Ah, the classic paternalistic argument. It's deeply appealing to many people's preconceptions. But a growing body of experimental results call it into question.
When you actually conduct the experiment -- a randomized controlled trial where you give some poor people cash and others in-kind services, the cash group outperforms.
I'd be interested to see any of the research on this, if you have references. I suspect that in practice it's exceptionally hard to draw realistic conclusions from any such research, simply due to the confounding factor of "the wider social structure of the country".
When you actually conduct the experiment -- a randomized controlled trial where you give some poor people cash and others in-kind services, the cash group outperforms.
None of the above links appear to support it. Please let me know if I'm mistaken, otherwise please do provide a relevant citation. Like many others here, I'm genuinely interested in learning about such a study.
When you actually conduct the experiment -- a randomized controlled trial where you give some poor people cash and others in-kind services, the cash group outperforms.