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A universal income is not such a silly idea

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Re: A universal income is not such a silly idea

#221

Post by mweibel »

nateabele wrote: post #141

People like to bring these things up to as thought experiments about how they'd fly in other countries, but one thing to keep in mind is that Switzerland is a really, really different place. Particularly compared to the US, it has fairly stable demographics, and obtaining citizenship is absurdly difficult. While the Reuter's article doesn't mention that as a prerequisite for income benefits, one can reasonably infer…

> "[...] and obtaining citizenship is absurdly difficult."

Can you elaborate? I'd like to have some arguments from an "outsider" if I encounter a discussion about this again :) The current majority (more or less) of people in Switzerland seem to believe that obtaining citizenship is way to easy and want to limit basicly everything..

Re: A universal income is not such a silly idea

#222

Post by chrishynes »

allochthon wrote: post #187
wavefunction wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every adult citizen receives basic income, no matter their "means." That's what makes it equitable.

The equitability of a basic income is not its main selling point, as I see it; in other words it is not necessary that it be equitable according to some specific conception in order for a basic income to provide value to society as a whole. The selling points are, as I see them: - There are now more people spending money because they have disposable income. This is good for businesses. - There is added incentive to w…

Equitability is not absolutely necessary, but it is a great selling point.

With a scheme like this, one would replace a system full of loopholes (for the rich) and handouts (for the poor) with a simple flat system.

Everybody gets $x/yr, and everybody pays y% in taxes on all income after that (not just earned income). No deductions, no credits, no loopholes, no welfare state (other than the UBI).

Re: A universal income is not such a silly idea

#223

Post by btilly »

yummyfajitas wrote: post #215
btilly wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your reasoning is severely flawed. Nobody today wants to accept an income below what you need to survive because..you need to survive. Liberals don't want to see other people accepting an income below what is needed for them to survive in a way that we can accept, so pass rules about a minimum wage. With this proposal, there is wage that it too low. As long as you make enough to afford something nice that you want th…

Liberals don't want to see other people accepting an income below what is needed for them to survive in a way that we can accept, so pass rules about a minimum wage. This is silly. If that were the motivation, then minimum wage would be a few dollars/day. Here is a list of countries by GDP per capita, after adjusting for purchasing power . Lots of countries (e.g. Venezuela, Georgia, India) have a GDP/capita below the…

I don't think you read what I wrote carefully enough. Here it is again.

Liberals don't want to see other people accepting an income below what is needed for them to survive in a way that we can accept, so pass rules about a minimum wage.

The key points being that liberals don't want to see it (they don't see other countries), and it is the liberals defining what seems acceptable.

As for your "after adjusting for purchasing power" comment, you know enough economics to know that such adjustments depend on the bundles of goods being purchased, and the poor purchase different bundles than middle class people would. (The same problem means that the quoted inflation figures do not accurately predict the experience of specific socioeconomic groups.) Thus the figures should be taken with a grain of salt.

But that said, yes, people survive on that. But do liberals like seeing them do that? I submit that liberals don't, and this is the motivation for the minimum wage. (See the sibling reply to yours for verification.)

As for watching TV versus working, I'm sure that would happen. I know some of those people. I also know people who would happily work for less than minimum wage just to get out of the house.

Re: A universal income is not such a silly idea

#224

Post by ptype »

gnaritas wrote: post #192
cynusx wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

hiring managers would use it to convince people to take sub-100k wages. This pretty much happens already in progressive taxation countries(e.g. belgium) where you can actually make less money by having a higher salary because your tax-rate increases.

> This pretty much happens already in progressive taxation countries(e.g. belgium) where you can actually make less money by having a higher salary because your tax-rate increases. You don't understand how progressive taxes actually work. This simply doesn't happen. You can't make less money by making more money.

Agree, but there is one interesting example of where this went wrong: http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pomperipossa_in_Monismania

Re: A universal income is not such a silly idea

#225

Post by Jach »

tinco wrote: post #172
switch007 wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They mention income support, so I take that as the UK, where hundreds of thousands of people rely on foodbanks each year.

Ah, I just took the opportunity to naïvely hate on the U.S. a little. I think their lack of social security is appalling. How can such a well faring nation have such a low income tax, and so many poor people. I guess I just don't understand their definition of liberty.

There's plenty of welfare in the US, and stable and reasonably intelligent individuals (though with dubious ethics) are already capable of exploiting it to never have to work. In some parts of the country homeless people make tens of thousands per year tax-free from panhandling and choose to live the way they do. (For more typical earnings you really have to look on a city-by-city basis. The US spans a continent.) I think the main problem with homelessness though is that there's just not much support or sympathy for the mentally ill -- who make up the majority of homeless people. If you're mentally ill, a lot of places won't even let you in a homeless shelter. Your cost-to-live-stably also goes up a lot due to the prices of medication. Furthermore, low IQ is often found in individuals with the types of mental disorders that can easily lead to homelessness, so you get the double whammy that even if they manage to get stable, they're still limited in what sorts of economic activity they can do since higher wages usually require a higher IQ. Minimum wage is not enough to cover the cost of living and the cost of medication. Some states have better support for the mentally ill than others, but it's a messy problem all around.

Re: A universal income is not such a silly idea

#226

Post by mweibel »

graeme wrote: post #44

Does anyone know how the swiss proposal treats travel/residency? I've long thought that a guaranteed income is an idea worth trying. But it did occur to me recently that such an amount would let you live like a king in many developing countries. Is there anything in the proposal to stop people from simply moving abroad? More generally, how should a well designed universal income proposal treat travel/living abroad? I…

As far as I understood it: the proposal doesn't specify this. This (among other questions) has to be solved by the parliament in case the proposal is accepted.

Re: A universal income is not such a silly idea

#227

Post by return0 »

PaulJoslin wrote: post #25

The thing I genuinely don't understand regarding the basic income for all argument is that surely it just moves the goal posts rather than solves the problem at hand? In the current system, you can go stay at home and get income support, which should provide you with the basics i.e. a home, food, electricity etc. If you would like more than this, you can go and get a job and hopefully earn more (have a better lifesty…

This is so self-evident, that I consider every talk of 'minimum income' to be populist bullshit.

It's also evil, as a large part of this income would go to funding alcohol and drug makers. If anyone needs further evidence, consider the costs of healthcare in the US vs Europe

Re: A universal income is not such a silly idea

#228

Post by lgieron »

ck2 wrote: post #12

It's not a silly idea at all but I like to think of myself as progressive and I think it is a very bad idea in reality vs on paper. Just look at how college costs magically rise to the availability of loans and grants. What do you think is going to happen to food and rent prices once those supply chains figure out there is much more profit to be made? The Walton family alone has more wealth then the lower 42% rest of…

College is different than food. Everyone cares about going to most prestigious school they can afford (that will accept them), which creates a bidding war. This is actualy very similar to housing markets in desirable neighourhoods - everyone wants to live there while there's room for maybe one person in ten, so the market forces set the price at a level beyond the means of the bottom 90%.

Food, on the other hand, is a globally traded commodity. There's no reason for the food prices in the US to go up if basic income was to be introduced there.

Re: A universal income is not such a silly idea

#230

Post by gojomo »

oleganza wrote: post #82

It is an outright fraud. 1. Premise: "Basic income of X units of money is sent to everyone in population". 2. Basic income comes from where? Either from taxes, or from printed money. Either way, purchasing power is being taken from some people in proportion to their savings/income. 3. There's always a difference in income and amount of savings. If everyone was making the same amount of money, doing "basic income" wou…

Everyone of consequence understands it has to be paid for, and thus it's not a net income win for everyone. So you're refuting an obtuse interpretation of "everyone gets it" that only the very naive might believe.

The point of "everyone gets it" is to simplify administration, soften the stigma, and eliminate the sort of marginal-disincentive cliffs that patchwork 'progressive' benefits often create.

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