In theory we also would save on the cost of the bureaucracy required to determine who is actually eligible for a particular entitlement. If everyone was getting

In theory we also would save on the cost of the bureaucracy required to determine who is actually eligible for a particular entitlement. If everyone was getting basic income and we eliminated a bunch of entitlements such as disability and unemployment insurance, then there would be no need for those entire sections of the government payroll. Of course in order to actually achieve any savings we would need to truly eliminate those other entitlements and fire all of the people that work in the departments that currently oversee them. That is the heavy lift politically. The same is true for a lot of policies that make sense economically but may not survive contact with the political system. Major tax reform is another obvious example. Everyone knows we could have a variety of different tax systems that are economically better than the one we have today, but in order to get there we need to eliminate some tax carveouts that people love. The pathway from today to the desired state can't just be hand waved away. If we added universal basic income, what entitlements are we eliminating? How much would that save? What parts of the government are getting shut down, and how much does that save? Who are the winners and losers in the new system?