A basic income for everyone? Yes, Finland shows it really can work

No, UBI is for everyone. And we really need to asses its effect on the rich. To say it makes no difference to the rich is flat out wrong.

To limit the UBI to the poor would mean it would be a poverty trap where once you make over the limit of income then society pulls the pay, making people want to stay unemployed to avoid loosing their benefits. The same problem we have now.

 

It does not have to "Universal". Giving UBI to anyone above the median wage is a waste of money.

And no, it is not a poverty trap just because you say it is. The poverty-trap is not something that happens occassionally. It is perpetual for about half that population (a great many of which are in retirement).

In the US 14.5% of the population today (that's 46.8 million people) is living below the Poverty Threshold ($24K for a family of four). A Basic Income allowed to (at least) them of $2500 a month (or $30K/year) would do wonders towards making lives more livable and probably have a profound effect upon lowering our incarcerated population.

In 2013, the incarceration rate of the US was the highest in the world, at 716 per 100,000 of the national population at a cost of $50/60K per year per jailbird ...

 

Avoiding means testing is a key component (as with the negative income tax). It minimises bureaucratic costs and reduces any threat of effective marginal tax rates becoming problematic.

 

But I WANT to see what a UBI can do for rich people. Is that so wrong???

 

It does nothing, given its relative importance to their income/wealth. The reason to give universal grant is to avoid the waste, and efficiency losses, from means testing the basic dosh.

 

You've just made that up. There's no historical evolution. Crikey, your own poor source (when asked for definitions) referred to evolution from social democracy to socialism.

 

You're simply bigoted against rich people. People have to go into debt to start and run a business, and it would be nice if they could be secure in their basic needs regardless of how the business venture turns out. Many businesses fail. Some businesses, like my family's seasonal business, has to have money to live with to get through the winter when there's no income. It's how we survive to make money in the spring and fall of next year.

 

This is just a very silly comment. A benefit to the rich is irrelevant to them, by definition. You'd have to assume they weren't receiving much higher incomes otherwise. Bit obvious!

Risk tasking behaviour increases with more generous welfare system. Are you now attempting to be relevant?

 

just like with two people vs one person working in a family, it would be a short term boost and then the norm

 

So, we still haven't heard how this was going to be paid for. For the sake of easy math, let's say 100 million people get $500 per month.

That's $600 billion a year in deficit spending. So where does the money come from?

 

A basic income guarantee is effectively a redistribution policy. Keep up! Its only problematic if the right wing 'sister' negative income tax is used (as that implies a single marginal tax rate)

 

You're talking about welfare but the topic of this thread is universal basic income for everyone!

The only thing expanding welfare does is make everyone hate the poor and restrict their programs, cut funding, put in work requirements, limit the number of years a person can collect welfare, anything they can do to kick people off the gravy train.

It's just like with Social Security is for everyone. If we applied your ideas to our current system, let me guess, you'd be all for cutting benefits for the rich???

 

You didn't answer the question.

 

So how do we pay for this?

 

A basic income guarantee is a welfare policy, by definition. Catch up!

This is just cliche. Countries with more generous welfare policy just happen to have lower poverty rates.

Social security is just an effort to reduce the consequence of market failure. Why aren't you capable of saying anything relevant on this issue?

 

The way I heard it is that you'd think taxes would go to directly fund it, but then you'd be wrong. What happens is that the money for a basic income is borrowed from the federal reserve bank and your taxes go to pay off the debt plus interest.

 

Why would they pay and not do the responsible thing and leave?

What are you going to do hold the rich hostage or something?

 

Is this an attempt at referring to tax dodge? That will happen, but the opinion against it is becoming increasingly negative. Isn't it ironic that right wingers have traditionally been defenders of tax evasion?

 

Once again , I have heard this complaint for the past 20 years on the net and in letters to the editor in local newspapers..


We live in a free country, people can move if you try to raise their taxes to high, I did from high taxes in Illinois to south Carolina..

Does that make you mad , pal?

 

It's obvious your upset , that you can't make people stay and demand what ever tax you please on them....

 

It's not tax dodging it's saying **** you and the horse you rode on....we will just leave

 

They are looking into Universal Basic Income in Hawaii. But they're just looking at it. Just because they signed a bill in their legislature doesn't mean an automatic UBI is in their future.

 

Then hop on a plane to Hawaii , enjoy living on a beach and driving around in circles...

 

That's what people are doing, I think they're moving to Hawaii, but I don't think they will end up with a UBI in Hawaii.

Once Hawaii becomes an overpopulated slum of moochers every place else will be happy that they didn't get involved with a UBI in their own state.

But anyway the legislation was just to think about a UBI in Hawaii, and other things, but it's not the actual conversion to that system.

 

Ok I get your drift now, sorry