# Poverty Apologists / Apologetics **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [April 5, 2016, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poverty-apologists-apologetics/751287 "2016-04-05T19:52:51Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 10
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2016, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poverty-apologists-apologetics/751287/181 "2016-04-11T17:35:05Z")
> [@Sitnam](#): > > Great, so we have 19 counts of voting fraud. Anymore cites? > > ETA: The question you quoted was me asking for evidence of voter suppression by Democrats, but either way is cool. Voter fraud in absentee ballots is a well recognized phenomenon. In person voter fraud is almost unheard of. ---
**Author:** ![Grumman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/43a26b/32.png) [@Grumman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grumman)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2016, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poverty-apologists-apologetics/751287/182 "2016-04-11T17:35:22Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > In your opinion, has no one in the history of the world tried something close to the basic income you advocate for? It is an idea that becomes easier to justify as time goes on - as we become more efficient at converting man-hours of labour into the proceeds of work, and as the per-person cost of retaining an employee and keeping them up to speed increases relative to the per-hour cost of retaining an employee, we approach a point where it’s simply more trouble than it’s worth to find jobs for that last 5% of the potential workforce to do. And frankly, the alternative is absurd - we should not deny people a comfortable existence specifically because the cost of providing a comfortable existence _has dropped too low_. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2016, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poverty-apologists-apologetics/751287/183 "2016-04-11T17:35:58Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > No, typically a “basic income” policy means that everybody gets minimal means of support whether they’re working or not. Like in the _Star Trek_ Federation system: the society has enough resources to provide basic support to everybody, so basic support is decoupled from earning or “deserving”. So how would this work? If you take 242,470,820 adults in the US (from googling “how many adults in US?”), and multiply that by a minimum-wage level of $15,080 per year, you get 3.7 trillion dollars, which is just a hair under the entirety of the current Federal budget. And if even if you offset that by getting rid of social security (1 trillion, more or less), you still have Medicare/Medicaid to pay for, as well as another trillion, give or take, of discretionary spending on things like the military, housing, VA benefits, education, governmental administration, etc… You’d still have to raise nearly a trillion and a half dollars of extra taxes to pay for this basic income. That’s going to be a hard sell to raise everyone’s taxes by an average of 1/4 to 1/3. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2016, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poverty-apologists-apologetics/751287/184 "2016-04-11T17:36:06Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > What you’re describing sounds a lot like today’s local bus system. How do (presumably more expensive and lower capacity) self-driving cars make it better / financially sustainable? Well it would be more flexible to the consumer so would be better from that perspective. Price wise, Not sure if it would be cheaper, but it isn’t so obviously more expensive to dismiss out of hand. Assuming a bus driver costs the county $100K after benefits etc. and can drive 50 passengers per hour at peak, and self driving cars cost $33K and last for only 5 years, the driver’s wages can pay for 15 cars which will also drive 50 passengers an hour at peak. Plus if you simply then throw away the cars at the end then I’d assume a lot of the maintenance would fall under warranty. And you’d still have to buy and maintain the buses. On the other hand, you’d need some help desk personnel when the app doesn’t work and someone is wondering where their car is. So I’m not sure if it would be cheaper or not. ---
**Author:** ![DWMarch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dwmarch/32/1010_2.png) [@DWMarch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DWMarch)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2016, 6:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poverty-apologists-apologetics/751287/185 "2016-04-11T18:19:18Z")
> [@bump](#): > > You’d still have to raise nearly a trillion and a half dollars of extra taxes to pay for this basic income. That’s going to be a hard sell to raise everyone’s taxes by an average of 1/4 to 1/3. There’s enough tax money out there, it just has to be brought back home. > **[The Panama Papers prove it: America can afford a universal basic income |...](https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/apr/07/panama-papers-taxes-universal-basic-income-public-services)** > > If the super-rich actually paid what they owe in taxes, the US would have loads more money available for public services I believe poverty can be fixed. The world absolutely has the resources and money to ensure that no one is poor. But it will require slaughtering a lot of sacred cows, such as the freedom to make unlimited profit or the freedom to refuse medical treatment for mental health issues. It’s much easier for society to just build higher walls. The world is turning into a massive collection of gated communities with hordes of criminals and poor people in between. It’s somewhat sustainable but I’d hate to see what our descendants have to say about it in a couple hundred years considering that we have the means to fix it right now. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2016, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poverty-apologists-apologetics/751287/186 "2016-04-11T19:15:56Z")
> [@DWMarch](#): > > There’s enough tax money out there, it just has to be brought back home. > > [The Panama Papers prove it: America can afford a universal basic income | Money | The Guardian](http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/apr/07/panama-papers-taxes-universal-basic-income-public-services) > > I believe poverty can be fixed. The world absolutely has the resources and money to ensure that no one is poor. First, some guy’s opinion piece that assumes that the money is there because the rich have to have that much, is hardly an authoritative source. And really… trying to recover that cash is less likely than politicians taxing the bejeezus out of everyone else. Which is what scares me. And second, there will ALWAYS be poor people, since poverty is a relative thing. By say… medieval standards, our poor live extraordinarily well. Even by standards 100 years ago, our poor live very, very well. Even if we implement basic income successfully, there will always be inequality . Maybe the people on the short end of the future stick won’t face the same kind of risk and hardship that it always has, but they’ll still be “poor” by the standards of the age, and they’ll face their own set of challenges as a result of that. Maybe it’ll be social opprobrium for being only on basic, or maybe it’ll be zip-code based, or something else, but I’m sure it’ll be there. ---
**Author:** ![octopus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/octopus/32/3716_2.png) [@octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/octopus)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2016, 7:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poverty-apologists-apologetics/751287/187 "2016-04-11T19:24:43Z")
> [@Stringbean](#): > > Isn’t minimum wage a “basic income?” > > Do we just need to raise it or do we need to guarantee food, shelter, and means of transportation regardless of whether someone is willing to work? > > I would wager if we implemented the latter we’d see unemployment sky-rocket and all the money that pays for this “basic income” would dry up real quick. No. Minimum wage is a counterproductive, vote buying policy that’s enacted because our nation is full of ignorant and improperly educated voters. Basic income is a distribution of resources to basically everyone. Minimum wage can be circumvented with doing it yourself, automation, illegal labor, outsourcing, or just hiring sole proprietors/independent contractors to provide services. For example lawn mowing. I don’t have to pay minimum wage if I can find a neighborhood kid willing to do it for less cash. Basic income, imo, seems to be a natural progression as automation and productivity increase. Especially as AI gets better and better. ---
**Author:** ![octopus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/octopus/32/3716_2.png) [@octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/octopus)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2016, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poverty-apologists-apologetics/751287/188 "2016-04-11T19:32:18Z")
> [@bump](#): > > So how would this work? If you take 242,470,820 adults in the US (from googling “how many adults in US?”), and multiply that by a minimum-wage level of $15,080 per year, you get 3.7 trillion dollars, which is just a hair under the entirety of the current Federal budget. > > And if even if you offset that by getting rid of social security (1 trillion, more or less), you still have Medicare/Medicaid to pay for, as well as another trillion, give or take, of discretionary spending on things like the military, housing, VA benefits, education, governmental administration, etc… > > You’d still have to raise nearly a trillion and a half dollars of extra taxes to pay for this basic income. That’s going to be a hard sell to raise everyone’s taxes by an average of 1/4 to 1/3. Basic income shouldn’t be the only income an individual has. He should also get off his butt and have an earned income. Or if prescient a retirement or investment income. Basic income is only a subset. Basic income doesn’t necessarily pay for all necessities. The idea is that a basic income combined with a removal of minimum wage means that people have money to buy many things they need but not all. People can work and produce at market value thus improving overall national productivity. Thus people would get a basic income and an earned income. I don’t think you can steal Social Security or Medicare from people who bought into the programs. Social Security was not intended to be a general tax. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2016, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poverty-apologists-apologetics/751287/189 "2016-04-11T19:37:04Z")
> [@bump](#): > > And second, there will ALWAYS be poor people, since poverty is a relative thing. Sure, there will always be people who are poorer than other people, unless you live in a fanatically egalitarian communist system that I don’t think any supporters of “basic income” programs are advocating. The goal of “basic income” programs, AFAICT, is not to abolish **relative** poverty, but to eliminate actual deprivation of fundamental necessities such as food, shelter and healthcare. [QUOTE=bump] By say… medieval standards, our poor live extraordinarily well. Even by standards 100 years ago, our poor live very, very well. [/quote] Very true, but why should that be our yardstick of success for **today**? If you complain to your mechanic that your new brakes are too noisy, say, does he point out to you that by medieval standards or even the standards of 100 years ago your transportation facilities are superb? If he did, would you just smile and say _“Yeah, I guess I haven’t been grateful enough for my advantages, so never mind about the brakes”_? We expect to measure our achievements of today by the standards of _what’s possible for today_. Only when it comes to anti-poverty measures does there seem to be this tendency towards petulant rebukes for not sufficiently appreciating the blessings of our present condition as measured by the standards of our remote ancestors. [QUOTE=bump] Even if we implement basic income successfully, there will always be inequality. Maybe the people on the short end of the future stick won’t face the same kind of risk and hardship that it always has, but they’ll still be “poor” by the standards of the age, and they’ll face their own set of challenges as a result of that. [/QUOTE] Sure, but so what? The aim of “basic income” programs, as I noted, is not the elimination of inequality _per se_. So arguing against such programs on the grounds that they won’t eliminate inequality is completely beside the point. ---
**Author:** ![D\_Anconia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/67e7ee/32.png) [@D\_Anconia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/D_Anconia)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2016, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poverty-apologists-apologetics/751287/190 "2016-04-11T20:14:39Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > The goal of “basic income” programs, AFAICT, is not to abolish **relative** poverty, but to eliminate actual deprivation of fundamental necessities such as food, shelter and healthcare. And vehicle registration fees, apparently. ---
**Author:** ![Velocity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/velocity/32/18006_2.png) [@Velocity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Velocity)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2016, 8:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poverty-apologists-apologetics/751287/191 "2016-04-11T20:22:12Z")
We had a thread about universal income, and I actually like the idea. BUT…it is vulnerable to exploitation. Scammers might set up fake identities just to harvest income from the government. I would support universal income as long as one does not forfeit the income by working a job. In other words, let’s say the basic income is $20,000 a year. Now let’s say you get a job in fast food paying $25,000 a year. You should get your $20,000 \*\*\*and \*\*\*$25,000 for $45,000. You shouldn’t get $25,000 \*\*\* instead of \*\*\*$20,000. That destroys a lot of work incentive, particularly if the work is unpleasant or laborious. ---
**Author:** ![Slash1972](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slash1972/32/6461_2.png) [@Slash1972](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slash1972)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2016, 9:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poverty-apologists-apologetics/751287/192 "2016-04-11T21:12:29Z")
Can you explain how giving everyone $20K a year does NOT result in inflation, eventually making the spending power of that $20K drastically less? ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2016, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poverty-apologists-apologetics/751287/193 "2016-04-11T21:26:39Z")
> [@bump](#): > > So how would this work? If you take 242,470,820 adults in the US (from googling “how many adults in US?”), and multiply that by a minimum-wage level of $15,080 per year, you get 3.7 trillion dollars, which is just a hair under the entirety of the current Federal budget. > > And if even if you offset that by getting rid of social security (1 trillion, more or less), you still have Medicare/Medicaid to pay for, as well as another trillion, give or take, of discretionary spending on things like the military, housing, VA benefits, education, governmental administration, etc… > > You’d still have to raise nearly a trillion and a half dollars of extra taxes to pay for this basic income. That’s going to be a hard sell to raise everyone’s taxes by an average of 1/4 to 1/3. For many people, the basic income would be offset by an similar increase in taxes. It is effectively a wealth transfer from the top 10% to the bottom 10% of income. Then the bottom 10% can sit at home and eat fried pork rinds unless the wage level rises high enough to entice people to get off their ass and work for a living. ---
**Author:** ![ISiddiqui](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/97f17d/32.png) [@ISiddiqui](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ISiddiqui)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2016, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poverty-apologists-apologetics/751287/194 "2016-04-11T21:28:46Z")
> [@Slash1972](#): > > Can you explain how giving everyone $20K a year does NOT result in inflation, eventually making the spending power of that $20K drastically less? I believe this is somewhat answered by the next post (responding to another post): > [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > For many people, the basic income would be offset by an similar increase in taxes. It is effectively a wealth transfer from the top 10% to the bottom 10% of income. Then the bottom 10% can sit at home and eat fried pork rinds unless the wage level rises high enough to entice people to get off their ass and work for a living. Therefore there wouldn’t be any increase to the money supply, simply the transfer of money from one group to the other. ---
**Author:** ![Bone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bone/32/407_2.png) [@Bone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bone)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2016, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poverty-apologists-apologetics/751287/195 "2016-04-11T21:35:36Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > For many people, the basic income would be offset by an similar increase in taxes. It is effectively a wealth transfer from the top 10% to the bottom 10% of income. Then the bottom 10% can sit at home and eat fried pork rinds unless the wage level rises high enough to entice people to get off their ass and work for a living. There is no income tax rate where the statement “the basic income would be offset by an similar increase in taxes” is true. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2016, 10:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poverty-apologists-apologetics/751287/196 "2016-04-11T22:02:56Z")
> [@Bone](#): > > There is no income tax rate where the statement “the basic income would be offset by an similar increase in taxes” is true. How else would the basic income be paid for, if not by raising taxes? ---
**Author:** ![Bone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bone/32/407_2.png) [@Bone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bone)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2016, 10:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poverty-apologists-apologetics/751287/197 "2016-04-11T22:21:26Z")
> [@Ludovic](#): > > How else would the basic income be paid for, if not by raising taxes? This isn’t talking about raising taxes per se as I understand the statement. The statement is “for many people…” in that even as they receive this basic income, it would be subsumed by paying more in taxes. Unless the tax rate is 100%, this isn’t going to be true. ---
**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2016, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poverty-apologists-apologetics/751287/198 "2016-04-11T22:58:29Z")
There are lots of other problems with the basic idea as well. You can’t implement a basic income without imposing really strict immigration reform at the same time. Illegal immigrants could not qualify for it for obvious reasons but one of the unstated premises of the idea is that there are already too few jobs for the citizens and residents already here so you can’t make the claim that large numbers of immigrants of any type are needed to fill jobs that supposedly don’t exist. There WILL BE serious unintended consequences as well. For many people, it wouldn’t be very different than the old welfare system that Bill Clinton reformed because it caused real harm except it will be worse because it will be universal. Despite what many people like to think, most people that have large amounts of free time on their hands do not use it to write poetry, do volunteer work or better themselves. The real result is usually something more like playing video games, doing drugs or just loitering around all day. You may say that is no one else’s business and it isn’t as long as it only comes to that but it is also highly dangerous as widespread phenomenon. Youngish men in particular don’t usually do very well with large amounts of unstructured time and encouraging that to happen will lead to everything from gangs to increased crime to terrorist rings. This experiment has been tried before many times even in the U.S. (such as the high-rise housing projects built during the 60’s and 70’s) and the results were disastrous. It isn’t going to work out any better if you give the benefits in straight cash and I would bet my own money that the results will be even worse because many people cannot handle significant sums of money at all. I also wouldn’t be surprised at all to see school dropout rates skyrocket as well. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2016, 11:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poverty-apologists-apologetics/751287/199 "2016-04-11T23:19:37Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > I thought there was one for each adult. My mistake, a website claims that you can use your TANF card to establish identity to qualify for some federal programs. But for the sake of argument, lets say that they issue one to each adult. From what I understand, a TANF/SNAP card (they aren’t exactly the same program, although in my state they use the same card) shows you’re income is low enough to participate in certain government programs allowing you to avoid filling out yet more forms, but you might well be required to use additional ID to confirm your identity. Also, since the cards are difference in every state, and the way the programs are administered in every state is different, it’s possible that in SOME states they can function as an ID card, but certainly not in Indiana, Illinois, or Wisconsin which are the states where I am familar with the card from my cashier work (and Indiana I had and used such a card for awhile, but I’m doing better financially now). > [@](#): > > How do you think they determine the identity of voters inn places with a photo ID voting requirement? > > Then I’m going to guess your state doesn’t have a photo ID requirement to vote. Frankly, I don’t know - since I’ve had a valid license ever since the age of 16 it’s never been an issue for me. I’m trying to remember if the last time I voted I was asked for a photo ID along with my voter card, though, since I’m a regular there at that location for the past 18 years they do recognize me by face now. Since I have a valid ID with me at all times it’s sort of non-issue for me personally. Having worked in social services in the past, though, and having had co-workers in recent years who were homeless and/or had other issues I am aware that this is a problem for some people. ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2016, 1:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poverty-apologists-apologetics/751287/200 "2016-04-12T01:46:22Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > The goal of “basic income” programs, AFAICT, is … to eliminate actual deprivation of fundamental necessities such as food, shelter and healthcare. If the goal is to eliminate deprivation of food, shelter, and healthcare, then the basic income is a TERRIBLE way to try to achieve that. It will almost certainly fail if that’s the goal. Pick any 100 bums in any city in America, give them a basic income, and I bet you’ll get 90+ even-more-drunk / drugged-out (and still homeless and hungry) bums. If you give poorly-educated people a bunch of cash, you’ll end up watching them piss it away on booze, drugs, lottery tickets, iPhones, designer shoes, etc. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poverty-apologists-apologetics/751287.md?page=9) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/poverty-apologists-apologetics/751287.md?page=11)