Universal Basic Income Is Superior to a $15 Minimum Wage (2019) • Hacker News Board

Re: Universal Basic Income Is Superior to a $15 Minimum Wage (2019)

#81

Post by rhino369 » Sat, Jan 30, 2021, 8:05 PM UTC

spamizbad wrote: post #47

nodesocket wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or how about the big elephant in the room that nobody seems to be bring up; the effect on small businesses that can’t afford to pay employees $15 or $20/hr. So, instead of helping the poor, these policies raise unemployment and actually are a detriment to the overall health of the economy.

The past 25-30 years of research do not show this to be true. The link between the minimum wage and unemployment isn't really a thing. I recognize your position was the conventional wisdom in the 1990s but newer research and analysis (along with tons of states experimenting with minimum wage over the various decades) paint a clear picture that it helps not just low-income workers but can help firms too by boosting pr…

There is no concussion among economists that "link between the minimum wage and unemployment isn't really a thing."

A lot of research suggests the effect is pretty small when the increase in minimum wage is small compared to the market wages for unskilled labor.

But there isn't a lot of data about a large change in minimum wage that affects a substantial number of people.

If there was no downside, why not $100 an hour?

Re: Universal Basic Income Is Superior to a $15 Minimum Wage (2019)

#82

Post by cactus2093 » Sat, Jan 30, 2021, 8:06 PM UTC

RangerScience wrote: post #39

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only difference between a UBI and a negative income tax is framing. Suppose you have a negative income tax in the amount of $12,000 which phases out at a rate of 25% up to $48,000 in income, and a 5% marginal tax rate on people who make less than $48,000 and a 30% marginal tax rate on people who make more. Suppose you have a $12,000 UBI and a flat 30% tax rate. These are really the same thing. The advantage of th…

Isn't the another significant different in the logistics of distribution? For UBI, you need to / get to have a direct line to every person/citizen. For NI, they come to you. I honestly have no idea which one is better/easier from this perspective, it just seems like the logistics implementation is another significant difference.

It seems like either one could work much the same way in terms of ease of distribution, but I agree UBI sounds simpler and more direct. Maybe just because it's something new and it's straightforward in principle so we can fantasize about it actually working efficiently.

I imagine UBI as a system where every citizen gets a monthly check, no questions asked. It shows up in the mail or gets direct deposited and that's it. And if someone can't receive it that way, say if they're homeless or don't have a bank account, maybe there could even be a place they can show up and collect their money in person. This might still be a pipe dream but it doesn't seem impossible, the hard part is actually figuring out how to pay for a UBI program.

Contrast that to sticking it into the existing income tax system. I imagine that would mean you'd only collect the money annually, and only if you file a tax return. Lots of people without much income don't file tax returns so that's already a blocker. And once the money is gone, a year is a long time to wait for another payment. Of course there's no reason a negative income tax couldn't still be distributed monthly and made more easily acceptable, but there's just a lot of baggage around the thought of dealing with taxes.

Re: Universal Basic Income Is Superior to a $15 Minimum Wage (2019)

#83

Post by dang » Sat, Jan 30, 2021, 8:07 PM UTC

Turing_Machine wrote: post #32

SmokyBourbon wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Andrew Yang: > I am a huge fan of a negative income tax, but I prefer a UBI for multiple reasons. It lowers the administrative burden because you don’t need to figure out how much I made last year. It removes any strange shenanigans in terms of trying to report a low income. It alleviates a payments timing issue — you’re not likely to get your negative income tax when you might need it. And politically, I think it’s…

I see no reason why a direct quote from Andrew Yang (probably the best-known proponent of UBI at the present time) should be flagged to death in this conversation. Vouched -- which doesn't indicate that I necessarily agree with him. I just hate people who are making a valid contribution to the conversation being mobbed down.

It wasn't flagged to death and nobody mobbed anybody. The account that posted it was banned. Posts by banned accounts are killed by default.

You're right that the parent was a good contribution and deserved to be unkilled. That's what vouching is for, and you made an excellent use of it.

Banning on HN isn't punitive, it's preventative. When a banned account has changed its ways and has reliably been sticking to HN's rules for a while now, we're happy to unban it. If people see cases like that, they should email hn@ycombinator.com so we can look into it. That's a fine way to watch out for a fellow user.

When a banned account hasn't been reliably sticking to HN's rules for long enough, or hasn't posted enough to decide that yet, it stays banned for obvious reasons. In that case their good posts can still be unkilled, just on a comment-by-comment basis. That's why we created vouching and it works well.

Re: Universal Basic Income Is Superior to a $15 Minimum Wage (2019)

#84

Post by throwawayboise » Sat, Jan 30, 2021, 8:09 PM UTC

jnwatson wrote: post #34

JPKab wrote: post #11

The minute UBI gets instituted is the minute that politicians will arise who want to lower the quantity for one group of people and increase it for the group of people that supports them. Eventually it will end up being means tested in one form or another just like the income tax system has been made so complex by politicians favoring one group over another. I absolutely love the idea of UBI but I just don't see it s…

That already happens with income tax. That’s exactly what the Trump tax cuts accomplished.

I don't know how old you are or how long you've been paying taxes, but they have been an insane labyrinth since long before Trump. My taxes actually got simpler with the increased standard deduction.

Re: Universal Basic Income Is Superior to a $15 Minimum Wage (2019)

#85

Post by [deleted] » Sat, Jan 30, 2021, 8:10 PM UTC

overton wrote: post #19

Authors like this frame the UBI/minimum wage debate as if we just haven't figured out the right policy mix to fix poverty or precarity -- as if it's a problem of ideas. I propose that it's in fact a question of power -- 1) who benefits from people being poor and how much 2) power do they have? 1) Owners of capital, who don't want to see their labour costs escalate and use firing/the poverty gun as a disciplinary tool…

[deleted]

Re: Universal Basic Income Is Superior to a $15 Minimum Wage (2019)

#86

Post by AnthonyMouse » Sat, Jan 30, 2021, 8:11 PM UTC

randomdata wrote: post #78

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is equivalent to whether the UBI is paid on the first day of the period or the last day of the period and is only a meaningful distinction in the first period of implementation.

To wrap my head around this, let's assume the period is the calendar year. Let's assume that I made enough from January to March that I exceed a payout position under a negative income tax system, but COVID-19 saw me lose my job in March and my income dried up since then. When I report my income as of December 31st, 2020, I still made enough for the year that I won't receive benefits, despite not having an income. Th…

> When I report my income as of December 31st, 2020, I still made enough for the year that I won't receive benefits, despite not having an income. That means that I will be unsupported through 2021 and won't see the money until 2022, correct?

There is no "don't receive benefits" anywhere. Everybody gets $12,000/year every year in both cases. Then separately people who make more than $48,000/year pay more than a total of $12,000/year in taxes or phase outs.

Re: Universal Basic Income Is Superior to a $15 Minimum Wage (2019)

#87

Post by SpicyLemonZest » Sat, Jan 30, 2021, 8:11 PM UTC

wpietri wrote: post #56

SpicyLemonZest wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The concern is that we're soon going to reach a point where "our current economic order" - the assumption that every healthy adult should have a full-time job - is unsustainable. I wouldn't say I oppose a $15 minimum wage, and I don't think the author would either, but we do desperately need to start thinking about our transition to a post-work society and I worry minimum wage debates are sucking up a lot of the ener…

Why do you think we'll run out of things for people to do? The history of the last 500 years or so suggests that when old jobs get optimized out of existence, there's still plenty that needs doing. When I look around, I definitely don't see a society with no unfilled needs, so I expect we can keep going quite a spell.

Labor force participation data (https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS11300001) strongly suggests that a lot of people believe we've run out of things for them to do over the last century. (The overall chart https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CIVPART is confounded by the simultaneous trend of the womens' rights movement getting women into the workforce https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNU01300002.)

Re: Universal Basic Income Is Superior to a $15 Minimum Wage (2019)

#88

Post by gtsop » Sat, Jan 30, 2021, 8:11 PM UTC

aww_dang wrote: post #76

thatguy0900 wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So poor people need to exist because otherwise we wouldn't be able to force people to do things we ourselves wouldnt want to do? And if they are not poor they would stop being in awful servitude jobs noone wants? I guess it just sucks to be born poor then, too bad we can't help them

At the end of the day most people don't want to work, but the option to be paid for not working isn't available. We all dislike working to some extent. Otherwise we would do it for free, as a hobby. There are some low paid jobs people choose out of passion or interest. There are also bottom rung jobs that beginners with no job skills can enter. Think about people with no language skills, don't they deserve a chance t…

> At the end of the day most people don't want to work [...] We all dislike working to some extent.

Where did you get that from? I really think the opposite is true.

Re: Universal Basic Income Is Superior to a $15 Minimum Wage (2019)

#89

Post by randomdata » Sat, Jan 30, 2021, 8:15 PM UTC

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #86

randomdata wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To wrap my head around this, let's assume the period is the calendar year. Let's assume that I made enough from January to March that I exceed a payout position under a negative income tax system, but COVID-19 saw me lose my job in March and my income dried up since then. When I report my income as of December 31st, 2020, I still made enough for the year that I won't receive benefits, despite not having an income. Th…

> When I report my income as of December 31st, 2020, I still made enough for the year that I won't receive benefits, despite not having an income. That means that I will be unsupported through 2021 and won't see the money until 2022, correct? There is no "don't receive benefits" anywhere. Everybody gets $12,000/year every year in both cases. Then separately people who make more than $48,000/year pay more than a total…

> There is no "don't receive benefits" anywhere. Everybody gets $12,000/year in both cases.

Does a negative income tax not tell that high earners pay money to the state, while low earners receive money from the state? If everyone receives money from the state, even if high earners have to pay it back at tax time, that does not meet the definition of negative income tax as I know it. That is UBI. A more concrete example would be useful.

Re: Universal Basic Income Is Superior to a $15 Minimum Wage (2019)

#90

Post by aww_dang » Sat, Jan 30, 2021, 8:16 PM UTC

gtsop wrote: post #79

aww_dang wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>argument is being propagated by the same people who will never have to do these jobs or live by limited money How were you able to determine this from across the Internet?

> How were you able to determine this from across the Internet? Who told you my source is the internet? :) we all live irl and discuss with people. I never heard a low-paid worker throw this argument. It always comes from people who have better jobs and more stable income

It appears as a variant of the 'check your privilege' argument. Everyone who disagrees with UBI, minimum wage increases is privileged and lacking empathy according to this generalization.

While the actual thread appears to be about incentives.

There are many who have worked entry level jobs who would object to UBI or minimum wage price fixing on purely economic terms.

There are also those who are unable to afford the current cost of living or gain employment due to interventions in the market. It wouldn't be difficult to unfairly characterize interventionists as insensitive to the plight of the poor.