Digital public servant Amanda Renteria has seen that the millions of people who rely on government welfare services are often discouraged from seeking them out, frustrated and discouraged by long lines and unnecessarily complicated processes. At Code for America, Renteria is helping develop human-centered technology that “respects you from the start, meets you where you are and provides an easy, positive experience.” She details the four factors that hinder effective delivery of government benefits and explains Code for America’s plan to bring user-centric, digital-first social services to more than 13 million Americans and unlock $30 billion in benefits for low-income families.
This ambitious plan is a part of the Audacious Project, TED’s initiative to inspire and fund global change. Watch all the talks from this year’s cohort at
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Elsie Clay
May 8, 2022 at 1:13 pm
How about bringing our jobs back to the world so that we can provide for our own families and don’t have to get money without work… This is disgusting
jo mystic
May 8, 2022 at 1:31 pm
Yes ! a better way for our tax dollars to reach the constituency. All your points are valid and advocacy is needed to create these types of changes and improvements for the common good.
Gary Barton
May 8, 2022 at 1:34 pm
Instead of finding more ways to give stuff away, maybe we should teach those poor and starving people how to change that. Give a man a fish, teach a man to fish.
Average Joe
May 8, 2022 at 6:30 pm
So invest in schools and provide free college education? 😏
breckandy
May 8, 2022 at 1:46 pm
Fight Poverty……..Work. Employers are screaming for help.
supershinigami1
May 8, 2022 at 1:57 pm
Better wages and work conditions then.
Average Joe
May 8, 2022 at 6:30 pm
Let them scream, we won’t work for these cheapskates 🥱🥱
Talking Tortoise
May 8, 2022 at 11:50 pm
But they’re screaming for help at the lowest pay-rates they can do. Most poor people have jobs. Most people who can’t pay for groceries are, in fact, working. But they don’t get paid enough to eat and also cover the rent.
Christian Soldier
May 8, 2022 at 1:47 pm
Go back to bartering and growing food at home
Mrs Deborah
May 8, 2022 at 2:16 pm
Stocks are crashing bitcoin investment right now will be at every wise individual’s list. In three two months you’ll be ecstatic with the decision you made today..
Josebeast Mr
May 8, 2022 at 2:46 pm
The Us stock market looks real weird right now investing in crypto/forex will be the wisest thing to do now as the market will crash
zach
May 8, 2022 at 2:48 pm
@Jonathan Mark Contect him
Misha Haider
May 8, 2022 at 2:50 pm
Bitcoin investment is great unlike the stock market and other financial Bitcoin has no centralized location since it’s operates 24 hours a day in different parts of the world
Tom
May 8, 2022 at 2:50 pm
Identity theft is not a joke. Millions of families suffer every year.
Christa Walker
May 8, 2022 at 2:50 pm
As a social worker, I am jealous of California. It’s my job to navigate this system and it overwhelms me, but it feels impossible to most of my clients. Please make this a reality everywhere!
Bilal Achahboun
May 8, 2022 at 3:20 pm
Outstanding speech
chas in lakewood
May 8, 2022 at 3:48 pm
No TED Talk has affected me more. If corporations are taking subsidies and you are eligible… why aren’t you?
John Brodrick
May 8, 2022 at 4:15 pm
This is necessary.
Simplifying/Consolidating any required applications is a huge win and actually helps the people intended to be helped by these programs. The piecemeal fashion and insane complexity of the current systems are just a barrier. If someone truly needs this assistance they most likely are overwhelmed just trying to survive let alone find their way through a maze of red tape.
CosmicSurgeon
May 8, 2022 at 5:22 pm
Designing, programming, and maintaining apps is a free service. That’s why all apps work so well. 🙄
Cleo
May 8, 2022 at 4:37 pm
The power of the human spirit. .thanks for the upload
MexicanReformist
May 8, 2022 at 5:08 pm
❤❤❤❤❤👍👍
Angelus Irae
May 8, 2022 at 6:07 pm
You people overcomplicate things and seem to think the legislation necessary doesn’t already exist. The McKinney-Vento Homeless Act is on the books and needs to be used. I’m sure there’s a team of lawyers, who were ready to draft something new for a premium, that will be very disappointed to hear this fact.
The Left Mike Right Mike Show
May 8, 2022 at 6:17 pm
Here’s a better and cheaper plan to radically transform access to US taxpayer handouts: get rid of them. Her shaky emotional voice talking about kids growing up searching for food is really out of touch with reality. Yeah we really need to give more handouts to obese people with flat screen TVs and smart phones who couldn’t pass a drug test. If you think I’m wrong I assume we could happily agree to increase handouts for any American citizen who is clinically underweight or malnourished and who tests negative for drugs/alcohol/tobacco. Conversely we remove benefits from anyone not meeting these criteria. We also change what items are eligible for SNAP/EBT, no soda, energy drinks, potato chips, etc.
Average Joe
May 8, 2022 at 6:28 pm
Τhats an extremely efficient way to make use of tax money. I fully support it. 💪
Let’s all hope politicians take notes from that as well
Yep Yep
May 8, 2022 at 6:50 pm
That’s beautiful. Very inspirational. Great efforts! Very commendable. I could say more but it would be an understatement.
Nataliia Holovata
May 8, 2022 at 7:29 pm
Ukraine 🇺🇦 has won and will win in the hard war with Russia 🇷🇺 because we have all world 🌎 with us !
L. Eliz
May 8, 2022 at 9:19 pm
This sounds ideal, but the GOP doesn’t want this, and fighting this idea will be mitch mcconnell, joe and kyrsten manchinema, sam alito, clarence thomas, amy corny barrett, brat kavanaugh, and john roberts. This plan will be struck down by our not-so-supreme court. No one will have any rights if the republiKKKons and Putin have their way.
Ruben Hilton
May 8, 2022 at 9:42 pm
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May 8, 2022 at 11:55 pm
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Kaleb Jason
May 9, 2022 at 12:14 am
Ray vardy
May 9, 2022 at 12:41 am
I have never seen any of his client complain of loss before, I think he is just too perfect
Bess Smith
May 8, 2022 at 10:43 pm
The poor are vilified & demonized so the government has made it difficult & shameful to discourage us from applying for benefits.
Tom Horn
May 9, 2022 at 12:12 am
Create a social problem and fix it with a socialistic solution.
Lisa Love Ministry
May 9, 2022 at 1:15 am
Seek God’s will.
John 3:16-21💝
1 Corinthians 6:9-11
1 John 1:9
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May 9, 2022 at 2:26 am
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May 9, 2022 at 2:27 am
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May 9, 2022 at 2:55 am
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William Arrington
May 9, 2022 at 2:17 am
One system should handle all of this.. it also means that 50% of people working for the government on the ones eliminated should be let go. There also needs to be easy to verify checks on if your still eligible and ways to actually get out of poverty.. teach a man to fish kind of stuff which means training programs attached to a job at the end before you start.. Its a net and should be there to catch you when you stumble.. not act as your hammock.
John Strawb
May 9, 2022 at 2:30 am
This is nonsense. Social services for the poor or struggling are intentionally difficult to access. This will only change when you get private money out of political campaigns. The rich WANT you to be poor.
gamerfever
May 9, 2022 at 2:44 am
There needs to be a safety just like there is a security in every work place. People are so dangerous and stupid now that being a security guard is scary.
Salem Black
May 9, 2022 at 3:38 am
This comment section is as confusing and convoluted as a surrealist artist vomit after a long night of binging. Man, I feel like my brain melted reading some of these comments! Anyways, the big picture that I got from this Ted Talk is that we need to make social assistance programs more accessible. The end. I literally could summarize her entire idea into a sentence. But, here she is taking the time to elaborate and to show proof of concept. It’s good, it’s sturdy, any successful country that supported its people have always succeeded. We are losing this country as a people. If we do not do the right things and hire the elected officials that represent the the people, the growing minorities that are productive and helpful Microsystems within our society, and not support a capitalist agenda because quite literally. We are living under the dystopic capitalist future.
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May 9, 2022 at 5:19 am
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Duck
May 9, 2022 at 5:54 am
Her name sounds like some type of psychoactive plant
Lazarus
May 9, 2022 at 4:50 pm
no. Thomas Sowell has taught me enough to know that benefits don’t fix poverty, they incentivise it. Most of this thinking (in this talk) sounds delusional to me. People who really need benefits are struggling to get ahold of it because it’s too difficult? No, I don’t buy it. I think this is an idea to expand to welfare state which I believe will have negative effects ona country’s people.
John Doe
May 9, 2022 at 5:33 pm
This will inevitably be screwed up by incompetent bureaucrats. To this day I don’t have healthcare, because trying to use government websites to get a straight answer to which of the 40+ options for healthcare insurance is soul crushing to me, someone who suffers from Major Depression Disorder. I don’t have months of free time to wade through a mountain of information. Also, Trump effectively killed publicly funded mental health care in my area. Democrats and Republicans alike are both worthless, and have abandoned those who need them to actually do their jobs.
Sara bee
May 10, 2022 at 3:59 am
lets not put the cart in front of the horse .. before leapfrogging and getting ahead of ourselves . start with fixing people who work able to easily maneuver thru the bureaucracy of unemployment benefits due to unnecessary forced shut down of the the whole u.s economy for a year 1/2 … lets start with the the IRS and its inability to refund tax payers $$$ in less than 6 months … lets not worry yet about how easily 2 million non documented , covid carrying migrants that crossed our border and got handed cash payments and vouchers for hotel rooms … lets not worry about streamline coach busses and passenger jets to drop off non documented , non citizens in the dead of night to all areras of the u.s … and just like this admin and that nimrod ginger pasaki think that those 2 milion illegals will voluntarily check in on their free gov cell phones and show up to court on their schedule date .. and not toss that free gov tracking device ..
exactly HOW STUPID IS YOUR LIVE AUDIENCE AND APPARENTLY BY WAY OF CONTRATS AND POSITIVE FEEDBACK ON THIS YOUTUBE POST .. HOW STUPID CAN YOU ALL BE !!!!!! THIS IS NOTHING BUT A SOCIALIST PLEA FOR STREAMLINED DISASTER RIGHT TO THE FINISH LINE !!!!
THE ONLY THING THIS DIMWIT CARES ABOUT IS HOW TO ENSLAVE AND DESTROY THE U.S.A AS FAST AS POSSIBLE !!! AND MOST OF YOU ARE BUYING IT !!!!
WAKEUP !!!
thiskidd
May 10, 2022 at 4:57 am
In 2007 the system failed me twice. 1st time: the system allowed the Church where I worked to break the law due to a legal loophole so when my mother became ill, they forced me into a 12 week continuous family leave, an UN-paid leave that is supposed to used as the worker needs, but they broke the law and got an excuse. 2nd then when I had no income I applied for food stamps during this time for myself and my son, and I was denied b/c I would not go to court to pursue his dead-beat Dad who never contributed to his son’s support, clothes, medical, or dental. At that time the County of Marin had a judicial system that gave full custody to Dead-Beat Dads and I was not going to risk losing my son to an uncaring ex-parent. It was a messed up system with tons of excuses to deny you access to the services that my and your taxes provide, Disgusting time period of my life with no respect for the care I was giving my mother in her dying months and my son as a single mom.
Mary Vanderbilt, Cliven Bundy
May 12, 2022 at 2:49 am
Adamentely against this at all costs.
Madman the pope
May 12, 2022 at 12:00 pm
You need a stop gap before people fall into poverty like UBI for middle class families and below to many people fall threw the gaps, like you make tp much money but 1 or 2 medical emergencies from being homeless and living paycheck to paycheck.