11–20 of 108 posts
It certainly makes a lot of sense. Just consider the reduction in crime it could bring about. That alone is nearly enough to make it worth it. However, 20k is a bit too high. You don't want to discourage people from working altogether. After considerable thought, I think the equivalent of a part-time job at minimum wage makes the most sense.
It certainly makes a lot of sense. Just consider the reduction in crime it could bring about. That alone is nearly enough to make it worth it. However, 20k is a bit too high. You don't want to discourage people from working altogether. After considerable thought, I think the equivalent of a part-time job at minimum wage makes the most sense.
> You don't want to discourage people from working altogether. 20k is basically poverty, you are not going to remove any desires at that level. > I think the equivalent of a part-time job at minimum wage makes the most sense. The idea is to make sure that when all else fails, you can still cover the necessities of life, things like eating and a place to sleep. Part-time minimum wage doesn't come close to that.
Then who do you think is going to do the part-time minimum-wage jobs?
No one. They can just get more money for doing nothing.
Obviously, employers will start paying a lot more for part-time menial jobs, or go out of business. All of a sudden, Canadians will be asking "Why did everything get so expensive?" and "Why can't teens find jobs these days?"
Big experiments have a tendency to fail catastrophically...
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 certainly makes a lot of sense. Just consider the reduction in crime it could bring about. That alone is nearly enough to make it worth it. However, 20k is a bit too high. You don't want to discourage people from working altogether. After considerable thought, I think the equivalent of a part-time job at minimum wage makes the most sense.
I don't think 20k is too high. We're burning more money than that per person just to maintain programs to deal with poverty, homelessness, etc.
As much as I like the idea of a basic income, it's hard to make the numbers work. Canada has 34,880,000 people in it, so a CAD 20,000 basic income would cost CAD 697,600,000,000. According to http://www.fin.gc.ca/afr-rfa/2013/report-rapport-eng.asp#a3 , Canada's total government revenue (at the federal level) was CAD 256,600,000,000. So Canada would have to raise taxes by 170% to provide this basic income, and raise…
Is it per person of per family? If it's per person then 20K is WAY too much. A family with 3 kids making 100K per year? If they actually did that watch the birth rate in Canada skyrocket.
It certainly makes a lot of sense. Just consider the reduction in crime it could bring about. That alone is nearly enough to make it worth it. However, 20k is a bit too high. You don't want to discourage people from working altogether. After considerable thought, I think the equivalent of a part-time job at minimum wage makes the most sense.
> You don't want to discourage people from working altogether. 20k is basically poverty, you are not going to remove any desires at that level. > I think the equivalent of a part-time job at minimum wage makes the most sense. The idea is to make sure that when all else fails, you can still cover the necessities of life, things like eating and a place to sleep. Part-time minimum wage doesn't come close to that.
Your milage may vary. Living in rural Canada, I calculated my expenditures to be under $20,000 last year. I don't feel I'm living in poverty at all (I have a developer's income if I want/need to spend more). My only concern is that $20K would not leave much room to save for the future, but if the income is guaranteed for the rest of your life, perhaps that is less of a concern?
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...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> You don't want to discourage people from working altogether. 20k is basically poverty, you are not going to remove any desires at that level. > I think the equivalent of a part-time job at minimum wage makes the most sense. The idea is to make sure that when all else fails, you can still cover the necessities of life, things like eating and a place to sleep. Part-time minimum wage doesn't come close to that.
>Part-time minimum wage doesn't come close to that. Then who do you think is going to do the part-time minimum-wage jobs? No one. They can just get more money for doing nothing. Obviously, employers will start paying a lot more for part-time menial jobs, or go out of business. All of a sudden, Canadians will be asking "Why did everything get so expensive?" and "Why can't teens find jobs these days?"
1) Stay unemployed and live off 20k/yr. 2) Work a min wage job and live off 40k/yr.
Many people will choose option 2.
Famously Friedman's answer to what would be better than minimum wage was a negative income tax bracket, and Nixon, of all people, almost implemented it.