Government Allows AI Benefit Decisions Against Beneficiaries
The Government has now opened the door to AI benefit decisions, allowing automated systems to make welfare calls while Jobseeker recipients are forced to reapply every six months. The poorest New Zealanders are once again the test subjects.
Beneficiaries are always the lab rats for how far the State thinks it can bend human rights.
Beneficiaries are already under a level of mass surveillance we wouldn’t agree with if used on us.
AI benefit decisions start with people who can least fight back
Beneficiaries are already facing automated decision-making. The Government forced people on Jobseeker Support to reapply every six months rather than annually, and has now passed legislation enabling MSD to use automated systems to make benefit decisions.
They are guinea pigs to this experiment!
Nothing comforts a struggling family like a chatbot saying ‘Have you tried not being poor?’
“Nicola Willis thinks AI can handle mental health support — because when you’re at your lowest, nothing hits quite like a machine asking you to rate your despair out of five.
National’s dream is a fully automated public service — no public, no service, and best of all, no one left to explain why it’s not working.
AI doesn’t replace bureaucracy. It replaces accountability.
I find it ironic that there’s so many out of employment put on welfare but they don’t have staff to process the applications.
A friend who works for IRD told me at Xmas that they are already using AI to summarize financial transactions.
And it produces fictitious transactions.
Are you going to be happy when IRD accuse you of tax dodging / supporting terrorism & human trafficking / paying for kiddy porn?