UBI in the US (from the Andrew Yang thread in Elections)

Great Debates
41

I am NOT advocating that UBI be means-tested. HOWEVER, since money is finite, it is a simple fact that giving money to people who don’t need it reduces funds available to those who do need it. If it seems that those two sentences contradict each other, let me try some examples.

The UBI is for adults. A high-income childless couple gets $2000, while a single mother trying to support 3 kids gets $1000. Does that sound right?

How does Yang’s plan deal with programs like food stamps and housing vouchers currently targeted at the needy? Even if these programs wouldn’t be scrapped immediately there would be political pressure to reduce them “because UBI.” Thus the neediest Americans might actually suffer under UBI. Especially needy Americans with children.

People on SSDI would have their SSI income subtracted from the $1000 under Yang’s plan. But people on Veteran’s Disability would keep the full $1000. Is this fair? (Change these details however you like, and someone will find it unfair.) If you scoff at my other examples, focus on this one please.

Young adults can use the $1000 to help train for a better job, to broaden their experience, or to have a kid. Retirees don’t need retraining and already getting SocSec and pensions; they just don’t need the money as much.

Without free healthcare, some people will need to spend the entire $1000 (and more) on healthcare. First fix healthcare; Then talk about UBI.

These are just off the top of my head. I think more objections exist.

I DO support UBI in principle, and realize the details can be fiddled. But the sums of money are huge, so unfairnesses will be huge.

So far I’ve avoided some of the usual cultural arguments. (City dwellers have high expenses, while hillbillies will just spend the extra money on meth!) But these arguments may not be completely unfounded.

Increasing the income tax on dividends, capital gains and corporate profits would go far toward progressivism. Are you suggesting these reforms are off-the-table while the revolutionary UBI is on-table? :confused: (BTW, we’ll need a cite to believe that top rates don’t yield much revenue.)

People with kids need more money than the childless. People that don’t want to eat at soup kitchens probably need the money less than those who do.

You implicitly treat $1000 spent on college education as no more valuable than $1000 spent on hookers and blow. Label me a Stalinist if you wish, but I’m willing to pass judgement on spending.

You speak of the “beauty” of the “freedom dividend.” Again, the economy is finite. It would be “beautiful” to give every child a pony, but it’s impracticable.

Wrong.

Suppose a present-day program is structured
(Plan A) You get $1000 per month unless you earn more than $1500; then you get zero. I restructure this to be
(Plan B) You get $1000 per month minus 20% of your earnings. (The subtrahend not to exceed the benefit. Change 20% to 15% if you prefer.)

The benefits, when your earnings are 0, 500, 1000, 1500, 2000, 2500, 3000 are
1000, 1000, 1000, 0, 0, 0, 0with Plan A, and
1000, 900, 800, 700, 600, 500, 400with Plan B

42

You don’t have to monkey with UBI payments wrt means testing if you just make the tax schedules correct.

I saw a comment about the “average” earner earlier. What happens if only a small percentage of income earners exceeds a level of productivity greater than their consumption while large percentages of us are unable to because of automation. For the record, I think we’re a long way off from this happening but I also think a society where we no longer have the need to work is a reasonable goal.

43

My main concern was automation taking over the vast majority of jobs, period, making it difficult for even the unlazy to survive. The last wide-spread blue collar job well into six figures – truck driving – is getting ever closer to getting automated. One of the biggest cost savings administration-wise is to make it universal. So Bill Gates and his wife get two-grand while the single mother of three get only one, so be it.

44

Same thing that happens to people that piss away their food stamps right now.

Soup kitchens, homeless shelters, and charities of last resort.

45

You can make a system more progressive by increasing marginal rates, by increasing capital gains rates, and a hundred other ways.

Increasing marginal tax rates ABSOLUTELY has an effect on tax revenue. Anyone that tells you different is lying, stupid or trying to sell you something.

Increasing capital gains rates will absolutely have a positive revenue effect.

All taxes are always distortive but taxes are less distortive for the wealthy than for others (like corporations).

TANSTAAFL That money comes from somewhere.

If the phase out is tapered enough, there is no cliff. The problem right now, is that there is a point where making an additional dollar will disqualify you from thousands of dollars of benefits. Particularly medicaid. The problem with the medicaid program is that it is all or nothing. We should have a medicaid program that requires the payment of premiums that are gradually increased as your ability to pay is increased, we could call it the public option.

46

Sure in theory you would have to have 120K of VATable spending to lose out and frankly for the wealthy it is almost inconceivable that they live on anything close to 120K worth of VATable spending.

The devil is in the details on this. At some point you cut out so much that you can’t pay for the UBI anymore.

47

I agree that health care is a far more pressing economic issue and it is entirely possible to phase out benefits or phase in pay-ins but the concept of a UBI is worth exploring. If Yang can’t get any delegates out of Iowa, we is toast but his ideas deserve to be considered.

48

septimus, the universality of UBI is a feature not a bug.

I have personally soured on the entire concept of means tested benefits. Why? Because a certain political party (who shall R emain nameless) decided to claim that people who have legally benefited from these programs are not worthy of earning American citizenship. They weaponized it, so I figure we no longer deserve the luxury of separating out those who need help from those who don’t.

UBI, UHC, Living Minimum Wage, Universal Tax Credits or Deductions. You can’t call up a list of UBI recipients, to declare them a drain on our economy, because the list is “everyone”. As an added bonus, you don’t have to spend as much money to administer it.

49

You can cheat a little bit on food stamps, but not completely. You can’t realistically cheat on Section 8 housing or Medicaid or WIC or a host of other things. You can cheat on cash big time.

I want to understand the proposal. Does this amount, whether is is $1k or some other amount, mean the total abolition of the above programs and any other welfare programs? You get the cash, but if you screw up, you are on your own or at the mercy of charities?

50

I would hope so. At least until next month. A poster here proposed increasing the frequency of payments so that it was every two weeks or weekly so help eliminate this problem but then there are other budgeting problems.

51

According to Yang Welfare and Food Stamps would be reduced as UBI is an Either/Or proposition, a person may not receive both. Details are under the “How would we pay for it” section.

I’d also suggest that, technically, you can’t “cheat” with cash, as the government does not presume to tell anyone what to do with their cash. Might someone spend foolishly? Yes, but I’m also not paying for an army of administrators to catch them.

52

While I’m very far from a UBI enthusiast, this is a good point.

53

What if you have kids and you pissed away the money this month? Do the kids get provided for under a welfare program and left with the parents? Provided for and then taken away? Or do you get One More Chance? Does it turn into ten more chances?

54

  1. What do you mean “reduced” food stamps? If everyone gets UBI why is there a need for any food stamps? Further, what do you mean “either/or”? I thought the proposal was UBI for all and all other programs are gone.

  2. I stated it inartfully. Yes, I understand that the proposal means that the $1k/month (or whatever different amount) is paid to a person and that person can do what he chooses with the money. However, what if the rent is still due or food needs to be bought or a doctor visit is needed? I meant “cheat” in the sense that the program was supposed to make my last sentence unnecessary as the payment would provide for those things. What if it does not? Tough shit on the person who wasted the money? I am JAQ, but in the good way. :slight_smile:

55

I don’t see how this is substantially different from the status quo.

56

You even quoted the link that answers this.

There is no good way; maybe try making your own arguments instead of asking others to make them for you.

57

  1. This is supposed to save money by eliminating welfare programs and providing UBI. If we are going to still have these programs like the “status quo” then what have we solved?

  2. I’m not reading Yang’s entire campaign website to get a fluff answer. If we are just going to create another program and keep the other ones at a “reduced” rate, then count me out.

  3. I guess you didn’t read that I was asking questions and not making an argument. That seemed to me to be a hole in the “UBI will eliminate welfare and save money” concept. Do you have an answer to this seemingly obvious problem with UBI?

In short, obvious problem that needs addressed by proponents: People will piss the money away. We will not allow them to die in the streets. Therefore we will still have these welfare programs, but now be in the hole $1k month (or whatever other amount) not only to needy people, but to Bill Gates as well.

How will this not happen?

58

Longer thought: The idea makes sense conceptually.

Every person needs food, housing, and health care (to keep it simple). Why have a massive program filled with bureaucrats with a top manager making $500k per year to skim off the top when you could just give the money to people to buy food? Same with housing. Why have another inflated program with more middle managers and coordinators and HR departments and secretaries in air conditioned office buildings to provide poor people with housing? I mean, we are paying the salaries of thousands of people, from which they buy their housing, food, and health care, in order to provide poor people money for housing. Just give poor people money for housing.

Same with health care.

You’ve convinced me on that point, and I agree. The way the government distributes benefits is horribly inefficient, so why not just give people who need it the money and problem solved? And to cut out this bureaucratic monstrosity, let’s not hire people to see who needs it. Everyone gets enough to provide for their basic food, housing, and health insurance. Boom. Done.

I think the first question that should come to anyone’s mind in this exercise is my prior question. What happens if despite handing people money for this, they fail to provide for themselves anyways. If we are going to have “reduced” food stamps or housing or health care, then we have to re-hire those same people above to start parceling out the benefits to those who meet the new criteria whether they are children, need drug addiction treatment, other life issues, etc.

Then we are back to square one only now we have the UBI on top of it. What is the way out of that scenario?

59

I am in favor of UBI, but have two concerns:

  1. People who fraudulently register multiple identities, or commit some form of fraud, so as to collect multiple UBI checks - now, for sure, the government would be checking for fraud, but you know this is going to happen;

  2. People who purposefully hold the government “hostage” with their lives - say, someone who always deposits his entire monthly UBI check into a 401k (which legally cannot be cashed out until he hits age 59) and then holds out his hands saying, “Hey, I have no money left, you gotta give me some more or else I’ll starve.”

60

As to people pissing UBI away: either 1. Why not let them? or 2. You also have the same problem with someone with dementia collecting Social Security–you appoint a guardian to handle the money.

As to people committing identity fraud it’s exactly the same problem now and you use the same type methods to combat it. (or even worse now because fraudsters collect benefits from different counties and states).

As to other programs there is a strong case for disability supplements–because there are things they can’t do for themselves. With regard to Social Security, no one wants to increase UBI to match top existing benefits or to substantially cut those highest benefits down to a UBI level. I don’t believe in housing supplements–if you live in a high priced housing area you can either move or cram together with others. Health care should be universal health insurance–not paid for via UBI.