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Activists push for guaranteed minimum income for Canadians

ctvnews.ca

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Re: Activists push for guaranteed minimum income for Canadians

#41

Post by RivieraKid »

BI is a change of how money is redistributed in society – it would lead to some people becoming poorer and other people becoming equally richer.

I'm quite sceptical about BI because I haven't seen any analysis that would answer the question who exactly would get richer / poorer and how much. Unemployed people get money from the government in Canada – will they get more or less after implementation of BI? What about teachers, software developers, bus drivers, lawyers, etc?

AFAIK, the main claimed benefits of BI are:

– The system would be simpler and cheaper. True, but only negligably.

– It removes disincentives to work. I'm not convinced about this, you could argue the opposite is true actually.

Re: Activists push for guaranteed minimum income for Canadians

#42

Post by forrestthewoods »

ppereira wrote: post #26

I once calculated the tax implications of a basic income where everyone received a lump sum paid for by a flat income tax. A basic income at the current welfare rate seemed to be easily achievable. I seem to recall that a 20k basic income was at the upper limit of what would be achievable without an exorbitant income tax rate. Many comments on the web are dismissive of a basic income because they simply multiply the…

I'd genuinely like to see your numbers because I've not seen a single napkin math calculation that makes is even remotely feasible. (for the United States)

Re: Activists push for guaranteed minimum income for Canadians

#43

Post by scott_karana »

jdjdmdo wrote: post #29
cpncrunch wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

20k is not poverty. I live in a luxury townhouse on Vancouver Island (aka paradise), paying $600/month for half the rent. My total outgoings are probably about $1200/month, so $20k would be more than enough to live on. Yes, you would pay more in Toronto, Calgary, Vancouver or Victoria, but if you're not working then you wouldn't need to live in those expensive cities. I think $15k would be a better figure, as it woul…

Wait, we should push the poor to spend at Whole Foods and dine at fine restaurants? How is making them spend a significantly higher percentage of their income on food a good thing again?

I think he meant that nobody would choose to work at places like Walmart and McDonalds, when they would be provided the same wage already; not that nobody would eat there.

Though, when people aren't having to work dead-end jobs to survive, maybe they could take time to prepare food properly and cheaply instead of buying "convenient" $5 burgers?

Re: Activists push for guaranteed minimum income for Canadians

#44

Post by learc83 »

RivieraKid wrote: post #41

BI is a change of how money is redistributed in society – it would lead to some people becoming poorer and other people becoming equally richer. I'm quite sceptical about BI because I haven't seen any analysis that would answer the question who exactly would get richer / poorer and how much. Unemployed people get money from the government in Canada – will they get more or less after implementation of BI? What about t…

Guaranteed Minimum Income and Basic Income are 2 different things (this article discusses GMI).

GMI means that you will get enough money to bring your income up to X (in this case $20k.)

BI means that every citizen gets Y dollars per year unconditionally.

GMI is only a net benefit if you make less than X. BI is more complicated because you have to decide at what income level should the BI be income neutral, i.e., how much do you have to make before the BI you're receiving and the extra income taxes you're paying are equal.

> I haven't seen any analysis that would answer the question who exactly would get richer / poorer and how much.

The reason you haven't heard this is because it's completely up to the implementation details.

If for example the government decided that for people making $50k a year the BI should be income neutral, then it would be a net benefit for all people under $50k and a net detriment for everyone over that.

>What about teachers, software developers, bus drivers, lawyers, etc?

In this hypothetical scenario some teachers, software developers, bus drivers, and lawyers would benefit, and some wouldn't.

>It removes disincentives to work. I'm not convinced about this, you could argue the opposite is true actually.

This is only true for BI, not GMI. GMI adds a huge disincentive to work for less than (or close to) whatever the guaranteed minimum is set at.

Re: Activists push for guaranteed minimum income for Canadians

#45

Post by eru »

forrestthewoods wrote: post #42
ppereira wrote: post #26

I once calculated the tax implications of a basic income where everyone received a lump sum paid for by a flat income tax. A basic income at the current welfare rate seemed to be easily achievable. I seem to recall that a 20k basic income was at the upper limit of what would be achievable without an exorbitant income tax rate. Many comments on the web are dismissive of a basic income because they simply multiply the…

I'd genuinely like to see your numbers because I've not seen a single napkin math calculation that makes is even remotely feasible. (for the United States)

In Europe it's entirely feasible, if your whole goal is to more or less keep the same post-tax, post-welfare distribution of income. You just do away with the traditional combination of means tested welfare and means tested taxes, and replace it with means testing for the taxes only.

In the US that would also be possible, but the level of basic income you arrive at might be bloody low. I don't know the data. At least, you'd save on bureaucracy.

Re: Activists push for guaranteed minimum income for Canadians

#46

Post by learc83 »

ars wrote: post #10
sb23 wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're including people who do not need the wage - people who already have a job that pays higher than the $20k would not receive it.

Is that the plan? Because that's not what basic income is. What you are describing also exists, but it has a different name (Welfare, Earned income credit, to list two examples).

It's called Guaranteed Minimum Income, which is what this article was talking about, in contrast to Universal Basic Income.

Re: Activists push for guaranteed minimum income for Canadians

#47

Post by electromagnetic »

RivieraKid wrote: post #41

BI is a change of how money is redistributed in society – it would lead to some people becoming poorer and other people becoming equally richer. I'm quite sceptical about BI because I haven't seen any analysis that would answer the question who exactly would get richer / poorer and how much. Unemployed people get money from the government in Canada – will they get more or less after implementation of BI? What about t…

It depends on what type of BI is implemented. This is around current minimum wage rates, so it could easily mean doing away with basic disability, welfare, and the government pension.

I would say you're naive of the costs if you think the system change would only be negligibly beneficial. There's the distribution costs, the evaluation costs, then there's the investigators to make sure people aren't scamming the system. For every system. You've got disability, welfare, unemployment and pension investigators to make sure everyone is getting what they're supposed to and to make sure no ones scamming the system. You can't scam basic income.

It removes disincentives to work, in that without welfare systems there's no disadvantage to work, and there's no advantage to trying to scam the system.

It does also do the contrary. It incentivized people not to work, at least for shitty employers. You can't be an assholr to a minimum wage employee when they can leave and still afford rent and food.

It also provides income for people to start up businesses (this has been shown in BI trials currently ongoing in India), which when we have high unemployment rates amongst youths I can only see this as beneficial.

What's better for society, an 18 year old doing busy work making coffee for people too lazy to make their own or do you want them writing apps, starting lawn care companies, etc.

Re: Activists push for guaranteed minimum income for Canadians

#48

Post by eru »

bayesianhorse wrote: post #13

If an "unconditional basic income" is ever to be successful, it should be tried first in a small, wealthy country, before being implemented in bigger countries. Good candidates might be Switzerland, Norway, Iceland and so on. Big experiments have a tendency to fail catastrophically...

Don't we have federalism for that?

Re: Activists push for guaranteed minimum income for Canadians

#49

Post by learc83 »

eru wrote: post #45
forrestthewoods wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd genuinely like to see your numbers because I've not seen a single napkin math calculation that makes is even remotely feasible. (for the United States)

In Europe it's entirely feasible, if your whole goal is to more or less keep the same post-tax, post-welfare distribution of income. You just do away with the traditional combination of means tested welfare and means tested taxes, and replace it with means testing for the taxes only. In the US that would also be possible, but the level of basic income you arrive at might be bloody low. I don't know the data. At least…

>In the US that would also be possible, but the level of basic income you arrive at might be bloody low.

Why would that be? The US has a significantly higher GDP per capita than every European country except Norway, Luxemburg, and maybe Switzerland (depending on who you ask).

If you're talking about limiting it to current social welfare expenditures, the US spends about 20% of GDP on social welfare [1], and many European countries spend close to 30%. But since our GDP per capita is so much higher it should come out fairly close per person.

[1] http://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/social-issues-migration-health/...

Re: Activists push for guaranteed minimum income for Canadians

#50

Post by forrestthewoods »

eru wrote: post #45
forrestthewoods wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd genuinely like to see your numbers because I've not seen a single napkin math calculation that makes is even remotely feasible. (for the United States)

In Europe it's entirely feasible, if your whole goal is to more or less keep the same post-tax, post-welfare distribution of income. You just do away with the traditional combination of means tested welfare and means tested taxes, and replace it with means testing for the taxes only. In the US that would also be possible, but the level of basic income you arrive at might be bloody low. I don't know the data. At least…

This may sound rude, but I literally do not care about any response that does include napkin math. The concept of basic income has been quite popular on HN and elsewhere for the past 6-12 months. I have asked for napkin math probably two dozen times. No one has ever been able to provide it.

I love the concept of basic income. I've played with the numbers quite a bit myself. I've tried to make it work. I can't do it. Not even close for the US. I'm desperate for someone to post some basic of basic back of the napkin level math. So far no one has done it. I do not consider that a good sign.

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