Loved your article!!
In the UK we don't have a section 8, but we do have Housing Benefit. However I don't think tenants pay anything towards their rent, and the Housing Benefit section certainly don't ever inspect the premises.
My daughter was unable to sell her flat when she moved to a different part of the country with her new husband, so rented it out to a couple with a little boy, who initially seemed good tenants. However they developed a drug problem, and couldn't pay their rent. They applied for Housing Benefit and got it immediately. For understandable reasons my daughter asked for it to be paid directly to her.
Over the months my daughter got more and more complaints from disturbed neighbours. She took this up with the tenant each time, but had difficulty in actually visiting as she was pregnant with twins had a full time job, and lived far away.
Eventually the neighbours concerns became more and more desperate and she decided to try and sell the flat again, which she had wanted to avoid, as she was aware that the couple had a small son, and she didn't want them to be homeless.
To cut a long story short when she eventually saw the flat, it was in an absolutely filthy state, there were hugh knife holes in the kitchen units which had been used for knife throwing, and a large hole in the bathroom wall where she thinks drugs had been stashed. In fact shortly before it went on the market the flat was raided by police!!!
Sadly, she had no option, but to evict them!!
A lot of money and hard work went into making the flat reuseable, let alone resaleable, but I'm pleased to say she did eventually get a buyer.
However your system sounds an eminently better one to ours. If people pay just a small amount towards their rent they will value the property more, and regular inspections may have saved my daughter a lot of hard work and heartache.