Guranteed annual income--conservative option

In My Humble Opinion
1

Our morning newspaper contained an op-ed piece by the resident conservative (actually the old-fashioned Progressive-Conservative who is disgusted by the current Conservative government). He may have written it to denounce the current push for a higher minimum wage. Be that as it may, he proposed that each person receive a guaranteed annual income. Enough to subsist on. And that if you earn money, this guaranteed income be gradually taxed away. But gradually only in order not to discourage people from working if they can. Currently, people on welfare are taxed at 100% of any income earned up to the welfare amount. They are also not permitted to enroll in courses or even do volunteer work (either of which might help get them off welfare).

So I am curious what Dopers think of this idea. Especially conservative Dopers. It sounds great to me. I would hate it if I were a wefare administrator, though.

2

How much? You said “enough to subsist on”. Do I get more if I have children? Is it adjusted for cost of living in your area?

What are the tax rates for the guaranteed income?

Does this affect retired people, and how does it affect their Social Security?

Regards,
Shodan

3

I don’t like the idea of guaranteed minimum income. First, it has to vary by area, since subsistence income for Boonies, TX is enough for only a few days in NYC. Second, you don’t know what the recipients will spend it on.

I don’t mind government (that is, local government) -provided service that includes food, clothing and housing. You live in the government complex, you eat in the government cafeteria and you can pick up clothing in the government dispensary. All basic but adequate. Nothing that you would be very comfortable living on forever. Very strict policing in the housing to make it safe, even if it involves lack of privacy and restricting some rights - by entering you agree to such conditions.

I would impose no income-testing on such services. If you want to live in conditions like that while earning $100K in your job - go ahead. I don’t expect people to want to do that.

4

I would have thought that in such a system each child would have it’s own minimum income, administered by either the parent or any other court-appointed guardian.
Which would save on administering child allowances etc…

5

Thay sounds extraordinarily soviet.

6

Only if non-voluntary.

7

It’s not a new idea to get support on the Republican side of the aisle. Nixon supported it and it got through theHouse in 1970 by a pretty wide margin. It died in the Senate though. It’s rally separate from the structure of Welfare creating disincentives to get off welfare. That could be dealt with by just welfare reform. Neither Party really seems to push that obvious and smaller change. That hints at the problem.

We have a buttload of targeted poverty alleviation programs in the US at the state and federal levels. Welfare is just the start. WIC, SNAP, School lunch and breakfast programs, utility assistance, EITC, MEDICAID, health insurance subsidies, are just part of the list. Then there’s the third rail of US politics, Social Security, created to provide a minimum income for retirees. The whole can of worms gets opened if you completely revamp how we address poverty. That’s a lot of friction points and special interests that can gather in a perfect storm. Then you throw on how to finance it. How we structure that taxation is a whole other can of worms.

The Devil’s in the details and the number of details here is huge. In the current climate I’d expect bipartisan opposition from both bases and a diverse number of special interests.

8

People on welfare are not allowed to enroll in school?

9

I was wondering that too, because I know a few people who went to community college while on welfare.

Is it based on the state’s rules?

10

I’m not convinced of this. If people are broke, we want them moving to Boonies, where their money will go farther. Of course, it’s tough for people whose family and friends are not in Boonies.

11

I think this is on a state-by-state basis, and it differs on what government program you are talking about.

I know someone on disability who is not permitted to take courses (I don’t know if this includes ALL courses, or if it is restricted in some way… For example, taking a class that would lead to a degree is not permitted, but taking a class on flower arrangement at the local CC is. My recollection of this situation was that ALL classes were verboten, but that was a number of years ago. I’d have to check to see if that has changed). To get declared legally disabled was no small achievement, and the hoops that were required to jump through were amazing. But even after all that, I personally think it is ludicrous that if someone wants to try to take a course because they are interested in it, or can learn something, they can risk losing their disability benefits. That is a joke, especially when you consider how many on-line programs there are that don’t require a person to even get to a physical classroom.

I guess the government’s position is that someone can’t be on disability and earn their bachelors, masters, or doctorate. Maybe there are a lot of people out there that are holding PhD’s making big bucks who earned their degrees while dealing with a permanent disability. :rolleyes: I don’t know.

To me, learning should never be discouraged. However, I guess then the question becomes, “who pays for it?” There are probably a number of factors to this that I have never considered, but on the surface, if someone wants to get off of welfare, and they need some specialized training to get a job that makes it worthwhile to get off of welfare, why not let the person on welfare take out loans, like I had to when I went to college? If they get a job after they graduate, they can pay back the loan… That’s how it worked for me when I was 18.

As for the OP, we need more information. How would this work? How much money are we talking about? Whatever the minimum is, the market forces that consumer prices are set by will increase as the money each person has increases. So then, the government would have get involved in price controlling?

I think when people want to increase the minimum wage, on the surface, it’s hard to argue against. However, prices tend to increase for the goods and services that people want. Those increases reflect the ability of people to pay for them.

The current system does NOT motivate people to get off of government assistance. That is not their fault. When you consider what a person (and their children) are eligible for while they are unemployed (or underemployed), you understand why many families can’t get out of the cycle of poverty. It is sad, but people don’t see what the government has done to the poor in this country.

We’ve turned this into a “liberal” vs. “conservative” debate, which has clearly not solved the problem. We need to remove politics from this, and try to come up with solutions which are in the best interest of our citizens. Unfortunately, I doubt this will ever happen, because people want to get elected or re-elected, and this issue motivates people to vote.

This is a complicated issue. But unless there are controls on what people can spend the money on that is given to them for their “guaranteed minimum income”, I don’t see how it could possibly work as you might intend.

12

Where do you live that these are the rules? When I was on TN’s Families First (welfare) I was encouraged to enroll in school and they FORCED me to do 30 hours a week of community service. If I’d gone to school they’d allow 10 of those hours for school. 10 dollars an hour didn’t reduce my monthly allotment (which was only 142 dollars no matter how much I might have earned at a job).

13

I agree, without knowing the OP’s location it’s a little hard to have a discussion about the topic.

14

The OP is in Montreal I think. Notice the reference to the Progressive-Conservative party, which is currently now just called the Conservative party.

15

Yes, I am in Montreal. The cynical me says that the reason they don’t permit volunteer work or taking of courses is that if people get off welfare, their own jobs might be at stake. The non-cynical me cannot think of a single explanation that makes sense.

Yes, the devil is in the details, which were not given. It was just an idea this conservative columnist was throwing out.

I assume children would continue to get family allowance. And yes, some would spend it on booze and drugs, that’s just life. But they would have the opportunity not to.

16

So what happens if *everyone *decides they can live on this guaranteed annual income and stops working? Where does the money come from then? This strikes me as a highly non-sustainable system.

17

A family friend was on welfare when it was still called welfare. My dad told me that while she was on welfare, raising four kids, she went to school. After college, she worked her way out of welfare and eventually got a job with the FAA. Later she worked for a defence contractor and was my supervisor. Maybe things have changed since then, but I’ve never heard that people receiving assistance were not allowed to go to school.

One thing I have a problem with is when conservatives say things like, ‘Well if the government gives you free money, why would you work?’ I don’t know about conservatives, but I would work just because I’d want more income than just to cover the minimum requirements. Even if I won the lottery, I’d work. Granted, I’d start my own business; but I’d stay on at my job until they found someone to replace me. (I’m the only one who does what I do there.) With a guaranteed income, not lottery winnings, I could devote my efforts to starting my business - receiving the needed training, obtaining the equipment, struggling through the early times. I certainly wouldn’t be taking vacations and buying toys to play with while I’m not working. There are very few people I know who would sit back and collect ‘free money’. Most of the people I know would use the money to work.

18

The vast majority of people are not satisfied with a minimal standard of living. If they were they would get a part-time job with 20 hours of work instead of a full time job.

Conversely there are a lot of people on welfare who would go off welfare if there weren’t negative consequences for doing so–and these negative consequences would be massively reduced.

One thing one could do is change the tax structure much more toward consumption taxes–strong economic reasons for this. Currently an increase in the sales tax hits the poor very hard. But if coupled with a basic income this would work well.

19

Why can’t we have a guaranteed job instead? I mean, again, I’m not saying the guaranteed job would be anything great. Ideally, it should use the skills you have, just pay less than the market rate and let you maintain your skills. But even if it’s washing dishes so you don’t starve, that’s better that what we have now.

What we have now, you can get a shiny new degree, but be unable to find a job at all - even for less than market value - because everyone wants experience and you cannot get employment to get that experience. Unless you’ve got the connections (interpersonal or the educational institution you attended) to get an internship.

Or you can be a decent worker in a field, and lose your job because of a layoff. Simple bad luck can prevent you from getting another one when you go interview. Eventually, you have been unemployed so long that people start discriminating against you simply from that, and now you can’t get a job at all…

And once you run totally out of money, you are now homeless and smell bad and you’re definitely not finding employment now.

You can protect yourself from this with “connections”, but this means that people who don’t have those connections are screwed.

20

I also support the idea of non-monetary support without means testing: Food stamps, free minimal housing, childcare and health care.

I don’t understand the push for “guaranteed jobs.” Many would be better off in training programs or taking care of their kids rather than working at a useless sub-minimum wage job. Many of the poorest are, for whatever reason, almost incapable of working. I advocate job-creating government investment (e.g. repairing roads), or free job-training, but the goal would be real competitive jobs, not make-work guaranteed jobs.