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This issue comes up from time to time here on Hacker News, which is why I submitted the current story. The policy proposal of a basic income guarantee is intere

This issue comes up from time to time here on Hacker News, which is why I submitted the current story. The policy proposal of a basic income guarantee is interesting because a) no country has ever tried it, really, so there isn't a real-world experience case to look at yet, and b) a remarkable variety of people from otherwise differing points of view have proposed it over the years. Charles Murray's book In Our Hands: A Plan to Replace the Welfare State, http://www.amazon.com/books/dp/0844742236 http://www.amazon.com/books/dp/0844742236 goes into detail about how much a program of guaranteed income for everyone would cost in the United States, and suggests some probable effects that would have on everyone's everyday behavior. I read the book a year or two after it was published. Murray's own summary of his argument http://www.irp.wisc.edu/publications/focus/pdfs/foc242a.pdf http://www.irp.wisc.edu/publications/focus/pdfs/foc242a.pdf and reviews of his book http://www.aei.org/article/society-and-culture/poverty/in-our-hands-a-plan-to-replace-the-welfare-state-article/ http://www.aei.org/article/society-and-culture/poverty/in-ou... http://www.conallboyle.com/BasicIncomeNewEcon/MurrayReview.pdf http://www.conallboyle.com/BasicIncomeNewEcon/MurrayReview.p... http://www.richmondfed.org/publications/research/region_focus/2006/fall/pdf/book_review.pdf http://www.richmondfed.org/publications/research/region_focu... http://mises.org/misesreview_detail.aspx?control=296 http://mises.org/misesreview_detail.aspx?control=296 may inform the discussion here. Big public policy proposals are not easy to discuss, but the big public policy proposal of a guaranteed basic income for all is a response to existing policy of supposedly targeted social welfare programs that are just about equally expensive in the benefits they provide, but much more costly to administer. As a matter of personal opinion, I am still thinking about whether or not a basic income guarantee is a good idea, but I definitely want to figure out if spending no more in total for social welfare by directly transferring cash to all citizens would simplify administration of welfare programs and allow more individual choice about how to use the money.

jswinghammer 13y ago
Arguments like this assume you can change one thing and society won't change around it. With a basic guarantee many people who are marginally employed would stop working. You'd have two classes of citizens: the workers and those who are effectively parasites off of the workers. I don't like people being poor but society is just not wealthy for poverty to disappear. The said a person living in poverty is probably better off than all the but the richest people at any time in human history. Part of the issue is that we lack an understanding of poverty and what actually causes people to not be in poverty. Considering that in human history poverty has always been the norm it makes sense to look at what causes poverty to not be the norm first before moving onto just "fixing" it.
- transfire 13y ago
  Here's the problem with your analysis: Just because someone doesn't have a job, doesn't make them a parasite. Here's an example, a granddaughter who lives with and helps take care of her poor grandmother who has Alzheimer's. In her spare time she does sonogram analysis to determine the sex of babies for newly pregnant mothers (Yes, this does exist.) But there is no money in any of this, even though she provides a service to society. Give it some thought and you can realize there are many variations on this. The problem with capital-driven society is that it only values a narrow range of activities that have high rates of money exchange. But there are many things in life worth doing, indeed that need to be done, that do not.
  - jknightco 13y ago
    Except your granddaughter isn't providing services to society. She's providing one service to her grandmother, as a family member (which could almost be seen as repaying a debt). The other service she's providing is the equivalent of a hobby: if it was valuable enough to other people to be considered a "service to society," then she could be getting paid for it.
    - eCa 13y ago
      > Except your granddaughter isn't providing services to society. I think it's arguable that she does. By doing what she does she relieves the system from taking care of her grandmother, and thereby making whatever small amount of taxpayer money usable for something else meanwhile taking that economic burden on herself. (Edit: It can of course be seen that whatever wellfare money she gets is the equivalent of her service to grandmother/society, but in that case it's still at worst a zero sum scenario.)
    - RWeaver 13y ago
      It's a service to society if the grandmother would otherwise be taken care of by the government (at enormous expense probably) I can imagine other fulfilling activities like helping less fortunate people get back on their feet, which could provide a giant boost to the economy but aren't really directly profitable (as the poor have no money)
frank_boyd 13y ago
> a) no country has ever tried it Isn't the cash you get from "Social Services" (or whatever it's called) just that, a basic revenue that's guaranteed (as long as you follow some very simple/basic/normal rules)?
- transfire 13y ago
  Those services have very narrow windows of qualification. This create a lot of top heavy bureaucracy which wastes a great deal of money that could be going directly to people. In addition it create a bifurcation of society, "those parasites" vs everyone else, which is turn create social stigma which only further exacerbates poverty.
  - frank_boyd 13y ago
    > "those parasites" vs everyone else, which is turn create social stigma which only further exacerbates poverty. Yep, our cultural stupidity does exist. That's why everybody should get a good education.
    - zentiggr 13y ago
      The issue in this branch of the conversation is the stigmatizing of people who legitimately need services but have actual hardships in maintaining them in the face of beauracratic rigidity and "discrimination by fiat". My mother is legally blind and needs assistance for almost any trip out of her residence, and all paperwork. How many classes/subjects will fix that?
- protomyth 13y ago
  Not so much. It is not very easy to navigate and can take a while depending on how you end up there. Some of the money is also restricted use[1]. It is very much not guaranteed. 1) ok, in the last year or two some rules changed allowing EBT payments at strip clubs and liquor stores, but not buying a burrito at a gas station then cooking it in the gas station's microwave.
- fnordfnordfnord 13y ago
Jacqued 13y ago
A proposal in this direction has been pushed in Switzerland that will be subject to a referendum. The idea : hand out 2500CHF a month (about $2700) to each citizen without anything in return or any condition. Plus around $1100 a month for each child you have to support. Now this has not been confirmed yed (the referendum is to be held in 2015). The goal is to put an end to the degrading controls forced upon people depending on welfare, and to balance the relationship between employers and employees - if you don't HAVE to work, you don't have to put up with abusive employers, low-paying slavery and the like
- bluecalm 13y ago
  Wow, I didn't think 2500CHF/month is anywhere near possible for a country like Switzerland. I think that balancing relationship (or negotiating position) is the argument for basic income. That being said going from 0 to 2500CHF/month looks very bold.
  - mordae 13y ago
    SPECULATION: I'd guess that they already have some kind of social security system that costs them a lot plus they would use progressive taxation to get most of the money back.
- salvadors 13y ago
  Is there a detailed explanation of the plan available online?
- hcarvalhoalves 13y ago
  > Now this has not been confirmed yed (the referendum is to be held in 2015). The goal is to put an end to the degrading controls forced upon people depending on welfare, and to balance the relationship between employers and employees - if you don't HAVE to work, you don't have to put up with abusive employers, low-paying slavery and the like That's quite radical, but smart at the same time. It has the potential to weed out bad companies from the economy, which in the long run is beneficial. It shifts a lot of power to the employee though, so there's a risk in the long run it can create a bad workforce instead.
hbbio 13y ago
a) France does just that. Since 1988. It was called for years RMI for "Revenu Minimum d'Insertion" which translates to something like minimum revenue for social integration. Our previous government changed the name to RSA or "Revenu de Solidarité Active", which translates to revenue of active solidarity. They reduced the revenue by a few percent at that occasion. The RSA provides now enough to live (about 500€ for a single person per month) if not in a major city center. It becomes about 1200€ month for a family with two children. Again, just the minimum to live. Also take in account that education and health are free* in France. (*) YMMV, not all MDs, but most schools, etc.
- hershel 13y ago
  Does this apply to immigrants ? If so why are there such large tensions around the issues of immigrant unemployment ?
  - hbbio 13y ago
    Yes, under conditions. Mainly: stable residency, plus legal immigration papers. Legal immigration is pretty low in France (compared to other European countries for instance), but what you mention IS a source of tensions, and the bread of extreme right parties.
- kemenaran 13y ago
  Except RSA is not available to everyone (many people are not eligible), not guaranteed (it's tied to searching for a job, for instance), and not an actual income that provides you the bare minimum (in some places it doesn't even get you housing).
westicle 13y ago
One thing I like about this policy is it removes all kinds of perverse incentives which currently exist. Some (true) personal examples: a friend of mine is moderately disabled and lives with his elderly parents. He wants (and they desperately want for him) to be able to live independently in a small apartment so that he can develop coping skills which will serve him when they are no longer around. His parents have the means to help him buy an apartment, but doing so would disqualify him from receiving any disability pension (including free health care). A colleague of mine once employed a young woman as a secretary/admin assistant. One day her family advised him that they had arranged a marriage for her and as she was no longer living with them she and her new husband would both qualify for unemployment benefits. If my colleague refused to pay her the equivalent of two unemployment benefits (after tax) she would resign. The next week she did. I used to know a guy who was what I would term chronically unemployable. He had no obvious disability but was seemingly unable to accomplish anything without having his hand held (it was a severe issue, not a joke). As an example, I actually couldn't trust him to fetch a plate from the kitchen. He was unsuited for either technical or menial work because he needed to be instructed down to the barest minutiae. Nice chap otherwise. He naturally ended up on unemployment benefits and attended fortnightly reporting sessions. He was required to apply for 5 jobs each fortnight which he would be duly rejected from, then report back on his results. I'm convinced that the sheer brutal pointlessness of the process crushed him to the point where he took his own life. Perhaps a basic income would create other perverse incentives, but it is clear to me that the current system is beyond broken.
- mrab 13y ago
  It does not remove "perverse" incentives. Human nature dictates our desires. If we could have everything we ever wanted then there would be no "perverse" incentives. I could have my own amusement park where there would be no lines and I could ride any ride I wanted at any time - not to mention someone would carry me from ride to ride. People will always want more, to achieve more. The "perverse" incentives exist simply because of that fact. If you cannot accept that, you should go live in the woods far away from people and be happy. Life isn't fair, you do what you can to help those less fortunate around you. But, if you think for a second that some sort of "equal" pay will solve our worlds problems you are either ignorant or in denial of our human nature.
hcarvalhoalves 13y ago
> a) no country has ever tried it, really, so there isn't a real-world experience case to look at yet, Brazil is trying, it's called "Bolsa Família". It's an attempt to assure a minimum base income, stop child labor and develop the economy on places far away from the big centers. It works by putting money directly into the hands of poor families and letting they decide how to use it, as opposed to more specific welfare programs. I guess that's as close as you can get to socialism, and there's a lot of controversy surrounding it, since brazilian government is provenly corrupt. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bolsa_Fam%C3%ADlia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bolsa_Fam%C3%ADlia
- polarix 13y ago
  Bolsa Familia is not a basic income. It fails to fix the fundamental problem with current welfare: that it is a disincentive to reemployment. A proper basic income is fucking trivial to implement. Give every member of society X amount of money per T time period. This has nothing to do with socialism. The means of production do NOT change ownership.
  - hcarvalhoalves 13y ago
    > Bolsa Familia is not a basic income. It fails to fix the fundamental problem with current welfare: that it is a disincentive to reemployment. I don't think it's disincentive to reemployment in this case, because being unemployed is not a requirement to receive the money, just being below a certain level of income per family member. Those families can both receive the benefit and work, as the program has the potential to stimulate the local economy and create business opportunities or jobs that didn't existed before. > This has nothing to do with socialism. Redistribution of wealth is a core concept of socialism, and that's what this program effectively achieves. The resources come from heavier taxation from the federal government on the bigger economic centers of Brazil. So I'm not sure what you're trying to say here.
    - consonants 13y ago
      Genuinely curious, at what point does taxation become socialism?
Shivetya 13y ago
Basic income of all the failed attempts at communism, whats the end difference? Everyone can be happy in poverty except for those who run the industries and government? Seen it, fails every time. Basic Income is nothing more than some people hoping to pay some groups enough so they don't steal their stuff. The issue becomes, how much is that pay off going to be? NPR has lots of stories about people living off of SSI/SSID and similar, very close the requirements of BI, guess what, they seem to lose the will to improve their lives. BI will just result in more people not trying to improve themselves
- consonants 13y ago
  If you think the majority of people would just lay their lives to waste because they don't need to doing the bidding of others just to survive, then you are wrong. 99% of able-bodied and able-minded adults would not succumb to idlery. Applying for SSI/SSID is an incredibly dehumanizing process. It takes over a year if you are lucky. You will be denied for any reason they can possibly find. It is guaranteed you will be denied for your first application. You have to prove you are disabled to them (disgusting really). You must have documentation. It goes on and on, but they honestly hope most applicators either die in the interim or just give up on 'improving themselves'. Really, if there is a miniscule amount of people who will abuse the system it does not at all outweigh the good it provides. If your qualm is with said abusers, profile, detect, and prosecute them. Society is not going to collapse.
  - mason240 13y ago
    >If you think the majority of people would just lay their lives to waste because they don't need to doing the bidding of others just to survive, then you are wrong. 99% of able-bodied and able-minded adults would not succumb to idlery. I would like to be the first to welcome you to planet Earth and introduce you human beings, as it is clear you have just arrived here.
    - daenz 13y ago
      The people who make more than enough money to survive (many tech people), what keeps them pushing for more? The drive to prove oneself, the drive to rise above the rest, the drive to obtain what others do not have, the drive to fame. Those forces will always exist, and will always push people.
wslh 13y ago
> a) no country has ever tried it, really, so there isn't a real-world experience case to look at yet. Argentina had implemented a minimum income based on the number of children of a family. There are some studies about it like: http://www.degruyter.com/dg/viewarticle/j$002fbis.2012.7.issue-1$002f1932-0183.1195$002f1932-0183.1195.xml;jsessionid=77104FFFA23465723E1541BE51191BC1 http://www.degruyter.com/dg/viewarticle/j$002fbis.2012.7.iss... This is not a basic salary but it's an important income for poor families.
neltnerb 13y ago
I've been thinking about this proposal for quite a few years, and wrote a blog post explaining how this kind of negative income tax actually reduces distortion of free markets by separating personal risk from income risk. I think the reason it keeps coming up here is because the ability to do this is particularly relevant to entrepreneurs. Unfortunately, it didn't get much interest when I posted it here, but hopefully some folks will find it interesting enough to more seriously consider this. It is not welfare, it is not socialism. It frees people to be rational actors in a capitalist society. http://neltnerb.tumblr.com/post/58818804903/an-entrepreneurs-argument-for-a-living-stipend http://neltnerb.tumblr.com/post/58818804903/an-entrepreneurs...
randomdata 13y ago
> no country has ever tried it, really, so there isn't a real-world experience case to look at yet Canada tried it in the city of Dauphin, Manitoba in the 1970s. While it was not conducted across the entire country, there is at least some data to look at.
danmaz74 13y ago
They idea is interesting, but only if you take healthcare out of the equation. Healthcare expenses are close to nothing when you're in good health, but can get incredibly high - at market rates - when you're not. And no, private insurance is not the answer.
drhowarddrfine 13y ago
An income guarantee removes all incentive to work or perform well.
gabriel34 13y ago
Australia has it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_security_in_Australia#Newstart_Allowance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_security_in_Australia#N... It's conditioned to seeking a job, but nonetheless there is no time limit; plus they offer job placement support, helping you become a productive citizen. Surprises me that in 400+ coments there is no mention to it.
- prawn 13y ago
  That is nothing like an unconditional payment to every adult regardless of their work situation. That's why no one has mentioned it. The concept of a basic income seeks to replace the variety of welfare/support payments a country has. In Australia, that would include Newstart, Austudy, Abstudy, veterans payments, carer's allowance, disability, pensions, etc. You would get the basic income even if you chose to work as well.

jswinghammer 13y ago

Arguments like this assume you can change one thing and society won't change around it. With a basic guarantee many people who are marginally employed would stop working. You'd have two classes of citizens: the workers and those who are effectively parasites off of the workers. I don't like people being poor but society is just not wealthy for poverty to disappear. The said a person living in poverty is probably better off than all the but the richest people at any time in human history. Part of the issue is that we lack an understanding of poverty and what actually causes people to not be in poverty. Considering that in human history poverty has always been the norm it makes sense to look at what causes poverty to not be the norm first before moving onto just "fixing" it.

transfire 13y ago
Here's the problem with your analysis: Just because someone doesn't have a job, doesn't make them a parasite. Here's an example, a granddaughter who lives with and helps take care of her poor grandmother who has Alzheimer's. In her spare time she does sonogram analysis to determine the sex of babies for newly pregnant mothers (Yes, this does exist.) But there is no money in any of this, even though she provides a service to society. Give it some thought and you can realize there are many variations on this. The problem with capital-driven society is that it only values a narrow range of activities that have high rates of money exchange. But there are many things in life worth doing, indeed that need to be done, that do not.
- jknightco 13y ago
  Except your granddaughter isn't providing services to society. She's providing one service to her grandmother, as a family member (which could almost be seen as repaying a debt). The other service she's providing is the equivalent of a hobby: if it was valuable enough to other people to be considered a "service to society," then she could be getting paid for it.
  - eCa 13y ago
    > Except your granddaughter isn't providing services to society. I think it's arguable that she does. By doing what she does she relieves the system from taking care of her grandmother, and thereby making whatever small amount of taxpayer money usable for something else meanwhile taking that economic burden on herself. (Edit: It can of course be seen that whatever wellfare money she gets is the equivalent of her service to grandmother/society, but in that case it's still at worst a zero sum scenario.)
  - RWeaver 13y ago
    It's a service to society if the grandmother would otherwise be taken care of by the government (at enormous expense probably) I can imagine other fulfilling activities like helping less fortunate people get back on their feet, which could provide a giant boost to the economy but aren't really directly profitable (as the poor have no money)

frank_boyd 13y ago

> a) no country has ever tried it Isn't the cash you get from "Social Services" (or whatever it's called) just that, a basic revenue that's guaranteed (as long as you follow some very simple/basic/normal rules)?

transfire 13y ago
Those services have very narrow windows of qualification. This create a lot of top heavy bureaucracy which wastes a great deal of money that could be going directly to people. In addition it create a bifurcation of society, "those parasites" vs everyone else, which is turn create social stigma which only further exacerbates poverty.
- frank_boyd 13y ago
  > "those parasites" vs everyone else, which is turn create social stigma which only further exacerbates poverty. Yep, our cultural stupidity does exist. That's why everybody should get a good education.
  - zentiggr 13y ago
    The issue in this branch of the conversation is the stigmatizing of people who legitimately need services but have actual hardships in maintaining them in the face of beauracratic rigidity and "discrimination by fiat". My mother is legally blind and needs assistance for almost any trip out of her residence, and all paperwork. How many classes/subjects will fix that?
protomyth 13y ago
Not so much. It is not very easy to navigate and can take a while depending on how you end up there. Some of the money is also restricted use[1]. It is very much not guaranteed. 1) ok, in the last year or two some rules changed allowing EBT payments at strip clubs and liquor stores, but not buying a burrito at a gas station then cooking it in the gas station's microwave.
fnordfnordfnord 13y ago

Jacqued 13y ago

A proposal in this direction has been pushed in Switzerland that will be subject to a referendum. The idea : hand out 2500CHF a month (about $2700) to each citizen without anything in return or any condition. Plus around $1100 a month for each child you have to support. Now this has not been confirmed yed (the referendum is to be held in 2015). The goal is to put an end to the degrading controls forced upon people depending on welfare, and to balance the relationship between employers and employees - if you don't HAVE to work, you don't have to put up with abusive employers, low-paying slavery and the like

bluecalm 13y ago
Wow, I didn't think 2500CHF/month is anywhere near possible for a country like Switzerland. I think that balancing relationship (or negotiating position) is the argument for basic income. That being said going from 0 to 2500CHF/month looks very bold.
- mordae 13y ago
  SPECULATION: I'd guess that they already have some kind of social security system that costs them a lot plus they would use progressive taxation to get most of the money back.
salvadors 13y ago
Is there a detailed explanation of the plan available online?
hcarvalhoalves 13y ago
> Now this has not been confirmed yed (the referendum is to be held in 2015). The goal is to put an end to the degrading controls forced upon people depending on welfare, and to balance the relationship between employers and employees - if you don't HAVE to work, you don't have to put up with abusive employers, low-paying slavery and the like That's quite radical, but smart at the same time. It has the potential to weed out bad companies from the economy, which in the long run is beneficial. It shifts a lot of power to the employee though, so there's a risk in the long run it can create a bad workforce instead.

hbbio 13y ago

a) France does just that. Since 1988. It was called for years RMI for "Revenu Minimum d'Insertion" which translates to something like minimum revenue for social integration. Our previous government changed the name to RSA or "Revenu de Solidarité Active", which translates to revenue of active solidarity. They reduced the revenue by a few percent at that occasion. The RSA provides now enough to live (about 500€ for a single person per month) if not in a major city center. It becomes about 1200€ month for a family with two children. Again, just the minimum to live. Also take in account that education and health are free* in France. (*) YMMV, not all MDs, but most schools, etc.

hershel 13y ago
Does this apply to immigrants ? If so why are there such large tensions around the issues of immigrant unemployment ?
- hbbio 13y ago
  Yes, under conditions. Mainly: stable residency, plus legal immigration papers. Legal immigration is pretty low in France (compared to other European countries for instance), but what you mention IS a source of tensions, and the bread of extreme right parties.
kemenaran 13y ago
Except RSA is not available to everyone (many people are not eligible), not guaranteed (it's tied to searching for a job, for instance), and not an actual income that provides you the bare minimum (in some places it doesn't even get you housing).

westicle 13y ago

One thing I like about this policy is it removes all kinds of perverse incentives which currently exist. Some (true) personal examples: a friend of mine is moderately disabled and lives with his elderly parents. He wants (and they desperately want for him) to be able to live independently in a small apartment so that he can develop coping skills which will serve him when they are no longer around. His parents have the means to help him buy an apartment, but doing so would disqualify him from receiving any disability pension (including free health care). A colleague of mine once employed a young woman as a secretary/admin assistant. One day her family advised him that they had arranged a marriage for her and as she was no longer living with them she and her new husband would both qualify for unemployment benefits. If my colleague refused to pay her the equivalent of two unemployment benefits (after tax) she would resign. The next week she did. I used to know a guy who was what I would term chronically unemployable. He had no obvious disability but was seemingly unable to accomplish anything without having his hand held (it was a severe issue, not a joke). As an example, I actually couldn't trust him to fetch a plate from the kitchen. He was unsuited for either technical or menial work because he needed to be instructed down to the barest minutiae. Nice chap otherwise. He naturally ended up on unemployment benefits and attended fortnightly reporting sessions. He was required to apply for 5 jobs each fortnight which he would be duly rejected from, then report back on his results. I'm convinced that the sheer brutal pointlessness of the process crushed him to the point where he took his own life. Perhaps a basic income would create other perverse incentives, but it is clear to me that the current system is beyond broken.

mrab 13y ago
It does not remove "perverse" incentives. Human nature dictates our desires. If we could have everything we ever wanted then there would be no "perverse" incentives. I could have my own amusement park where there would be no lines and I could ride any ride I wanted at any time - not to mention someone would carry me from ride to ride. People will always want more, to achieve more. The "perverse" incentives exist simply because of that fact. If you cannot accept that, you should go live in the woods far away from people and be happy. Life isn't fair, you do what you can to help those less fortunate around you. But, if you think for a second that some sort of "equal" pay will solve our worlds problems you are either ignorant or in denial of our human nature.

hcarvalhoalves 13y ago

> a) no country has ever tried it, really, so there isn't a real-world experience case to look at yet, Brazil is trying, it's called "Bolsa Família". It's an attempt to assure a minimum base income, stop child labor and develop the economy on places far away from the big centers. It works by putting money directly into the hands of poor families and letting they decide how to use it, as opposed to more specific welfare programs. I guess that's as close as you can get to socialism, and there's a lot of controversy surrounding it, since brazilian government is provenly corrupt. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bolsa_Fam%C3%ADlia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bolsa_Fam%C3%ADlia

polarix 13y ago
Bolsa Familia is not a basic income. It fails to fix the fundamental problem with current welfare: that it is a disincentive to reemployment. A proper basic income is fucking trivial to implement. Give every member of society X amount of money per T time period. This has nothing to do with socialism. The means of production do NOT change ownership.
- hcarvalhoalves 13y ago
  > Bolsa Familia is not a basic income. It fails to fix the fundamental problem with current welfare: that it is a disincentive to reemployment. I don't think it's disincentive to reemployment in this case, because being unemployed is not a requirement to receive the money, just being below a certain level of income per family member. Those families can both receive the benefit and work, as the program has the potential to stimulate the local economy and create business opportunities or jobs that didn't existed before. > This has nothing to do with socialism. Redistribution of wealth is a core concept of socialism, and that's what this program effectively achieves. The resources come from heavier taxation from the federal government on the bigger economic centers of Brazil. So I'm not sure what you're trying to say here.
  - consonants 13y ago
    Genuinely curious, at what point does taxation become socialism?

Shivetya 13y ago

Basic income of all the failed attempts at communism, whats the end difference? Everyone can be happy in poverty except for those who run the industries and government? Seen it, fails every time. Basic Income is nothing more than some people hoping to pay some groups enough so they don't steal their stuff. The issue becomes, how much is that pay off going to be? NPR has lots of stories about people living off of SSI/SSID and similar, very close the requirements of BI, guess what, they seem to lose the will to improve their lives. BI will just result in more people not trying to improve themselves

consonants 13y ago
If you think the majority of people would just lay their lives to waste because they don't need to doing the bidding of others just to survive, then you are wrong. 99% of able-bodied and able-minded adults would not succumb to idlery. Applying for SSI/SSID is an incredibly dehumanizing process. It takes over a year if you are lucky. You will be denied for any reason they can possibly find. It is guaranteed you will be denied for your first application. You have to prove you are disabled to them (disgusting really). You must have documentation. It goes on and on, but they honestly hope most applicators either die in the interim or just give up on 'improving themselves'. Really, if there is a miniscule amount of people who will abuse the system it does not at all outweigh the good it provides. If your qualm is with said abusers, profile, detect, and prosecute them. Society is not going to collapse.
- mason240 13y ago
  >If you think the majority of people would just lay their lives to waste because they don't need to doing the bidding of others just to survive, then you are wrong. 99% of able-bodied and able-minded adults would not succumb to idlery. I would like to be the first to welcome you to planet Earth and introduce you human beings, as it is clear you have just arrived here.
  - daenz 13y ago
    The people who make more than enough money to survive (many tech people), what keeps them pushing for more? The drive to prove oneself, the drive to rise above the rest, the drive to obtain what others do not have, the drive to fame. Those forces will always exist, and will always push people.

wslh 13y ago

> a) no country has ever tried it, really, so there isn't a real-world experience case to look at yet. Argentina had implemented a minimum income based on the number of children of a family. There are some studies about it like: http://www.degruyter.com/dg/viewarticle/j$002fbis.2012.7.issue-1$002f1932-0183.1195$002f1932-0183.1195.xml;jsessionid=77104FFFA23465723E1541BE51191BC1 http://www.degruyter.com/dg/viewarticle/j$002fbis.2012.7.iss... This is not a basic salary but it's an important income for poor families.

neltnerb 13y ago

I've been thinking about this proposal for quite a few years, and wrote a blog post explaining how this kind of negative income tax actually reduces distortion of free markets by separating personal risk from income risk. I think the reason it keeps coming up here is because the ability to do this is particularly relevant to entrepreneurs. Unfortunately, it didn't get much interest when I posted it here, but hopefully some folks will find it interesting enough to more seriously consider this. It is not welfare, it is not socialism. It frees people to be rational actors in a capitalist society. http://neltnerb.tumblr.com/post/58818804903/an-entrepreneurs-argument-for-a-living-stipend http://neltnerb.tumblr.com/post/58818804903/an-entrepreneurs...

randomdata 13y ago

> no country has ever tried it, really, so there isn't a real-world experience case to look at yet Canada tried it in the city of Dauphin, Manitoba in the 1970s. While it was not conducted across the entire country, there is at least some data to look at.

danmaz74 13y ago

They idea is interesting, but only if you take healthcare out of the equation. Healthcare expenses are close to nothing when you're in good health, but can get incredibly high - at market rates - when you're not. And no, private insurance is not the answer.

drhowarddrfine 13y ago

An income guarantee removes all incentive to work or perform well.

gabriel34 13y ago

Australia has it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_security_in_Australia#Newstart_Allowance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_security_in_Australia#N... It's conditioned to seeking a job, but nonetheless there is no time limit; plus they offer job placement support, helping you become a productive citizen. Surprises me that in 400+ coments there is no mention to it.

prawn 13y ago
That is nothing like an unconditional payment to every adult regardless of their work situation. That's why no one has mentioned it. The concept of a basic income seeks to replace the variety of welfare/support payments a country has. In Australia, that would include Newstart, Austudy, Abstudy, veterans payments, carer's allowance, disability, pensions, etc. You would get the basic income even if you chose to work as well.