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Certainly SOME inflation would happen if "all people get more money", but a thought on that, since it seems to be more subtle than that: I'd imagine that we'd

Certainly SOME inflation would happen if "all people get more money", but a thought on that, since it seems to be more subtle than that: I'd imagine that we'd already SEE that inflation, motivated through e.g. SNAP instead of UBI. There's an optimization curve that producers are fitting; and if the lower segments of the economy have more money to spend, that curve would probably lift some, but to lift sufficiently as to preclude such a significant market segment I imagine would be self defeating. That being said; I only feel that intuition for goods that can readily market to the poorest market segments with profit. For goods that already require jobbing (mid-high end luxury goods as an easy example), if UBI was on top of that, I imagine you'd certainly see inflation in those domains, unless enough people stopped working entirely to fall into the UBI-only market segment. I'd be curious to hear what someone with any real economics background (not I) has to say on this, since I can only reason about it on a very first-order level.

ghaff 11y ago
Based on what I've read, inflation is one of the weaker arguments against UBI assuming that it was implemented as a pure redistribution. (i.e. no increase in money supply, deficit, etc.) That said, given the scope of such a hypothetical program, it's probably reasonable to assume that there would be some demand shifts that could drive up certain wages and certain goods (perhaps housing in some areas). Or not. With, presumably, no more minimum wage and everyone with a poverty line-ish income without working, maybe Walmart doesn't need to pay as much to get part-time workers who just want to earn a little extra.
- existencebox 11y ago
  You touch on actually another part of the question that I haven't heard discussed much. Many UBI proponents suggest that it would allow people to allocate smaller portions of their lives to "earning a little more" rather than their whole time on one job, but is the economy even set up (or able to evolve sufficiently) to support this? Additionally, would WE be ok with it? There's already a lot of push-back around buzzwords like "gig economy", and that would seem more prevalent in an era of ad-hoc work as needed for luxuries.

ghaff 11y ago

Based on what I've read, inflation is one of the weaker arguments against UBI assuming that it was implemented as a pure redistribution. (i.e. no increase in money supply, deficit, etc.) That said, given the scope of such a hypothetical program, it's probably reasonable to assume that there would be some demand shifts that could drive up certain wages and certain goods (perhaps housing in some areas). Or not. With, presumably, no more minimum wage and everyone with a poverty line-ish income without working, maybe Walmart doesn't need to pay as much to get part-time workers who just want to earn a little extra.

existencebox 11y ago
You touch on actually another part of the question that I haven't heard discussed much. Many UBI proponents suggest that it would allow people to allocate smaller portions of their lives to "earning a little more" rather than their whole time on one job, but is the economy even set up (or able to evolve sufficiently) to support this? Additionally, would WE be ok with it? There's already a lot of push-back around buzzwords like "gig economy", and that would seem more prevalent in an era of ad-hoc work as needed for luxuries.