Guarenteed Income, what would happen?

In My Humble Opinion
41

The system we have no is not effective, as there are still people who are hungry or homeless.

Get rid of most of the bureaucracy. Everyone gets vouchers for necessities. Those necessities would be discussed and voted on and changed quite a bit over time, but everyone would receive the same vouchers to receive the same necessities as everyone else. If you want to use them, you can. If you don’t want to use them, you don’t have to. If you want something beyond what a voucher will get you, then get a job, luxuries are not needs. Doesn’t have to be a 40 hour a week job, either, maybe you make a webcomic, or write a book or a song.

I think that basic income should be just that, the most basic that can be expended in order to keep a person healthy and free from suffering and deprivation, but not necessarily comfortable, and certainly not luxuriating. Saving up an income that is supposed to cover only your most basic needs to purchase luxuries means that either you are shorting yourself, and not consuming the basic needs to stay alive, or that the basic income is too generous, and is being used for non-necessities.

42

Unless we also include Social Security. I think basic income can realistically replace both Social Security retirement & disability programs. That’s another $900 billion or so that we are already spending.

43

Perhaps. But that’s a whole separate payment system we’d have to implement, followed by endless debate on what should or should not be eligible for Basic Income payment. Every industry lobby group will be trying to get their goods and services added to the list. I don’t think the bureaucratic nightmare would be worth it.

If the concern is people spending it on luxuries and then not having enough to pay for necessities later, make it a debit card (SNAP already is) and put a strict limit on daily spending.

44

I did not include the 65+ in my calculations, leaving the SS recipients as they are. It would also be a pretty big “f*** you” to the Social Security recipients to reduce their average annual amount from 19K+ to 11K. Wouldn’t you say?

45

That’s one of the issues IMO. If UBI was implemented and there were still people who were hungry or homeless, would you call it not effective?

46

It’s not my number. It’s quoted in the TED talk.

47

If a UBI were rolled out, and anyone of sound mind did not find a safe place to sleep, and food to eat, then the version of UBI we rolled out would be ineffective, and would need to be changed or updated in order to meet those most basic of goals.

There may be some who refuse the help, and as long as they are not suffering from mental disorders that do not allow them to properly understand the consequences of their actions, then they can be left to their own devices.

48

And what about the people who spend all their money on drugs and/or alcohol and wind up homeless or hungry anyway? That’s what I meant. I don’t think any program will remove 100% of the homeless/hungry population.

49

But “It won’t solve 100% of the problem” is not enough reason to abandon the idea. If it were, nothing would be worth doing.

50

Fair enough. But at least it should replace Social Security Disability Insurance which is around $150 billion a year. So going by your estimate, we just need to come up with an additional $250 billion a year. Increasing the tax rate by 10% will take care of that. Or reducing the defense spending by 1/3. Or some of both.

51

There most definitely would be a need for minimum wage. Otherwise many people wouldn’t want to work for the “working two thousand hours a year for $3,000” reason.

52

I’m not saying we should abandon the idea. I’m saying that **k9bfriender **posted “The system we have no[w] is not effective, as there are still people who are hungry or homeless”

I suspect that with a UBI, there will STILL be people who are hungry or homeless. What amount of homelessness or hunger would be acceptable for a program to be successful in your eyes?

53

I think Basic Income is successful if lack of money is no longer the cause of hunger and homelessness. Other causes (drug addiction, mental illness, health care cost, debt from predatory lending, etc) will require different solutions.

54

ok, that’s cool. How much of the hunger and homelessness that occur today are because of drug addiction, mental illness, health care costs, debt from predatory lending, etc, and not strictly lack of money and how much is caused by strictly “lack of money”?

55

No, people would instead only work for what they are willing to work for. If your choices are work for what they give you or starve in the street, then you work for what they give you. If you are only working because you need to work to afford luxuries, then you can work for what you feel your time is worth. If you cannot come to an agreement with an employer as to a mutually agreed upon value of your time, then you don’t have to take the job.

So, if you want to save up for something special for a friend or yourself, you can work for a bit, maybe at a job that you don’t like too much.

If you just want to do something, then there may be a job out there that you enjoy doing, and don’t mind getting paid peanuts for.

Part of the reason that I favor vouchers over cash, you can’t spend it on drugs or alcohol. Not that difficult to match a UBI voucher card to a photo ID (hey you could use it to vote!), to ensure that goods and services are only going to the intended recipient.

In any case, as I said, “of sound mind”, I do not think that drug addiction is an evil, but drug addicted people are not of sound mind, either.

In any case, if you get rid of all the drug laws, then those drugs would actually be very cheap to buy, and would only create an incentive for the pensioner to get a job enough to afford them.

As I stated, there is no reason why anyone who does not refuse help to be hungry or homeless. Any that are is an indicator of failure of the system, and should be addressed.

56

And it is more than just getting people off the streets and fed, it is also about keeping people off the streets and fed.

Quite a bit of stress comes down to people worrying about losing their homes, ending up on the street and diving into dumpsters for food. I know I was pretty close to that situation a few years back, and only stayed homed by the skin of my teeth. That sort of stress can lead to mental illnesses, which can lead to self medication for those illnesses.

If we pass some sort of UHC system (and a UBI without UHC makes little sense), then people will not be bankrupted due to medical bills, and if a comprehensive safety net is in place, then people will not see predatory lenders as their only option in dealing with an unexpected financial crisis, and in and case, UBI benefits should not be up for garnishment, as they are intended to be just barely enough to keep you alive in the first place.

Under my system, the only reason why someone would be homeless or hungry is because they choose to be, whether it be out of pride of not accepting handouts, a challenge to themselves, or just a temporary “camping trip” to remind one of the benefits of civilization.

57

I only see support for a UBI coming in the wake of massive job losses caused by automation. Until then, it will likely never happen

58

It’s interesting how many people would argue from their own perceptions rather than look at evidence. And there are experiments under way: Ontario pilot project puts universal basic income to the test | Canada | The Guardian. In addition (and I couldn’t find this on google or I would cite it), I heard a radio program maybe a year ago in which it was claimed that there was an experimental study somewhere in Canada whose results were quite positive (the people were quite effectively lifted out of abject poverty) and the results were suppressed.

To be honest (and here I join the people I criticized in my first sentence), if automation continues I don’t see any alternative to UBI. What do you do, let the jobs disappear and people starve? Well, I guess if you are DT, that is what you would do.

Will people choose to work if they don’t have to. All I can say is that in my 17th year of retirement I am still doing mathematical research because I enjoy doing it. And I would happily resume teaching, provided they hired markers for me, for very little pay. And if someone wanted to just get a basic income and watch TV all day, that’s okay with me.

59

We are in the middle of a wave of automation that is causing quite a bit of job loss. Waiting for the wake to be prepared leaves a large number of people scrambling.

60

The notion that low-paying jobs now would become even lower-paying jobs under a UBI system is nonsense. It would just give the employees a stronger place of setting wages. Now, in a work-or-starve world, the employer can pay ridiculously low wages to, say, nursing home aides or custodians or fast food workers. If people don’t *have *to work in order for basic things like food, employers will have to pony up a little more to get the help they need. Or find a way to automate the work. It would likely slow down the income disparity that continues to increase.

It could also encourage entrepreneurialism, artistic endeavors, increased recreation spending, scientific and technological innovation, etc.

And you could even offer incentives to individuals and families who don’t **need **the UBI, to invest it or donate it to a charity/non-profit.

We’re entering a time where gigs are being offered more often than jobs, PT is more common than FT, and automation continues to displace workers. Working hard is no longer a guarantee that you can feed yourself and your family. Something needs to change, otherwise there will only be rich and poor pretty soon.

Personal anecdote: I’m currently working 40 hours a week at our family business, which I decided to pursue full-time this spring and summer (after being laid off). I’m busting my ass, going to bed early and exhausted every night these days. I’m not making a dime off this work, but the hope is that by next year, I’ll be paid…something. Luckily I’ve got unemployment to tide us over through the next few months, because we’ve got kids to feed. I’ll still have to take a part-time job this fall and winter, and then hope we can make enough next year to sustain us. You know what would be nice? To know that after all this ass-busting and sacrifice we’ll be able to eat and keep our home-- not get rich, not have a boat or a fancy car, not lounge and get drunk all day, not retire at 60, I don’t even want a guarantee that we’ll have a successful business…I just want to eat and pay our mortgage and have a *shot *at success. A UBI of 15,000-20,000 (as a household) would allow us to continue busting our ass at this family business, pay our bills, save a little, get our kids a treat once in a while…right now we’re living hand-to-mouth with more than a few sleepless nights.

It would be nice if starting a business wasn’t such a drastic risk, it would be nice if more people would have the opportunity to sustain themselves this way and not worry about losing everything, it would be nice if people weren’t so reliant on employers for their income, it would be nice if older workers with families could try something new and it wasn’t just youngins with no dependents who were able to launch new ventures. With a UBI, you may see some amazing new ways of doing things pop up-- new services, new products, new technology. You may also see people relaxing and not working so much (two/three jobs, 60-80 hour weeks, etc). Recreation and time with family and friends is an amazing thing, even more amazing than lots of money, in my opinion.

Of course the corporate muckity-mucks don’t want such an independent populous-- they want us to be wholly reliant on them for a wage/salary. A populous with guaranteed income has power the upper echelon is not willing to give up.

Obviously, no one has any real clue of what would happen if/when a UBI is implemented, how it would be implemented, etc. But the fact that the workplace is changing so drastically and quickly, UBI does need to be further discussed and not dismissed out of hand. There’s an argument to be made for UBI from both the right-wing and left-wing of the political spectrum.