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I sympathize with the consistency of a "pure universal" approach to policy, but like many purist policy philosophies, I don't think it would survive rigorous im

I sympathize with the consistency of a "pure universal" approach to policy, but like many purist policy philosophies, I don't think it would survive rigorous implementation. For so many reasons. Chief among them, maybe, people are generally reluctant to support governments engaged in transfers of resources from themselves to billionaires.

dictum 9y ago
An instance of "ignorance is bliss": people would rather see transfers of resources from themselves to billionaires through corporate welfare (often advocating for it in hopes of a better local economy) and special interest lobbying than direct, documented and smaller cash transfers.
yorwba 9y ago
If you provide the billionaire with food stamps, but tax them at 10% of their net worth (which would reduce them to a mere millionaire in ≈65 years), I'm not sure whether anyone would complain about the food stamps.
- mcintyre1994 9y ago
  Wouldn't the billionaire just leave and move somewhere that doesn't reduce their total worth every year?
  - marvin 9y ago
    This happens even in Norway, where the wealth tax is 0.85% of net worth per year. So you'd have to have some wealth tax everywhere the well-off would want to move.
- yunesj 9y ago
  I prefer the simpler policy, but strongly oppose the 10% net worth tax! > I'm not sure whether anyone would complain Maybe the billionaires would complain? Or is their sacrifice necessary for your greater good? I would also complain. It's unethical. And, we don't need yet another tax on the most value-bearing (and typically philanthropic) people in society, to be collected by the most violent organization in history, to dole out food stamps and other benefits in the most inefficient way possible.
  - yorwba 9y ago
    See, you're not complaining about the food stamps.
  - annabellish 9y ago
    >we don't need yet another tax on the most value-bearing (and typically philanthropic) people in society If we assume for a moment that this is true, then why would this state of affairs be okay? Society cannot run on the philanthopy of billionaires. Further, there's not very much evidence that this is actually true. In terms of largest individual contributions, yes, many billionaires make impressive donations and pay for valuable things, but that's the all-too-common fallacy of looking at absolute figures when it's relative figures that matter. Ignoring that a lot of charity and philantropic work wouldn't even be _necessary_ in a world with less extreme wealth inequality, the idea that non-billionaires aren't proportionally charitable doesn't really hold much water.
    - yunesj 9y ago
      > Society cannot run on the philanthopy of billionaires. Well, it doesn't run on taxes either. Successful societies runs on voluntary exchange. Given how much of the taxes are paid by the ultra wealthy (most of them), how philanthropic they are (very), and how wasteful the government is (impressively), why would you assume that voluntary philanthropy cannot replace involuntary, state-managed welfare?
      - annabellish 9y ago
        We have many historical examples of government-based systems working. We have many historical examples of individual-based systems not working. Everybody just submitting to the hope that billionaires will take pity on them might even work with a sufficiently benevolent overlord, but you get the same problem as so many alternatives to democracy have: If you concentrate all the power in one person, or a small set of people, it's a breeding ground for corruption. Even if your set of people is entirely benevolent, over time as that set of people change it becomes near certain eventually you'll get people who aren't benevolent, and then everyone is fucked. Democracy, and taxation-based systems of governmental funding, are less efficient than the best possible case elsewhere, but are primarily valuable for massively reducing the risk and dangers of bad actors. Concentrating power among an elite class has historically always been a fantastic way of increasing the risk and dangers of bad actors instead.
scott_s 9y ago
Yes, they are. However, programs which do not require meeting any qualifications are massively easier to implement, which can make them much cheaper overall - think of all of the bureaucracy required for applying for and evaluating if various people meet the thresholds for programs, plus all of the appeals processes. Then it becomes two questions: is the cost of enforcing the thresholds greater than the cost of just giving it to everyone, and can the public be made to understand this rational tradeoff.
- brownbat 9y ago
  > However, programs which do not require meeting any qualifications are massively easier to implement, which can make them much cheaper overall - I agree you can get some efficiency gains from eliminating thresholds. Back of the napkin, though, you're talking about an implementation cost delta (ie, only threshold determination costs) that swamps the benefit-and all other implementation costs-by several multiples, maybe an order of magnitude, depending on the size of the targeted group. But ok... Although it's not my intuition that threshold costs would significantly outstrip the savings from targeting, it's just a factual question. For the sake of argument, say that happens in a case. Then yeah, that's a great candidate for universality. If those are the cases you want to focus on... Are we then agreeing that universality is preferable only in those cases where it pays for itself? Because that is totally consistent with my position. If you only want universality when it's cheaper then we already agree and can just defer to the CBO.
  - mcny 9y ago
    > Because that is totally consistent with my position. If you only want universality when it's cheaper then we already agree and can just defer to the CBO. No, I am not trying to argue it will be cheaper. It will likely be more expensive and/or worse for everyone involved but I think it will bring us all together. I think it is worth the extra cost or degraded service.
whataretensors 9y ago
It's also about helping young people who have parents who aren't filing taxes. I was poor and in this situation in college.
- mcny 9y ago
  Yes. I know someone whose parents being very uncooperative is what made me think of this. My conspiracy theory is that politicians use these qualifiers to turn us into vote banks.

dictum 9y ago

An instance of "ignorance is bliss": people would rather see transfers of resources from themselves to billionaires through corporate welfare (often advocating for it in hopes of a better local economy) and special interest lobbying than direct, documented and smaller cash transfers.

yorwba 9y ago

If you provide the billionaire with food stamps, but tax them at 10% of their net worth (which would reduce them to a mere millionaire in ≈65 years), I'm not sure whether anyone would complain about the food stamps.

mcintyre1994 9y ago
Wouldn't the billionaire just leave and move somewhere that doesn't reduce their total worth every year?
- marvin 9y ago
  This happens even in Norway, where the wealth tax is 0.85% of net worth per year. So you'd have to have some wealth tax everywhere the well-off would want to move.
yunesj 9y ago
I prefer the simpler policy, but strongly oppose the 10% net worth tax! > I'm not sure whether anyone would complain Maybe the billionaires would complain? Or is their sacrifice necessary for your greater good? I would also complain. It's unethical. And, we don't need yet another tax on the most value-bearing (and typically philanthropic) people in society, to be collected by the most violent organization in history, to dole out food stamps and other benefits in the most inefficient way possible.
- yorwba 9y ago
  See, you're not complaining about the food stamps.
- annabellish 9y ago
  >we don't need yet another tax on the most value-bearing (and typically philanthropic) people in society If we assume for a moment that this is true, then why would this state of affairs be okay? Society cannot run on the philanthopy of billionaires. Further, there's not very much evidence that this is actually true. In terms of largest individual contributions, yes, many billionaires make impressive donations and pay for valuable things, but that's the all-too-common fallacy of looking at absolute figures when it's relative figures that matter. Ignoring that a lot of charity and philantropic work wouldn't even be _necessary_ in a world with less extreme wealth inequality, the idea that non-billionaires aren't proportionally charitable doesn't really hold much water.
  - yunesj 9y ago
    > Society cannot run on the philanthopy of billionaires. Well, it doesn't run on taxes either. Successful societies runs on voluntary exchange. Given how much of the taxes are paid by the ultra wealthy (most of them), how philanthropic they are (very), and how wasteful the government is (impressively), why would you assume that voluntary philanthropy cannot replace involuntary, state-managed welfare?
    - annabellish 9y ago
      We have many historical examples of government-based systems working. We have many historical examples of individual-based systems not working. Everybody just submitting to the hope that billionaires will take pity on them might even work with a sufficiently benevolent overlord, but you get the same problem as so many alternatives to democracy have: If you concentrate all the power in one person, or a small set of people, it's a breeding ground for corruption. Even if your set of people is entirely benevolent, over time as that set of people change it becomes near certain eventually you'll get people who aren't benevolent, and then everyone is fucked. Democracy, and taxation-based systems of governmental funding, are less efficient than the best possible case elsewhere, but are primarily valuable for massively reducing the risk and dangers of bad actors. Concentrating power among an elite class has historically always been a fantastic way of increasing the risk and dangers of bad actors instead.

scott_s 9y ago

Yes, they are. However, programs which do not require meeting any qualifications are massively easier to implement, which can make them much cheaper overall - think of all of the bureaucracy required for applying for and evaluating if various people meet the thresholds for programs, plus all of the appeals processes. Then it becomes two questions: is the cost of enforcing the thresholds greater than the cost of just giving it to everyone, and can the public be made to understand this rational tradeoff.

brownbat 9y ago
> However, programs which do not require meeting any qualifications are massively easier to implement, which can make them much cheaper overall - I agree you can get some efficiency gains from eliminating thresholds. Back of the napkin, though, you're talking about an implementation cost delta (ie, only threshold determination costs) that swamps the benefit-and all other implementation costs-by several multiples, maybe an order of magnitude, depending on the size of the targeted group. But ok... Although it's not my intuition that threshold costs would significantly outstrip the savings from targeting, it's just a factual question. For the sake of argument, say that happens in a case. Then yeah, that's a great candidate for universality. If those are the cases you want to focus on... Are we then agreeing that universality is preferable only in those cases where it pays for itself? Because that is totally consistent with my position. If you only want universality when it's cheaper then we already agree and can just defer to the CBO.
- mcny 9y ago
  > Because that is totally consistent with my position. If you only want universality when it's cheaper then we already agree and can just defer to the CBO. No, I am not trying to argue it will be cheaper. It will likely be more expensive and/or worse for everyone involved but I think it will bring us all together. I think it is worth the extra cost or degraded service.

whataretensors 9y ago

It's also about helping young people who have parents who aren't filing taxes. I was poor and in this situation in college.

mcny 9y ago
Yes. I know someone whose parents being very uncooperative is what made me think of this. My conspiracy theory is that politicians use these qualifiers to turn us into vote banks.