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Moving Forward on Basic Income

blog.ycombinator.com

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Re: Moving Forward on Basic Income

#811

Post by davemel37 »

jomamaxx wrote: post #605
davemel37 wrote: post #228

If you are really serious about Basic Income, I strongly encourage you to look at the Kollel system within the ultra-orthodox/yeshiva communities (i.e. Lakewood, NJ) While their model is conditional, the framework for providing a stipend to cover basic necessities so the kollel members are free to study, is very similar. You will see a glimpse of what happens. There is amazing achievement, and there is abuse of the s…

"ultra-orthodox/yeshiva communities" Ultro Orthodox Jews / Mennonites etc. have a very strong set of social rules, and very conservative behavioural expectations. You can't compare someone in such a community to the American population at large. The 'ethos' in a religious community centres around faith, family, duty, responsibility. In America, it's 'personal aspiration'. They can hardly be used as an experimental ba…

Maybe you can't compare it, but you can still learn from it.

Re: Moving Forward on Basic Income

#812

Post by eanzenberg »

If that were the case, then the dividens should be paid proportionally to the "collective" taxpayer... the ones who paid the most taxes... the wealthy.

You totally don't get it and probably never will. Wealth isn't created equally and will never be. Do yourself a favor and read up on Venezuela.

Re: Moving Forward on Basic Income

#813

Post by geekingfrog »

eanzenberg wrote: post #812

If that were the case, then the dividens should be paid proportionally to the "collective" taxpayer... the ones who paid the most taxes... the wealthy. You totally don't get it and probably never will. Wealth isn't created equally and will never be. Do yourself a favor and read up on Venezuela.

Except that the wealthy don't pay that much taxes in the first place.

Re: Moving Forward on Basic Income

#814

Post by tamana »

notahacker wrote: post #119
dragonwriter wrote: post #16

Honestly, I think any "Basic Income" research where the recipient classes aren't 100% of the members of some well-defined polity and where the policy is explicitly a close-ended pilot is researching something so fundamentally different from Basic Income (it is well-known that close-ended benefits have a different effect on behavior) that, while there may be some useful insights that have applicability to actual Basic…

This. I can confidently predict that most people will be better off (vs a control group) for having their income topped up for a fixed period by wealthy philanthropists, in addition to any benefit entitlements they may already be eligible for. But that's not Basic Income. Basic Income is replacing [most aspects of] the welfare state with a programme that redistributes portions of income from each according to their a…

Alternatively, adding a BI may show that recipients do not need more social services to improve their lot, so we can stop growing them.

Similar to how we don't withold all basic medical care when testing efficacy of a new drug.

Re: Moving Forward on Basic Income

#815

Post by eanzenberg »

geekingfrog wrote: post #813
eanzenberg wrote: post #812

If that were the case, then the dividens should be paid proportionally to the "collective" taxpayer... the ones who paid the most taxes... the wealthy. You totally don't get it and probably never will. Wealth isn't created equally and will never be. Do yourself a favor and read up on Venezuela.

Except that the wealthy don't pay that much taxes in the first place.

http://www.cnbc.com/2015/04/13/top-1-pay-nearly-half-of-fede...

Re: Moving Forward on Basic Income

#816

Post by themartorana »

eanzenberg wrote: post #815
geekingfrog wrote: post #813

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except that the wealthy don't pay that much taxes in the first place.

http://www.cnbc.com/2015/04/13/top-1-pay-nearly-half-of-fede...

"The top one percent of income earners, who paid 38 percent of federal income taxes, faced an effective tax rate of 23 percent." [0]

"The richest 1% of the world’s population now owns 50% of its total wealth, according to a report by Credit Suisse." [1]

I was in the top 5% last year. I paid an effective tax rate of 28% federal, and almost 45% including state/local. Why should I give one flying fuck if the people that control 50% of the world's wealth pay a majority of taxes, if they pay a lower effective tax rate than I do?

This idea that the 1% pay more than their fair share because they pay a majority of taxes is some ridiculous double-speak. One single percent of people control 50% of the world's wealth. You want me to feel bad for them how?

[0] http://www.economics21.org/html/rich-pay-more-their-fair-sha...

[1] http://fortune.com/2015/10/14/1-percent-global-wealth-credit...

Re: Moving Forward on Basic Income

#817

Post by platz »

eanzenberg wrote: post #812

If that were the case, then the dividens should be paid proportionally to the "collective" taxpayer... the ones who paid the most taxes... the wealthy. You totally don't get it and probably never will. Wealth isn't created equally and will never be. Do yourself a favor and read up on Venezuela.

> Wealth isn't created equally

Agreed. But that wasn't the claim (Equally != Collectively). It takes the whole society to produce both the demand and the capital for wealth creation.

> dividens should be paid proportionally to the "collective" taxpayer.

Although the IPhone example did refer to public financing; focusing on taxes here is missing the point, which also includes wealth without such an obviously direct link to government financing.

Re: Moving Forward on Basic Income

#819

Post by orlandob »

EGreg wrote: post #213

People wonder "where is the money going to come from?" On a national level it could be newly issued fiat currency, which silences the "it's theft!" argument but then raises the crucial question: what about inflation? Well, there are two issues here: 1) If the people are freed up to learn or take jobs (I wish minimum wage would be abolished in any jurisdiction that UBI is given out) then more dollars would be chasing…

So many intelligent people read this site yet only a handful understand real world monetary policy and economics. Thank you for this comment.

Re: Moving Forward on Basic Income

#820

Post by Retra »

eanzenberg wrote: post #812

If that were the case, then the dividens should be paid proportionally to the "collective" taxpayer... the ones who paid the most taxes... the wealthy. You totally don't get it and probably never will. Wealth isn't created equally and will never be. Do yourself a favor and read up on Venezuela.

If you're only counting money, it might seem that way. Perhaps you could measure time spent and freedoms lost instead.
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