mr. Chen said that poor people should know where they are without having to buy a banana.
He said that we pay hundreds of billions of dollars to fund the programs. Why not make them work well?
