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> The exact same way as the new system, except instead of 63% it's a much smaller number. If it's less than 63%, you "unilaterally extend benefits to a whole b

> The exact same way as the new system, except instead of 63% it's a much smaller number. If it's less than 63%, you "unilaterally extend benefits to a whole bunch of people who don't currently get them". Let's say benefits for the unemployed are £1,000 a month (chosen to be an easy number to work with). You lose 63p of benefits per extra pound you earn. The government gives you (some) benefits up to the first £1,587 you earn. If you go to 50%, the government gives people earning up to £2,000 a month benefits, and so on, which probably includes a bunch of people who don't currently get any. You can't change 63% without either paying much more in the way of benefits overall, or without reducing the benefits of those who can't do any work. > It would technically bring more people into the system, but they'd be at the top end, and therefore only be receiving a small fraction of the current levels of benefits That's not how the maths works. Assuming an even distribution of people at each wage level, changing this to 30% effectively doubles overall spend.

Dylan16807 7y ago
The people making between £1,587 and £2,000 are getting £206 or less though. That's not an unsolvable expansion, especially because those people probably do in fact need the help.
- peteretep 7y ago
  > That's not an unsolvable expansion So your solution is "spend a lot of extra money on social security", which is fine, but it doesn't satisfy the constraints.
  - Dylan16807 7y ago
    You said you didn't want to "unilaterally extend benefits to a whole bunch of people", not that the cost couldn't increase even the tiniest amount. But even so, smoothing out the curve some might be better overall even if the max amount drops. Also you could extend the curve so that 'benefits' go negative at the high end. Now your budget is fine...
    - peteretep 7y ago
      Your plan both massively increases the number of people on benefits and also increases costs by 20% on your 50% proposal, which in the UK means £15b-ish. Reconciling this with "even the tiniest amount" is impossible. > Also you could extend the curve so that 'benefits' go negative at the high end You've just invented tax, congratulations.
      - Dylan16807 7y ago
        > massively increases the number of people on benefits You have a very different definition of 'massively' than I do. > You've just invented tax, congratulations. Positive taxes can balance out negative taxes, ~tada~.
        FabHK 7y ago
        Dylan, just note that the problem as originally posed is not solvable. Your „solution“ is one that violates one of the constraints and then says „but it’s minimal“. Sure. But that was exactly the point of the comment above: by the nature of things, any change you make leads to an undesirable consequence. Either people who need the benefits don’t get them, or the „marginal tax rate“ is very high, or you extend the benefits to more people (which is costly). You’re stuck on the horns of a trilemma, and that’s the solution the UK has chosen, and any „improvement“ you suggest will be worse on at least one of the dimensions.
        Dylan16807 7y ago
        > Dylan, just note that the problem as originally posed is not solvable. The original constraint was not a $0 increase. I did not violate the original constraint. And even if you did take it to be $0, it said you can't "just afford to" increase. Proposing a tax to make up the difference meets that critera. But even inside a hard "no more spending" constraint, it's not nearly as unsolvable as you make it out to be. It's quite possible that giving less money to people mildly below the old cliff edge, while giving more money to people mildly above it, is a net positive. That doesn't screw over people at the bottom, and it doesn't increase total cost. Going from a hard cliff to a 90% marginal rate was obviously better, right? And going from 90% marginal rate to 85% was obviously better, right? They decided to stop at 63%. It doesn't mean that going further is a priori wrong. And on top of all of that, smoothing out the curve to 50% very likely motivates more people in the range to work, reducing the amount of benefits they use.

Dylan16807 7y ago

The people making between £1,587 and £2,000 are getting £206 or less though. That's not an unsolvable expansion, especially because those people probably do in fact need the help.

peteretep 7y ago
> That's not an unsolvable expansion So your solution is "spend a lot of extra money on social security", which is fine, but it doesn't satisfy the constraints.
- Dylan16807 7y ago
  You said you didn't want to "unilaterally extend benefits to a whole bunch of people", not that the cost couldn't increase even the tiniest amount. But even so, smoothing out the curve some might be better overall even if the max amount drops. Also you could extend the curve so that 'benefits' go negative at the high end. Now your budget is fine...
  - peteretep 7y ago
    Your plan both massively increases the number of people on benefits and also increases costs by 20% on your 50% proposal, which in the UK means £15b-ish. Reconciling this with "even the tiniest amount" is impossible. > Also you could extend the curve so that 'benefits' go negative at the high end You've just invented tax, congratulations.
    - Dylan16807 7y ago
      > massively increases the number of people on benefits You have a very different definition of 'massively' than I do. > You've just invented tax, congratulations. Positive taxes can balance out negative taxes, ~tada~.
      - FabHK 7y ago
        Dylan, just note that the problem as originally posed is not solvable. Your „solution“ is one that violates one of the constraints and then says „but it’s minimal“. Sure. But that was exactly the point of the comment above: by the nature of things, any change you make leads to an undesirable consequence. Either people who need the benefits don’t get them, or the „marginal tax rate“ is very high, or you extend the benefits to more people (which is costly). You’re stuck on the horns of a trilemma, and that’s the solution the UK has chosen, and any „improvement“ you suggest will be worse on at least one of the dimensions.
        Dylan16807 7y ago
        > Dylan, just note that the problem as originally posed is not solvable. The original constraint was not a $0 increase. I did not violate the original constraint. And even if you did take it to be $0, it said you can't "just afford to" increase. Proposing a tax to make up the difference meets that critera. But even inside a hard "no more spending" constraint, it's not nearly as unsolvable as you make it out to be. It's quite possible that giving less money to people mildly below the old cliff edge, while giving more money to people mildly above it, is a net positive. That doesn't screw over people at the bottom, and it doesn't increase total cost. Going from a hard cliff to a 90% marginal rate was obviously better, right? And going from 90% marginal rate to 85% was obviously better, right? They decided to stop at 63%. It doesn't mean that going further is a priori wrong. And on top of all of that, smoothing out the curve to 50% very likely motivates more people in the range to work, reducing the amount of benefits they use.