Yes, I've long supported the so-called "negative income tax" -- the name is confusing; what it means is that below a certain income level, the IRS gives you mon

Yes, I've long supported the so-called "negative income tax" -- the name is confusing; what it means is that below a certain income level, the IRS gives you money instead of you having to pay it, with the amount you receive being a monotonically increasing function of your income that is zero at the same income at which your tax reaches zero. Personally I've long been inclined to the view that we should replace our existing welfare, unemployment, and Social Security systems with the NIT. Although SS has been sold as a retirement savings system, it is really a transfer payment system, a reality that is starting to become inescapable. It's just not right, I believe, for a transfer payment system not to involve means-testing -- there's no way to justify taking money from young middle-class workers, many with families, to support retirees who are well off anyway. For some very interesting arguments against the NIT, backed by some experimental data, see: http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc1/NegativeIncomeTax.html http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc1/NegativeIncomeTax.html I actually think the problems could probably be solved, but I have to grant that they are nontrivial.