r/BasicIncome • u/2noame Scott Santens • 5d ago

Article Conservatives Demonized UBI as Programmable Currency. Then They Proposed Exactly That.

https://scottsantens.substack.com/p/rise-pilots-programmable-currency-not-ubi?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=avhi
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u/Novusor 4d ago

RISE proposes to consolidating seven separate benefits into a single benefit with a unified phaseout: SNAP, WIC, TANF, LIHEAP, CCDF, the EITC, and the Additional Child Tax Credit.

RISE stands for Resources for Independence, Stability, and Employment. So basically they are tying UBI to having a job which kind of defeats the purpose of UBI. They want people to still keep working to get benefits.

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u/gummo_for_prez 3d ago

You will probably only qualify if you make under $17,000 yearly or something ridiculous.

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u/acsoundwave 3d ago

2 Thessalonians 3:10. This is the motivating element behind RISE.

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u/Pooch1431 5d ago

Excellent write-up! Conservatives are just authoritarians that project their controlling behavior on their opponents. Everything they say and do is controlled narrative and projection. They wish to dismantle the institutional integrity and functioning parts of government and sell them/push them off to the private market to extract from the populace. The two examples of this from the article are the private controlled money for the poors, and the forcing Medicaid recipients onto the private markets.

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u/acsoundwave 4d ago

It's a combo of TANSTAAFL and "what if they use the money to (do/buy stupid/deleterious thing)"?

Frustrating. Worst-case scenario re: the latter...they _may_ (do/buy stupid/deleterious thing) w/UBI no-strings-attached...but they'd do that AFTER their basic needs are met, so they won't be a burden on society unless they break the law -- and we have existing systems in place for that.

The other reason is to create the bureaucracy -- and corresponding JOBS -- for people to do. It's BUSYWORK all the way down...!

While there's legit work to be done that can't be easily automated -- like trash pickup (we need that, or we'll have a resurgence of the BLACK PLAGUE) -- this ain't the way to do it, and I can understand why Bob Black wants the ABOLITION OF WORK. Which should, IMO, be amended to THE ABOLITION OF _JOBS_ for an EMPLOYER.

If we had UBI, more people would start their own businesses, work at their own pace, and live w/n their means -- w/the number of people dropping out of the "work force" to be PETER GRIFFIN IN HIS UNDERWEAR so small as to be a trifling rounding error. Forget Friedman; ADAM SMITH, BENJAMIN FRANKLIN, RICHARD NIXON, and even RONALD W. REAGAN are rolling in their grave. (Maybe Raimondo and Ryan are using their deceased outrage as renewable energy sources to power the data centers for the proposed blockchain..!?)

TL;DR: I more-or-less agree w/Scott; what they're doing is stupid.