4 ms·

How are you accounting for the increased economic velocity of a sustained cash injection across the entire country?

anovikov 7y ago
But there will be less injection that now right, in case UBI is implemented? No "new" money will appear (unless you suggest printing more and more trillions). This is the same money taken away as taxes. Except now it goes to those in need, instead it will go to everyone: now almost all of that money is consumed and so is indeed a "cash injection", instead the portion of the money - that goes to those already doing OK - will be saved. Providing a "cash injection" doesn't require the UBI. It only requires taxing the rich. But the rich - yes, they mostly CAN actually leave the country to escape taxation, and operate from elsewhere, they can move their assets - increasingly virtual such as intellectual properly - onto offshore entities too... So there's really no option of taxing the rich.
- gonational 7y ago
  > No "new" money will appear... ... except that part where $1,000 per month per person in the US comes out to about $4 trillion, which is 100% of all taxes collected. There is no universe in which this much money can be given to every citizen in the US without creating new money.
  - AnthonyMouse 7y ago
    The pretty obvious solution would be for more nominal taxes to be collected. It would also replace a very large fraction of existing government spending. Or you might have a one-time election between receiving the UBI and receiving social security, and a lot of people in or near retirement would choose social security and then not have to be provided with a UBI, and everyone else wouldn't have to be provided with social security. Doing the accounting in a naive way is also misleading with a UBI, because it's effectively a tax credit. If you paid $15,000 in taxes and received a $12,000 UBI, you're really in the same situation as if you paid $3000 in taxes and had no UBI. The fact that you're nominally paying $12,000 more in taxes doesn't actually affect you because you get all that back.
  - rpedela 7y ago
    It is closer to $3 trillion because children wouldn't receive the UBI as far as I know. Still a big number for sure.
- Red_Leaves_Flyy 7y ago
  You completely dodged the question. I'll rephrase in case I've been unclear. How, or have, you considered that if everyone gets an extra $1k/mo that a huge swath of Americans will just spend it every month? When they spend that money it does not disappear. Some goes to taxes and gets redistributed there. Some gets taken by the service providers (grocery stores, gas stations, cable/cell companies, etc) some gets vacuumed up into the murky world of private equity, some flows into the black market, etc, etc, etc. That money keeps flowing and keeps generating tax revenue. This is economic velocity. The question I have is how have you examined this effect and found it to be unlikely to spur an increase in quality of life for tens of millions of Americans?

But there will be less injection that now right, in case UBI is implemented? No "new" money will appear (unless you suggest printing more and more trillions). This is the same money taken away as taxes. Except now it goes to those in need, instead it will go to everyone: now almost all of that money is consumed and so is indeed a "cash injection", instead the portion of the money - that goes to those already doing OK - will be saved. Providing a "cash injection" doesn't require the UBI. It only requires taxing the rich. But the rich - yes, they mostly CAN actually leave the country to escape taxation, and operate from elsewhere, they can move their assets - increasingly virtual such as intellectual properly - onto offshore entities too... So there's really no option of taxing the rich.

gonational 7y ago
> No "new" money will appear... ... except that part where $1,000 per month per person in the US comes out to about $4 trillion, which is 100% of all taxes collected. There is no universe in which this much money can be given to every citizen in the US without creating new money.
- AnthonyMouse 7y ago
  The pretty obvious solution would be for more nominal taxes to be collected. It would also replace a very large fraction of existing government spending. Or you might have a one-time election between receiving the UBI and receiving social security, and a lot of people in or near retirement would choose social security and then not have to be provided with a UBI, and everyone else wouldn't have to be provided with social security. Doing the accounting in a naive way is also misleading with a UBI, because it's effectively a tax credit. If you paid $15,000 in taxes and received a $12,000 UBI, you're really in the same situation as if you paid $3000 in taxes and had no UBI. The fact that you're nominally paying $12,000 more in taxes doesn't actually affect you because you get all that back.
- rpedela 7y ago
  It is closer to $3 trillion because children wouldn't receive the UBI as far as I know. Still a big number for sure.
Red_Leaves_Flyy 7y ago
You completely dodged the question. I'll rephrase in case I've been unclear. How, or have, you considered that if everyone gets an extra $1k/mo that a huge swath of Americans will just spend it every month? When they spend that money it does not disappear. Some goes to taxes and gets redistributed there. Some gets taken by the service providers (grocery stores, gas stations, cable/cell companies, etc) some gets vacuumed up into the murky world of private equity, some flows into the black market, etc, etc, etc. That money keeps flowing and keeps generating tax revenue. This is economic velocity. The question I have is how have you examined this effect and found it to be unlikely to spur an increase in quality of life for tens of millions of Americans?