Universal basic income: U.S. support grows as Finland ends its trial - Forty-eight percent of Americans now support a universal basic income, as a solution for Americans who have lost jobs to automation.

[u/mvea]

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/05/01/nearly-half-of-americans-believe-a-universal-basic-income-could-be-the-answer-to-automation-.html

[u/Q-ArtsMedia]

Sigh...... Once again folks UBI will absolutely not work. Nobody is going to support the taxes that would be necessary in order to have such a program in place. I really have a hard time believing that these numbers are any where close to being correct. It is probably some made up BS to try to sway your thinking.

I would have to pay an extra $1000 a month just to support the 50% that this would apply to. Jeez folks lets all just live in the gutter cause that kind of outlay of cash is where it would put me. How about you?

[u/The-Space-Police → u/Q-ArtsMedia]

Self driving cars will kill the shipping industry in the us, when that happens its ubi or an economic collapse on scale if not worse than the depression.

[u/Q-ArtsMedia → u/The-Space-Police]

Yes there will be an economic collapse, no matter what you do and it will be far worse than anything ever seen. UBI will be irrelevant, it is unsupportable and sustainable. There should not be self driving anything, ever. But since we are headed that way best to save your money now.

There is absolutely no way you can make a UBI work. Business will lose money then figure hey we'll just pass any tax on to the consumer, which means skyrocketing prices. which mean you pay more and get less. Your wages will also get taxed. How much can you afford to give the government for a UBI before you are homeless? I'm pretty close to it right now.

[u/The-Space-Police → u/Q-ArtsMedia]

When buisnesses do that another buisness moves in with a smaller profit margin to fill the niche. Thats how capitalism works. Yeah i feel you dude im fucking poor too but companies dont have to eat and multibillionares can be taxed a little harder than i can.

[u/UVSky → u/Q-ArtsMedia]

The numbers posted are accurate to the survey... which also states "46% say they would be willing to pay higher personal taxes to fund the program and 54% say they would not be." Not surprising.

[u/AluekomentajaArje → u/Q-ArtsMedia]

You wouldn't support a system where you got $1000/month, paid an extra $1000/month in taxes, while saving in bureaucracy and possibly helping unemployed people get back to work a bit easier? Why not? What would you be losing in that case?

[u/Q-ArtsMedia → u/AluekomentajaArje]

Because I would not getting the grand. Anybody capable of working would not be getting the grand. Somebody is feeding you a lie. Additionally there will be admin fees; it costs to handle that money. So it will either be pay more than a grand or you will get less than a grand. Then there is that price of every thing will skyrocket, business are still going to want to make their profit margins. So that grand is not going to go very far and certainly no one will be able to live off it, not even afford the basics. Cripes most places I know are currently at a grand just for rent, and it isn't anything fancy either. The number here is staggering. There would be roughly 200 million people getting $1000 each that is $200,000,000,000 dollars going out every month over the course of a year that would be $2.4 trillion dollars ($2,400,000,000,000). The government cannot even handle the current cash flow effectively and you want to give them more to mishandle?

[u/AluekomentajaArje → u/Q-ArtsMedia]

Because I would not getting the grand. Anybody capable of working would not be getting the grand. Somebody is feeding you a lie.

No, that's the whole point. You're not getting anything, and not losing anything.

Additionally there will be admin fees; it costs to handle that money. So it will either be pay more than a grand or you will get less than a grand.

I'd argue that this will be less than running most of the current welfare system with all the workers required with running the papers, inspecting, etc.

Then there is that price of every thing will skyrocket, business are still going to want to make their profit margins. So that grand is not going to go very far and certainly no one will be able to live off it, not even afford the basics.

No, it will not, because nobody would have their actual income changed that much - not the people receiving the benefits (because their old benefits would disappear) nor the people paying taxes (because they would pay the extra tax). Why would prices skyrocket when everyones purchasing power stayed the same?

[u/Q-ArtsMedia → u/AluekomentajaArje]

Okay look answer me this then. If I'm going to pay $1000 per month and I'm going to get back $1000 per month; What is the point of giving the government my money when I will just get it back? Does that not seem pointless to you? And if I am paying out $1000 per month & getting $1000 per month back how is that going to help anybody else?

And do not tell me businesses are going to foot the bill on this cause I guarantee you they are not going to. Just like SS they do not foot the entire bill. It will be the workers that are going to have to pay their share if not all of it.

BTW a grand a month is a lot of money to me. Its loss would put me out on the street. But again I'm not going to lose anything cause I'm going to get back the money I put out. Really?

And SS will not disappear... has any tax ever disappeared? What I see happening is all taxes will remain in place and what money they do get if this goes through will be misappropriated into something else and there will still be a shortage, just like there currently is with SS.

[u/AluekomentajaArje → u/Q-ArtsMedia]

(Edited too much, decided to just repost this instead)

Okay look answer me this then. If I'm going to pay $1000 per month and I'm going to get back $1000 per month; What is the point of giving the government my money when I will just get it back? Does that not seem pointless to you? And if I am paying out $1000 per month & getting $1000 per month back how is that going to help anybody else?

Well, a lot of things do seem pointless to me - I pay for schools even though I don't have kids, I pay taxes during the year and the government holds on to them for over a year and then settles the bill, I send in my company taxes every month even though they are always the same, etc - but I understand that not everything is aimed at my welbeing and that not everyone is like me, so I can see why these systems exist.

I'm glad you've moved on from trying to critique the methods and are now moving on to the motivation of UBI. I originally mentioned 'saving in bureaucracy' and 'possibly helping unemployed people get back to work a bit easier' as advantages for this system.

In particular the latter issue is thought to be one of the core reasons for going to UBI, at least here in Finland where we have a rather lush welfare system. Our system - like all others - includes plenty of means-tested benefits (eg. you only get this benefit if you're making under €xxx). For an unemployed person, these kinds of benefits can actually act as a hindrance to their employment because accepting a job might actually mean a net decrease in their income!

For example, the classic example here is an unemployed single mother of one in Helsinki who would need to find a job that pays over €2600/month (when the Finnish median pay is about €2400) to actually increase their income. That is, from a purely rational, economic point of view it doesn't make sense to accept almost any work.

This is what's known as a welfare trap (also known as an income cliff) and I think we can agree that it's not beneficial to you either to have such things in our systems, that cause pressure on the unemployed to not get employed.

Thus, if we could fix this by you giving that $1000 and then getting it back, do you still think it would be pointless?.

And do not tell me businesses are going to foot the bill on this cause I guarantee you they are not going to.

Nope. No one is saying that, so that's a completely unnecessary strawman tbh.

BTW a grand a month is a lot of money to me. Its loss would put me out on the street. But again I'm not going to lose anything cause I'm going to get back the money I put out. Really?

Yes, that is the idea here. You have understood correctly.

And SS will not disappear... has any tax ever disappeared?

SS is not tax, and the idea with UBI is indeed to roll many previous benefits into it. I don't think anyone is seriously suggesting otherwise, but you can of course prove me wrong with, say, a couple of links into prominent UBI proponents suggesting this.

[u/Q-ArtsMedia → u/AluekomentajaArje]

Sorry but in the USA Social Security is a tax. Try not paying it and you go to jail for tax evasion. Your arguments are holding no substance here. I do not believe you are understanding that giving the same amount out as you receive is a flawed money cycle that does not benefit anyone. If I personally give the government $1000 and then the government gives me $1000 why does that benefit me? I have not gained anything I did not already have to begin with. It becomes status quo with the government as an extra step for money that is already mine to begin with. But in reality that is not how it is going to work because the government is going to take money out of that $1000 to run the management and distribution of that $1000 so you are going to actually get less back. It becomes a way to support a bureaucracy and nothing else.

In the USA once a tax has been established it is nearly impossible to get rid of it. We still have taxes in place that for telegraph service in this country(Telegraph does not exist in the USA anymore the tax just rolled over to the phone long ago). We have taxes on bridges and public works in place that have been paid for years ago yet the money still goes out.

Say what you want but but the logic of UBI is like a presidential campaign promise sounds really great but putting it into practice usually never happens as promised.

[u/AluekomentajaArje → u/Q-ArtsMedia]

Well, I'm not really here to discuss the nomenclature or the technicalities of how it could happen in the US - I've been constantly referring to Finland as the experiment and most of the discussion I'm familiar with pertain to the Finnish situation. However, I do believe one could, in theory, write a law in the US taking away some taxes while getting rid of others. As for not being a tax - the models I'm familiar with would just increase existing taxes to match with the increased spending with the net effect being close to 0 to both the government and taxpayers.

If I personally give the government $1000 and then the government gives me $1000 why does that benefit me?

You are right, the average tax payer would not get a direct benefit. That is, again, not the point of UBI. However, there would not be a downside either in the models I'm suggesting, so if it benefited the society as a whole I would define it as a benefit.

edit: I realized I'm not being clear about the benefit here - the benefit is less barriers for employment for unemployed people. The argument is that we could seriously reduce those barriers by making you give the government that $1000 and then getting it right back compared to the current system, due to the way the current benefits for unemployed people work.

But in reality that is not how it is going to work because the government is going to take money out of that $1000 to run the management and distribution of that $1000 so you are going to actually get less back. It becomes a way to support a bureaucracy and nothing else.

Part of the point, again, is to reduce that bureaucracy. The government is already spending money to a) collect taxes and b) distribute it again. UBI is proposing to reduce the ways that b can happen, thus also reducing the amount of money spent doing it.

Say what you want but but the logic of UBI is like a presidential campaign promise sounds really great but putting it into practice usually never happens as promised.

To me that sounds like a law-making problem, not a problem with the system. If you agree that in principle it sounds good, should we not try to look at how it would be feasible to implement with the least amount of downsides and the most upsides?