4 ms·

Why can't UBI be attempted on a local scale first? We have state and local governments for a reason. Something as risky and expensive as UBI, if it is going to

• smbullet 8y ago
  Maybe because it's hard to control? I could imagine if enough people work within the jurisdiction of a local government but live outside it then the experiment could get skewed.
• sacheendra 8y ago
  Unless local governments have the ability to levy significant taxes, the experiment would be unrealistic. The impact of UBI needs to be studied at the societal level, not just the individual level. Who pays the higher taxes, which jobs would find no takers, where would wages need to increase to compensate, etc. Most countries which are not the Unites States don't have the power to make large scale systematic changes that this requires. It might not be possible even in the US, what with states shipping homeless people to other states and all.
• RickJWagner 8y ago
  Perfect response.
• mdp553 8y ago
  This is seemingly exactly what Finland is doing according to the article. Finland is trialling this approach with on a small subset of eligible people (n = ~ 2000) to assess the effects and allow feedback, etc.
• SiempreViernes 8y ago
  What, exactly, are these risks you talk about? How do those risks compare to the risks of loose moderation on social networks (bullying, radicalisation, etc)?
• em500 8y ago
  Probably not. One of the most fundamental and vexing problems of macro-economics is that individial effects often don't aggregate to the larger system: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aggregation_problem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aggregation_problem Just consider the simplest thought experiment: levy a one-off extra tax of $0.01 on every tax payer and credit some random poor person. This is almost certainly a strict Pareto improvement, but it clearly doesn't scale.
• winter_blue 8y ago
  Most countries grant freedom of movement to its citizens (within its borders), and there's a significant risk of unemployed/underemployed people intentionally moving into the state seeking a better social safety net. In the U.S., this already happened in Alaska with the Alaska Permanent Fund. All residents of Alaska receive annually a portion of the proceeds from Alaska's oil revenue. Alaska tried to prevent internal migrants from receiving this by having the dividend be dependent on a person's years of residency in Alaska , but this was struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court in Zobel v. Williams[2]. Now, anyone who has lived a whole year in Alaska is eligible to receive the dividend. As such, a social safety net as generous as UBI will likely not be workable in the United States. Other states' unemployed residents would likely swarm the state with UBI. (Unless of course, if the Supreme Courts decides to reverse its decision in Zobel v. Williams.) [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alaska_Permanent_Fund#Permanent_Fund_Dividend https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alaska_Permanent_Fund#Permanen... [2] https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/457/55/ https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/457/55/ "Under the plan, each adult resident receives one dividend unit for each year of residency subsequent to 1959, the first year of Alaska's statehood. Appellants, residents of Alaska since 1978, brought an action in an Alaska state court challenging the statutory dividend distribution plan as violative of, inter alia, their right to equal protection guarantees. ... the dividend statute creates fixed, permanent distinctions between an ever-increasing number of classes of concededly bona fide residents based on how long they have lived in the State."
• hak8or 8y ago
  States don't have anywhere near as high of a margin in terms of essential expenses (infrastructure, etc) vs entitlements (social security, health insurance, etc) as the federal government does in the USA. The fed has more money to spend than states.