Finland considering a universal basic income.

That was the political agreement which enabled the whole farm bill (reautherized every two years). The big city folk didn't give a shit about farmers, farmers didn't give a shit about cities. So an alliance was made, city folk would get subsidized food for the needy and rural folk would get their endless welfare for being bloodsucking gobshites. You fucking welfare queens.

Killing them would be the best thing that this country could do.

I have never seen Dayton do that in any way, in any shape, or in any form.

But wait, if you would stop billionaires from buying multiple homes to "rent" to people, by out bidding poor people, then those same homes would be affordable to the poor and the poor wouldn't have to rent.

Your economics is utter garbage.

It's an interesting idea. But there are legitimate questions about skewed incentives (will young people, for example, not bother to work?) and I'm also wary of it being used as a trojan horse to eliminate the social state.

The limited trial that the Finns plan seems a sensible first step.

well this would presume that there are enough people currently not consuming those items which this figure would be to stimulate a significant increase in demand.

That in turn presumes a fairly large, if not quite large, population of starving and homeless people which conservatives and most libertarians typically denies exist.

Conversely, if the assertion that there are not that many, as a percentage of the whole, people in this country subsisting at such a low-to-no income, then the impact of such a small group should not radically affect the supply situation.

There are. If 20% of people aren't working at any given time (reasonable, given the figures I quoted above), then the basic income would provide millions of people with the means for very significant consumption. No matter how you look at it, you can't expect that won't affect demand. In fact, it would probably be pointless to do it if it didn't increase demand. Why provide someone with a living income if you don't expect they will actually consume with it?

Even if you believe that they'll just buy what others were buying for them, that still leaves the others with more spending money.

No, it doesn't. You can have no income and survive quite well if you are dependent on someone else. Roughly 20% of working age people aren't working, and yet nowhere remotely near 20% of working age people are starving or homeless.

There are many. And, if such a law were in place, there would be many more as many people, particularly at the lower end of the scale, would find it more advantageous to collect the benefit than to work.

Yes, the idea IS interesting.
But I think the state, even with removing most other welfare programmes, would soon overextend itself financially. I don't think they could generate enough taxes to make such a thing really work for every citizen.

It would cost well over a trillion dollars to provide a base income of $10,000 per person in the US, so yeah, financially not viable. To work, it would have to apply to just some people. I would favor it as a replacement for other social welfare programs, but not as something universal to all working age people.

What is the cost of the programs that it would replace, I wonder?

It would probably have to replace several hundred programs. food stamps, aid to families with dependent children, various housing assistance programs

to name just a few.

A huge question would be whether a guaranteed income was dependent upon how many children were in a household. In real life, income doesn't change just because you have more children.

Uh, pretty sure that the plan calls for a guaranteed basic income for every individual, Dayton. If you're single, you get your salary. If you are married, you both get a salary. If you have a whole Duggarload of kids, each of them would get a salary as well, although I imagine salaries would be on an age based scale of some sort.

No, I think Dayton's correct. It would be for adults.

This idea has been around forever. I'm all for helping people out but I'm strongly against an unconditional universal income. Laziness aside, it'll just start an Inflation spiral. No one will work low income Jobs any more, wages go up, so do prices... a universal income would have to come with Price freezes. Which can't, of course, be good for the economy. As in, it dies. And who's gonna pay then?

Not a good idea. No matter how much I'd like to live la vida loca myself.

That's actually pretty hard to figure out. I wonder if anybody actually knows the answer to that.

If you only gave it to adults, not kids, and set it at $700 a person per month, we would likely spend less money assuming all social programs are rolled up including social security.

Are you talking about all adults? Because many people on assistance are getting more than $700 a month. If you take the total cost of all social welfare programs, divide that by the number of adults, and hand it out on that basis, you will end up taking away from the people who actually need it, handing the money instead to people who don't.

True.

@Paladin, I think your reasoning is sound, but you are skipping over two important points.

This is a basic income that covers bare necessities. It's only new buying power if the poorest were previously lacking barest necessities, i. e. dying. But they weren't, much less in a country with strong social services such as Finland. This just simplifies and evens out a system that is already in place.

Secondly, prices are currently kept low on most bare necessities by limiting production or even destroying the finished product. Instead of buying off producers with tax money, this could distribute it to consumers. Products get bought as before, but for consumption rather than destruction.

Understood. If there's a 1:1 exchange between people collecting welfare benefits and people who receive basic income, there wouldn't be much/any difference.

But lots of people would/could be eligible for basic income, even if they are not currently welfare recipients. If only one half of a married couple works, for instance, they may be well above the poverty/welfare eligibility line, but the non-working partner could now bring a considerable increase in household by receiving the basic income. If you found out you were eligible for, say, $10,000/year, wouldn't you take it? I would.

It may be that this will make very little difference to the Finns (though I doubt it). But that doesn't necessarily mean it will transplant to other cultures.

Yes, they could; that doesn't mean they will. Assuming they did, this might make some small difference for things like eggs and such. But for housing--which is usually the biggest living expense--or any other good whose overproduction is not subsidized by the government, this will not apply.

I wonder if it would drive down wages by roughly the same amount, at least for middle-income people. If everyone gets $10,000 guaranteed, the typical applicant pool would start to include people willing to work for $10,000 less than they would otherwise, because (a) they wouldn't need as much as they used to, and (b) lowering their asking price would give them a competitive advantage.

Also, would there be an upper income cap? I mean, Trump probably spends 10K on lunch.

Queen Communist here criticizes those who complain about "poor people are getting Free Stuff," yet I don't see her advertising her editing & ghostwriting services ( ) for free. Doesn't everyone *deserve* to be published, regardless of ability & talent? Seems garamet doesn't like capitalism, except when it fattens her own wallet.

Shut up Wombat.

Yes, exactly. Which is why only those without a steady income from work could be considered to gain raw purchasing power.

True, but again, housing is not something any relevant percentage of these people did without before.

The point isnt to raise wages but to support people unable to find work.

How are you supossed to find a job if there are only jobs for 50% of the adults?

http://www.cartercenter.org/health/guinea_worm/index.html

Who here doesn't like capitalism?

Capitalism on the one hand, and a social safety net and robust public investment in shared priorities on the other, are not incompatible.

*Raises hand*
I mean, its never exactly been my friend, or nothing.


Yeah, don't worry, I know we're trapped in it, and there's no escape, and no hope, and it's going to kill each and every one of us in due course, so don't sweat me becoming a commie revolutionary, or nothin.

Have you ever had a paying job?