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Pelosi: It's time to consider universal basic income pushed by Andrew Yang

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Re: Pelosi: It's time to consider universal basic income pushed by Andrew Yang

#131

Post by LaEc »

scabbycakes wrote: post #84
LaEc wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Elimination of the price mechanism eliminates a key way to sort out who truly needs healthcare (or whatever service). Consider a safe elective knee surgery. If you knew it was paid for by the government, you would just sign yourself up for the surgery for even the slightest ache. If there was a copay, you might reconsider unless your pain was actually painful enough to warrant it. Ask any Brit about NHS waiting times…

I can agree on the points you made about the system not having any need to be efficient, a government ran system is just not able to be lean - but as far as people just getting whatever they can for the heck of it, that's probably not the case. Just from personal experience, I don't have copays or much in the way of direct monetary costs (I'm not American) and it's not like I'm out there grabbing free drugs and surge…

HSAs are just like bank accounts. It reflects a debt owed to you by the govt/bank. The govt/bank doesn’t actually store all the money it owes on hand, it lends it out, makes investments or spends it. That’s why bank panics and bank runs can occur when too many people withdraw their money at once.

Re: Pelosi: It's time to consider universal basic income pushed by Andrew Yang

#132

Post by danans »

jazzyk wrote: post #107
hyperpape wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Food stamps generally do not allow purchasing hot food or a wide variety of foods that are not considered essential (there is some variation in policies, however). Remove those restrictions, and it would be better. You would still have the problem that it wouldn't actually provide food for everyone or some people would end up losing the money because they're frugal.

What about people who are addicted (huge problem in the US)? If we give them money, they will spend it on drugs/alcohol/etc. and will still need to be taken care of. So while food stamps (universal or need based) may not be a perfect solution (selling food stamps for drug money is not unheard of), it is still better, because it makes misappropriating the help provided more difficult.

There will always be a segment of the population who will take the benefit and use it to make themselves worse off.

But it doesn't matter because far more people will use it for good things like feeding and clothing their families.

On balance, that's better than what we do now, which is that the addicts still abuse substances, but many who are not addicts struggle to provide for their families.

Re: Pelosi: It's time to consider universal basic income pushed by Andrew Yang

#133

Post by xyzzyz »

throwaway287391 wrote: post #127
xyzzyz wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Look at countries that actually have VAT. Germany for example has VAT at 19% rate, and it brings 6% of GDP to government budget. For Yang’s plan, he’d need more like 30% VAT. Of course this would be on top of already existing taxes.

Ok, but your previous post said "even if you are very optimist and assume that he’ll get exactly as much as he expects in taxes", so I was operating under that optimistic assumption. Was Yang planning to exempt any part of the GDP from his VAT? Genuine question but I didn't think he was. Speaking of which, I googled Germany's VAT and it seems there are quite a few exemptions ("food, books, hotel accommodation, cultur…

> Was Yang planning to exempt any part of the GDP from his VAT?

A lot of GDP is exempt from VAT by design. It's easiest to see if you look at the expenditure approach to GDP. For a simplest example, government expenditure is effectively exempt from VAT. Exports are VAT-exempt (though it only matters if you export more than import, because imports are subtracted in expenditure approach to GDP calculation). Another part of GDP effectively exempt from VAT is capital goods: when a business buys a piece of equipment, it technically pays VAT on it, but it also gets the same amount they paid as a credit for the VAT due on their own sales. The business gets to "consume" the capital good by utilizing it in production process, but doesn't pay any VAT for it on net.

Re: Pelosi: It's time to consider universal basic income pushed by Andrew Yang

#134

Post by mister_hn »

xyzzyz wrote: post #39
mister_hn wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By really applying taxation to rich?

What’s your definition of “rich” for purposes of funding UBI? How much exactly do you want to tax those rich? How much money do you expect to extract? These are ideas seldom entertained by UBI proponents, because as soon as they are seriously considered, it becomes clear that there aren’t even nearly enough rich to pay everyone $1000 a month.

mmm..someone that earns more than $150K/200K per year?

Re: Pelosi: It's time to consider universal basic income pushed by Andrew Yang

#135

Post by orwin »

LaEc wrote: post #55
cultus wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's pretty hard to argue that private companies are good and ethical at operating natural monopolies. History and all evidence is not on your side. I'll list a few examples: the California blackouts after electrical deregulation, the Bolivian water crisis after water supplies were privatized, the abuses of companies like Comcast in the US, etc. Even Adam Smith warned of natural monopolies. Nearly any economi…

Are healthcare outcomes worse in the US than other first world countries? Life expectancy is endogenous to variables like diet and exercise. Looking at cancer survival rates, the US is best at some and mediocre at others but other countries are not "objectively better"[0]. Is health expenditure in the US higher than in other countries? Yes, but that is because the US is rich, really rich. If we plot US Real Household…

At least in France, the liberalisation of our healthcare system from 2005 to today came with a huge drop in efficiency and increase in price (subsidized ofc, as it is still universal healthcare, but still)[0][1]. Act tarification and the bureaucratic ocntrol of the hospital mean that more time is needed for service chiefs to do paperwork instead of... curing people, and the huge increas in private care use is an indicator of the public health service. Also as more and more acts were driven off universal healthcare to private insurance (that your employer have to get for you if you don't have one, but that is paid on your salary) was in fact an increase in cost for everyone. Public healthcare administration cost in France is 18% of their budget [2]. Care to guess what private insurance company administration cost is? 27% for swisslife (i don't know if this account for privatised profits or not sadly).

Also nurses and other low-level health workers have low pay compared to the rest of the first world as their salaries did not increase as much as other wokers.

[0] https://www.who.int/whr/2000/en/whr00_en.pdf

[1] https://www.commonwealthfund.org/chart/2017/health-care-syst...

[2] (doing the math myself i found 13% but i think that's because they are also paying the retirement pensions)

Re: Pelosi: It's time to consider universal basic income pushed by Andrew Yang

#136

Post by throwaway287391 »

xyzzyz wrote: post #133
throwaway287391 wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok, but your previous post said "even if you are very optimist and assume that he’ll get exactly as much as he expects in taxes", so I was operating under that optimistic assumption. Was Yang planning to exempt any part of the GDP from his VAT? Genuine question but I didn't think he was. Speaking of which, I googled Germany's VAT and it seems there are quite a few exemptions ("food, books, hotel accommodation, cultur…

> Was Yang planning to exempt any part of the GDP from his VAT? A lot of GDP is exempt from VAT by design. It's easiest to see if you look at the expenditure approach to GDP. For a simplest example, government expenditure is effectively exempt from VAT. Exports are VAT-exempt (though it only matters if you export more than import, because imports are subtracted in expenditure approach to GDP calculation). Another par…

Thanks, hadn't considered any of that. The exemptions of government expenditures and exports do seem inherent to any VAT, now that you mention them, but I wouldn't think the capital goods sales credit for businesses would necessarily have to be, would it?

Re: Pelosi: It's time to consider universal basic income pushed by Andrew Yang

#137

Post by basch »

LaEc wrote: post #130
basch wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or a tax on natural resources, extracted from America. Instead of a few people owning the mineral rights to everything underneath the country, you make American oil, coal, natural gas, sunlight, wind, nuclear energy something the people own. It's something that already happens in part of America, and it works in Europe. Supplement it with a VAT on luxury items above a certain threshold (yachts, jewelry, property) and…

I agree with most of your ideas except energy ownership. However, as a Singaporean I have to say that Singapore has HSAs. They are called MediSave accounts and are separate from CPF although both earn interest. CPF is the retirement plan.

My understanding was CPF was the overarching program, Medisave was the HSA, and CPF MS was the IRA. Medisave is part of the overall CPF program.

What part of energy ownership don't you disagree with? I still wasn't advocating against private industry doing the extraction or creation. Just that if you pull something from underground, it gets taxed and benefits everybody, not just the person who bought it from the person who stole it 175 years ago.

Re: Pelosi: It's time to consider universal basic income pushed by Andrew Yang

#138

Post by LaEc »

basch wrote: post #137
LaEc wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with most of your ideas except energy ownership. However, as a Singaporean I have to say that Singapore has HSAs. They are called MediSave accounts and are separate from CPF although both earn interest. CPF is the retirement plan.

My understanding was CPF was the overarching program, Medisave was the HSA, and CPF MS was the IRA. Medisave is part of the overall CPF program. What part of energy ownership don't you disagree with? I still wasn't advocating against private industry doing the extraction or creation. Just that if you pull something from underground, it gets taxed and benefits everybody, not just the person who bought it from the pers…

I think we are talking at cross-purposes, but I read your comment as suggesting a single account. No one calls our IRA the CPF MS, CPF always refers to the IRA and Medisave is totally separate even if it is partly administered by the CPF board.

What is the purpose of that tax? In public finance, we don't want to unnecessarily distort incentives by picking winners and losers. Taxing natural resource extraction for no good reason chases away companies in those industries and forces them to pursue other businesses, possibly leaving only the most profitable monopolies to survive. If we want to raise revenue, why not just raise VAT, corporate tax, income tax, or property tax more generally.

Re: Pelosi: It's time to consider universal basic income pushed by Andrew Yang

#139

Post by petermcneeley »

missedthecue wrote: post #124
petermcneeley wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure but using any definition you want at some point you will be at the end of the distribution that will be contributing not gaining from UBI. This function could be described as a graduated income tax. (Sure on your tax form you might be getting 12k a year in but your getting like 30k going out for UBI) I think you are describing some system that is sorta some sorta economically inconsistent plan. Everyone gets 1k…

Yes but there aren't enough people that can contribute to make it cause much sense to implement. The following is a graph distributed by Andrew Yang's campaign. (The most popular proponent of UBI) https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EQi8jWpWkAMQ_5d?format=jpg&name=... Examine that graph and you'll clearly see you're taking $500 billion from net contributers and paying out $1.55 trillion to net beneficiaries. AND THIS IS ACCO…

I agree this sounds a bit odd. So we at least agree that america has a great deal of wealth. Certainly enough that if it really wanted to support its citizens with basic essentials it could. This kind of ubi is welfare or EI with no strings attached. This is a neutral statement about the health of the economy.

The policies of say Yang are not that interesting as for the most part he isnt really talking redistribution and I think he himself is ideologically opposed to it.

How I tend to think about the economy is very much like a game. If you have played say a game like "Banished" (https://store.steampowered.com/app/242920/Banished/) you can see how the economy works without the notions of money/debt/politics. Obviously it doesnt represent the real economy but it comes close to getting a taste. If you send me your Steam ID I will buy you a copy.

Re: Pelosi: It's time to consider universal basic income pushed by Andrew Yang

#140

Post by basch »

LaEc wrote: post #138
basch wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My understanding was CPF was the overarching program, Medisave was the HSA, and CPF MS was the IRA. Medisave is part of the overall CPF program. What part of energy ownership don't you disagree with? I still wasn't advocating against private industry doing the extraction or creation. Just that if you pull something from underground, it gets taxed and benefits everybody, not just the person who bought it from the pers…

I think we are talking at cross-purposes, but I read your comment as suggesting a single account. No one calls our IRA the CPF MS, CPF always refers to the IRA and Medisave is totally separate even if it is partly administered by the CPF board. What is the purpose of that tax? In public finance, we don't want to unnecessarily distort incentives by picking winners and losers. Taxing natural resource extraction for no…

It's not taxing the company doing the extraction, its taxing the company that owns the mineral rights (the land.) Those may likely be the same thing, but the extraction and refinement itself is still profitable.

It would be akin to the government pulling eminent domain, and saying "the oil under the country belongs to the people, not who owns the deed."

This is basically what Alaska did. They said "if you plunder our natural resources, the profit gets shared with the people whos natural resources you are plundering."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alaska_Permanent_Fund

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