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Request For Research: Basic Income

blog.ycombinator.com

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Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#231

Post by bluedino »

bryanlarsen wrote: post #83
chubot wrote: post #46

My personal viewpoint is that you should be guaranteed survival and some opportunity by society, but not guaranteed income. That is, you should get food, shelter, medical care, and education for free (this also implies free child care). But you don't get to buy a cell phone or an XBox or whatever -- you have to work for that. In other words, I think basic income is jumping the gun a bit. Who is going to PAY for this,…

Basic Income is probably the most efficient way of giving everybody food & shelter. Giving everybody food and shelter through standard government processes would probably cost way more than $10K/year.

10k/year isn't going to get you far with food and shelter in all but the lowest cost of living areas.

Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#232

Post by loumf »

richardwhiuk wrote: post #129
larsiusprime wrote: post #32

What I want to know is whether Basic Income implemented with our current housing and laws about land ownership will just run afoul of the Henry George Theorem: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_George_theorem IE, the aggregate value of public spending in an area tends to soak into the land value -- give everybody $X,000 a year and the landlords will dutifully raise annual rents by $X,000.

Partially it will, but mostly it won't, because it won't be an aggregate change, as you will need to increase taxes to the middle and upper income thresholds in order to pay it. It also is being given people, not directly to the area, so if rents are raised in one area, people can move away from it. This isn't the case with infrastructure improvements such as road/rail/schools/electricity improvements. The likely eff…

Linked to inflation is a must, I would think.

The CoL problem is currently "solved" in Unemployment and Social Security by tying it to past wages (which probably correlate with this). I think we do need to replicate that in some way.

A similar metric might be to tie it to the minimum wage of a region, which will hopefully capture inflation and CoL.

Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#233

Post by joepvd »

avip wrote: post #203
tptacek wrote: post #170

Things that would help everyone, regardless of income, without depending on a radical restructuring of entitlement spending, that seem like things startups could actually do: * Equally credible alternatives to university education for professions that don't involve students shouldering $100k-$200k in debt based on decisions they have to make when they're 18 years old. * Empirical, blinded, skills-assessment based tur…

There's a more trivial alternative to "equally credible alternatives to university" - just ban education based discrimination. Same way US so nicely enforces regarding race or martial status. Make it illegal to ask. Simple change with 100% guaranteed positive outcome.

Wow, this is such a simple, practical, and subversive idea that my mind has been too boxed up for coming up with that. Whether I agree with this genius, devious and trivial idea... not sure yet.

Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#234

Post by firloop »

avip wrote: post #203
tptacek wrote: post #170

Things that would help everyone, regardless of income, without depending on a radical restructuring of entitlement spending, that seem like things startups could actually do: * Equally credible alternatives to university education for professions that don't involve students shouldering $100k-$200k in debt based on decisions they have to make when they're 18 years old. * Empirical, blinded, skills-assessment based tur…

There's a more trivial alternative to "equally credible alternatives to university" - just ban education based discrimination. Same way US so nicely enforces regarding race or martial status. Make it illegal to ask. Simple change with 100% guaranteed positive outcome.

I disagree. While college is becoming less of an important step for many careers, education, especially post-graduate, is vital for many others. For example, if I were a large tech company hiring physicists for R&D, I really don't think it's unfair to expect some sort of post-grad education, nor do I think these instances really contribute to any sort of problem right now.

Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#235

Post by rewqfdsa »

tptacek wrote: post #170

Things that would help everyone, regardless of income, without depending on a radical restructuring of entitlement spending, that seem like things startups could actually do: * Equally credible alternatives to university education for professions that don't involve students shouldering $100k-$200k in debt based on decisions they have to make when they're 18 years old. * Empirical, blinded, skills-assessment based tur…

> Equally credible alternatives to university education for professions

You're talking about trade schools? Good. That's a step in the right direction. It doesn't go far enough though. One unfortunate reality of our existence is that people differ markedly in cognitive skill. These differences are innate and immutable. Not everyone can benefit from an education.

If we pitch education as the way to address to inequality, we're not only going to waste a lot of money on useless education, but we're also going to give these negative-marginal-value people false hope of economic success.

We need to figure out an alternate way of living for people who are intellectually incapable of contributing to a modern technologically advanced economy. A basic income is a good start.

Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#236

Post by honksillet »

glibgil wrote: post #114
forrestthewoods wrote: post #76

Bernie Sanders at the recent town hall meeting asked for someone to tell a story of their struggles. A woman in tears told of how hard it was to get by on $10k to $12k a year. It makes me wonder. How happy will people who only get basic income be? How easy or difficult will it be for them to get simple work for a little extra income? Now there is a big difference in getting $10k for free vs scraping it together from…

Why shouldn't basic income be $36,000?

The number is arbitrary. The net effect would be the same just differing in degrees... inflation, decrease productivity of the economy as a whole, and downward pressure on the middle class. It would have negligible effect on the problem of inequality with the 1% and above.

Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#237

Post by DeBraid »

grandalf wrote: post #111

This is very interesting. I recall the first time I heard of a basic income proposal... Milton Friedman proposes it, calling it a "negative tax" in his book Capitalism and Freedom. Some kind of welfare state is always going to be necessary, so the ideal proposal creates an incentive landscape that is both humane and also nudges citizens toward improving skills and working hard. This is how we'd design a video game if…

+1 for Milton Friedman who almost 50 years ago described a negative income tax as the Revolutionary Subsidy.

Basic formula for negative income tax is to apply tax rates on the basis of median income. Friedman offers maximum of 50% of median income as the largest possible subsidy.

Assume median income of $50,000. Joe Smith earns $30,000 and therefore has negative income of $20k (median income - actual income). Joe would then receive a negative income tax of 50% his total negative income, or $10,000. The sum of his earned income + negative income tax = $40,000 / year.

More here: https://github.com/DeBraid/investing-notes/blob/master/negat...

Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#238

Post by vijayr »

avip wrote: post #203
tptacek wrote: post #170

Things that would help everyone, regardless of income, without depending on a radical restructuring of entitlement spending, that seem like things startups could actually do: * Equally credible alternatives to university education for professions that don't involve students shouldering $100k-$200k in debt based on decisions they have to make when they're 18 years old. * Empirical, blinded, skills-assessment based tur…

There's a more trivial alternative to "equally credible alternatives to university" - just ban education based discrimination. Same way US so nicely enforces regarding race or martial status. Make it illegal to ask. Simple change with 100% guaranteed positive outcome.

just ban education based discrimination

I am not sure I understand this. If you are going to a doctor, you would want to make sure she is qualified, isn't it? And the only way (currently at least) to make sure is that degree that proves she knows what she is doing. Of course this doesn't apply to all professions.

Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#239

Post by alkonaut »

cousin_it wrote: post #227

My short-term worry about basic income is that it'll end up bidding up the prices for goods that poor people buy, especially the rent. I won't be surprised if most of the basic income eventually goes to the landlords. IMO the right solution is to get the government involved in distributing certain goods, not just handing out money to buy them. The state could guarantee free housing, food, healthcare, education and pe…

I think the key is to start from a welfare state that is the same size as the Basic Income system. That is, you have a tax funded system that pays for paternal leave, pensions, unemployment benefits, daycare subsidies, food stamps, and all other types of transfers.

After that you make a transition to a basic income system, with a very small change in total transfers (e.g. 0-20%). This is exactly what would happen in for example Finland, where proposals have pretty wide political support now.

Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#240

Post by theseatoms »

avip wrote: post #203
tptacek wrote: post #170

Things that would help everyone, regardless of income, without depending on a radical restructuring of entitlement spending, that seem like things startups could actually do: * Equally credible alternatives to university education for professions that don't involve students shouldering $100k-$200k in debt based on decisions they have to make when they're 18 years old. * Empirical, blinded, skills-assessment based tur…

There's a more trivial alternative to "equally credible alternatives to university" - just ban education based discrimination. Same way US so nicely enforces regarding race or martial status. Make it illegal to ask. Simple change with 100% guaranteed positive outcome.

Let's also ban previous-employer based discrimination. ;)
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