31–40 of 746 posts
Which is incredibly charitable! Opponents to UBI only oppose the income source being tax; which is a forced wealth transfer (opposite of my money my choice).
> opposite of my money my choice you cite this as if it's some commonly accepted moral principle
Which is incredibly charitable! Opponents to UBI only oppose the income source being tax; which is a forced wealth transfer (opposite of my money my choice).
Namely, if everyone got $x,xxx a month, how do we ensure that rents don't just go up by that amount or wages don't go down by that amount? I worry that without a well thought out plan, UBI just ends up funneling money directly back to the wealthy (eg, landlords and business owners).
I'm not convinced yet that Yang has a thorough enough plan here.
What is the actual case for Basic Income? I hear that it 'solves' the problem of automation ... except that it doesn't actually solve it AT ALL. If automation will lead to high unemployment, basic income will do nothing for that. It will send cash to people who aren't working so they can provide for basic necessities, but our welfare state already does that. And we know that segments of society that are wholly depend…
Citations please.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> opposite of my money my choice you cite this as if it's some commonly accepted moral principle
Money is just a placeholder for value produced. You usually produce value by doing something with your brain and body. "My money = my choice" is essentially "my body = my choice".
Earlier quoted context omitted.
US centric opinion: Social Security and Medicare are already UBI at large scale, but age tested (62 is the minimum age, 70 the max for social security benefits, age 65 qualified you for Medicare, US universal healthcare for seniors). Caveat: you needed to have worked and earned certain amounts to qualify for Medicare and your benefits level. To test at small scale, you'd need an endowment that would use the investmen…
Seems like nonsense to me to say 'this is universal income just except it's not universal.' If you take away the 'universal' then you're missing the entire point.
This is no different than contributing to the "right" Congressional candidates with few dollars so they control hundreds of billions of dollars of policy (or in this case, trillions of dollars). This isn't anything new or weird. NGOs face this issue all the time, having to prove out models before they'll get gov or foundation funding.
I don’t think there is any good way to test UBI at any small scale, I think there needs to be a critical mass of people who can pay their housing and food costs how society and economic activity would be reshaped under such a system.
What if you did it in some moderately isolated place, like Alaska? Alaska already has almost-universal not-quite-basic income: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alaska_Permanent_Fund
If you're not asking them to fund it, you're not testing UBI, you're testing "if an external entity provides money to a community without asking for anything in return, will that be cool?"
Earlier quoted context omitted.
UBI has a lot of practical problems. Why not start at universal health care or wider affordability of affordable housing and education? Without that any UBI will immediately be eaten up by rising prices in these areas.
It seems to me that many people are trying desperately to push all of these proposals, and it's been a borderline immobile uphill battle on all fronts. If any of these gain traction, we should celebrate, rather than accusing people of not yet achieving the others. It also makes sense that UBI would be the first to reach the staging phase, since it's the easiest to explain and the easiest to implement. Of course, your…
As opposed to socialized healthcare, which has a long track record and a variety of implementations in every industrialized nation to use as inspiration? We would literally just have to expand programs that we already have (such as the VA or Medicare/Medicaid) to start. Healthcare free at the point of service also takes no effort to explain - the "Medicare For All" marketing is actually designed to explain how easy it would be to implement.
What is the actual case for Basic Income? I hear that it 'solves' the problem of automation ... except that it doesn't actually solve it AT ALL. If automation will lead to high unemployment, basic income will do nothing for that. It will send cash to people who aren't working so they can provide for basic necessities, but our welfare state already does that. And we know that segments of society that are wholly depend…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
UBI has a lot of practical problems. Why not start at universal health care or wider affordability of affordable housing and education? Without that any UBI will immediately be eaten up by rising prices in these areas.
A response to what happens to markets when people have more money: More people enter and participate in markets, which makes markets work better. Markets behave better with more participants than with fewer participants. UBI is a net positive on this point.
What would really happen is that the Fed would raise rates, which would increase the barrier to market participation and we would be back to where we started.
I don’t think there is any good way to test UBI at any small scale, I think there needs to be a critical mass of people who can pay their housing and food costs how society and economic activity would be reshaped under such a system.