## Notes from 12 April 2025 [[2025-04-11|← Previous note]] ┃ [[2025-04-13|Next note →]] I read this contribution from the _[Social Care Future](https://media.licdn.com/dms/document/media/v2/D4E1FAQHZZV67ymSU0g/feedshare-document-pdf-analyzed/B4EZZH0DF2HcAc-/0/1744961551429?e=1746057600&v=beta&t=wRk9kKxcfthMlXkfnAol-M157eQxQmpxfGnRYU0u4CM)_ coalition to the [Casey Commission](https://www.gov.uk/government/news/new-reforms-and-independent-commission-to-transform-social-care), which the Labour government set up to build cross-party consensus on a new National Care Service. The document stands out for its clarity and ambition: it frames care reform not as a question of how to fund the current model, but as an opportunity to build something very different: relational, preventive and grounded in what actually matters to people! Three things stand out: first, that people who rely on care services are rarely listened to, and when they are, their priorities differ radically from what’s currently on offer; second, that social policy shouldn’t just aim to lift people out of crisis, but enable them to thrive on their own terms; and third, that the building blocks of a better system already exist locally, they need recognition, support and new procurement models to flourish. Many of these insights travel well and are relevant to policy debates far beyond social care. On the same day, I saw a [Twitter thread](https://x.com/florianederer/status/1911794728431181961?s=48) about a [recent paper](https://drive.google.com/file/d/13Q-bpMIXPrhVYpcVII2eGfxSSEyzh8aX/view) (2025) that sharpened the contrast. The study looks at the U.S. Work Opportunity Tax Credit, which subsidizes companies that hire people facing barriers to employment (like those on public benefits or with a criminal record). The results? no effect on hiring, wages or social program use. The policy mostly ends up transferring money to firms that would have hired those workers anyway. There’s something off about designing incentives for companies instead of focusing directly on the person trying to find work. It also made me think about what a future job center could be: not just a place that matches people with vacancies, but one that trusts job coaches to use judgment and work in sync with other public services. The goal wouldn’t be just to “get people into work,” but to help them find work that makes sense in the context of their lives _PS: This vision reminded me of [[Speculative Bureaucracies and Administrative Futurism#^ministry-of-meaning|the Ministry of Meaning]]—a speculative design project by Sweden’s Ministry of Employment, exploring what it would mean to make employment policy genuinely meaningful from the perspective of those living it._