Turn Supplemental Security Income (SSI) into a public Basic Income???

I was watching some Basic Income videos on YouTube, and I was thinking what if we turned Social Security's Supplemental Security Income (SSI) from a program for the poor elderly and the disabled into a public Basic Income???

Basically it works like this: you earn about $700 dollars a month, and about $500 dollars if you get free food in your household.

Would that work for you? It provides a basic income while keeping costs low.

 

"Earn"? How do you earn it?

 

I could use a free $1200 a month. Who is going to pay for it?

 

You get that kind of money by replacing social programs and raising taxes.

 

Sorry, you make it you don't earn it.

 

What does everyone think about making 500-700 dollars? Is that enough?

 

So you want me to pay more taxes for the govt to just hand out more money for nothing? How does this benefit me?

 

You don't get your head chopped off in a French Revolution. Which is what they think the poor will do if they have to continue facing income inequality.

 

Income will never be equal. There will always be people smarter and harder working than the masses.

 

It doesn't matter that income will be unequal. I've heard that with a basic income many people will go back to work. Because there aren't any penalties for going back to work. With a basic income people can try risky business ventures that they otherwise wouldn't.

 

My guess is that less people go to work in low end jobs.

 

I don't know that.

 

Here's an article on the Basic Income experiments being conducted in 2017.

8 basic income experiments to watch out for in 2017
http://www.businessinsider.com/basic-income-experiments-in-2017-2017-1/#kenya-1

 

I'm on SSI and by law its needs based this offers me a lot of protections no-one can garnish it not even the IRS if its under twice my monthly amount, further it has a COLA and I'll get next year $750 a month plus SNAP around $140 plus Medicaid and my Medicaid HMO won't cover things I must pay for like dentistry. So I'll lose money and not get adjustments for COLA and lose protections - hell no comes to mind.

 

The French class stratification was a state institution and it kept people, by force and by bureaucracy, in dire poverty. Very, very few people in the United States and even most of the Western world live in dire poverty. I don't think that the "poor" of today would revolt over income inequality simply because they have a lot more to lose and very little to gain from it. You are banking on envy being a rationale and motivator for revolt, and I doubt that you can point to a single instance of revolution that has come about because of envy.