ECONOMIC BENEFICENCE

The word beneficence is synonymous with charitable, altruistic, humane, humanitarian, benevolent, neighborly, public-spirited, generous, and magnanimous to mention a few. When I think of the word, I get a sense of a huge balloon loaded with all of the above synonyms that could be allowed to burst open on society. When the word is combined with economics, I get a lovely vision of what is possible if societies practiced ‘economic beneficence.’

In fact, two words jump out at me in the context of the economic arena: public- spirited and neighborly. These two elements were in abundance in this difficult year of 2020 as neighborhoods and communities combined their resources and skills to help each other, without question. Support was provided almost blindly as components of the fat balloon were released in humanitarian fashion.

When I saw the kindness all around, I thought:

“Why can’t this happen in an organized socio-political way.”

What if instead of looking to the national or state government for continuous support that is provided through national governmental agencies, neighborhoods got services designed by city councils and mayors who are cognizant of the actual needs of their constituents? What if the mayors knew which households had vulnerable seniors who needed special care during the spread Covid-19 and could then call on national, state, and local resources without too much delay? What if individuals with underlying conditions were contacted and treated at home before a crisis sets in?

What if city council members could organize a ‘geek squad’ to help households such that there would be instructions and immediate support of children in homes where taking home the computer was not enough for online learning? Households where continuous information and technical know-how were needed could have been identified such that 16 million children would not have fallen off the grid. What if households with special needs children could have individual education programs developed to help parents, grandparents, and care givers for the children? Surely, the school districts could help with relevant information without a serious invasion of privacy!

What if city council members and mayors could know their neighborhoods well enough to understand which households would suffer food insecurity so that the resources could be harnessed quickly and brought to the immediate vicinity rather than individuals joining long lines? Could distribution be designed with beneficence at the core? What if mayors knew which banks got relief funding to help homeowners and landlords, and were able to alert tenants and homeowners? Further, what if mayors established a cadre of knowledgeable individuals to help with the bank application process? Could this relieve the mental stress of uncertainty which would be a big humanitarian effort? Could this local interaction between government and neighborhoods create a public service system within and around communities with huge balloons of beneficence at the core? Could this not lead to more trust with all local governmental agencies to make their work more effective and to better services for communities?

I posit that activities that are derived from the national policy goals and the state government objectives before being delegated to local governmental agencies for strategic implementation, could serve our democratic economic system well if these activities are planned with more beneficence imbued in the entire process.