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Universal Basic Income

Arkady said:
Could be. I'd be interested to know how this has worked out in practice when/if something like it has been tried. Do the poor, no longer being so poor, develop smarter spending habits? It's possible. Under the current system, with food and housing essentially handled separately, it encourages odd budgeting behavior. The poor can basically act a lot like kids, whose basic food and housing needs are covered by their parents, so they spend extra money on things that may seem frivolous (designer sneakers, concert tickets, etc.) Yet most of those kids, when they get older and handle their whole budgets themselves, don't respond by spending all their money on the frivolous stuff and wind up homeless and starving. Most, once in control of their full budget, step up their game. Would the poor do the same?
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Here's one for the ages:
The poor can basically act a lot like kids, whose basic food and housing needs are covered by their parents, so they spend extra money on things that may seem frivolous (designer sneakers, concert tickets, etc.)
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When we were POOR, there WAS no "extra money" to spend on ANYTHING. What you're saying is ridiculous. If people have enough money to buy designer sneakers, concert tickets etc, they are not "POOR".
 
Arkady said:
I think the idea would be it's just an automatic payment, with no strings attached. What you're pointing towards is also an interesting idea, though. That's more like a guaranteed job. Like, everyone has the ability to go to the government and demand a job at a basic decent income, but then they have to work the way the government dictates, and if they don't, they don't get paid. To avoid displacing private-sector workers, you'd need to tailor those jobs for stuff that's currently neglected by the private sector, for profitability reasons. For example, cleaning up roadside trash, sorting recyclables, etc. Even done well, you'd be able to eliminate traditional welfare programs, acheive some neglected societal goals that incease general quality of life, and you'd wind up with unemployable people developing job skills that make them more valuable and employable in the future. But, it certainly wouldn't be low-overhead, like simply cutting a check.
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would that notion not apply to current recipients..of welfare...even unemployment.. roadside clean u...recyclable sorting and the like..

that woudl help develop skills...achieve societal goals..development..
 
Arkady said:
An idea that some progressives have been pushing, lately, to try to meet conservatives half-way, is a universal basic income, in lieu of welfare. The idea is that rather than things like food stamps, with all the rules about what people can buy with it and what they can't, and other things like subsidized housing, etc., you just have a simple cash payment the government hands to everyone, with which people can do whatever they want. Traditionally, this has been seen as a conservative alternative to liberal jobs- and welfare programs. Some conservatives like it because there are very low costs: no auditing for eligibility, no overhead for jobs programs, no policing what the money gets spent on, almost no bureaucracy, etc. And the distortions to the market are minimal, since government isn't trying to dictate where the demand and investment will be.

Switzerland, which is an arch-conservative nation by Western European standards, is considering a monthly basic income of around $2800 for its citizens.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-25415501

For practical purposes, Alaska, one of our most conservative states, already has something like this (although it's quite low, relative to what Switzerland is considering). Fans of the minimum income concept include arch-conservative economic godfather Milton Friedman, and Austrian Economic god-to-the-libertarians Friedrich Hayek.

Of course, in the US, implementation of this conservative-friendly idea would be confounded by the nature of our partisan politics. The moment some major Democrat starts pushing it, it will be labeled "socialism" and the Tea Party crazies will all go around screeching like little girls who got their hair pulled. Before long the very conservatives who promoted the idea will be leading the charge to attack it, and every ninny dittohead on the Internet will memorize the new talking points so they can provide the obligatory denunciations in chat forums. We saw that happen already with Obamacare, which started life as a conservative pet project, designed by the right-wing think-tank the Heritage Foundation, and championed by Mitt Romney. We've seen how quickly support of something by leading Democrats can cause conservatives to turn 180-degrees on their prior convictions. But it's an interesting idea, nonetheless.
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Awesome idea! Push for it....I could use an extra $2500 a month....
 
Jen said:
Definitely a fine idea, but it has to be universal - meaning everyone gets it.
And no strings attached.
Somehow I suspect that "universal" might not actually mean universal.
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Well, universal as in everybody except Republicans, anybody making more than minimum wage, white people, and probably Asians. Oh, and non-union members, too. :rolleyes::D
 
Arkady said:
I think the idea would be it's just an automatic payment, with no strings attached. What you're pointing towards is also an interesting idea, though. That's more like a guaranteed job. Like, everyone has the ability to go to the government and demand a job at a basic decent income, but then they have to work the way the government dictates, and if they don't, they don't get paid. To avoid displacing private-sector workers, you'd need to tailor those jobs for stuff that's currently neglected by the private sector, for profitability reasons. For example, cleaning up roadside trash, sorting recyclables, etc. Even done well, you'd be able to eliminate traditional welfare programs, acheive some neglected societal goals that incease general quality of life, and you'd wind up with unemployable people developing job skills that make them more valuable and employable in the future. But, it certainly wouldn't be low-overhead, like simply cutting a check.
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This is exactly what they do in Cuba, and that place if f-cking awesome! LOL!

Take a look at this to see your plan in action (the real Cuba, not the tourist one that Sean Penn, Michael Moore and Jay-Z like to talk up):

http://www.penultimosdias.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/Harper-Havana-Oct2010.pdf
 
marvin martian said:
This is exactly what they do in Cuba, and that place if f-cking awesome! LOL!

Take a look at this to see your plan in action (the real Cuba, not the tourist one that Sean Penn, Michael Moore and Jay-Z like to talk up):

http://www.penultimosdias.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/Harper-Havana-Oct2010.pdf
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Cuba is undemocratic and based on an economy with centralized control. It's also fairly economically and socially isolated from the rest of the world, and lacks basic civil rights protections. If I ever come out in favor of setting up a country in that mode, remind me what a crap-hole Cuba is. But, for now, you're preaching to the choir.
 
Arkady said:
Cuba is undemocratic and based on an economy with centralized control. It's also fairly economically and socially isolated from the rest of the world, and lacks basic civil rights protections. If I ever come out in favor of setting up a country in that mode, remind me what a crap-hole Cuba is. But, for now, you're preaching to the choir.
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You don't think the government paying everyone a no-strings-attached "salary" is centralized control??
 
Sunset Rose said:
At least they won't be spending the money on hookers like you do.
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Ms. Rose,

I beg to disagree, that unlike I, who haven't had the need to purchase the services of a young lady of the night since I was in the Army, that will be another line item they will be spending their money on.
 
Arkady said:
There's that dog whistle again. The list could have included, say, Lone Star beer, chaw, BBQ, ammo, shiny cowboy boots, and country CDs, but those totems of white rural poverty wouldn't have painted the target you were after.
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Mr. Arkady,

I was painting the target of the poor underclass that is more interested in their fags and beer than getting ahead in the game of life.

I thought I was pretty clear in my intention.
 
ya-ta-hey said:
Mr. Arkady,

I was painting the target of the poor underclass that is more interested in their fags and beer than getting ahead in the game of life.

I thought I was pretty clear in my intention.
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I thought your intention was clear, too. Your list was not built around generic stereotypes of the buying habits of poor people, but rather built around the stereotypes of the buying habits of black people. As you no doubt know, methol cigarettes, malt liquor, and rap CDs are all disproportionately purchased by African Americans. And "bling," although not associated with poor people, is definitely associated with African Americans (it's often used to describe the showy jewelry of super-rich hip-hop stars). You weren't painting a target of the poor underclass. You were painting a target of African Americans. You were going for a focus on a particular black, urban culture, even though much of the poverty in this country is white and rural. If you'd talked about beer, junk food, and drugs, only, I wouldn't have called you out for the dog whistle. But you knew what you were doing.
 
Arkady said:
I thought your intention was clear, too. Your list was not built around generic stereotypes of the buying habits of poor people, but rather built around the stereotypes of the buying habits of black people. As you no doubt know, methol cigarettes, malt liquor, and rap CDs are all disproportionately purchased by African Americans. And "bling," although not associated with poor people, is definitely associated with African Americans (it's often used to describe the showy jewelry of super-rich hip-hop stars). You weren't painting a target of the poor underclass. You were painting a target of African Americans. You were going for a focus on a particular black, urban culture, even though much of the poverty in this country is white and rural. If you'd talked about beer, junk food, and drugs, only, I wouldn't have called you out for the dog whistle. But you knew what you were doing.
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Thank you, Arkady. Yes, he knew. And I'm glad you called him on it.
 
The problem I'd have with a scheme like this, has been expressed by others, in different contexts and to different intended ends.

I think it's inevitable - in the context of an economy as vast and varied as ours - that it would put upward pressure on the prices of the goods and services the lower-incomers need. Therefore, in short order, whatever amount we settled upon, wouldn't be enough.
 
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