UBI only has a theoretical efficiency. The idea that governments are going to close massive departments of staff due to 'efficiency' is extremely naive - and b

UBI only has a theoretical efficiency. The idea that governments are going to close massive departments of staff due to 'efficiency' is extremely naive - and belies a misunderstanding of how that kind of employment works. Governments are not efficient, generally. In some areas - more than others. 'Teaching' I think is fairly efficient, it's hard to screw up. Building roads, similarly. But other functions can get way out of whack. Governments on some level employ as a means of redistribution. My sister in law works for Canadian government - there are 600 people to 'research' and 'strategy' for prisons etc. and yet we have no real meaningful reform, experimentation or thoughtfulness in our prison system. It's nearly as basic as it was 50 years ago. So why 600 people? Because they can. Government unions are the most powerful entities on planet earth. Those jobs will be reallocated elsewhere and there will be no 'operational savings' from UBI. More likely - they will increase the regulation/complexity of it so that it actually does require 'tons of overhead' to manage. UBI is a great theoretical idea, that doesn't meet the test of pragmatism. It will be about as effective as other forms of welfare. A cheaper experiment would be to simply allow people on welfare to have some kind of job/income. No need to re-write the book to see if that works out, which is one of the big things they are trying to find out with UBI.