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What you call the "whims and woes of the market" others would call market efficiency. Being a government employee myself, and dealing with multiple state and fe

What you call the "whims and woes of the market" others would call market efficiency. Being a government employee myself, and dealing with multiple state and federal government programs in my personal life including my mortgage, I am fully on board with allowing the market to better serve the needs of people making their own decisions with cash in hand funded collectively by every citizen of this country. Which, by the way, if not called socialism then I don't know what is. Also, UBI by its very acronymm is Universal, meaning everyone gets the same amount. That's the only fair way to do it, and would negate criticism of cash recipients being "dishonest and lazy." Yes some pay more than others, but that's simply a re-implementation of our current progressive tax system. I think it all basically comes down to your view on government - can they do the right and best thing, or can the individual make better decisions for themselves. By disempowering the invididual, you may even the outcomes, but you disadvantage those who would most benefit from achieving more in life - which in turn, benefits society.

extralego 8y ago
>I have a positive, but finite, amount that I care about people in poverty. UBI is another attempt to save an economic system which works for you but incentivizes maintaining a class of desperate and powerless citizens. Each of these ill-fated attempts punishes another slew of innocent generations of poverty-ridden lives, in the name of ignoring the root issue of misaligned incentives. How many chances do you believe the ruling class to deserve? The issue may not be the amount that you care but that your caring evidently depends on what you get out of it. That’s not caring. Try again. >Giving people in poverty a sustenance level of amount money per month seems it prioritizes neighbors in poverty more than today. The contradictions and other problems really are too long to list here but it shouldn’t be necessary. For someone so concerned with wasting money, advocating UBI over direct commodity distribution is about as hypocritical as it gets. The only difference is an additional and purely self-serving dependency on market values, which are drastically unstable across time, geography and, social structures. So, while your claim is of course untested, your proposal only further establishes that, once implemented, the results will be ever-changing and therefor unknowable. You might do best to just state why you would prefer UBI over direct commodity distribution.

extralego 8y ago

>I have a positive, but finite, amount that I care about people in poverty. UBI is another attempt to save an economic system which works for you but incentivizes maintaining a class of desperate and powerless citizens. Each of these ill-fated attempts punishes another slew of innocent generations of poverty-ridden lives, in the name of ignoring the root issue of misaligned incentives. How many chances do you believe the ruling class to deserve? The issue may not be the amount that you care but that your caring evidently depends on what you get out of it. That’s not caring. Try again. >Giving people in poverty a sustenance level of amount money per month seems it prioritizes neighbors in poverty more than today. The contradictions and other problems really are too long to list here but it shouldn’t be necessary. For someone so concerned with wasting money, advocating UBI over direct commodity distribution is about as hypocritical as it gets. The only difference is an additional and purely self-serving dependency on market values, which are drastically unstable across time, geography and, social structures. So, while your claim is of course untested, your proposal only further establishes that, once implemented, the results will be ever-changing and therefor unknowable. You might do best to just state why you would prefer UBI over direct commodity distribution.