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Unconditional Cash Study: first findings available

openresearchlab.org

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Re: Unconditional Cash Study: first findings available

#311

Post by EnigmaFlare »

ixwt wrote: post #278
jewayne wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Personally, I'm a big fan of the "for every $2 you make, you get $1 less from UBI/Welfare" That's..that's not UBI, at all. UBI is universal . If there are any means tests whatsoever , that's not UBI.

I disagree. Universal just implies everyone gets it. If the system includes a gradual fall off, it's still universally applied to everyone, no?

It doesn't matter what the individual words mean, the term UBI refers to income without any means testing. That's just how it's defined.

Re: Unconditional Cash Study: first findings available

#312

Post by anon291 »

mdorazio wrote: post #4

Link to the preliminary study results from OpenResearch: https://www.openresearchlab.org/studies/unconditional-cash-s... Note that this was a time-limited study where participants knew they would only receive money for 3 years. Personally, I feel like this leads to different behaviors than if people believe they will receive the income indefinitely.

This is bordering on an unfalsifiable (hence religious claim). If it's only going to work if the money is in perpetuity and then, when that doesn't work, we require the money is in perpetuity for an individual and his descendants, and then, when that doesn't work, require the money is truly perpetual with no hope to end it, then there becomes no way to determine whether or not the policy works in any meaningful way.

Re: Unconditional Cash Study: first findings available

#313

Post by patmcc »

briHass wrote: post #293
karmajunkie wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

just curious, but why is there always an implicit assumption in this debate that we only tax the wealth of billionaires? is the money of a half billionaire somehow less green than a full billionaire?

Keep going until you're taxing everyone that makes over $80K/year or so, and you pretty much have it being balanced. I never understood the UBI argument. 30 seconds of napkin math would show you how insane the proposal is, even at the rate of $1000/month. If you want to increase welfare for those below the median income, fine, let's have that discussion. Don't play games with the word 'universal'

You'd adjust marginal rates so the poor would (net) benefit, the middle class would about break even, and the rich would pay more. Napkin math on that isn't that bad, especially if you chop a bunch of other welfare payments (and the associated expensive means-testing and administration).

No one serious is suggesting "everyone gets $1000/month and literally nothing else changes".

Re: Unconditional Cash Study: first findings available

#314

Post by AnthonyMouse »

namibj wrote: post #290
fdr wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are looking for the term "effective marginal tax rate." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effective_marginal_tax_rate To give a sense how much benefits code and tax code have in common, see this worksheet for SNAP eligibility, which resembles a second tax return: https://www.fns.usda.gov/snap/recipient/eligibility . You get to do something similar, again(!), for Medicaid. The American benefits code is a patchwork of…

Under that concept, well, if actually taking the social security (Grundsicherung) in Germany as a given, even assuming low CoL situations (it's worse in higher-CoL situations), the effective average tax rate past like about 160 EUR/month of income will rise to a peak at around 1500 EUR/month income and then continuously decrease to the super wealthy limit tax just under 50%. At least you technically never have less m…

> At least you technically never have less money from more work (but only if you consider bureaucracy free; there is severe bureaucracy especially for those that fluctuate in and out of coverage).

When the effective marginal tax rate is high, this is often as close as makes no difference, because you not only have the cost of bureaucracy but also the cost of working. You're paying an effective marginal tax rate of 80% so nominally you get to keep 20% of your income and have the incentive to work, but working requires you to commute, so you have to buy transit tickets or maintain a vehicle.

And because you're now spending your day working, you can't use that time to prepare food or maintain your household, so you may have to pay someone else to do some of those things -- but their entire compensation has to come out of the 20% of your pay you actually get to spend, so this can easily eat the entire thing and make you better off to not take the job.

Re: Unconditional Cash Study: first findings available

#315

Post by patmcc »

rbanffy wrote: post #35
beejiu wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People have different definitions of UBI, but in my mind 'basic' doesn't translate to quitting your job and not working. People in a functioning society still have to work.

> People in a functioning society still have to work Why?

Because the food needs to come from somewhere?

Re: Unconditional Cash Study: first findings available

#316

Post by patmcc »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #135
hansworst wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This assumes people just stop doing anything of value if there no longer is a proverbial stick in the form of financial ruin if they stop working. Nobody is saying that the carrot (personal financial gain) needs to be removed from the equation. Just that everyone is guaranteed some basic level of financial support. Society already produces enough wealth to cover the expense of UBI. Remember it would replace any other…

> it would replace any other welfare systems in place today I’ve never seen this math worked out. Also, some benefits are inherently lumpy. A special-needs or chronically-ill person needs (and receives) resources that wouldn’t be covered by a broad-spectrum UBI.

Most UBI proposals assume a functioning healthcare system, which would deal with most of those needs. Probably not all, so you could certainly have additional programs as needed.

Re: Unconditional Cash Study: first findings available

#317

Post by rembicilious »

smileysteve wrote: post #238
vharuck wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're right to fear employers who want to avoid claiming employees so that they don't have to comply with, for example, safety laws. But shadow work also includes situations with "casual" business relationships, like a couple who hires a nanny to watch their kids 40 hours a week. Both parties may feel that complying with tax and labor laws is too much of a burden.

> Both parties may feel that complying with tax and labor laws is too much of a burden. That's - a way - to phrase: - facilitate an effective 7.5% pay cut (employer paid Social Security / Medicare / Medicaid tax) - avoid being properly compensated for overtime (assuming non exempt salary), - and make claiming unemployment, disability benefits more difficult When you refer to both, can you emphasize a specific burden…

You may have been downvoted because you seem be ignoring the point gp post. By working under the table, the nanny or gardener or handyman can (often fraudulently) qualify for government healthcare and welfare programs as well as other low income assistance. In my opinion those programs are of a greater benefit than the ones you listed.

Re: Unconditional Cash Study: first findings available

#318

Post by AnthonyMouse »

Majromax wrote: post #180
ixwt wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There was a podcast or video about this exact same issue in... Sweden? Some anecdata from people receiving welfare, but couldn't start a job or a business because if they received any money, they get nothing from welfare and wouldn't be able to support themselves. This resulted in people that were trying to start a business not get paid for their work (I believe one of the anecdata was a photographer) because doing s…

> Personally, I'm a big fan of the "for every $2 you make, you get $1 less from UBI/Welfare" concept. This seems a very easy way to wean people off of welfare. That money is already tracked by the IRS (unless you're getting paid under the table). That's a more gradual phase-out, but it still is an effective marginal tax rate of 50%+ – a level that wealthy earners would complain about to no end. In light of this study…

> a negative effective phase-out rate: "for every $1 you make up to $X, you get $0.25 more from UBI/Welfare."

The main problem with this is that the tax system is set up to prevent you from under-reporting your income. Over-reporting it is essentially trivial, e.g. two people who are in the relevant income range exchange favors (do each others' laundry etc.), or claim to have, and then actually report the transactions as income and get the credit.

But there's something else you can do here which is really neat. Stop using a complicated progressive rate structure, and instead eliminate the phase out entirely. Now instead of low income people having a nominal 0% tax rate but an effective 50% benefits phase out rate and high income people having a nominal 30% tax rate, you just use a flat 35% tax rate which implicitly has the benefits phase out built into the tax system. Which means you don't need any of this income reporting or annual tax returns or anything of the kind, the employer/seller just withholds the fixed tax rate and you're done, and everybody unconditionally gets the UBI to provide the effect of a progressive rate structure.

Re: Unconditional Cash Study: first findings available

#319

Post by briHass »

patmcc wrote: post #313
briHass wrote: post #293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Keep going until you're taxing everyone that makes over $80K/year or so, and you pretty much have it being balanced. I never understood the UBI argument. 30 seconds of napkin math would show you how insane the proposal is, even at the rate of $1000/month. If you want to increase welfare for those below the median income, fine, let's have that discussion. Don't play games with the word 'universal'

You'd adjust marginal rates so the poor would (net) benefit, the middle class would about break even, and the rich would pay more. Napkin math on that isn't that bad, especially if you chop a bunch of other welfare payments (and the associated expensive means-testing and administration). No one serious is suggesting "everyone gets $1000/month and literally nothing else changes".

Which welfare plans are you cutting? Social Security? Nope, because the average payout is 50% higher than $1000/m. Same with SSI/disability. You certainly couldn't replace any of the medical plans (Medicaid/Medicare) with anywhere near that amount.

The welfare plans that might be subject to being replaced only amount to a few percent of the federal budget. The bulk of the budget is those plans above, which would result in less benefits if replaced. You're not paying for this by finding lost coins in the couch cushions.

Re: Unconditional Cash Study: first findings available

#320

Post by AnthonyMouse »

briHass wrote: post #293
karmajunkie wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

just curious, but why is there always an implicit assumption in this debate that we only tax the wealth of billionaires? is the money of a half billionaire somehow less green than a full billionaire?

Keep going until you're taxing everyone that makes over $80K/year or so, and you pretty much have it being balanced. I never understood the UBI argument. 30 seconds of napkin math would show you how insane the proposal is, even at the rate of $1000/month. If you want to increase welfare for those below the median income, fine, let's have that discussion. Don't play games with the word 'universal'

The premise of it being universal is that it doesn't have an explicit phase out and instead it's implicit in the tax system. Obviously someone making six figures is not going to be a net recipient, but they would still have the money deposited into their account. The amount would just be smaller than the amount they're paying in taxes.

The advantage of doing it this way is that it makes it clear what's going on. Right now we nominally impose low marginal tax rates on the poor but their effective marginal tax rates are high because of benefits phase outs, so their effective marginal tax rates are higher than the wealthy. With a UBI you replace the benefits with cash payments and eliminate the phase outs, but also flatten the tax rates so the poor are paying the same effective marginal rates as the rich, instead of higher ones.

The result would be that the poor pay slightly lower effective marginal rates and the rich pay slightly higher ones (although you don't even inherently have to do that; it depends entirely on the tax rate and the amount of the UBI), but the overall system is much simpler. And the consequence that the poor are paying higher effective marginal rates than the rich, which was presumably never intended, goes away.

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