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UBI isn't enough money to live on for free. It's about half that. 12k is enough money to live but your standard of living is worse enough to be visibly felt.

UBI isn't enough money to live on for free. It's about half that. 12k is enough money to live but your standard of living is worse enough to be visibly felt. If you look at https://www.gapminder.org/dollar-street/ https://www.gapminder.org/dollar-street/, 12k / yr generally the level where most essentials are visible around the world. But you're likely not going to have: 1) A car 2) A house 3) Feed a family 4) Savings 5) An expensive hobby You'd need about another 5-10k on the UBI check to really make this argument for UBI... which you get through working.

AdrianB1 6y ago
First, you don't need savings if you have UBI forever. Second, you ignore the basics of economics of demand and supply: if a large enough proportion of the population lies on UBI you will even find cars cheap enough for them, either second hand or purpose built. True story, Renault is a car manufacturer that sells their cars for prices very similar to everyone else, but they built for some years a model that was selling for 5000 Euro (about $6000 at that time) new, with a modern and solid engine and all the safety features mandated by law in Europe. That car was also sold in France for a lot more (8000 euro or more) just because people in France afforded to pay more. Now Renault is still selling 7000 Euro cars (Dacia Sandero) that are really good for the money, while selling Renault branded cars for around 20,000 Euro and more.
- spyckie2 6y ago
  Not sure if you're a student or never had an income, but savings are not just for retirement. Savings, as opposed to a retirement plan, are for major life decisions like buying a car, getting married, supporting a family, upgrading your standard of living, taking care of emergencies, and affording expensive opportunities (like moving or traveling, for instance). Also, no, the basics of supply and demand will not make cheap cars a thing. It's not the cost of a car that you can't afford, it's the cost of maintenance. Fuel, maintenance, and insurance (mandatory in the US btw) are all costs to use the car - the average being around $100/mth. https://newsroom.aaa.com/tag/cost-to-own-a-vehicle/ https://newsroom.aaa.com/tag/cost-to-own-a-vehicle/ -> 1.1k And also no, new cars will not become cheaper over time in the US. There's already 19% of the US families who make under 24k a year (we roughly double UBI to account for 2 adult UBI incomes and one car per household rule). That's 24 million households already out of the 130m households in the US. The market for used cars is actually quite big (17.6 million transactions / yr) which is probably why there isn't an $8200 new US car offering (which, btw, requires savings in order to purchase). Back to my original point, if you have a budget of 1k/month, you could spend ~$400 on rent, $300 on food, $100 on your car, $100 on personal needs, and $100 on misc / emergencies in a small suburban town (like the outskirts of Pittsburgh) -> I've done this in college before. But realistically you would need an extra ~$600-1000 a month to pay for things like - internet, health insurance, furniture, clothes, laptop, phone, heating / ac bill, eating out every so often, a social life, hobbies, travel, etc. So yes, you'd still want double of your UBI income.
  - AdrianB1 6y ago
    Not a student, but probably older than many people here. I am quite familiar with countries with very low income and the economics of it, the 19% you mentioned is too small to make an impact in pricing, wait until it goes to 60-80%. I read a study made by my employer in China on how people were living on $1/day in rural areas a few years ago, it all makes sense and it matches the examples from other countries. Just consider the car factory would be crewed by people earning $15-20k, same for suppliers of parts and you can see how a car can get cheaper. Also the cars for low income people are modestly equipped with non-essential features like displays, radio, air conditioning and people with $12k income will accept it this way. The kind of people that live on UBI (with no other job) are not the kind of people that care about savings.
skocznymroczny 6y ago
If it's not enough to live on for free then it's not an UBI. The B in UBI stands for basic, it means that it covers all the basic needs, such as housing, food, electricity. One might argue that things like entertainment or internet wouldn't be covered by UBI because it'd be really basic, but I assume few years of activism would change that with actions like "internet for everyone, let's tax the rich to pay for it".
- spyckie2 6y ago
  > If it's not enough to live on for free then it's not an UBI. This is either very poor wording or just plain wrong. UBI is a cash grant policy, nothing more. The intent is to increase overall standard of living of the poorest people in the US more efficiently, not to make everyone have the same high level of standard of living for free. It's a policy, not an ideology. In respect to that, I already mentioned that 12k is enough money to live but your standard of living is worse enough to be visibly felt.

AdrianB1 6y ago

First, you don't need savings if you have UBI forever. Second, you ignore the basics of economics of demand and supply: if a large enough proportion of the population lies on UBI you will even find cars cheap enough for them, either second hand or purpose built. True story, Renault is a car manufacturer that sells their cars for prices very similar to everyone else, but they built for some years a model that was selling for 5000 Euro (about $6000 at that time) new, with a modern and solid engine and all the safety features mandated by law in Europe. That car was also sold in France for a lot more (8000 euro or more) just because people in France afforded to pay more. Now Renault is still selling 7000 Euro cars (Dacia Sandero) that are really good for the money, while selling Renault branded cars for around 20,000 Euro and more.

spyckie2 6y ago
Not sure if you're a student or never had an income, but savings are not just for retirement. Savings, as opposed to a retirement plan, are for major life decisions like buying a car, getting married, supporting a family, upgrading your standard of living, taking care of emergencies, and affording expensive opportunities (like moving or traveling, for instance). Also, no, the basics of supply and demand will not make cheap cars a thing. It's not the cost of a car that you can't afford, it's the cost of maintenance. Fuel, maintenance, and insurance (mandatory in the US btw) are all costs to use the car - the average being around $100/mth. https://newsroom.aaa.com/tag/cost-to-own-a-vehicle/ https://newsroom.aaa.com/tag/cost-to-own-a-vehicle/ -> 1.1k And also no, new cars will not become cheaper over time in the US. There's already 19% of the US families who make under 24k a year (we roughly double UBI to account for 2 adult UBI incomes and one car per household rule). That's 24 million households already out of the 130m households in the US. The market for used cars is actually quite big (17.6 million transactions / yr) which is probably why there isn't an $8200 new US car offering (which, btw, requires savings in order to purchase). Back to my original point, if you have a budget of 1k/month, you could spend ~$400 on rent, $300 on food, $100 on your car, $100 on personal needs, and $100 on misc / emergencies in a small suburban town (like the outskirts of Pittsburgh) -> I've done this in college before. But realistically you would need an extra ~$600-1000 a month to pay for things like - internet, health insurance, furniture, clothes, laptop, phone, heating / ac bill, eating out every so often, a social life, hobbies, travel, etc. So yes, you'd still want double of your UBI income.
- AdrianB1 6y ago
  Not a student, but probably older than many people here. I am quite familiar with countries with very low income and the economics of it, the 19% you mentioned is too small to make an impact in pricing, wait until it goes to 60-80%. I read a study made by my employer in China on how people were living on $1/day in rural areas a few years ago, it all makes sense and it matches the examples from other countries. Just consider the car factory would be crewed by people earning $15-20k, same for suppliers of parts and you can see how a car can get cheaper. Also the cars for low income people are modestly equipped with non-essential features like displays, radio, air conditioning and people with $12k income will accept it this way. The kind of people that live on UBI (with no other job) are not the kind of people that care about savings.

skocznymroczny 6y ago

If it's not enough to live on for free then it's not an UBI. The B in UBI stands for basic, it means that it covers all the basic needs, such as housing, food, electricity. One might argue that things like entertainment or internet wouldn't be covered by UBI because it'd be really basic, but I assume few years of activism would change that with actions like "internet for everyone, let's tax the rich to pay for it".

spyckie2 6y ago
> If it's not enough to live on for free then it's not an UBI. This is either very poor wording or just plain wrong. UBI is a cash grant policy, nothing more. The intent is to increase overall standard of living of the poorest people in the US more efficiently, not to make everyone have the same high level of standard of living for free. It's a policy, not an ideology. In respect to that, I already mentioned that 12k is enough money to live but your standard of living is worse enough to be visibly felt.