Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Universal basic income to be tested in Wales

bbc.co.uk

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

231–240 of 337 posts

Re: Universal basic income to be tested in Wales

#231

Post by hollerith »

smaryjerry wrote: post #218
ItsMonkk wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find it fascinating that this community can both have this stance and find nothing wrong with the FIRE movement. What is a $1000/month UBI? Using the 4% rule, it's equivalent to having investments worth $300000. I have a feeling that a lot of people on HN have a portfolio worth $300000. Are you still working?

It’s not just employees but my close friends. They refuse to work because they will make more on unemployment. Making less by working means they are essentially paying someone to work. What is FIRE movement?

"financial independence and retire early".

Re: Universal basic income to be tested in Wales

#232

Post by dazc »

ktzar wrote: post #86
gandalfian wrote: post #40

In practice the UK already pays the price for a universal basic income. Most poor people get some sort of tax credit and/or housing benefit. What we don't do is allow people to use it to rise out of poverty. A disabled lady thought saving some of her disability was the responsible thing to do, despite further impoverishing herself, once she built up some savings she was prosecuted for fraudently claiming benefits whi…

What is outrageous if that the UK prevents you from getting any benefit of you have any savings. It's basically encouraging you to not save any money.

Not true. Job Seeker's Allowance is not means-tested. https://www.gov.uk/jobseekers-allowance/eligibility

If you are still unemployed whan that runs out your savings are taken into account but you can still have £16K. https://www.gov.uk/universal-credit/eligibility

Re: Universal basic income to be tested in Wales

#233

Post by dragonwriter »

s3tz wrote: post #7

I'm curious, can we determine from small scale tests like this whether the data we get from them is scale independent?

Since the tests are at different indivividual scales, possibly.

We might even get some idea of how scale affects the results, which could make the conclusions applicable across scales even though the results vary, but extrapolation is always more dangerous than interpolation.

Re: Universal basic income to be tested in Wales

#234

Post by smaryjerry »

danShumway wrote: post #184
smaryjerry wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Today’s stimulus is a perfect example of UBI. 33.8% of all personal income in the last year came from the government. It results in everyone having more money to spend but eventually as we see now shortages in just about everything, those shortages cause prices to rise and soon even though everyone has more money, everything costs more. The market settles prices in the end and trying to control the market by pumping…

> Today’s stimulus is a perfect example of UBI. > eventually as we see now shortages in just about everything This is a pretty big jump in logic. We've had a ransomware account that shut down a gas pipeline, we've had mass business shutdowns in multiple countries that affected the entire economy, we've had a large shipping block. It's pretty hard to blame the current chip shortage on the stimulus. I do not understand…

I’m not even talking about gas. I’m taking about chips, lumber, chicken, and much much more. All of them are having shortages and it has nothing to do with randomware but it is important to recognize that using stimulus is like using a budget, spending money in one spot means you can’t spend it in another, while we have gone all in on the pandemic we forget that other problems like ransomware and whatever else comes up still need to be addressed and take money to correct.

Re: Universal basic income to be tested in Wales

#235

Post by notahacker »

LatteLazy wrote: post #39
notahacker wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. So far we've repeatedly tested that if you give people in an area a small sum of money paid for from central government funds for a couple of years, they won't change their habits much but will be a little better off financially, which should be of absolutely no surprise to anyone. A real pilot would - as a minimum - be making the local tax rises and welfare cuts necessary to make the scheme revenue neutral, wh…

I'm the root commentor but I hope you don't mind me piling on. It's pretty well agreed that the trial in Finland worked: https://www.newscientist.com/article/2242937-universal-basic... Id welcome a trial that included paying for it. That said, I don't think it would make a big difference. The UK (I'm a brit) spends enough on welfare to just give everyone £5000 pa (including kids) at the same price. We could just star…

We could try that experiment. Good luck persuading those pensioners who've lost half a state pension they believe they've earned and single parents made homeless that UBI is a positive change because some other people are better off though. Or getting the Parliamentary votes to even try that...

The Finnish trial "worked" in the trivial sense that unemployed people given an extra £2k a year on top of any other income they might earn were marginally better off. It didn't work in the sense that it was considered worth raising taxes to pay for it to be extended

Re: Universal basic income to be tested in Wales

#236

Post by imtringued »

zozbot234 wrote: post #113
amanaplanacanal wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The people who supported segregation mostly abandoned the Democratic Party decades ago because of the civil rights issue. It’s one of the prime reasons the south used to be solidly Democratic and is now solidly Republican. Neither party is the same as it was in the nineteenth century.

> The people who supported segregation mostly abandoned the Democratic Party decades ago because of the civil rights issue. Yup, that's what people like to tell themselves but much of it is wishful thinking. Look at how long people like Robert Byrd stayed around. Look at who actually supports, e.g. extreme NIMBY policies in urban areas to keep undesirable "demographics" out of the neighborhood, and "fights gentrifica…

I agree. A lot of zoning is intentionally based on the idea of raising the cost of living so that the poorer part of the population is driven out. Things like rent control primarily benefit those who were not struggling in the first place. They just get to pay less on their expensive apartments. If you were struggling to pay rent, then rent control does nothing for you because the rents you were paying were not significantly above the mandated rent control level to begin with. However, since you are struggling, landlords are not willing to rent out units to you because any missed payment is a loss for them. They can't price that risk into their rents so they simply take someone with a better economic background.

That's how you get systemic racism without any single individual even thinking about skin color.

Re: Universal basic income to be tested in Wales

#237

Post by jxidjhdhdhdhfhf »

ItsMonkk wrote: post #229
jxidjhdhdhdhfhf wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't quite understand. The land reduces in price because of LVT, requiring a smaller mortgage. But wouldn't we expect the smaller mortgage + LVT to be equal to the old higher priced mortgage? After all the intrinsic value associated with owning the property hasn't changed. My point is how is a buyer better off under this scenario if they would have to pay the same amount per year in order to have a home? In fact t…

Right, so you are looking at the pie and seeing a redistribution, and going "this is all equal". The key you are missing is that this fixes the incentives. Currently NIMBY's(No in my back yard) say no to new housing so that their home prices appreciate in values. Currently companies buy empty lots and leave them empty for 30 years. What happens when you have a UBI funded through a LVT? Well, exclusivity drives market…

Yeah I'm not quite seeing how the pie gets bigger. You have a UBI at the cost of massive wealth destruction in the housing market.

How does LVT favor dense housing? And why would people be building more now that they don't expect the price of homes to ever increase?

I'm not seeing how the scenario you've outlined is the most likely to happen.

Re: Universal basic income to be tested in Wales

#238

Post by domino24 »

sokoloff wrote: post #92
domino24 wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are a few instances of being able to collect both right now. I've heard of some people who manage manual labor type companies (painters, tree trimmers, landscapers, etc) that offer to pay laborers cash (which would be in addition to the unemployment benefits) and they cannot get workers. It's like the unemployment is a high enough amount that they'd rather collect just that and not work to earn more. Perhaps th…

Or perhaps manual laborers are more ethical than you give them credit for in the post above and choose not to lie and cheat to double-dip unemployment while actually working.

This might be the case for some individuals, but in the examples I have been given, this was not the issue.

Re: Universal basic income to be tested in Wales

#239

Post by zozbot234 »

hogFeast wrote: post #213
gandalfian wrote: post #40

In practice the UK already pays the price for a universal basic income. Most poor people get some sort of tax credit and/or housing benefit. What we don't do is allow people to use it to rise out of poverty. A disabled lady thought saving some of her disability was the responsible thing to do, despite further impoverishing herself, once she built up some savings she was prosecuted for fraudently claiming benefits whi…

> A disabled lady thought saving some of her disability was the responsible thing to do, despite further impoverishing herself ??? So if I earn £100k/year, and I choose to save all of my income then I am impoverishing myself. Do you understand what saving is? The UK has this terrible habit, like the US, where people are infinitely jealous of other people. Any benefit that someone else is getting, I want it. You get t…

> Yes, if you have £18k in savings...you don't need help. Do you understand what being poor is? You are not poor if you have £18k in savings.

Savings is not income. One is a stock, the other is a flow. People might be in need of income support even if they've been saving responsibly for a while.

Re: Universal basic income to be tested in Wales

#240

Post by WhompingWindows »

jxidjhdhdhdhfhf wrote: post #200
ItsMonkk wrote: post #63

Housing can’t be both affordable and a good investment. The price of a home should therefore equal its replacement cost. If the market value of the home with the land is $1 million, but the cost to build the home is $200k, raise taxes on the land until the new market value is $200k. Tada, Land Value Tax. Why am I mentioning LVT in a Universal Basic Income thread? What should we do with the money we earn through a LVT…

I don't quite understand. The land reduces in price because of LVT, requiring a smaller mortgage. But wouldn't we expect the smaller mortgage + LVT to be equal to the old higher priced mortgage? After all the intrinsic value associated with owning the property hasn't changed. My point is how is a buyer better off under this scenario if they would have to pay the same amount per year in order to have a home? In fact t…

It's a bit hand-wavey logic in the OP. He's saying the cost of a home should be affordable, therefore any intrinsic value of the land (versus the cost of building the structure) should be taxed very heavily, such that 100% of the value of housing spending goes into the structure and not the land. Land is merely a vehicle to produce tax revenue, if anyone has extra land, they must pay for the privilege.

This would be disastrous for our house, we have a large wooded plot, it would presumably be heavily taxed beyond our means to pay.

Post reply on HN