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I firmly believe that removing the administrative spend to run the current bureaucratic nightmare that is welfare would free up enough money to implement a true

I firmly believe that removing the administrative spend to run the current bureaucratic nightmare that is welfare would free up enough money to implement a true UBI. Of course, that's almost impossible to prove, but I just feel it in my bones that it's true.

euleriancon 1y ago
Well, the US publishes numbers for a lot of its programs so we can see exactly how much is spent on the bureaucratic nightmare. Medicaid FY 2023 Budget: $900.3b ($620b federal, $280b state) [1] FY 2023 Budget not spent on benefits (admin overhead): 5% ($45b) [2] SNAP FY 2024 Budget: $100.3b [3] FY 2024 Budget not spent on benefits (admin overhead): $6.5b [3] TANF FY2024 Budget: $31.5b ($16.5b federal, $15b state) [4] FY2023 Budget spent on program overhead: %10.1 ($3.2b) [5] Total Admin Spending $54.7b -> $169 per person in the US So not totally negligible but also not exactly a basic income [1] (https://www.macpac.gov/topic/spending https://www.macpac.gov/topic/spending) [2] (https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/R42640 https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/R42640) See figure 4 [3] (https://usafacts.org/answers/how-much-does-the-federal-government-spend-on-snap-every-year/country/united-states/ https://usafacts.org/answers/how-much-does-the-federal-gover...) [4] (https://www.gao.gov/assets/880/872093.pdf https://www.gao.gov/assets/880/872093.pdf) [5] (https://acf.gov/sites/default/files/documents/ofa/fy2023_tanf_and_moe_financial_pie_charts_final.pdf https://acf.gov/sites/default/files/documents/ofa/fy2023_tan...)
- steveBK123 1y ago
  Precisely, people on the left wildly overestimate the admin overhead while people on the right wildly overestimate the fraud. In the end, we have a gradually increasing idea of what the "basics" are which we should provide the poor / the elderly / everyone, and a decreasing working-to-retired ratio. That is - the spend side is increasing faster than the income side. Europe is about 10 years ahead of us on this problem, but we are catching up fast.
  - roboror 1y ago
    >Precisely, people on the left wildly overestimate the admin overhead Public or private? I've never seen "the left" criticize admin overhead in public services. McKinsey estimates healthcare profit pools will reach $819 billion in 2027.
    - Shaanie 1y ago
      They don't criticize it, but believe UBI will "almost pay for itself" by not requiring aa much overhead. Which it won't, not even remotely close.
      - steveBK123 1y ago
        I think the other problem with UBI, besides the fact that we can't afford it .. is that its probably actually bad for society. Many problems come from an increasing lack of purpose in society. Getting paid to do nothing will not solve that for probably 99% of the population. Lots of idle time for lots of bored people is like pouring gasoline on a fire.
        dragonwriter 1y ago
        UBI isn’t “getting paid to do nothing”, it is “removing rapid clawback from means-tested welfare so that there isn’t a significant range in the working poor to middle income range where additional outside income as reduced impact because it is offset by welfare clawbacks.”
        steveBK123 1y ago
        It really depends on who you ask. Mechanically the other problem would seem to be, if you listen to someone like Gary Stevenson, that it only works if you ratchet up taxes on the top end. Otherwise broad flat cash distribution from the government generally causes inflation and all the money ends up workings its way up to the wealthier. So if you do not tax it back, it actually ends up being regressive. The mechanism is something like - the poorer you are, the higher % of your income, by necessity goes to spending on basic needs. You have a zero or negative savings rate. The richer you are, the opposite. You have savings you put into income producing assets (stocks which are fractional ownership in companies, real estate, etc). So if everyone gets $25k/year, the bottom end will spend it all on goods & services (food, clothing, rent) that are owned/produced by the wealthy. And it compounds as the wealthier then are able to buy more and more income producing assets from the middle class.
- 0xffff2 1y ago
  Also, not all of the admin overhead would disappear if we got rid of means testing. I don't have the expertise to come up with a specific number, but I'd wager that getting half the admin costs back would be the absolute best case. I still support simplifying means testing for benefits programs, but not because it's going to magically free up a consequential amount of money.
  - Aurornis 1y ago
    > Also, not all of the admin overhead would disappear if we got rid of means testing. Exactly. The same conversation happens with discussion about eliminating private health insurance: Other countries with nationalized health care still have their own overhead. It's less than the overhead of a private healthcare system, but not by as much as everyone assumes. You could completely eliminate the overhead of private health insurance in the United States and it would only change the situation by a couple percent, though most people assume it would be much, much more.
prewett 1y ago
Feelings are uncorrelated with accuracy. Last year, the US revenue was $4.7 billion [1]. The US population is estimated to be 342 million [2]. If we had no government, we could UBI everyone $13,742/year. This is the maximum we could UBI, and it is not enough to live on. But if you want roads, enforcement of food and drug safety, some sort of law enforcement system, national parks, at least enough military to prevent Canada or Mexico from waltzing in and annexing us, support for research grants, etc. then it's going to be substantially less than that. [1] https://fiscaldata.treasury.gov/americas-finance-guide/government-revenue/ https://fiscaldata.treasury.gov/americas-finance-guide/gover... [2] https://www.census.gov/popclock/ https://www.census.gov/popclock/
- HanayamaTriplet 1y ago
  Nitpick: Your math is correct, but you have the US revenue in billions rather than trillions.
- mcdonje 1y ago
  Don't forget all the private sector jobs associated with means testing. Read "Bullshit Jobs". Also, taxes on the top are way, way too low. As evidenced by the facts that inequality is at a high point and the super rich are able to thoroughly control the government. Edit: The person I replied to made a pithy comment about 'feelings being uncorrelated with accuracy', then made an incomplete superficial analysis. Now, I'm getting downvoted with no logical rebuttal. Seems like a knee-jerk emotional reaction to me daring to say taxes aren't high enough, even though inequality is high, and the balance of power does favor the super rich over the government and the masses. Either that, or an inability to imagine the second order effects on the economy if people who are currently working BS jobs had enough of a safety net to persue their passion projects. Even though their wages are private sector, the jobs are private sector waste to support governmental waste. Imagine if instead of getting people to work 40 hours a week to help a company determine if they're in compliance with a governmental means-tested program, people were just given money to live. Some would spend their time taking care of their grandkids. Many would start businesses. Open source projects would have plenty of labor. Towns battling invasive species would have plenty of labor.
Aurornis 1y ago
> to implement a true UBI. Of course, that's almost impossible to prove, but I just feel it in my bones that it's true. It's actually easy to prove that this isn't true. Not even close. What do you define as a "true UBI"? Take that annual number and multiply it by the population of the United States. That's how much a "true UBI" program would have to spend annually. If we took a poverty-level wage of $15.5K annually and gave it to every person, that would require $5.4 Trillion, excluding any overhead of sending out the money. That's more than all of the federal tax revenue combined. Even if we took every dollar paid in federal taxes and gave it to every person in the United States with 100% efficiency, divided evenly, it would still be below what's considered poverty-level wages. I think a lot of people have "feel it in my bones" beliefs about UBI that they haven't stopped to check with some simple math. Actually giving everyone a lot of money is extremely expensive.
- fnordsensei 1y ago
  So to do true UBI, you’d also have to raise taxes quite a bit. If US GDP is ~30 trillion, the program would have to capture ~20% of that to achieve your target. Do check my math, I’m not sure I’ve got this right.
  - Aurornis 1y ago
    > So to do true UBI, you’d also have to raise taxes quite a bit. That's correct. You'd have to raise taxes across the board. There is a lingering assumption that we can tax billionaires and get UBI, but more simple math shows that won't work either. Even if you seized 100% of the net worth (not just cash in the bank) of all US billionaires, you couldn't provide poverty-level wages to everyone for very long. In practice, this means that a UBI program would turn into a tax rate program. You might "receive" $15K in UBI, but your middle-class taxes would go up by $20K per year. So you're technically getting UBI, but your taxes have gone up to pay for it to go to people in lower tax brackets.

euleriancon 1y ago

Well, the US publishes numbers for a lot of its programs so we can see exactly how much is spent on the bureaucratic nightmare. Medicaid FY 2023 Budget: $900.3b ($620b federal, $280b state) [1] FY 2023 Budget not spent on benefits (admin overhead): 5% ($45b) [2] SNAP FY 2024 Budget: $100.3b [3] FY 2024 Budget not spent on benefits (admin overhead): $6.5b [3] TANF FY2024 Budget: $31.5b ($16.5b federal, $15b state) [4] FY2023 Budget spent on program overhead: %10.1 ($3.2b) [5] Total Admin Spending $54.7b -> $169 per person in the US So not totally negligible but also not exactly a basic income [1] (https://www.macpac.gov/topic/spending https://www.macpac.gov/topic/spending) [2] (https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/R42640 https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/R42640) See figure 4 [3] (https://usafacts.org/answers/how-much-does-the-federal-government-spend-on-snap-every-year/country/united-states/ https://usafacts.org/answers/how-much-does-the-federal-gover...) [4] (https://www.gao.gov/assets/880/872093.pdf https://www.gao.gov/assets/880/872093.pdf) [5] (https://acf.gov/sites/default/files/documents/ofa/fy2023_tanf_and_moe_financial_pie_charts_final.pdf https://acf.gov/sites/default/files/documents/ofa/fy2023_tan...)

steveBK123 1y ago
Precisely, people on the left wildly overestimate the admin overhead while people on the right wildly overestimate the fraud. In the end, we have a gradually increasing idea of what the "basics" are which we should provide the poor / the elderly / everyone, and a decreasing working-to-retired ratio. That is - the spend side is increasing faster than the income side. Europe is about 10 years ahead of us on this problem, but we are catching up fast.
- roboror 1y ago
  >Precisely, people on the left wildly overestimate the admin overhead Public or private? I've never seen "the left" criticize admin overhead in public services. McKinsey estimates healthcare profit pools will reach $819 billion in 2027.
  - Shaanie 1y ago
    They don't criticize it, but believe UBI will "almost pay for itself" by not requiring aa much overhead. Which it won't, not even remotely close.
    - steveBK123 1y ago
      I think the other problem with UBI, besides the fact that we can't afford it .. is that its probably actually bad for society. Many problems come from an increasing lack of purpose in society. Getting paid to do nothing will not solve that for probably 99% of the population. Lots of idle time for lots of bored people is like pouring gasoline on a fire.
      - dragonwriter 1y ago
        UBI isn’t “getting paid to do nothing”, it is “removing rapid clawback from means-tested welfare so that there isn’t a significant range in the working poor to middle income range where additional outside income as reduced impact because it is offset by welfare clawbacks.”
        steveBK123 1y ago
        It really depends on who you ask. Mechanically the other problem would seem to be, if you listen to someone like Gary Stevenson, that it only works if you ratchet up taxes on the top end. Otherwise broad flat cash distribution from the government generally causes inflation and all the money ends up workings its way up to the wealthier. So if you do not tax it back, it actually ends up being regressive. The mechanism is something like - the poorer you are, the higher % of your income, by necessity goes to spending on basic needs. You have a zero or negative savings rate. The richer you are, the opposite. You have savings you put into income producing assets (stocks which are fractional ownership in companies, real estate, etc). So if everyone gets $25k/year, the bottom end will spend it all on goods & services (food, clothing, rent) that are owned/produced by the wealthy. And it compounds as the wealthier then are able to buy more and more income producing assets from the middle class.
0xffff2 1y ago
Also, not all of the admin overhead would disappear if we got rid of means testing. I don't have the expertise to come up with a specific number, but I'd wager that getting half the admin costs back would be the absolute best case. I still support simplifying means testing for benefits programs, but not because it's going to magically free up a consequential amount of money.
- Aurornis 1y ago
  > Also, not all of the admin overhead would disappear if we got rid of means testing. Exactly. The same conversation happens with discussion about eliminating private health insurance: Other countries with nationalized health care still have their own overhead. It's less than the overhead of a private healthcare system, but not by as much as everyone assumes. You could completely eliminate the overhead of private health insurance in the United States and it would only change the situation by a couple percent, though most people assume it would be much, much more.

prewett 1y ago

Feelings are uncorrelated with accuracy. Last year, the US revenue was $4.7 billion [1]. The US population is estimated to be 342 million [2]. If we had no government, we could UBI everyone $13,742/year. This is the maximum we could UBI, and it is not enough to live on. But if you want roads, enforcement of food and drug safety, some sort of law enforcement system, national parks, at least enough military to prevent Canada or Mexico from waltzing in and annexing us, support for research grants, etc. then it's going to be substantially less than that. [1] https://fiscaldata.treasury.gov/americas-finance-guide/government-revenue/ https://fiscaldata.treasury.gov/americas-finance-guide/gover... [2] https://www.census.gov/popclock/ https://www.census.gov/popclock/

HanayamaTriplet 1y ago
Nitpick: Your math is correct, but you have the US revenue in billions rather than trillions.
mcdonje 1y ago
Don't forget all the private sector jobs associated with means testing. Read "Bullshit Jobs". Also, taxes on the top are way, way too low. As evidenced by the facts that inequality is at a high point and the super rich are able to thoroughly control the government. Edit: The person I replied to made a pithy comment about 'feelings being uncorrelated with accuracy', then made an incomplete superficial analysis. Now, I'm getting downvoted with no logical rebuttal. Seems like a knee-jerk emotional reaction to me daring to say taxes aren't high enough, even though inequality is high, and the balance of power does favor the super rich over the government and the masses. Either that, or an inability to imagine the second order effects on the economy if people who are currently working BS jobs had enough of a safety net to persue their passion projects. Even though their wages are private sector, the jobs are private sector waste to support governmental waste. Imagine if instead of getting people to work 40 hours a week to help a company determine if they're in compliance with a governmental means-tested program, people were just given money to live. Some would spend their time taking care of their grandkids. Many would start businesses. Open source projects would have plenty of labor. Towns battling invasive species would have plenty of labor.

Aurornis 1y ago

> to implement a true UBI. Of course, that's almost impossible to prove, but I just feel it in my bones that it's true. It's actually easy to prove that this isn't true. Not even close. What do you define as a "true UBI"? Take that annual number and multiply it by the population of the United States. That's how much a "true UBI" program would have to spend annually. If we took a poverty-level wage of $15.5K annually and gave it to every person, that would require $5.4 Trillion, excluding any overhead of sending out the money. That's more than all of the federal tax revenue combined. Even if we took every dollar paid in federal taxes and gave it to every person in the United States with 100% efficiency, divided evenly, it would still be below what's considered poverty-level wages. I think a lot of people have "feel it in my bones" beliefs about UBI that they haven't stopped to check with some simple math. Actually giving everyone a lot of money is extremely expensive.

fnordsensei 1y ago
So to do true UBI, you’d also have to raise taxes quite a bit. If US GDP is ~30 trillion, the program would have to capture ~20% of that to achieve your target. Do check my math, I’m not sure I’ve got this right.
- Aurornis 1y ago
  > So to do true UBI, you’d also have to raise taxes quite a bit. That's correct. You'd have to raise taxes across the board. There is a lingering assumption that we can tax billionaires and get UBI, but more simple math shows that won't work either. Even if you seized 100% of the net worth (not just cash in the bank) of all US billionaires, you couldn't provide poverty-level wages to everyone for very long. In practice, this means that a UBI program would turn into a tax rate program. You might "receive" $15K in UBI, but your middle-class taxes would go up by $20K per year. So you're technically getting UBI, but your taxes have gone up to pay for it to go to people in lower tax brackets.