This study explores the implications of a national identification system for Jamaica and provides evidence to support the need for a national identification card, including its economic value. Jamaica does not presently have an identification that serves as a general- purpose identification, usable across all activities. Such IDs, known as foundational IDs, are usually created with the general population in mind, rather than a specific group of citizens. It is the norm in many jurisdictions that such IDs are universally available and are used for multiple purposes. In Jamaica, instead of using a foundational ID, functional IDs, such as passport, electoral ID, and driver’s licence, together with the TRN, are used to authenticate citizens’ identity. Those means of identification were not intended to verify identities in other contexts, or by third parties, but rather to meet the objectives of the issuing organizations. These current ID systems are not only limited in their coverage and, for some, costly to obtain, but there is a lack of interconnectivity; that is, each system’s collection, processing, storage, and management of identity data is isolated from each of the others.