5 ms·

I think because UBI is guaranteed to be fair. With negative income tax you're still going to get people fiddling with their taxes to get every penny they can ou

I think because UBI is guaranteed to be fair. With negative income tax you're still going to get people fiddling with their taxes to get every penny they can out of the system. UBI is also less bureaucratic so less expensive. You simply wire everyone who has registered their money. With negative income tax their is more paperwork which means more people need to be employed to deal with it and to deal with the potential fraud. It also places more burden on citizens to correctly report taxes or face prosecution.

zanny 11y ago
This is the answer. Disconnect the economic floor from the means to fund it - when you have a NIT, it tightly couples its revenue source to itself. One of the cornerstones of UBI proposals is to tie it to cost of living to avoid having to touch it, whereas with tax code you often want to change it all the time determined by how prosperous or stagnant the economy is. In addition, humans are kinda weird animals. It is much easier to pitch much higher taxes and a guaranteed $1500 a month from the state to people rather than higher taxes and no state check.
adventured 11y ago
The frequent counter argument to this, is that it isn't fair to give rich people a basic income at all. That it's inherently regressive to give rich people welfare. Instead, those income payments should be going to those that need it the most. Basic income is fair like a flat tax is fair, and just as regressive.
- erkkie 11y ago
  I believe the premise is that those rich people will pay much more in taxes than their cut of the UBI pool. I guess if you mean rich people who don't work / pay taxes, but I don't think that's an actual issue (since the few who end up unfairly benefitting don't matter in the grand scale), more so an emotional one. Would love if anyone had actual numbers on this.
  - ant6n 11y ago
    One could always tax capital a little bit to offset this. Like a 0.1% of capital, so that person who has 15M will pay their 15K annual basic income. On the other hand, that person will generate interest income, which is taxed normally anyway, at a much higher rate overall.
    - jacalata 11y ago
      There are a lot of ways to invest that don't produce interest income. Easiest example: buy a house in San Francisco.
      - ant6n 11y ago
        Fair. But most investments will incur some taxes when you turn them into something liquid like money. You know, if you actually want to benefit from the wealth that it represents. The personal home is one of the few exceptions (at least in Canada, where there's a 'principal residence tax exemption'). But even there you need to pay at least some property taxes. Can you think of others?
        jacalata 11y ago
        Yes, like the Cayman Islands. And the entire existing tax avoidance industry.
      - CydeWeys 11y ago
        The person you're responding to was suggesting a wealth tax though, not an income tax. With a wealth tax you'd pay some percentage of your wealth every year, including on your properties. It's not a crazy idea; either. France, along with many others, currently have a wealth tax: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solidarity_tax_on_wealth https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solidarity_tax_on_wealth
        jacalata 11y ago
        They were hedging their recommendation, saying that we could have a wealth tax but maybe it isn't necessary because your gains on capital are all taxed anyway. The wealth tax obviously suffers from massive tax evasion as well.
- solipsism 11y ago
  By that logic it's also regressive to give rich people free access to roads, free access to public K-12 education, etc. Money is fungible, and if progressivity in an income tax pays for the "free" resource, it's disingenuous to call it regressive. It becomes a matter of practicality. Do you want both an IRS and a Department of Basic Income Administration? Also, by definition a flat tax is neither progressive nor regressive. , so I'm pretty confused about what you're talking about. Note, flat doesn't mean fair by everyone's definition.
  - seabee 11y ago
    It's regressive because of the marginal utility of money. The difference between earning 0 and 10K (getting to pay rent and groceries) is more important than the difference between earning 100K and 110K (better luxuries), yet a flat tax assigns it the same value.

zanny 11y ago

This is the answer. Disconnect the economic floor from the means to fund it - when you have a NIT, it tightly couples its revenue source to itself. One of the cornerstones of UBI proposals is to tie it to cost of living to avoid having to touch it, whereas with tax code you often want to change it all the time determined by how prosperous or stagnant the economy is. In addition, humans are kinda weird animals. It is much easier to pitch much higher taxes and a guaranteed $1500 a month from the state to people rather than higher taxes and no state check.

adventured 11y ago

The frequent counter argument to this, is that it isn't fair to give rich people a basic income at all. That it's inherently regressive to give rich people welfare. Instead, those income payments should be going to those that need it the most. Basic income is fair like a flat tax is fair, and just as regressive.

erkkie 11y ago
I believe the premise is that those rich people will pay much more in taxes than their cut of the UBI pool. I guess if you mean rich people who don't work / pay taxes, but I don't think that's an actual issue (since the few who end up unfairly benefitting don't matter in the grand scale), more so an emotional one. Would love if anyone had actual numbers on this.
- ant6n 11y ago
  One could always tax capital a little bit to offset this. Like a 0.1% of capital, so that person who has 15M will pay their 15K annual basic income. On the other hand, that person will generate interest income, which is taxed normally anyway, at a much higher rate overall.
  - jacalata 11y ago
    There are a lot of ways to invest that don't produce interest income. Easiest example: buy a house in San Francisco.
    - ant6n 11y ago
      Fair. But most investments will incur some taxes when you turn them into something liquid like money. You know, if you actually want to benefit from the wealth that it represents. The personal home is one of the few exceptions (at least in Canada, where there's a 'principal residence tax exemption'). But even there you need to pay at least some property taxes. Can you think of others?
      - jacalata 11y ago
        Yes, like the Cayman Islands. And the entire existing tax avoidance industry.
    - CydeWeys 11y ago
      The person you're responding to was suggesting a wealth tax though, not an income tax. With a wealth tax you'd pay some percentage of your wealth every year, including on your properties. It's not a crazy idea; either. France, along with many others, currently have a wealth tax: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solidarity_tax_on_wealth https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solidarity_tax_on_wealth
      - jacalata 11y ago
        They were hedging their recommendation, saying that we could have a wealth tax but maybe it isn't necessary because your gains on capital are all taxed anyway. The wealth tax obviously suffers from massive tax evasion as well.
solipsism 11y ago
By that logic it's also regressive to give rich people free access to roads, free access to public K-12 education, etc. Money is fungible, and if progressivity in an income tax pays for the "free" resource, it's disingenuous to call it regressive. It becomes a matter of practicality. Do you want both an IRS and a Department of Basic Income Administration? Also, by definition a flat tax is neither progressive nor regressive. , so I'm pretty confused about what you're talking about. Note, flat doesn't mean fair by everyone's definition.
- seabee 11y ago
  It's regressive because of the marginal utility of money. The difference between earning 0 and 10K (getting to pay rent and groceries) is more important than the difference between earning 100K and 110K (better luxuries), yet a flat tax assigns it the same value.