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>In order to be useful the basic income has to be a substantial fraction of the median income Woah thats a pretty crazy assumption - basic income only needs to

>In order to be useful the basic income has to be a substantial fraction of the median income Woah thats a pretty crazy assumption - basic income only needs to provide enough income for basic needs to be useful - are you trying to say that the median salary in the US is the bare minimum to meet necessities? Median income is the amount which divides the income distribution into two equal groups, half having income above that amount[1] currently the median household income is estimated to be $51,371 - if you think that this is the MINIMUM amount of basic income for the program to be useful then its clear you have a core misunderstanding of basic income at its core. >What I mean is that say $2000 for 0 hours worked in a month is very nice, and $2020 for 1 hour worked is at least in percentages, infinitely less desirable. You say that people are not entirely rational at the beginning of your comment, yet you are now assuming they are - many people enjoy work, do you think PG only does ycombinator purely for the money? warren buffet? does tom cruise still act only for the paychecks? Also, you are missing another key point of my last comment, and that is that the price of labor will rise. I agree that working for 20 extra dollars isnt going to seem as worth it when you already have enough to serve your needs - that is the whole point. wages will rise, people will be choosier about what work they are willing to do, and the less desirable jobs will have to pay more - that is how simple supply and demand work >EDIT: I forgot to touch on the black market. If a person wants to accumulate income it might be better to do so on the black market. That allows a person to avoid high taxes (basic income has to come from somewhere, that somewhere is always proposed to be higher taxes). That makes the black market (or working "under the table") attractive. The shadow economy of Europe is already by one estimate 17% of the total economy. Basic income would further encourage such things: First, you are somehow overlooking that the incentive to work under the table is already there, yet the vast majority of workers do not get paid cash under the table - it is in both the employer and employees interest to subvert the tax system for wages already yet this isnt happening - what makes you believe that this would so dramatically change that MOST of the labor market chooses this option? This is to ignore that fact that there are regulatory bodies that actually enforce this, and will go to job centers to make sure employees are being payed legally - this happens all the time and is a common method is trying to find illegal aliens (I have years of experience cooking in restaurants where i have seen this first hand many times) I appreciate the discussion thanks [1]http://web.archive.org/web/20060922200944/http://www.business.gov/topics/research_resources/market_research/census_bureau_faq.html http://web.archive.org/web/20060922200944/http://www.busines... [2]http://www.census.gov/prod/2013pubs/acsbr12-02.pdf http://www.census.gov/prod/2013pubs/acsbr12-02.pdf

msandford 12y ago
Thanks for being civil about this. When I stated "substantial fraction" I guess what I mean is that it's at least 20% or 40% or something. A basic income of 5% of median personal or household income is going to be little more than a sick joke. Note I didn't say "exactly the same as" but rather "a substantial fraction" To compare people who make millions of dollars a year to people who are eking out subsistence wages is a mistake I think. These people tend to be highly motivated and thus for them it's often not strictly about the money anyhow, but the money sure is nice as it affords them the ability to work on the thing they're passionate about. When you're making $9/hr at mcdonalds I suspect that passion has less to do with it and a need to eat and have shelter is a bigger factor. The higher taxes go, the more incentive there is to work under the table. I don't know if the black market in the US is bigger than in Europe, but I can tell you that in the US taxes are lower and so there's less incentive. I agree that policing can do a fair amount, but what if you push people into entirely invisible jobs? It doesn't have to change MOST of the labor market, but if right now the black market is 10% of GDP and the taxes rise enough to push it to 15% or 20% then you're growing crime. I don't think that's a good outcome. Now a great question to ask is which is worse? Would it be worse to raise crime and have a basic income? I don't know. Trying to think about the unintended consequences of policies is really hard, so few do it. I think that's part of the reason our laws tend to be so full of obvious loopholes.

msandford 12y ago

Thanks for being civil about this. When I stated "substantial fraction" I guess what I mean is that it's at least 20% or 40% or something. A basic income of 5% of median personal or household income is going to be little more than a sick joke. Note I didn't say "exactly the same as" but rather "a substantial fraction" To compare people who make millions of dollars a year to people who are eking out subsistence wages is a mistake I think. These people tend to be highly motivated and thus for them it's often not strictly about the money anyhow, but the money sure is nice as it affords them the ability to work on the thing they're passionate about. When you're making $9/hr at mcdonalds I suspect that passion has less to do with it and a need to eat and have shelter is a bigger factor. The higher taxes go, the more incentive there is to work under the table. I don't know if the black market in the US is bigger than in Europe, but I can tell you that in the US taxes are lower and so there's less incentive. I agree that policing can do a fair amount, but what if you push people into entirely invisible jobs? It doesn't have to change MOST of the labor market, but if right now the black market is 10% of GDP and the taxes rise enough to push it to 15% or 20% then you're growing crime. I don't think that's a good outcome. Now a great question to ask is which is worse? Would it be worse to raise crime and have a basic income? I don't know. Trying to think about the unintended consequences of policies is really hard, so few do it. I think that's part of the reason our laws tend to be so full of obvious loopholes.