The current overly bureaucratic welfare systems are reactions on the idea that everyone is supposed to have a "job". If you don't have a job your job is to navigate the welfare system to "earn" your welfare income while you are "looking for a job that doesn't necessarily exist". The overly bureaucratic system also require more people to maintain it which means jobs are created through it, which ultimately is a good thing because more jobs is obviously a good thing in the western economies, right?

Inefficient in what terms? If you want to optimize for a nice current life for that person you give money, if you want to optimzing for getting back to work without starving then you given physical goods.

> If you want to optimize for a nice current life for that person you give money, if you want to optimzing for getting back to work without starving then you given physical goods.

If you want to optimize for getting back to work in an economy which is rapidly changing, you provide (1) resources which are flexible in form so that people can address different reasons why they might be out of work and the different needs they have to meet to get back into work, and (2) you provide aid in a form makes it easy for people to benefit from work income as additive to the aid.

Money is better for both than a standard-issue set of goods.