The problem with “free” is that somebody is paying for it, and the bureaucrats are getting a healthy cut, and the politicians are getting a healthy kickback.
When the somebody who is paying for it figures out how to minimize (or avoid) paying for it they will do so, until nobody is paying for it.
At that point everybody starts yelling and jumping up and down and pointing fingers and eventually chopping off heads and sending people off to camps and firing squads.
Think of it as socialism in action.
My memory is that the commies used work crews at the point of a gun. They didn’t tolerate lazy welfare leeches. And the sick and infirm died quietly in the night.