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LA County's guaranteed income program to give some foster youth $1k per month

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Re: LA County's guaranteed income program to give some foster youth $1k per month

#31

Post by toomuchtodo »

LMYahooTFY wrote: post #14
toomuchtodo wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

25% of foster kids end up homeless after aging out of the system. Direct cash transfer value is mostly proven from a social work/benefit perspective. Sure, coaching and counseling through social services must also be provided to help underprivileged humans take care of themselves and reach their full potential, but cash benefits help, full stop. The moral hazard argument needs to die. There is a difference between st…

The responses that completely ignore addiction and mental health need to die. Can you address what the parent described about mental health and addiction? Would you rather invest $10k into someone who has shown you they're reliable, or someone who has shown you they are unreliable? Please answer both questions.

I have invested more than that in both cohorts, and would do it again. Everything is luck, the money buys dice rolls. Some dice are weighted towards success more than others. I like to gamble on people, it’s a worthy cause and brings me happiness.

With regards to mental health and addiction, I support Medicare for All and robust access to mental health and addiction treatment for those in need. We have the means, we simply choose not to implement efficiently. Set the tax rate at whatever is necessary. There will never be perfection, never the perfect time for policy components. Implement what you can when you can and accept good enough is all that can be done.

Re: LA County's guaranteed income program to give some foster youth $1k per month

#32

Post by Bjartr »

LMYahooTFY wrote: post #14
toomuchtodo wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

25% of foster kids end up homeless after aging out of the system. Direct cash transfer value is mostly proven from a social work/benefit perspective. Sure, coaching and counseling through social services must also be provided to help underprivileged humans take care of themselves and reach their full potential, but cash benefits help, full stop. The moral hazard argument needs to die. There is a difference between st…

The responses that completely ignore addiction and mental health need to die. Can you address what the parent described about mental health and addiction? Would you rather invest $10k into someone who has shown you they're reliable, or someone who has shown you they are unreliable? Please answer both questions.

> Would you rather invest $10k into someone who has shown you they're reliable, or someone who has shown you they are unreliable?

Since the goal is to produce functioning members of society that produce a net benefit, I'd invest the money in making the unreliable one more reliable.

Re: LA County's guaranteed income program to give some foster youth $1k per month

#33

Post by Eumenes »

RC_ITR wrote: post #7
cenobyte wrote: post #5

As a programmer from a bad family, group home, foster family background myself. $1k per month without working or struggle would have destroyed me. Imagine all the weed and whiskey I could have bought for that? (Which is what I would have done) Instead of working I would have been lazy. Homelessness and hunger was my major motivator and made me work in fast food while dreaming of computers. The lack of struggle would…

Would a $1,000 raise at your job have been as devastating? Surely you're not implying $12k/year in Los Angeles (a county with c. $3k/month median rent) is going to create a class of willfully unemployed former foster-kids with no drive? Should we also ban parents sending their kids money for the same reason? Or are foster kids uniquely prone to laziness?

> Should we also ban parents sending their kids money for the same reason?

How is that anyway comparable to the county government giving monthly welfare checks to a niche demographic of the population?

Re: LA County's guaranteed income program to give some foster youth $1k per month

#35

Post by Karunamon »

LMYahooTFY wrote: post #14
toomuchtodo wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

25% of foster kids end up homeless after aging out of the system. Direct cash transfer value is mostly proven from a social work/benefit perspective. Sure, coaching and counseling through social services must also be provided to help underprivileged humans take care of themselves and reach their full potential, but cash benefits help, full stop. The moral hazard argument needs to die. There is a difference between st…

The responses that completely ignore addiction and mental health need to die. Can you address what the parent described about mental health and addiction? Would you rather invest $10k into someone who has shown you they're reliable, or someone who has shown you they are unreliable? Please answer both questions.

Steelman:

1. Perhaps GP is just exceptionally sensitive to bad mental states or addiction. I know the social "sciences" have an entirely well-deserved bad reputation, but it isn't good science to extrapolate from n=1 either. Pilot programs like this one are useful.

2. The obvious answer to your rhetorical question is the second one, but in this case it is irrelevant; the program is targeted at a random set of applicants, their reliability is unknown.

Re: LA County's guaranteed income program to give some foster youth $1k per month

#36

Post by papercrane »

cenobyte wrote: post #5

As a programmer from a bad family, group home, foster family background myself. $1k per month without working or struggle would have destroyed me. Imagine all the weed and whiskey I could have bought for that? (Which is what I would have done) Instead of working I would have been lazy. Homelessness and hunger was my major motivator and made me work in fast food while dreaming of computers. The lack of struggle would…

Studies like this are important to separate data from anecdotes and conjecture.

There are a lot of comments and conjecture that this will kill drive and increase drug use, but without actual data those are just hypothesis.

It is an interesting question around ethics of studies though. I'd be interested to see the ethics review for this study.

Re: LA County's guaranteed income program to give some foster youth $1k per month

#37

Post by malfist »

prosqlinjector wrote: post #20
malfist wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh please, this is just repackaged "Don't give poor people money, they'll just spend it on drugs" drivel. Even if you're telling the truth, you're advocating a state where people suffer because you personally couldn't handle a tiny bit of welfare.

> because you personally couldn't handle a tiny bit of welfare. If there was a segment of the population who "couldn't handle" welfare, where do you think we would find them?

I think you need to prove there is a population that "can't handle" welfare.

Re: LA County's guaranteed income program to give some foster youth $1k per month

#38

Post by brink »

Eumenes wrote: post #8

> "Given the huge number of L.A. County residents who applied, it's abundantly clear that a guaranteed basic income is an idea whose time has come," Supervisor Sheila Kuehl said. Uh, its abundantly clear that people want free money?

I know, right? What a dangerously simplistic mindset to have for someone in authority.

Re: LA County's guaranteed income program to give some foster youth $1k per month

#39

Post by slg »

jstarfish wrote: post #26
RC_ITR wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would a $1,000 raise at your job have been as devastating? Surely you're not implying $12k/year in Los Angeles (a county with c. $3k/month median rent) is going to create a class of willfully unemployed former foster-kids with no drive? Should we also ban parents sending their kids money for the same reason? Or are foster kids uniquely prone to laziness?

You're proving his point. $1k isn't enough to do anything with, so it's going to get wasted on vice. Go give 1k to a homeless guy...he'll still be homeless, and probably dead thanks to what you enabled. Qualify them for food stamps or something if you want to help. Cash always leads to trouble.

>Go give 1k to a homeless guy...he'll still be homeless, and probably dead thanks to what you enabled.

Why do people assume that every homeless person is both an idiot and an addict? Especially in cities in which real estate is as expensive as Los Angeles, the overwhelming majority of homeless people aren't there because of addiction issues. All the numbers I have seen suggest that only a quarter of LA's homeless population has addiction issues and even still the causal relationship isn't clear. When you live on the streets, the momentary escape of drugs is pretty alluring, but probably not as alluring as getting off the streets.

Re: LA County's guaranteed income program to give some foster youth $1k per month

#40

Post by bko »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #6
cenobyte wrote: post #5

As a programmer from a bad family, group home, foster family background myself. $1k per month without working or struggle would have destroyed me. Imagine all the weed and whiskey I could have bought for that? (Which is what I would have done) Instead of working I would have been lazy. Homelessness and hunger was my major motivator and made me work in fast food while dreaming of computers. The lack of struggle would…

25% of foster kids end up homeless after aging out of the system. Direct cash transfer value is mostly proven from a social work/benefit perspective. Sure, coaching and counseling through social services must also be provided to help underprivileged humans take care of themselves and reach their full potential, but cash benefits help, full stop. The moral hazard argument needs to die. There is a difference between st…

You should check out the movie reversal of fortune. It follows a homeless dude that was given 100k no strings attached. He was specially chosen as he did not have any substance abuse issues. Despite that the story has a sad ending but it does humanize the struggle as you grow to like and empathize with the guy while the slow rolling train wreck carries on

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reversal_of_Fortune_(2005_fi...

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