comingle thoughts
I was just looking at https://www.comingle.us/ - it's sort of a closed circle mutual aid platform for people in the US, where you share more if you earn more, and get more if you don't. it's at the trial stage and being tested on a limited number of people.
I have mixed feelings about it. it's a great concept, could really help me out, and is a thing I'd be glad to contribute to if my income ever got to that level again.
otoh you have to have a bank account, and give them full access to your statements/transaction records.
a) people who need the most help often don't have bank accounts. so (perhaps inevitably) it's a sharing system for people with a certain level of privilege, albeit not necessarily a lot.
b) multiple third party processors are involved, which is scary given the state of data security.
c) probably some other issues I just haven't figured out yet.
mufos, I'd be interested in your thoughts, if any. I'm leaving it unlisted so y'all can read each other's comments, but no boosts thx.
comingle thoughts
@twistylittlepassages idk anything about anything, so please take this all with a grain of salt
something about this feels a little too magical and creepy? I get that folks want to try to redistribute money but I don't have a lot of trust for folks having access to my bank or transactions, especially with privacy breaches being rampant
also, tech folks making piles of money with stocks won't have that show up in their bank accounts; how do you even prevent fraud from people having different bank accounts? or individuals vs families? I think more about how things like covered california works, where you estimate your income and get health care assistance, but it's integrated with your california taxes (in case you get it wrong)
Edit: oh n/m I misread the 2%, maybe that's reasonable
comingle thoughts
@picklish Covered California etc are relying on tax returns so yeah, different ballgame. oddly if this was also relying on tax return stuff (appropriately anonymized) I would be more comfortable with it, but as it is, jfc. @twistylittlepassages
comingle thoughts
@titania @picklish yeah tax info would be much less invasive. it's not clear why they don't just use that.
(on a philosophical level, the fraud potential doesn't actually bother me so much -- any system of mutual aid can and will be misused, but the misuse is generally less than people expect/believe. for me, that's inherent and acceptable risk as long as it doesn't become system-breaking. there has to be some amount of trust for any mutual aid to work.)
comingle thoughts
@twistylittlepassages @titania @picklish they make a very big deal about how the point is to smooth out income spikes and dips by doing deductions/credits on a weekly basis so presumably that’s why they went for bank info (which is near enough to real time) instead of tax. but i don’t know that that’s enough justification to be handing over such a huge amount of data to a private, for profit company.
also very funny that their faq has a section like “do i have to fill out lots of forms to prove i need money” and they’re like “no! we will literally always be tracking you so we will already know” as if that’s somehow better
comingle thoughts
@Satsuma GOD RIGHT THAT LAST POINT THREW ME TOO @twistylittlepassages @picklish