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Reminder that the entire point of UBI is to eliminate needs testing for welfare. Why? 1. Administrative costs 2. Disincentive to work 3. Simplification 4. Equa
by jl2718 3y ago
Reminder that the entire point of UBI is to eliminate needs testing for welfare. Why?
1. Administrative costs
2. Disincentive to work
3. Simplification
4. Equality
The government only does one thing: takes money from people, and gives money to other people. They don’t build roads or systems of defense. The vast majority of the government outlays are somehow concerned with giving out money to people that “need” it, and they do a patently awful job at it. The idea of UBI is just to give that money away efficiently instead of creating a massive poverty pimp administration. Even people that hate the idea of giving away money start to look at it favorably in comparison to the current system. In numbers, the US government spends about $25-30k per adult citizen. Maybe give each adult about $15k per year and eliminate all spending on healthcare, education, social security, welfare, housing, and anything concerned with diversity, equity, or inclusion, because everybody’s getting the exact same thing.
But that’s not going to happen without a huge fight from the poverty pimp lobby, and by fight I mean stuffing the pockets of legislators and judges while calling for riots over perceived injustices. So anything in this direction will just increase the size and inefficiency of the poverty pimp business, and thus achieve the opposite of its intention.
In conclusion: nice thought; bad idea.
- wesselbindt 3y agoThat's certainly one approach and motivation for doing UBI, but it's not the only one. The idea of replacing welfare with UBI and only UBI is what the more libertarian folks want. But for example, if you look at Thomas Piketty and the like's ideas surrounding UBI, it's clear that it is meant as a supplement to current welfare programs, and is designed to improve the bargaining power of the workers in the job market. So instead of being a cost cutting measure and ultimately a source for greater inequality of opportunity, it becomes a measure to reduce inequality of opportunity, with the drawback being that the government has to find a way to fund it. One proposed solution would be progressive wealth taxes, which, if you're a millionaire or higher is a perfectly reasonable thing to be upset about but otherwise not so much.
- seabass-labrax 3y agoWere I a millionaire, I wouldn't be upset about progressive wealth taxes, I would be pleased. Why? Because in the philosophical justification for personal wealth and private capital, being a millionaire is a reflection of your worth to others in society. If your millions go to help others through taxes, you get double the social standing: once for earning the millions, once again for giving them back!
- wesselbindt 3y agoI think that's an admirable way of looking at things!
- jl2718 3y agoExcept by your own definition the state does a worse job at benefiting people with your money than you do.
- wesselbindt 3y agoThat's quite a poor assumption I find. Most modern leaps in progress have been publicly funded (see for example penicillin, the internet, anything resulting from the space race, and for a more comprehensive list, the entrepeneurial state by Mazzucato). Capital owners typically just take this publicly funded work, slap a sticker on it, and put it behind a paywall. Not much added value imho.
- fidotron 3y agoIt's more importantly an alternative to the minimum wage to reduce unemployment. The classic example is if you can only add $10 value/hour in an area where the minimum wage is $20/hour you will go unemployed. If there is a UBI instead then you receive the UBI plus whatever you are paid in accordance with the value added. This also means you wouldn't need endless arguments over adjustments to a minimum wage. You are dead right about poverty-pimps - they are the true parasites in all this.