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Unconditional Cash Study: first findings available

openresearchlab.org

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Re: Unconditional Cash Study: first findings available

#371

Post by amadeuspagel »

bankcust08385 wrote: post #225

UBI at this time is like topical ointment on a festering wound. Americans first need livable wages and single-payer healthcare that isn't Medicare, which is a Byzantine, confusing maze of dozens of coverage options largely outsourced to for-profit corporations.

Ointment on a festering wound applies much more to healthcare, which can't fix many problems associated with poverty, like stress, bad nutrition, bad housing and to livable wages, which don't help people who don't have a job, then to UBI.

Re: Unconditional Cash Study: first findings available

#372

Post by amadeuspagel »

geor9e wrote: post #56

I am not sure how small studies can account for the inflation wide rollout could cause. Consider this hypothetical: If you give 1 of 1000 renters $100, 1 landlord will leave the rent alone because they don't know. If you give 1000 of 1000 renters $100, word will get to 1000 landlords, who will all increase rent $100, because the market will bear it. I'm not saying this will happen, just that a small study enjoys the…

There are places in the US that have vacant homes but no jobs. A UBI would let people move there.

Re: Unconditional Cash Study: first findings available

#373

Post by amadeuspagel »

skeledrew wrote: post #158

UBI might be an OK stopgap in the beginning when comparatively just a few are losing their jobs. Over time though, in the long run, the core of currency-based systems will need to be replaced as a greater percentage of labor is made valueless by AI, with the resulting increase in bodies not earning anything and decrease in bodies bearing the tax burden. I hardly see any discussion anywhere of what happens when 100% o…

Labor is the main part of the cost of most products. If AI could produce all these products without any human input, they would become drastically cheaper.

Re: Unconditional Cash Study: first findings available

#374

Post by amadeuspagel »

irjustin wrote: post #291

Serious question, didn't we have a glimpse into UBI w/ all the stimulus packages? I'm very open to discussion here because I'm quite naive. My current lens is that UBI ultimately inflates prices leaving everyone back where they were before. The problem with openresarchlab's test is it's limited scope. It did increase the spending power of a particular group because the prices around them did not increase. If everyone…

An UBI that inflates prices doesn't leave everyone back to where they were before.

This is most obvious in the case of someone who doesn't have any money at all without UBI. This person can now buy things, and before they weren't able to buy anything.

Depending on how much money people make pre-UBI, there's a point where the inflation costs them more then they get.

Re: Unconditional Cash Study: first findings available

#375

Post by amadeuspagel »

andy_xor_andrew wrote: post #77

I'm dumb and have no real education in economics. But even my dumb self makes the correlation that in 2020/2021, we handed out free money to keep people afloat (a very good thing), and then immediately following there was a surge in inflation. So I guess I don't understand, how do you give out free money without devaluing the currency? Am I making an incorrect correlation between the stimulus checks and the subsequen…

Some inflation is worth it, but if it becomes too much of a problem, we can raise taxes.

Re: Unconditional Cash Study: first findings available

#376

Post by piombisallow »

ilaksh wrote: post #22

$1000 is not enough to quit their jobs or get a nice apartment. They could move slightly closer to work if they have to commute. It's not enough for a real tuition or to support them to study instead of work. I don't think we've ever had a universal basic income test. We have always missed the universal and basic part. It's below basic and not at all universal. I suspect that you need to get international cooperation…

"Real UBI has never been tried"

Re: Unconditional Cash Study: first findings available

#377

Post by jon_richards »

jewayne wrote: post #188
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" That's..that's not UBI, at all. UBI is universal . If there are any means tests whatsoever , that's not UBI.

Wikipedia has a nice graph showing how UBI and NIT are effectively the same thing

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_basic_income

Re: Unconditional Cash Study: first findings available

#378

Post by jopsen »

jimt1234 wrote: post #98

There's been a narrative in the US over the last 40-or-so years that a "job" is the answer to all social problems. At best, that's half-true. Money is the real solution to social problems. And maybe it was the case 40 or 50 years ago, but having a job doesn't provide the same money that it used to, relative to required expenses. My boomer dad got a job right out of high school, with only a diploma, and was able to pu…

> Money is the real solution to social problems.

Money can't fix everything, but a little money can make many problems go away.

> That is simply unheard of now. And it's not because people don't have jobs.

Could it be that we have higher expectations today? (housing quality, technology access, not cooking ourselves, etc).

Part of it could also be that today, like it or not, you're increasing competing in a global market. And the best leverage you can find is having a long education.

Re: Unconditional Cash Study: first findings available

#379

Post by drakonka »

legitster wrote: post #5

This is a pretty generous reading of the study. One result they are missing out is that the income actually reduced overall employment compared to the control group, and ended up decreasing household earnings: https://www.nber.org/papers/w32719 Even with a generous reading, it was an extremely expensive study. And similar proposals like the Negative Income Tax would cost far less money and have none of the presented…

I don't think they missed this - the website does include those findings.

Re: Unconditional Cash Study: first findings available

#380

Post by xenocratus »

kiba wrote: post #336
ilaksh wrote: post #22

$1000 is not enough to quit their jobs or get a nice apartment. They could move slightly closer to work if they have to commute. It's not enough for a real tuition or to support them to study instead of work. I don't think we've ever had a universal basic income test. We have always missed the universal and basic part. It's below basic and not at all universal. I suspect that you need to get international cooperation…

A thousand dollars is enough to pay for theater class, three and a half semester worth. It is almost enough to pay for five months of personal coaching. It would definitely cover a voice acting workshop that I am going to attend. Granted, some form of education are cheaper than other, especially those that can easily be self taught. I spent hundred of dollars on books and materials to learn electronics. Maybe I could…

> A thousand dollars a month? Please, that's enough to pay for a lot of education like you wouldn't believe.

Alas, it would probably not be. People like to compare apples and oranges in discussions like this. UBI is such a game-changer that we probably wouldn't be able to predict how prices would react once such a thing is enacted. Look at the pandemic stimulus worldwide, and the inflation since.

If a lot of people had more money on hand, they would: 1) want to spend it; 2) prefer to work less (on average) so they have more time to enjoy spending it. Both of those lead to inflationary pressure, so it's unlikely $1000 in the new system would get you anything near what you currently get with it.

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