Universal Minimum Income
- Thread starter Traditio
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nikolai_42
Well-known member
I think the idea is to replace welfare, unemployment etc... and just give the cash out in lieu of those programs.
I think, don't worry about it, because I think this is a tangent. I don't want to derail the thread. I'm not necessarily averse to leaving it as a matter for side negotiation between an employer and employee, but I also see a potential good reason for the government to be involved.
The bolded is what I actually intended to say.
Taxes. Are you really telling me that there's not enough money to go around to provide for everyone's basic needs?
nikolai_42
Well-known member
Food will then go up in price very quickly. Cost of currently "cheaper" items will increase disproportionately with everything else since everyone knows the man on the street has minimum $24,000 to spend.
$24,000 "tied to inflation."
nikolai_42
Well-known member
I still think it's going to mess with prices if business knows that everyone - without exception - is going to have a certain amount in their pockets. But then again, it may also increase alcoholism rates...
Yes, there is not enough money to go around. Your number is $24,000 per person. For the sake of argument, lets say there are 30 million kids leaving us with 300 million adults. 24,000 * 300,000,000 = 7,200,000,000,000. That's 7.2 trillion dollars per year to fund this program. Currently, the IRS brings in about 3.7 trillion and that is not enough to pay for everything as it is. So where do you propose to get this extra money since nobody will be paying taxes on it?
1. Increased taxes on persons who make more than $24,000 a year, especially on those persons who make more than $250,000 annually and most especially on those persons who make more than $1 million annually. I'm thinking 90% or more in taxes on all income over $1 million should just about do it.
Second look at 1: it looks like a collosal figure, but what you have to take into account is the number of people who already make $24,000 or more.
2. The actual number of adults in the US, based on a quick google check I did, is closer to 250,000,000 or so. Adults make up roughly 75% of the population.
3. The GDP is over 16 trillion. Even if we double the number you gave (to account for things like single payer health insurance, etc.), we only arrive to 14.4 trillion. By my reckoning, that leaves over 2 trillion to spare.
4. You are failing, I think, to take into account decreased spending in terms of things like military pay (each soldier could be payed $24,000 less, since he'd already be being paid that elsewhere), the abolition of social security and welfare programs, greater government efficiency, etc.
Hey man... when people are proposing free money why settle for less?
Is this a plea for universal welfare?
I'm not from your country so I can only respond in general.
Interesting discussion starter but not very practical.
The fundamental problem is that this payment does not discriminate.
To me it is one of the characteristics of lefties that they don't discriminate when they should. They equate discrimination with what is properly called unfair discrimination.
I am fairly sure that there will be many people who will need a great deal more than this to survive. People with significant disabilities, people who act as carers of others, people who have children, etc.
But also there will be many people earning multiples of this amount for whom the extra money from the government is chicken feed. That extra money is going to be wasted because it will be nothing more than someone's pocket money and perhaps just be put down the drain instead of being used to relieve real need and hardship. To hand out this money indiscriminately is the exact opposite of government. It is the abnegation of government. It is washing the government's hands of its responsibilities to care for the poor of its citizens as well to promote and encourage the industry of its able citizens.
I would not want to live in such a country because I would like to have some reassurance that the government cared for its citizens. And I just wonder if you yourself don't care and would rather find a simple lazy solution to life's problems even if it meant leaving everyone to the dogs.
Communism is a form of socialism. Socialism is trying to get an equal outcome for everybody via government. It is what you support. The Bible calls it tyranny for the government to take what is yours (at only 10%) and give to somebody else.
Government exists to wield the sword of justice and to regulate the infrastructure. That is it. And by regulate, I mean take bids from private companies to build the bridge, which is usually what happens.
Right. Straight to communism. That is the difference between the Nazis and Bolsheviks. The Nazis had paperwork to try and handle the stealing in an orderly fashion. The commies just take everything, they simplify it. Everyone gets the same. You are pathetic. And you are still going to hell. I know this by what you confess.
Good idea. Just like the great depression. A wonderful time in history.
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Which has already been tried throughout history and it always ends the same, with uncontrolled poverty and violence. Go move to a communist country. You are lazy.
1). Why would anyone try to earn a million or more when they can only keep 100k$? Your taxes remove incentive.
2). I strongly suggest that you look very closely at what Gross Domestic Product is. It is not a liquid asset or even a real monetary asset that anybody has access to.
3). The top earners in the country including business don't make enough money to pay 7.2 trillion in taxes and have anything left.
It is a terrible idea.
oatmeal
Well-known member
I saw a while back, on Facebook, an article about an idea which is apparently fairly popular both among left-wingers and libertarians worldwide (Republicans probably aren't a big fan, but hey): a universal minimum income.
Basically, here's the idea: have the government pay everyone enough money so that they start off at an above-poverty income level.
I can't express just how much I love this idea, and just how much this would pretty much solve all kinds of social problems and political debates.
Pay everyone $24,000 of untaxable, no strings attached income and automatically adjust that amount every year based on inflation.
Abolish social security.
Abolish federal and state entitlements (except, perhaps, as an addition to the universal minimum income).
Abolish welfare.
Abolish foodstamps.
Abolish minimum wage laws.
You get the idea.
Combine this with a single payer health-care system, tuition free universities and extremely tight border controls? I can't even express in words just how supremely epic that would be.
All of a sudden, the need for unions just ends. There's no need for unions, for minimum wages or for all sorts of other government regulation about employment. All of a sudden, the employee doesn't need his employer. They can negotiate on a perfectly level playing field.
"You want me to work for you? Ok. Then treat me like a person, not like a number. Oh. You don't want to do that? That's fine. I don't need your job anyway."
Not to mention it would simplify things a lot government wise. No need for a dozen different government agencies.
Here, people will complain about the following:
1. It would decrease productivity and take away peoples' incentives to do meaningless, inhuman work.
2. It would be unfair because pay would no longer correspond to merit.
I answer as follows:
A. 1. is going to happen with technological increases anyway.
B. 1. If the job is meaningless and inhuman, then maybe it's not worth doing in the first place.
C. 1. There's only so many jobs anyway. What's the unemployment rate again?
D. 2. Money shouldn't be a standard of personal worth. It should be a mean of acquiring the necessities of a dignified and properly human life.
E. 2. It's not even true. I'm talking about a universal minimum income. Note the key word: "minimum."
Of course, the government would have to tax everyone about $48,000 to pay for the bureaucracy that doles out that money.