4 ms·

You'd want to increase the level of income slowly over time so you can deal with problems like this as they arise. I don't think anyone's proposing an immediat

by panic 9y ago

You'd want to increase the level of income slowly over time so you can deal with problems like this as they arise. I don't think anyone's proposing an immediate $40k-per-year no-questions-asked grant to all residents.

wbillingsley 9y ago
It's a state change. As with the introduction of the NHS in the UK, you'd need to bring it in pretty much all at once, with a significant value so people see the benefits. Otherwise, the costs add up fast, but the impact does not. eg, even picking a smaller country than the US -- the UK has 70 million people; giving them £14 per year would be a £1bn item in the budget but £14 would not have visible impact to society-as-a-whole, and would be cancelled quickly as an unaffordable indulgence. It's happened before recently -- eg, the UK's Child Trust Fund policy gave every child born a one-off £250 investment gift (a relatively small sum but with a multiplier effect as it would grow over time and prompt relatives to add to the account). The £250 from the government was cancelled within six years as unaffordable. As the benefits only get seen later (when the children grow up), there's a valley of death for the policy where the cost of it kills it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_Trust_Fund https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_Trust_Fund Curiously, Iain Duncan Smith's "universal credit" seems about the closest governments have come to a national scheme headed towards being a basic income (or at least a negative income tax), with the idea of at least first eliminating the benefits eligibility cliffs that existed in the system. But it's not been plain sailing, and again started being taken apart before it could be rolled out or "got right". (Any government can be expected to get it wrong first, you just hope they'll get it right later.) So has comparatively little likelihood of growing to be a universal basic income or negative income tax.

by panic 9y ago

wbillingsley 9y ago

It's a state change. As with the introduction of the NHS in the UK, you'd need to bring it in pretty much all at once, with a significant value so people see the benefits. Otherwise, the costs add up fast, but the impact does not. eg, even picking a smaller country than the US -- the UK has 70 million people; giving them £14 per year would be a £1bn item in the budget but £14 would not have visible impact to society-as-a-whole, and would be cancelled quickly as an unaffordable indulgence. It's happened before recently -- eg, the UK's Child Trust Fund policy gave every child born a one-off £250 investment gift (a relatively small sum but with a multiplier effect as it would grow over time and prompt relatives to add to the account). The £250 from the government was cancelled within six years as unaffordable. As the benefits only get seen later (when the children grow up), there's a valley of death for the policy where the cost of it kills it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_Trust_Fund https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_Trust_Fund Curiously, Iain Duncan Smith's "universal credit" seems about the closest governments have come to a national scheme headed towards being a basic income (or at least a negative income tax), with the idea of at least first eliminating the benefits eligibility cliffs that existed in the system. But it's not been plain sailing, and again started being taken apart before it could be rolled out or "got right". (Any government can be expected to get it wrong first, you just hope they'll get it right later.) So has comparatively little likelihood of growing to be a universal basic income or negative income tax.