> That's called rational and responsible policy.
While I wouldn’t say that the policy as implemented was optimal, I think it’s worth considering the conditions under which it was made.
Each policy like this needs to balance the efficiency of the program with its coverage of those who need help. As an example, giving money to everyone unconditionally would have ensured full coverage, but it might not be very efficient. However, each restriction added to make the aid more targeted risks excluding people who genuinely needed help (reducing coverage) and _also_ increases costs since now the restriction needs to be tested, there needs to be an enforcement apparatus for those who violate it, etc. This is an uncertain calculus.
Then there’s the political reality that policy is not created by a benevolent dictator but instead through compromise among many individual parties, each of which has their own agenda and priorities, some of whom are acting in bad faith. Each decision point leads to more debate (should this group be in or out? should this threshold be X or Y?) and hassle, while in the background there are people suffering right now. After some point, you have to give up and accept the imperfections just to get it done.
Finally, politics being what they are, no matter how effective, helpful, and efficient the program is, the government’s reward for shipping the aid package is that the opposition party will decry it as wasteful and unnecessary. Every flaw will be amplified as part of their overall political messaging, and armchair analysts with the full benefit of hindsight will critique every decision. I can’t imagine that provides great motivation to put a lot of effort into polishing and tweaking the policy into perfection.
All of this is not to say that we shouldn’t strive for better programs and government—we absolutely should—just that it is a tremendously difficult problem.