4 ms·

The only way that works is if UBI is both guaranteed and super high. Like "everyone gets a guaranteed $50k/yr" super high. The UBI Yang and folks are talking ab

The only way that works is if UBI is both guaranteed and super high. Like "everyone gets a guaranteed $50k/yr" super high. The UBI Yang and folks are talking about is so low that it doesn't offer any of those benefits. $1k/month worth of UBI wouldn't even cover average rent for a single person in any of the ~20 most populated cities in the US. $1k/month doesn't quite even cover the cost of child daycare for a single child, in most of the US. $1k/month of UBI is barely even ~50% of the current minimum wage in much of the US (a minimum wage that currently is so low, that it doesn't even cover bare-minimum cost of living either). The UBI is so low, it doesn't even give people the freedom to leave the lowest-paying legal job a typical person could have.

AnthonyMouse 7y ago
Making it guaranteed is implied. Making it huge is completely unnecessary and counterproductive. $1k/month doesn't cover average rent in the most populated cities because the most populated cities have the highest rents and its purpose is not to make you average, it's to provide a floor. Supplying enough for the lowest rent in the lowest cost of living place is sufficient for that, and if you want more you can go get a job or find some other way to make money -- which the UBI continues to supplement, so it doesn't even have to pay very much. It's not supposed to make it so you can live a happy life for a hundred years without ever working. It's just supposed to take starving and freezing to death off the table, and give you a lot more runway when you're trying to start a new business.
- maxsilver 7y ago
  > It (UBI @ $1k/month) is just supposed to take starving and freezing to death off the table My point is that $1k/month does not do this. Hell, minimum wage is approximately 1.5x to 2x greater than UBI (depending on the area), and even it does not quite take "starving and freezing to death" off the table. "Working Homelessness" is a thing - https://www.npr.org/2018/09/30/652572292/working-while-homeless-a-tough-job-for-thousands-of-californians https://www.npr.org/2018/09/30/652572292/working-while-homel... and https://newrepublic.com/article/154618/new-american-homeless-housing-insecurity-richest-cities https://newrepublic.com/article/154618/new-american-homeless...
  - AnthonyMouse 7y ago
    Working homelessness is a thing in California because of outrageous housing costs. The problem there isn't insufficient wages, it's insufficient local housing. You can live a spartan life on $12,000/year in many places in the midwest and not die of poverty.
    - dragonwriter 7y ago
      > The problem there isn't insufficient wages Yes it is. > it's insufficient local housing Insufficient housing given wages and insufficient wages given housing costs are the exact same thing. If you have one you, ipso facto, have the other. California has insufficient low-end wages (and poverty support programs) given the prices (not just for housing, though that's a particularly significant aspect of the issue) created by the wealth of California's high-end workers and capitalists.
      - AnthonyMouse 7y ago
        > Insufficient housing given wages and insufficient wages given housing costs are the exact same thing. If you have one you, ipso facto, have the other. They're not. If you need housing for two million people and you have housing for one million, and you refuse to build any more housing, you don't have enough housing. It doesn't matter how much money people have because whoever has the most would just bid up housing prices so they can have it and there would be people left at the bottom without it. Whereas if you had enough housing for twice as many people as actually live there then housing would be very inexpensive and even people not making very much money would be able to afford it, because getting a unit wouldn't require outbidding someone with a lot more money than you.
        dragonwriter 7y ago
        > If you need housing for two million people and you have housing for one million, and you refuse to build any more housing, you don't have enough housing. California has several times as many unoccupied housing units as homeless people. California doesn't have a hard shortage of housing units, certain people that need housing in California have insufficient material means to convince the people that own existing unoccupied housing units to rent or sell to them.

AnthonyMouse 7y ago

Making it guaranteed is implied. Making it huge is completely unnecessary and counterproductive. $1k/month doesn't cover average rent in the most populated cities because the most populated cities have the highest rents and its purpose is not to make you average, it's to provide a floor. Supplying enough for the lowest rent in the lowest cost of living place is sufficient for that, and if you want more you can go get a job or find some other way to make money -- which the UBI continues to supplement, so it doesn't even have to pay very much. It's not supposed to make it so you can live a happy life for a hundred years without ever working. It's just supposed to take starving and freezing to death off the table, and give you a lot more runway when you're trying to start a new business.

maxsilver 7y ago
> It (UBI @ $1k/month) is just supposed to take starving and freezing to death off the table My point is that $1k/month does not do this. Hell, minimum wage is approximately 1.5x to 2x greater than UBI (depending on the area), and even it does not quite take "starving and freezing to death" off the table. "Working Homelessness" is a thing - https://www.npr.org/2018/09/30/652572292/working-while-homeless-a-tough-job-for-thousands-of-californians https://www.npr.org/2018/09/30/652572292/working-while-homel... and https://newrepublic.com/article/154618/new-american-homeless-housing-insecurity-richest-cities https://newrepublic.com/article/154618/new-american-homeless...
- AnthonyMouse 7y ago
  Working homelessness is a thing in California because of outrageous housing costs. The problem there isn't insufficient wages, it's insufficient local housing. You can live a spartan life on $12,000/year in many places in the midwest and not die of poverty.
  - dragonwriter 7y ago
    > The problem there isn't insufficient wages Yes it is. > it's insufficient local housing Insufficient housing given wages and insufficient wages given housing costs are the exact same thing. If you have one you, ipso facto, have the other. California has insufficient low-end wages (and poverty support programs) given the prices (not just for housing, though that's a particularly significant aspect of the issue) created by the wealth of California's high-end workers and capitalists.
    - AnthonyMouse 7y ago
      > Insufficient housing given wages and insufficient wages given housing costs are the exact same thing. If you have one you, ipso facto, have the other. They're not. If you need housing for two million people and you have housing for one million, and you refuse to build any more housing, you don't have enough housing. It doesn't matter how much money people have because whoever has the most would just bid up housing prices so they can have it and there would be people left at the bottom without it. Whereas if you had enough housing for twice as many people as actually live there then housing would be very inexpensive and even people not making very much money would be able to afford it, because getting a unit wouldn't require outbidding someone with a lot more money than you.
      - dragonwriter 7y ago
        > If you need housing for two million people and you have housing for one million, and you refuse to build any more housing, you don't have enough housing. California has several times as many unoccupied housing units as homeless people. California doesn't have a hard shortage of housing units, certain people that need housing in California have insufficient material means to convince the people that own existing unoccupied housing units to rent or sell to them.