
It Is Time For Basic Income - mchusma
http://hawkins.ventures/post/80304090196/it-is-time-for-basic-income
======
kalvin
I think if you could see close-up how these systems work now, you'd be
convinced that it's completely not worth the cost in practice to try and
figure out who "deserves" each of the many, many special
benefits/allowances/exemptions available (plus it's incredibly difficult for
potential recipients to figure out what they're eligible for, plus it imposes
those costs on the people who aren't eligible, but end up having to jump
through all the same hoops.)

This is just my experience after working for ~1000 hours on healthcare.gov
w/other YC alumni (relatively nonideological-liberal-or-libertarian engineer
bias), but I think it's become increasingly clear to all of us that the
implementation of well-meaning policies intended to separate the deserving
from the undeserving ends up adding an incredible amount of complexity and
overhead, along with unintentional side effects, edge cases, and bad
incentives.

(This isn't why healthcare.gov had major issues, it's just another problem.)

That said, there's no way politically a basic income is going to fly anytime
soon. So since this is HN... is there any way to get to an MVP without having
a sovereign state to experiment with? Or is this solely in the realm of public
policy?

~~~
yummyfajitas
_...it 's become increasingly clear to all of us that the implementation of
well-meaning policies intended to separate the deserving from the undeserving
ends up adding an incredible amount of complexity and overhead,..._

Unless the overhead is truly massive (read: 5x more than the actual benefits),
it doesn't matter. It's still vastly cheaper to pay only a small set of
deserving people than to pay everyone.

Consider a BI paying 300M people $20k. Cost is $6 trillion.

Consider a targeted program paying 50M people $20k, no overhead. Cost is $1
trillion.

You need an overhead cost of 500% of benefits for a basic income to be cost
competitive.

Can any BI proponents provide even a back of the envelope calculation
suggesting how BI could possibly be competitive?

~~~
davmre
Naturally you have to "raise taxes" (in a nominal sense) at the same time you
add a basic income, so that the added income is cancelled out for middle-class
and wealthy people, and the net amount of redistribution stays more or less
constant.

It's still a big win, since you've taken all of the various benefits agencies
and collapsed their roles into that of the IRS or equivalent tax agency, which
has to exist anyway to fund other government functions.

~~~
freefrancisco
If it's really more efficient than the current system, it should be fundable
from the existing entitlements. Just dismantle the programs, fire all the
bureaucrats running them, and divert all these funds toward the basic income.
If it requires another tax then it's not an alternative, it is an expansion of
the welfare state.

~~~
richardjordan
No. It's not more net taxes. It's a change in the tax rate so the basic income
is clawed back at the high end. Doesn't change tax out of pocket.

~~~
31reasons
Its like applying plaster to an uneven wall. The dents gets filled with
plaster but the bumps stays at the same level! Its much better than giving tax
breaks since you need income to begin with.

~~~
chimeracoder
Two things:

> Its much better than giving tax breaks since you need income to begin with.

1\. There is a difference between refundable and non-refundable tax credits. A
big misconception is that tax breaks only help those who already have income
exceeding the size of the credit, which is _not_ necessarily true.

Second,

> Its like applying plaster to an uneven wall. The dents gets filled with
> plaster but the bumps stays at the same level!

In this analogy, where is the plaster coming from? It can't just come from
nowhere[0].

[0] ("Just print more" isn't the answer, because that increasing the money
supply doesn't actually "create" money (in the colloquial sense) - it's just a
redistribution method that redistributes by changing the relative value of
outstanding debt.)

~~~
31reasons
>>In this analogy, where is the plaster coming from? It can't just come from
nowhere[0].

Moore's Law, AI , other technological advances. Some bumps are producing way
too much paster thats oozing out of the wall boundaries and into the emerging
market wall of other countries.

Imagine a time in future when everyone is replaced by robots and no one is
"employable" in a traditional sense. What would you do then? The economy is
directly linked to the productivity of nations in producing goods and services
, it has nothing to do with human effort directly.

------
adekok
I'm reading the comments, and surprised at what's missing. What happened to
the business approach?

The US government is delivering a large number of products with wildly varying
costs, efficiencies, and price points. e.g. unemployment, welfare, food
stamps, etc. There is a proposal is to replace those products with only one.

The new product fills (mostly) the same need as the existing ones. It will do
so at less cost, with more efficiency (less bureaucracy, administration,
fraud, etc.). Previous market studies show that it works.

So... what's the problem?

As a non-US person, this looks a lot like previous discussions on health care.
France pays about $10 per person per day for universal health care. The UK
pays about $10. Japan pays about $10. Canada pays about $10.

The US (before Obomacare) ? About $20, for care that isn't universal.

You guys are getting ripped off. Yet the bulk of the population sticks their
fingers in their ears, and complains about people who may not "deserve" it. Or
they complain about fraud.

Who the hell cares about random welfare guy ripping off the system? If you're
making over $40K per year, you're getting ripped of by the system. By _your_
system, that you demand to keep in place.

You can get rid of the checks and balances, and just absorb the cost of fraud.
And as a bonus, a simpler system is harder to game, which leads to more
detectable fraud, and therefore less of it.

This won't happen in the US for a number of reasons. One of which is that the
bureaucracy won't voluntarily reduce. Another (as seen here) an unwillingness
to deal with these issues in a business-like manner.

Yes, I'm from a socialist country advocating for _more_ capitalism. Not
unfettered, but more.

~~~
wozniacki
Let us not delude ourselves into thinking any healthcare system is self-
contained and self-sustaining, equipped to deal with all the needs of its
citizenry.

Most European nations ( and Canada, Australia & New Zealand ) are great at
dispensing - what can be termed as - "subsistence medicine." Most ailments,
procedures and surgeries are handled quite well, although - it has to be said
- a tad frugally. ( It is not uncommon for the doctor to under-prescribe
medications or opt for a less cost-prohibitive option over another even when
the situation could be better dealt with, with a more exhaustive course of
prophylaxis)

Plenty of Canadians including the Premier of New Foundland have opted and
continue to opt for minimally invasive procedures ( as well as convoluted
surgeries ) to be done in the United States, simply because the U.S. is better
equipped with the resources and the doctors to deal with such cases.

    
    
      "This is my heart, it's my health, it's my choice."
      With these words, Newfoundland Premier Danny Williams
      defended his decision to hop the border and go under the 
      knife for heart surgery in Florida.
      The minimally invasive mitral valve surgery he needed is not 
      available in Newfoundland, he told his province's NTV News channel
      in the first part of an interview aired last night.[1]
    
      For instance, some Canadian patients who are tired of waiting 
      for procedures in their country's national health system come
      to Michigan hospitals. [2]
    

Even the richest of the rich pick the United States over say European
destinations for their medical treatments.

    
    
      The king (Abdullah of Saudi Arabia), who is 86 years old, was in town
      for surgery at New York Presbyterian Hospital on Nov. 24.[3]
    

[1] [http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/its-my-
health-i...](http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/its-my-health-its-
my-choice-danny-williams-says/article4311853/)

[2] [http://www.cbsnews.com/news/reverse-medical-tourism-
points-u...](http://www.cbsnews.com/news/reverse-medical-tourism-points-up-
pluses-and-minuses-of-us-healthcare/)

[3]
[http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/14/business/14road.html?_r=0](http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/14/business/14road.html?_r=0)

~~~
TheLegace
I think you need to see what Dr. Danielle Martin[1] a Canadian doctor had to
say when she testified to the U.S. Senate defending the Canadian system.

The reference was to Newfoundland Premier Danny Williams’ controversial 2010
decision to undergo heart surgery at a Miami hospital.

“It’s actually interesting,” replied Dr. Martin, “because in fact the people
who are the pioneers of that particular surgery … are in Toronto, at the Peter
Munk Cardiac Center, just down the street from where I work.”

She then hinted that Mr. Williams was of the mistaken belief that simply
paying more for something “necessarily makes it better.”[2]

[1] [http://youtu.be/iYOf6hXGx6M?t=1m22s](http://youtu.be/iYOf6hXGx6M?t=1m22s)

[2] [http://news.nationalpost.com/2014/03/12/toronto-doctor-
smack...](http://news.nationalpost.com/2014/03/12/toronto-doctor-smacks-down-
u-s-senate-question-on-canadian-waitlist-deaths/)

~~~
haldujai
As a Canadian in the healthcare field perhaps I can chime in as well.

When you talk about Canadian healthcare, it is a provincially run program (not
federal) so let's talk about it at the provincial level. As I am an Ontario
resident I'll be discussing this from an Ontario perspective, talking about
all of the provinces and their differences would entail several posts.

Ontaio is currently going to institute (or plans to at least) pay freezes on
physicians due to the rising cost of healthcare in a non-booming economy.
However it is currently one of the best provinces in wait times. The
provincial median is 6.7 weeks to see a specialist after being referred and
another 7.1 weeks to being treated. This has increased 3 years compared to
last year and about doubled from 20 years ago. For some specialties like
orthopaedics the total duration is ~40 weeks. This is in contrast to the US
where ~90% see the specialist within 4 weeks. Internationally we are
considered to be amongst the worst nations when it comes to wait times.

Another big problem with the Ontario system is unemployment. 1/3 specialists,
especially surgeons, are unemployed due to a lack of operating rooms and jobs
available - even in rural areas. There is a definite need but with the single
payer system we have, the aging population pyramid, and increasing healthcare
costs we have there is no money left to pay physicians - who make less on
average (at least in the surgical specialties) than the US physicians. So
we're graduating surgeons who can't work and are forced to go the US to find
jobs.

To address one of Dr. Martin's comments btw, someone jwo develops a
surgery/technique/game isn't always the best person at solving it. Developing
a mitral valve replacement survey using MIS techniques doesn't mean you're the
best person to technically achieve it (you could be, but it's not a given as
she phrases it). The US has a system that rewards exceptionalism and
excellence, the Canadian system generally rewards mediocrity (this is even
evidence in other fields such as law and even academia). The US is famous for
having premier surgeons and state of the art equipment. A prominent example I
know is in the field of limb lengthening, where until very recently there was
not a single surgeon in Canada who could do internal limb lengthening, they
all used the external fixator pioneered in the USSR. Even in medical education
you are seeing prominent US schools teaching the use of hand held ultrasound
devices which are supposed to one day replace stethoscopes. The US also has
far more specialized medical fellowships focused on advanced techniques and
tools such as using tne da Vinci robot system.

I can provide references if necessary (I typed this up on my phone) but most
of these facts are readily google-able.

TLDR: Our system isn't as perfect as you might think and is actually teetering
on financial instability at the moment with up to 1/3 new physicians unable to
find a job in the country due to funding issues.

~~~
eli_gottlieb
>The US has a system that rewards exceptionalism and excellence, the Canadian
system generally rewards mediocrity (this is even evidence in other fields
such as law and even academia).

That sounds like a Polandball-grade national stereotype, and I'd really prefer
to hear some justification.

------
FD3SA
Basic income is the first step to an empirically ethical society, which
accounts for inherent human limitations and behaviors. Evolution is an
extremely feckless game, and thus far we've been trapped by its whims,
endlessly struggling in a free-for-all battle for survival.

In order to transcend and escape our evolutionary origins, we will first and
foremost need to understand ourselves. How we came to be, what behaviors we're
prone to, and what impact these have on our societies.

Second, we will need technology which allows us to liberate ourselves from
extreme labor, giving us free time to engage our societies in a calm, rational
matter without our survival on the line.

If these two conditions are met, then I believe humanity will transcend into a
new golden age. As of this writing, I think we're made incredible progress on
the second point, but are very far behind on the first.

Furthermore, the US is an extremely complex nation, with a history that makes
unity almost impossible except against foreign entities. The US needs to make
an incredible amount of progress on the first point in order to even consider
radical ideas like basic income. In fact, it is currently dialing back its
SNAP (food stamps), which is part of its social assistance program. This is in
the context of an already weak social safety net, by far the weakest of any
western nation.

Sadly, the US has a very long way to go. The commonwealth and Nordic
countries, by comparison, are much further along.

~~~
ekianjo
> Basic income is the first step to an empirically ethical society

Not sure, but wouldn't basic income induce increased prices for commodities?
If disposable income increases for everyone, then there is an incentive to
increase prices everywhere (including accommodation which is a significant
part of monthly expenses), thus negating the positive effects of basic income.

Then you know what would happen next... people asking for an increased basic
income, and the thing would spiral to the end.

~~~
dragonwriter
> Not sure, but wouldn't basic income induce increased prices for commodities?

Yes, it would be expected to shift the demand curve somewhat, because you'd be
redistributing income to people with a higher propensity to spend, increasing
demand.

> If disposable income increases for everyone, then there is an incentive to
> increase prices everywhere (including accommodation which is a significant
> part of monthly expenses), thus negating the positive effects of basic
> income.

Reducing, not negating: the normal effect of more money in the hands of people
with a given desire to buy a product is that the price goes up somewhat and
the market clearing volume traded goes up somewhat, not that the whole
increase in income is reflected in price increases.

> Then you know what would happen next... people asking for an increased basic
> income, and the thing would spiral to the end.

If you tie it to a dedicated revenue stream and set the benefit amount based
on the revenue divided among the eligible population, you establish a control
mechanism.

~~~
stcredzero
_If you tie it to a dedicated revenue stream and set the benefit amount based
on the revenue divided among the eligible population, you establish a control
mechanism._

How do you keep some demagogue from campaigning on abolishing this mechanism
and just giving people more money?

~~~
dragonwriter
> How do you keep some demagogue from campaigning on abolishing this mechanism
> and just giving people more money?

You don't. People can run with any platform they want.

Of course, pretty much this idea has been raised against even the idea of
democratic government for centuries -- that if the masses could just vote for
people to give them money, they would. Strangely, that doesn't seem to happen.

There'll be plenty of people that understand the problems with that idea and
have self-interest in communicating those problems -- and they will be
disproportionately the people with the resources to effectively sell the idea.
Frankly, I'd be more worried about the system being eroded by people
campaigning to limit the dedicated revenue stream than by abandoning limiting
controls. (Not that I necessary think that method of control is necessary in
the first place, just that its an available option.)

~~~
growupkids
Of course it happens. Entitlement spending essentially never goes down, it
always goes up or when proposals are floated to reduce it they almost always
fail. People do vote to give themselves money, and they always vote to protect
their entitlements.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
Adjusted for inflation it can go down. And some states have reduced welfare
(welfare mothers don't vote).

~~~
stcredzero
You'd have to add in lobbying for corporate tax breaks, subsidies, and all
manner of sweetheart deals.

------
whyme
Obviously this is not a new idea... Twenty years ago I sat around with college
mates, in Canada, listing the merits of the "Guaranteed Income" and quite
frankly I still support the idea today.

If you took all the salaries, property and operations cost associated with
distributing old age security, welfare, disability, unemployment wages etc
etc, it would probably pay for much of the cost associated with the Guaranteed
Income (even if you had a small group dedicated to counter fraud abuse).

I could list out the many benefits and the nay-sayer objections with counter
arguments, but after twenty years I've come to realize money distribution is
not the problem. The problem is money = power and society is hell bent on
gaining power.

The real solution is to move to a resource managed economy that eliminates
money all together. But quite frankly we as a society are not there yet and I
doubt we will be in my lifetime.

~~~
atom-morgan
_...that eliminates money all together_

You can't eliminate money. It's a natural creation of human interaction. Even
_prisoners_ have money.

~~~
mekael
If we can create , then we can destroy just as easily.

~~~
PeterisP
It's not enough to 'destroy' money, you'd have to prevent it from reappearing.
Since it's easy for communities to create 'money', destroying it won't bring
any freedom or radical change; just disruption.

It's just as with anarchy - you can destroy government, but you can't prevent
"government"(s) from springing up to replace them, and usually worse than the
ones before.

~~~
stcredzero
_It 's not enough to 'destroy' money, you'd have to prevent it from
reappearing._

If you can't get rid of drugs and prostitution, you won't be able to get rid
of money.

~~~
atom-morgan
History has shown that black markets are extremely resilient. Those two are
great examples.

------
MrZongle2
So let's assume this was implemented.

Some citizens, with their guaranteed basic income, will spend it wisely to
cover their needs...as envisioned by proponents of this approach.

Others, however, will waste their income and again find themselves short of
what is necessary to cover their needs.

What then? Simply increase the amount of basic income awarded, and hope that
by throwing more money at the symptoms of poverty, the cause will be
addressed?

And where does this money come from? Not _immediately_ , of course, but 5-10
years down the road once society has been changed by this policy's
implementation? Why would the financial engines of today, which could
theoretically fund such an endeavor, continue to run as efficiently in the
future?

~~~
pmorici
I think in that case you would be justified in telling the irresponsible
person tough luck and maybe they would spend it more wisely the next time
around. If they die of starvation that's their problem. I have a hard time
believing that would be a wide spread problem though.

~~~
pedalpete
Exactly, and it isn't like this is the ONLY form of income. This is meant to
subsidize those who are living below the poverty line. If you are living below
the poverty line and go out and buy yourself a car you can't afford, guess
what, you'll have to sell the car, and you'll have learned your lesson that
next year, you can't go waste your BI.

~~~
marknutter
> This is meant to subsidize those who are living below the poverty line

Now that's just silly. If it were meant to subsidize people living below the
poverty line it would target people living below the poverty line, not
households making over 50k a year who would likely sock away the money or
spend it on a bathroom renovation.

------
jdreaver
I am always wary of supporting a basic income guarantee. Although it sounds
much better than the current welfare mess we have, the actual implementation
will probably be an addition rather than a replacement.

~~~
rjtavares
The current mess is not only poorly implemented, it's based on false
assumptions. We just need to stop pretending there's something wrong with
people not being able to find a decent job, and stop punishing them.

~~~
ahomescu1
You should also look at it from the other side: if I have a job that I work at
8-10 hours a day (and might not do if I didn't need the money), how am I
"punishing" the other guy by not sharing the fruits of my labor with him for
nothing in return?

EDIT: To put it another way: if I'm a productive worker and have a job, I am
"rewarded" by working for a boss (taking orders from him/her), and having to
turn over 35-50% of my income to government, to give it to others. If I were
unemployed, I'd be "punished" by receiving welfare, food stamps and a bunch of
other stuff, without having to contribute in any way to society.

~~~
assface
Because you don't live in a vacuum. Our society makes it possible so that you
can earn a living. You're just paying back for having that opportunity to
those that are less fortunate.

~~~
tsotha
>Because you don't live in a vacuum. Our society makes it possible so that you
can earn a living.

This argument doesn't hold water for me. Society makes it possible for
_everyone_ to earn a living, so people who aren't doing it should start.

~~~
orthecreedence
> so people who aren't doing it should start

But they won't. It's safe to say that lazy people are _good_ at being lazy and
will find a way to be lazy no matter what system they're in.

Pretending we can build a system that eradicates laziness in an exercise in
futility. It's better to accept the fact that a fixed percentage of people are
only going to take while most others give (and take), and stop wasting the
enormous overhead trying to figure out which is which.

~~~
tsotha
>Pretending we can build a system that eradicates laziness in an exercise in
futility.

Not at all. You know what eradicates laziness? Hunger.

~~~
orthecreedence
I'd argue hunger promotes stealing more than eradicates laziness.

------
drawkbox
I agree there are immense benefits but it fails to recognize that markets rule
the world. Once there would be a Basic Income, that is when market prices
would go up to cancel out the benefit. You underestimate the rulers of the
world (wealthy) to hold onto their advantage.

I see it as many times better than welfare or unemployment since it is
distributed equally to everyone. If there is a limit it will eventually be too
low, so even rich people would get it, they would have to or it would be
destroyed.

Social security is an insurance policy really that doesn't hit wealthy wallets
much beyond what everyone pays, but people still want to destroy it and this
is against workers directly paying in their whole lives for a subpar
investment, yes small businesses pay the full 15%ish and social security
returns 2% annually and also props up our dollar big time with investment in
t-bills. So even benefits like that are too social for many.

But a Basic Income distributed to everyone would lose the current perception
of welfare/unemployment being bad when really these are helpful to keep the
low end propped up and in the end I believe it saves money. You'd have to keep
moving it up like minimum wage as the effects are normalized, it really is a
travesty that minimum wage hasn't gone up as well.

People in America really don't like helping one another so this and other
programs with even a hint of social aspects will not catch on. But if someone
gets a benefit that the complainer also gets, they would probably be ok with
it. However this does not redistribute and would eventually be cancelled out
in pricing.

~~~
bryanlarsen
Why would prices go up? It's a money redistribution scheme, not a money
creation scheme. The poor have more money, the rich have slightly less, the
middle class have about the same, and the bureaucrats and parasitical
corporations that live off administering the welfare system have a lot less.

Goods generally purchased by the poor might go up slightly, but BI should
shift the poor into the low end of lower middle class. In other words, putting
them in a situation comparable to that of the majority of the American
population, so the effect on the demand curve should not be large.

~~~
dragonwriter
> Why would prices go up?

Because the propensity to consume is not equal across the economic spectrum;
downward redistribution increases expected consumption and, therefore, overall
price levels.

The idea that this would eat up the beneficial effects of BI is hard to
justify, but the idea that some increase in overall price level is likely is
pretty easy to justify.

------
krazydad
I am not at all an economist, but I wonder: if everyone had the same amount of
fixed income (in addition to whatever else they made from their jobs),
wouldn't there be continual inflation, rendering that money worthless?
Wouldn't the fixed income become the new zero income?

Also: How does Macdonalds work in this situation, if the fixed income
"replaces" minimum wage. Does Macdonalds pay on top of this wage? Do they
double it? Do they pay zero? If they pay zero, what incentives workers to work
at Macdonalds?

~~~
robobenjie
It replaces minimum wage in that McDonalds is welcome to offer a job flipping
burgers for $1 an hour if they want. However, because no one _needs_ a job to
live (because they can just live on the basic income) someone would only take
that job if it was worth it/fulfilling to them.

~~~
baddox
> However, because no one _needs_ a job to live (because they can just live on
> the basic income)

Well, _someone_ needs a job for the system to work, since it's presumably
funded by taxation. At least one person (more realistically, a large portion
of the population) still needs to be creating wealth.

~~~
maxsilver
>someone needs a job

I don't know that we necessarily _need_ to have jobs.

We could fund it by taxation of revenue and wages, rather than just wages.

A company who fires all it's employees, and uses only robots, would see a huge
surge in profit from reduced overhead. That profit could be taxed at something
like 60%.

The owner(s) of the business still see windfall from the cost savings of
laying everyone off, and the basic income now rises for everyone _and_ can now
cover the lost wages of the newly unemployed, using the companies new profits
as a funding source

~~~
baddox
> A company who fires all it's employees, and uses only robots, would see a
> huge surge in profit from reduced overhead.

Where is their revenue coming from?

~~~
ryandrake
People spending their basic income :)

------
fishtoaster
I haven't read much on BI, so I'm sure this has already been answered already,
but: how do the numbers add up?

The US poverty line for a single person is $11k. For simplicity, let's say BI
gives everyone in the US $10k per year. Times 313.9 million, that's $3.1
trillion per year. The US government spent, overall, $3.45 trillion in 2013.
How would we be able to afford basic income?

~~~
AJ007
Some adjustments:

People under 18, 25%

Felons/criminals, probably 3%

Removing social security, medicare, and most other government social welfare
programs should remove a giant chunk of the federal budget. I think if you re-
do these numbers that will appear a lot more affordable.

Proponents of BI say it can't exclude anyone. That is silly. Things we
consider the most basic fundamental rights: voting, free speech, are
restricted for large groups such as convicted felons. It would be reasonable
that anyone who fails to conform with government rules of accepted social
behavior should also be excluded from BI.

The more serious problem with BI is how the dollars flow toward prices. If you
make a blanket distribution of money to a large group of money the end result
may just be price inflation in the goods that exist in a limited quantity,
most specifically real estate.

I think BI is a fairly poor idea. But, being realistic I am trying to imagine
what it would look like in use. All I see is a tool for governments to control
large segments of lower middle class citizens. That may well be the goal.

~~~
stonith
Isn't excluding criminals likely to reduce what is often touted as a positive
effect of BI: reducing crime by giving people what they need to survive?

------
mynameishere
Every time a post like this comes up it gets hundreds of people supporting the
idea. The problem is that most of the readers of HN have been in the Upper
Middle Class or higher their entire lives. Friends, family, co-workers, all
UMC, and so you don't know, you've never experienced, the pathologies typical
of poorer people. Or, you pretend those pathologies can be solved with a new
variation on welfare.

Giving out checks is going to create millions of people who do nothing but 1)
Watch television and eat potato chips or 2) Spend the checks on drugs/alcohol,
and steal whatever they need until the first of the next month. Worse, many of
those people are the same who used to clean your toilets and take out your
garbage. Not mine--yours.

That's just reality. I'm guessing that the main reason why conservatives like
Charles Murray support basic income is because it focuses the menagerie of
handouts into one policy, which will allow for easier metrics into how
increases are harmful.

~~~
aianus
What's wrong with 1)?

I'd rather have robots clean the toilets and free these people to watch TV and
eat chips or get high or whatever they would prefer to spend their lives
doing.

------
blisterpeanuts
I have a proposal. Those who favor basic income should pick one or two
recipients who are deserving of assistance, and open their own pockets and
provide the money. The recipients will be glad and thankful, the donors will
feel they have moved society toward utopia, and the rest of us can just get on
with our lives without suffering the burdens that an additional entitlement
would impose.

I say this not to incite a flame war or partisan jibes. I just feel that it's
the most honest and ethical way to provide basic income; those who believe in
this approach are free to contribute, while those who don't are free not to.

Seems fair to me.

~~~
yourapostasy
That would only seem workable if the donors could offset the amount of
donation from their tax liabilities. Also, most BI discussions I've seen are
about how to replace the existing benefits delivery infrastructure with BI,
and not as an additional entitlement.

~~~
nirnira
Blisterpeanutes: "People who support blind charity should put their money
where their mouth if they think it's such a great idea."

Yourapostasy: "Hey great idea, even better why don't we give them all the
money they give back so they don't actually have to make a sacrifice at all
for their beliefs!"

~~~
yourapostasy
If you want a bifurcated benefits distribution program, where BI and
"conventional" taxes exist side-by-side, to see which program is more
effective in an open competition, then telling supporters of BI "you not only
have to pay the taxes you already pay, but you also then pay beyond that for
BI" would handicap the results in favor of the existing "conventional"
taxation system. I personally think advocates of BI are committing the Soros
reflexivity mistake, which pretty much most of the field of economics sins
against as well. Without a near-free energy source, I doubt BI works over the
long-haul. But that doesn't mean when someone advocates testing BI by telling
supporters to dig into their pockets even deeper after they have paid taxes
they currently are liable for, that I will idly stand by and let that pass for
a fair challenge. Operationally, unless there is some strong way (like via
DNA) to identify benefits recipients of one system over another to avoid
double-dipping and similar negative externality behavior, I don't think side-
by-side systems are actually feasible.

------
ekianjo
> While people could theoretically survive off the charity of others, advanced
> artificial intelligence and robotics are likely to increase the portion of
> the population who are unemployable.

We've been hearing this kind of arguments for _literally centuries_ (the steam
engine is going to put people out of work, cars and trucks will create
unemployment, oh no Silicon valley is going to kill all manual work out there
through automation, and then robots will take over the world and there will be
no more jobs for people). This is really, really old and tiring. If anything,
technologies increase the amount of economic growth through increased
opportunities, and so far the market has clearly demonstrated that it's
providing a lot more jobs to way more people than when we were still 1 billion
on this planet.

~~~
psbp
Let assume that these kinds of investments actually lead to something:
[http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2014/03/21/zuckerberg-musk-
inves...](http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2014/03/21/zuckerberg-musk-invest-in-
artificial-intelligence-company-vicarious/)

Maybe not immediately, but 10, 20, 50 years? Good luck.

------
bcheung
1) When people don't need to produce value to live in the world, they will
cease to produce value.

2) Ultimately it is not income that is needed to survive but resources
properly organized. The cost of survival is getting cheaper and cheaper at an
exponential rate. You wouldn't know that though because they keep raising the
bar on what it means to "survive"—big screen tv, air conditioning, car, etc.
The amount of work required to live according to living standards 100 years
ago is rather minimal.

3) Where does this "basic income" come from? If you are taking it from others
who produce value then how are you any better than a slave owner? The only
difference is that instead of owning and taking the livelihood of an
individual you are taking it from everyone collectively in smaller amounts.
The moral principle is the same.

4) Why would people work if they can just take from others? Everyone will do
the least amount possible because everyone else is just going to take their
profits so why bother. Communism didn't work so why are you proposing it now?

5) You can't protect people from being stupid. Unless you are physically
handicapped or retarded, in which case there is charity and family, it's
really pathetically easy to survive in today's world. You aren't being chased
by tigers. Agricultural yields are 100x than they were just a short time ago.
The Internet provides a vast amount of resources to better yourself. There are
greater abundances than ever before and people are generally charitable
towards others. If you can't survive under those conditions there is something
wrong with you.

6) I find it offensive and an attack on my personal liberty that you would
demand that I sacrifice my livelihood so that another doesn't have to work
hard and make wise decisions.

~~~
iopq
Well, it's the only way to be able to dissuade people from programs like
welfare and food stamps. Practically, it's the only program that can succeed
in doing so in the US. You don't think it would be a better system than we
have now where making past a certain amount has a NEGATIVE effect on your
income if you're a single mother?

It's better to make closer to $30,000 as a single mother rather than $50,000 -
you'll get to keep more of it because you qualify for more government
programs.

I think it's easier to disassemble these really perverse incentives if you
replace it with something simpler. Then you can reduce social security
benefits because of this, then turn to alimony and child support (no longer
needed), etc.

You can't do that without first giving an alternative to the status quo

~~~
bcheung
I agree that the current system rewards people for consuming welfare and
provides disincentives for them to work, but I don't think making the rest of
the working population their slaves through taxes is a moral solution.

I think a better solution would be along the lines of "How can we reduce the
barriers of entry so that people can create their own success?" and "How can
we shift the cultural motif of society from entitlement mentality to valuing
hard work and the benefits that come from it?"

------
tomphoolery
Providing a basic income for all people, regardless of their merit to the
society as a whole, is problematic. It's not enough to just hand over a couple
hundred dollars to someone and say "have fun". We need to ensure everyone is
getting the proper basic services, first.

I'm talking about shelter, food, water, and a basis for living comfortably. We
have the resources to do this, today. We just don't have the distribution
infrastructure. Money should be something you spend purely on things you
_want_ , not things you _need_.

Given that we built a distribution infrastructure of some kind to
automatically and evenly distribute the total food resources of the country,
we would see a dramatic change in how money is looked upon and how we use it.
No longer will we require money, instead, money is something you earn and use
for things you wish to do. We can focus all of our time and energy on
furthering our technology, our minds, and the human race in general.

~~~
vilhelm_s
What you describe seems like the status quo system: the state distributes food
and shelter to people directly (through food stamps and council housing). The
idea of basic income is that it is much more efficient if the state
redistributes _money_, and then everyone can buy food and shelter using money.

~~~
tomphoolery
Given that we have no distribution system in place, it is true that if the
state redistributes money, that is a more efficient way to go. However, you
slightly missed my point. I'm not talking about a system that gives you
vouchers. I'm talking about a system that gives you FOOD. This isn't food
stamps, this is a system that lives outside of the economy. You don't pay for
food, you don't have a "quota". Everything is centralized. Basically, this
removes the need for brick and mortar grocery stores, and ends our dependence
on large companies like Wal-Mart, et. al., to sell us our food.

We shouldn't need to _buy_ food. That's the point.

------
ThomPete
There are three major advantages of unconditional basic income.

1) It will always be beneficial to work. I.e. even for a couple of hours.

2) Society wont have to waste money controlling whether someone should have
the money or not. The frees millions of people and billions of not trillions
of control.

3) It removes most argument around inequality and it makes sure there always
is customers.

------
bcheung
You can't have wealth without creating it through labor. You can see this when
you isolate the abstractions society has and go to the core semantics.

Take a population of people. Stick them on a remote island. Then institute
this measure. Where does this income come from? If you just print money, what
is there to buy if nobody has produced it? If it is from taxation, then if you
produce something and others just take it why would you bother producing when
it is much easier just to take from others like everyone else?

I would argue, and history seems to show this. That a society prospers as a
whole the more they reward hard work and allow the people to enjoy the fruits
of their own labors.

------
softatlas
I once stumbled upon a YouTube video consisting of a woman who received
~$1,400/mo entirely supplied by Government Assistance Programs.

I once saw a job posting for a Web Developer/Python position where the client
stated: "$1,000/mo is enough in Belarus."

I stopped to think for a bit: "I hardly made $800/mo when I was freelancing,
and I was happiest when I was not working."

I think the biggest argument for Basic Income is to normalize what is already
an existing systemic exploitation of a broken system. Professional exploiters
and accidental/system-justifier exploiters need to be cut off, which might
motivate professionals and invalids to assess our system as more just. I'm
sure a positive network effect will follow.

Why not just try it? Why not stop arguing these speculative points and just
try it?

It only works if you test.

~~~
bcheung
You actually raise a good point about testing it. If you have heard of the Sea
Steading Institute they are proposing that we establish a bunch of "startup"
style countries to examine which policies and solutions will work and which
won't. The problem with basic income though is that it relies on captive
individuals (value producers who pay tax) and given the choice they are most
likely going to move to somewhere that doesn't force them to pay as much tax.
I can't see how socialism can survive without forcing people against their
will.

~~~
ende
This assumes that a basic income is funded through income taxation. Instead,
fund it through a land value tax (a rent on land ownership paid to society).
The LVT is just the cost of investment, like any business owner renting space
to run their business on.

------
cordite
I support the idea, but there are other things that have to go with it in
order to really work and not end up like the broken economy that Argentina had
to put up with when doing something similar.

It would need serious tax reform, changes to how business are treated locally
and internationally.

One suggestion for tax reform is to apply taxes strictly on only sales tax,
not income tax. Certain property taxes may still be effectful, but it's really
a huge mess that will really function if not taken all together.

I suppose an analogy is when it comes to extreme programming, you can't just
take what you like and get all the benefits--not that basic income specifies
these other things, but I believe there is a bigger package that has to be
considered.

~~~
mulligan
Can you explain what you see as the problem and why the solution to that
problem is not to tax income?

~~~
cordite
I am not stating that it is _the_ solution, but here are some thoughts as to
why it would help.

We spend billions just paying accountants to fool around wit millions of rules
that most people do not understand. Sales tax is very simple. Rich people get
out of paying taxes by doing inefficient things like tax shelters.

Now, the sales tax would need to be refunded for those in the basic income
bracket, especially on food, housing, etc..

Remember that HN article about "We'll not incorporate in the US" by some
Danish group? What needs to happen is to encourage businesses to run locally,
and part of that is simplifying the entire structure to represent what the
economy is closest to--consumption.

------
ende
Replace income tax with land value tax. Then it's not redistribution of
income. The argument for a land value tax is Georgist: land is not property
because it is not the product of one's own labor. Therefore land 'owners'
should pay rent to society in the form of the land value tax (though not on
the property built on the land). That rent is then paid to society as a
universal basic income.

(And to preempt those who might question why anyone would both owning land:
because like any investment there is a cost that can be exceeded by profit.)

~~~
dredmorbius
How does a lands tax comport with the fact that some acres are _hugely_ more
productive (or extractive) than others?

It's not in the US, but the First Oil Well in Bahrain, which has been
providing oil since June 2, 1932. For much of its life at 70,000 bbl/day, more
recently at about half that rate, 35,000 bbl/day.

That's roughly $3.5 million per day in productivity.

There was a time, and Henry George came well after it, when the agricultural
productivity of land was in fact the basis of virtually all wealth (some
contributions from the sea, as well as water and wind power). Since the large-
scale exploitation of coal, oil, and gas, starting in the mid 18th century,
that hasn't been the case.

It eventually likely will be again, but I've not read enough of the Georgist
view to see how the huge variances in land productivity would be addressed.
Even if mere ag output is considered.

~~~
boomlinde
If it's not a "lands tax" but a "land value" tax, if some acres are hugely
more productive they are also hugely more valuable, and at best they are taxed
accordingly.

~~~
dredmorbius
Thanks. I've heard a bit about Georgism but haven't looked into it in depth.

------
gfodor
I don't consider myself very liberal but basic income makes sense to me just
from a simplicity perspective. The amount of complexity right now in the
welfare state almost certainly introduces all kinds of bizarre unintended
effects. With basic income, you push all that onto the (hopefully fairly
efficient) market. It would also let me sleep well at night knowing that
nobody could game the system, since everyone, from the rich down to the poor,
get their basic income.

I guess the biggest question with it is what is the differential in outcomes
for people. What % of people who work now out of fear of living on the street
would stop working if they could be sure they would have the bare minimum to
survive. I can't imagine many. Everyone always wants more for themselves and
their children. If people choose to not work, basic income puts a cap on how
much of a "drain" they are on society.

There are a lot of nice properties to this concept and it would be interesting
to hear well-founded opposition arguments. Unfortunately I have to assume that
almost all of the arguments are going to be along the lines of "doing this
will encourage people to be lazy" without any real evidence that this is the
case.

------
donkeysmuggler
Additionally, as well as 100% Inheritance tax with exceptions for personal
items (inheritance is the biggest game breaker in a fair system), another very
practical and fair idea would be no VAT/sales tax (disproportionately affects
the poor) and vastly reduced business taxes; however Progressive personal
income taxation that works like the effects of relativity on the speed of
light (no tiny group of bands that end at a middling percent and allow capital
gains but rather a direct calculation from the income; the more non-charitably
allocated income, the even higher the tax rate approaching 90+% in the
stratospheric levels, encouraging investment in business, employment, public
good projects etc, just like the old rich guys in the early 20th century
building all those public libaries. All of these resources held in the public
trust (as well as complete citizen ownership of natural resources and most
land; nobody should have rights to important earth resources because their
daddy had a piece of paper they got from their slave plantation) used for
basic income & investment in automation as well as myriad other public good
projects.

~~~
PeterisP
100% inheritance tax is a bit ridiculous - if I'd die today in a car accident,
my family already would lose it's main income and suffer; and you'd suggest
taking away my savings from my widow&toddlers at that point?

And even if you'd really want this, it's feasible only if you also have a 100%
tax on gifting stuff - otherwise any old/sick person would simply gift their
wealth to whoever he wants to leave (generally taxed at the normal income tax
rate) or buy/sell stuff at very advantageous terms for the same effect; or
take an expensive life insurance policy that'd pay out as much as he'd like to
his relatives.

~~~
donkeysmuggler
The amount of revenue gained in a near 100% system would guarantee basic
income for all, including children. This is my point. Take away gifting and
nepotism and automatically assign an equal amount of potential resources to
each child from birth.

~~~
PeterisP
You can't take away gifting unless you take away private property - how you
can prevent me spending my resources (no matter how much/little of them I may
have) on rising my kids instead of myself?

The natural unit of the economy isn't a person, it's the household - all the
legislation and market theory is about resource flows between households,
we've never had societies that were able (or even intending) to control
resource flows within a household. The only way to ensure equal resources to
each child from birth would involve also fully centralizing childcare - i.e.,
taking them away from parents and raising them all equally by some single
anonymous system; but I'd call that a dystopia.

I _do_ want my children to have an advantage in resources if I can help it,
it's a natural property of homo sapiens and most other mammals to care about
their offspring.

You can take away 'nepotism' in that sense as soon as you're able to
genetically modify our species to have a different psychology than homo
sapiens - and while we're at it, this could also solve wars, greed and a bunch
of other problems.

Implementing what you propose might be possible, but it would require to apply
violent force on a mass scale, as almost all people would naturally want to
circumvent the system at some point and need to be forcibly prevented from
that - or it all goes back to the "communism" where in theory everybody is
equal but in practice it's just empty words and everybody cheats the system.

------
belleruches
I'm in favor of this.

Do we have any examples where this has worked before?

~~~
tim333
You could argue the system in the UK provides similar payments and could be
called a basic income system if you rebrand it. Basically the system comes out
roughly as:

Zero earned income. You get about £60-200 from the state per week so lets call
this a £60 basic income. Typical unemployed.

Annual income £12K. No tax and no subsidies. We could rebrand as £60/wk basic
income = 3K/yr and and 25% tax on the 12K. Typical minimum wage earner.

Income £50k. Roughly £35K in your pocket, £15K tax. Rebrand as 18K tax less 3K
minimum income.

The system kind of works. One of the main problems is that there is a very
steep effective marginal between zero income and minimum wage - a lot of
people end up about equally well off in the short term whether they do nothing
or flip burgers. This would be better under a straight basic income system.

I think you could improve the basic income set up by something like karma
points where you get a bit more money if you are productive even if it's doing
something unpaid like charity work or writing poems and less if you are
criminal etc.

~~~
lazyjones
> _The system kind of works._

Isn't it actually radically different in that you are not allowed to choose to
stay unemployed, i.e. you have to be at least trying to look for work in order
to be eligible for such benefits?

In other countries there are similar systems but before you get "basic income"
like benefits, your property will have to be used up / sold.

------
Dale1
This would be akin to dumping a load of cash into the economy, driving
inflation to the point where the extra cash had absolutely no difference to
anyone especially the poor.

It's a lovely idea but the working wage is a much better one!

------
jokoon
I think everyone should go first debate what Milton Friedman proposed: the
negative income tax.

The negative income tax has the virtue of at least restart the debate on how
much taxes should companies pay. Why aren't taxes progressive ? Why are there
still oil subsidies ? Why are many companies still able to dodge taxes ?

The basic income cannot happen if the government cannot pay for it. Maybe s
very low basic income at something like $3000 or $5000 per year would be nice
to experiment, but until then, politically with that congress, and considering
the electorate and how hated the poor are, it's just impossible.

------
Taek
If a basic income was implemented, would we also be comfortable getting rid of
minimum wage?

And, if we attempted to go for this in the US, how much struggle would there
be to both implement the minimum wage and also remove all of the other
programs such as welfare, food stamps, disability?

The system is very well established and you couldn't just remove each part in
a single step. Each program that gets removed would need to be eliminated one
by one.

Overall, I think that a basic income is the cleanest, fairest, least game-able
way to help the lower class. I just don't see it happening in our current
political climate.

------
abraham_s
I have been thinking about the long term effects of automation (as in self
driving car/trucks etc) and I think such a scheme will become necessary in the
near future. How many job losses will be there in near future if all the
vehicles become self-driven. Number of truckers is estimated at In 2006, the
U.S. trucking industry as a whole employed 3.4 million drivers. Another
233,900 cab driver. Maybe 2X number in supporting jobs, like waiters etc. Can
a society survive with so many jobless people with the current unemployment
schemes?

Edit: spelling

------
ghx
This sounds kind of like the earned income tax credit, which is basically a
reverse tax (if you don't make enough to pay taxes, you get a subsidy
instead):
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earned_income_tax_credit](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earned_income_tax_credit)

Expanding EITC substantially would be politically easier than attempting to do
this, since it already exists and has bipartisan support (as opposed to
raising the minimum wage). You need some sort of job for the EITC, though.

------
afhsfsfdsss88
I want to live in a society of people who are working together to make human
existence meaningful. What I don't want is the pseudo-free market designed to
further despotism and self-interested behavior which we have today.

That said, I'm not for giving someone food, shelter, water, and health care
for falling out of a uterus. You have to contribute in some measurable way.
Also I believe that we should provide, specifically these things...NOT
currency/income.

I've seen too many examples of people having children for well-fare checks.

------
dicroce
Here's the thing: I believe that millions of years of evolution have baked
into every living thing a deep need to work, and we'll feel bad if we don't
(because for millions of years lazyness meant death). We need to struggle.

Further, I think we need to bad times to help us recognize the good times and
a basic income would do much to soften those bad times...

I worry that Basic Income is in the long term practically unavoidable, but at
the same time will create new levels of depravity in mankind.

~~~
alexeisadeski3
Hard work is a recent invention. It arrived with the farming revolution a mere
10-12k years ago.

Before that, humans as foragers are believed to have worked about 20hrs per
week, if they so chose.

~~~
nirnira
Yeah, and early vertebrate species in the Cambrian just swam around singing
happy songs and smooching anemones all day while they enjoyed a universe free
of those horrible constraints of energy and matter that nasty humans invented
to oppress each other.

Get a fucking grip. Hunter gatherers lived in shitty conditions with
unbelievably poor material wealth, and had no protections against disease,
injury, starvation, attack by animals, attack by other humans, old age, death
in childbirth, etc etc. Average lifespan was 20.

~~~
alexeisadeski3
Oh, and you're also wrong about much of the rest of it as well. There is a
reason that anthropologists consider farming "the worst mistake in human
history":

[http://www3.gettysburg.edu/~dperry/Class%20Readings%20Scanne...](http://www3.gettysburg.edu/~dperry/Class%20Readings%20Scanned%20Documents/Intro/Diamond.PDF)

------
ethana
So what should the basic income be? $10k/yr? 20k? 50k? 100k?

~~~
benched
It should be tied to some indexes that reflect the cost of living. If it's
impossible to actually live a very minimal life on the basic income, there's
not much point, as you'll still have to work and be under stress about making
ends meet.

~~~
ethana
So basic income is the minimum living cost? What if minimum cost of living
increase every year as it does? What if you live in San Francisco where the
standard of living is crazy high? Do the citizens of S.F get a higher basic
income than say Milwaukee?

~~~
orthecreedence
The point of a universal/general basic income is that _it 's the same for
everyone_. SF's cost of living is significantly higher, but nobody's stopping
you from getting a job there still _on top of_ your GBI.

If on top of having a job and getting GBI you still can't live in San
Francisco, then you'd move to a cheaper area of the state/country.

What's interesting is that a lot of people flock to urban areas for the
increased opportunity, but with a GBI, this may not be the case as much
because there's less of a strain to make ends meet. This could reduce the cost
of living in urban areas.

------
Meekro
People becoming "unemployable" because of robots is one of the most common
arguments in favor of this, and that argument is nonsense because actual
skilled jobs are not going away.

Will a robot fix your car when it breaks? Will it be designing new and better
cars? Will it even design the automation systems that let those new cars be
built more efficiently?

Will those robots provide legal advice to the companies that operate them?
Will they provide medical care to your kid when he breaks a bone? Will they
provide him with counseling when he's struggling emotionally? Will they give
him a lesson on algebra, and then work with him one-on-one to make sure he
understands it?

Will robots patrol the streets and keep you safe from crime? Will they
prosecute people who hurt others, or preside over those trials to make sure
everyone's rights are protected?

Will robots invent the next Google or Facebook, and will they code it up and
design a nice-looking and intuitive interface for it? Will they entertain you
from a stage or a movie set? Will they write new jokes for a stand-up act,
write an original novel, or provide an author with advice on how to make his
characters more lifelike?

Maybe McDonald's fry cooks will eventually be replaced with robots, but
"labor" isn't going anywhere.

~~~
sukuriant
But the number of people that want / need to do those visionary / human-
centric jobs (though I would not consider all of those jobs as necessarily
human) is lower than the number of people that would be seeking employment
without a system for basic income; and, as long as it's pennies to get a
person to do those low-income jobs, they're not likely to be automated away

------
platform
I do not agree that "Combining income redistribution and decentralizing
spending would solve poverty today. "

I would argue more individual wealth that's based on

a) cumulative and legal earnings b) penalty-free inheritance c) a system that
rewards individual greed d) a system that rewards equal opportunity

would solve poverty today.

For that to work, though -- those have to be world wide rules. Making an
individual country as a test ground will not produce repeatable results.

The above also has one more built in assumption -- vast majority of the people
are 'good to other human beings' and act 'rationally'.

The definition of 'legal' is of course vague, but must be uniform across the
world (not in individual country) and would include things like

a) equivalence of
genders/race/religions/ethnic/disability/political/financial/marital/law-
enforcement status in the eyes of a law and competitive bidding

b) law of contract

c) uniformly standardized legal language around contracts that does not
require legal council to initiate and resolve disputes

e) criminal penalty system that treats qualified threat of a physical or
financial harm, with 80% of equivalence to posterior event

(this it to prevent wide spread racketeering )

f) criminal system that requires non-cirmustantial/independently verifiable
evidence to result in conviction

g) largely uniform across country criminal law

------
ericHosick
Real questions because I'm not an economist.

If I have money does that mean I am assured that the goods required to fulfill
my basic needs exist and can be purchased by that money?

~~~
Klinky
No. Simply having money means nothing. This is true for all economies. It's
entirely up to society accepting the currency you have to produce the goods
you desire.

In a basic income society, the amount received should be based off of indexes
for items/services deemed necessary to meet some basic quality-of-life
thresholds. If the private sector cannot provide items/services to meet those
thresholds, then the government should step in to provide them, until the
private sector can provide it more efficiently(if possible).

------
zaidos
Wouldn't businesses just raise prices to offset the basic income, rendering it
useless?

~~~
lilsunnybee
Only if they were colluding with one another. Lower prices remain attractive
to consumers even when they have extra cash to spend. Reasonably priced goods
would still win out in volume of sales over unnecessarily high-priced goods.

~~~
paulhauggis
"Only if they were colluding with one another"

If everyone knows they can get basic income for doing nothing, the majority
will not choose a job that pays less than or equal to the basic income.

This means businesses will have to increase wages (and costs of goods and
services). No colluding necessary..just economics.

~~~
cdash
You don't lose your basic income just because you get a job. Everyone gets it.

------
jgalt212
The real problem is all the tax loopholes that almost exclusively benefit the
upper/upper end of the income spectrum.

I am looking at you carried interest loophole.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carried_interest](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carried_interest)

And the low rate dividends are taxed at. Dividends should be deducted at the
corporate level as a cost, and taxed at the shareholder level as regular
income.

~~~
drcode
Hey! This thread isn't meant for ideas that are sane and would actually
improve things. Please move on to another thread.

~~~
jgalt212
b/c making the tax code more fair/logical would not improve things? your
comment does not make sense.

~~~
drcode
I agreed with your statements. Since they are sane and would improve things,
you are in the wrong comment thread.

~~~
jgalt212
sorry, I misunderstood. It's very difficult to detect sarcasm on message
boards.

------
xenophanes
It Is Time For Basic Economic Literacy

~~~
dllthomas
I don't know whether you're saying "supporting a Basic Income is entailed by
basic economic literacy" or "basic economic literacy precludes a Basic
Income".

~~~
xenophanes
sorry. basic economic literacy precludes a Basic Income

see Ludwig von Mises

~~~
dllthomas
'k, well, I'm going to go with "Milton Friedman was not _economically
illiterate_ ", whether or not he was actually correct...

~~~
xenophanes
My position: Milton Friedman had basic economic literacy but chose to ignore
it at times, caring more about some other things (like moral and social issues
– an area where he made some serious mistakes).

Many other people don't have economic literacy in the first place – and if
they did have it, some of them would change their minds about Basic Income and
other issues, rather than ignore economics to focus on their social-moral
philosophy. One reason that would happen is plenty of people don't have a very
strong social-moral philosophy in the first place, don't care about it much.
And some would even change their social-moral philosophy itself, for the
better, if they understood basic economics.

Spreading basic economics isn't a total cure-all alone, but it's a great step.
Many people would notice the conflicts between economics and some of their
other ideas. Some of those people would then have some success resolving the
conflicts and reaching reasonable economically-informed conclusions.

------
alexeisadeski3
US specific:

* 2014 total US gov't spending: $6.3T (36.4% of GDP)

* # of Americans: 314m (2012)

* Cost to provide $10,000 per year to everyone: $3.14T

* Current US military spending: $0.8T

* Current US education spending: $1T

* Basic income + education + mil = $4.94T

* $4.94T vs $6.3T

[1][http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/](http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/)

~~~
lazyjones
> _Basic income + education + mil = $4.94T_

What's the point of this? Do you think all government spending except military
and education is obsoleted by basic income?

~~~
alexeisadeski3
Basic income (replacing pensions, welfare, healthcare), military, education
are the three most expensive government functions.

------
j1z0
It seems to me it's just a matter or priority. The line share of US Gov
spending is Healthcare (+ medicare / medicare) covert that to a BI + take a
bit out of defines and "income protection / veteran benefits" and you wouldn't
have to raise taxes at all.

The question is would it be more effective than "specialised" programs, and
all the literature I have read seems to say yes (although, it's all based on
educated guesses). So switch all the "specialised" programs to BI plus take a
bit extra from defense and your there.

What's more important? Total domination of all oceans in the world, or peoples
happiness? (Assuming that BI actually works as described in the article)

------
ethana
Basic income already exist for some people, it's extended unemployment checks
+ food-stamps.

~~~
Adam503
If a person were getting 10x the amount a person gets on unemployment + food
stamps, you might be able to call that basic income.

Please show us all how a person living in a US city could survive on food
stamps, ethana.

~~~
ethana
this guy:
[http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2568109/Unemployed-b...](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2568109/Unemployed-
beach-bum-uses-food-stamps-eat-lobster-drives-Escalade-says-help-make-
millions.html)

~~~
brenschluss
anecdotes != data

~~~
ethana
The 47 millions food-stamp recipients disagree with you.

~~~
boomlinde
I am glad that someone is speaking up on their behalf, but I don't get your
point. Have you spoken to each of these 47 million individuals? Are you one of
them? Are you just letting your butt do the talking? We'll never know.

------
nnq
One problem with BI is the potential future overpopulation problem making it
unsustainable even for rich countries. The solution is quite simple though,
but I don't guess people would accept it: if you have more than two children
per family, you loose the BI (forever, for live, you are never eligible for it
again, even if your children die).

A bigger one is the global context: the retoric in poorer countries could very
easily get to "those rich smucks with their strong army and everything have so
much money they can even pay the slackers who do nothing! while we are milked
by their corporations and can't even afford clean water for all!" and then you
know what happens next...

------
sukuriant
I've read this thread; and I think my biggest hope here is the realization in
the bureaucrats that are afraid of losing their job ... that they'll be
getting money anyway because the basic income will provide their money now.

~~~
Adam503
The only means by which corruption can fought and reduced all involve
bureaucracy by definition.

------
ceocoder
just an aside - this is the first time I've seen a TLD this long actually
being used...

interesting.

------
euroclydon
I think we are severely overestimating the panacea that is the future. When we
run out of gas to fuel automobiles and natural gas to make fertilizer from, it
will make us all poorer. Our problem is not just that we need to transition to
electric automobiles or sustainable agriculture, rather it's that we have no
replacement for the free portable liquid and gas energy that we take out of
the ground every day.

We'd be better off planning for the reduction in carrying capacity of the
human race that will ensue as fossil fuels wane, instead of trying to find
more efficient ways to distribute all of our newfound wealth and production.

------
evjim
Thomas Paine makes a good point for citizen's dividend in his pamphlet
"Agrarian Justice".
[http://www.ssa.gov/history/paine4.html](http://www.ssa.gov/history/paine4.html)

Now that we live in a civilized state and people own all the property, it
makes it impossible for one to live in a natural state. So, he argues property
owners owe a tax to everyone reaching maturity. That way everyone has a chance
to acquire property, education, or what not to live successfully in a
civilized state.

------
brunooo
Tom Streithorsts excellent piece also was published yesterday:

[http://lareviewofbooks.org/essay/road-to-
recovery](http://lareviewofbooks.org/essay/road-to-recovery)

------
dola
This is actually a very current topic right now in Switzerland. There will a
national vote to decide if every Swiss citizen should get a basic income of
2500 swiss francs (approximately 2700$) a month. Some interesting details can
be read in this (kind of) recent article (most other ones are in German)
[http://themindunleashed.org/2014/03/swiss-pay-basic-
income-2...](http://themindunleashed.org/2014/03/swiss-pay-basic-
income-2500-francs-per-month-every-adult.html)

------
jimktrains2
Aside: I don't know how I feel about all these new TLDs...

~~~
johnduhart
[http://fucking.domains/](http://fucking.domains/)

~~~
jimktrains2
<3 that the Google Analytic script (in-page, not even counting the download)
is larger than the content.

------
drblast
I'm baffled by the logic of people who recoil at the idea of a basic income
because it's "socialist", but if you were to ask many of them if lowering
taxes for nearly everyone by X% is a good idea, they'd scream "YEAH! Money is
much more efficient in people's hands!"

Maybe if you don't call it a basic income and call it a guaranteed tax rebate
instead we'd get everyone on board.

------
Kiro
If the incentive to work at McDonald’s decreases to a point where they either
need to raise the wages or automate large parts of their process, won't that
lead to a possibility where McDonald’s ceases to exist or becomes a luxury
item?

It's not very unlikely that they won't be able to automate their business and
the only option is to raise the wages. With raised wages they will need to
increase their prices.

~~~
jsmeaton
They won't need to raise their wages though. BI takes care of the minimum
amount to survive, and McDonalds wages provides "extra" money. BI essentially
takes over as the "minimum" part of the minimum wage, and low wage jobs become
a lot more attractive (than they are currently).

------
grondilu
I'd love the idea of a basic income as a replacement for all the bureaucratic
nightmare of various state subsidies and benefits, but we all know this is not
what is going to happen.

They'll give basic income but soon they'll establish exceptions for some
categories of people that will receive something more. Then an othe category,
then an other.

In the end it will be exactly like before, except it will cost much more.

------
mamcx
This will not break, for example, because everyone know that everyone must be
able to pay higher rents? Where I live (Colombia) if the basic income become
5% at the start of the year then everything is 5-10% more costly.

If I get (fixed) 100/month and everyone else too, then the rent will be
(surely) X+100. This is happening now, the economy is accelerating and
everything is rising up.

------
yetanotherphd
No, it's time for something proven: Australian style welfare. Maybe in 50
years time, it will be time for basic income.

The problem with giving people free money, is it reduces the incentive to
work. Australia, and other countries, have introduced systems with minimal
requirements for receiving welfare: making an effort to find a job, based on
simple objective criteria.

~~~
dllthomas
_" Australia, and other countries, have introduced systems with minimal
requirements for receiving welfare: making an effort to find a job, based on
simple objective criteria."_

That's more or less the situation in the US at present, as I understand it. We
all want people doing useful things, but this kind of system 1) means that the
benefit of _finding_ that job (for those at the bottom) is substantially less
than it is under BI, and 2) we're requiring people focus not on their job
search or on preparing themselves for work but on _documenting_ their job
search and jumping through bureaucratic hoops - hopefully there is substantial
overlap but when do we ever measure exactly what we intend to?

------
NoPiece
Question for the liberals who support this. Would you honestly be willing to
get rid of social security, welfare, unemployment, earned income tax credit,
food stamps, student loans, pell grants, and all the other entitlement
programs? If so, I might support it, even if it cost more, just to get rid of
all the government social engineering.

~~~
dredmorbius
NB: Social Security is arguably fairly close to how a basic income system
might work:

• It's not means-tested. It's available to (nearly all) citizens. Exceptions
include some workers classified under the Railroad Retirement Act, and the
self-employed.

• It's funded from taxes assessed over your working life. Actually, BI would
likely take this one step further, as there's an income cap to SSI
contributions. Lifting that cap would make SSI more BI-like.

As to the rest of your points: with universal healthcare, you'd eliminate the
need for means-tested medical assistance. With universal higher education,
you'd eliminate PELL Grants (already pretty limited -- most college financial
aid is now in the form of loans, with their own class of problems). BI would
directly address the goals of welfare and food stamps, and EITC is effectively
BI in limited dress.

I'd be open for programs which _do_ address specific remaining needs: say,
treating drug addiction as a public health, not a criminal, problem (though
drugs trafficking might still fall under the latter in cases), and other
programs addressing those with specific needs (health, disability, etc.). But
yes, you'd be wiping out a large class of present means-tested programs.

------
kosei
Pardon my ignorance, but how does this differ from an earned income tax
credit?

[http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/03/03/buffett-minimum-
wag...](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/03/03/buffett-minimum-wage-tax-
credit_n_4889519.html)

~~~
sstrudeau
The EITC and a basic income are actually very similar in effect. The
difference is largely in the mechanism of distribution. With a basic income,
every citizen gets a check every month. With an EITC you get it in a lump with
your tax refund, if you qualify for it.

------
msh
I wonder why none of the calls for basic income considers how inflation and
prices would be affected.

------
ozten
If you have a hard time overcoming your gut reaction to this proposal, I'd
recommend the book Debt: the first 5000 years

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debt:_The_first_5000_Years](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debt:_The_first_5000_Years)

------
Oculus
>>It is the most efficient possible form of wealth redistribution because
there is no bureaucratic overhead needed. More money reaches the poor
directly.

Unfortunately, the exact opposite will occur with an entirely new three letter
agency being responsible for the distribution.

------
stasy
If this were the case, many people would just not work, and rely on the
monthly checks.

------
shurcooL
I really really support this. IMO it would make this world so much more fun to
live in.

------
Adam503
I agree.

Unemployment runs no lower that 70% among disabled people in the best of
times.

Anyone that is not literally perfect (beautiful, slim, brilliant, healthy,
emotionally well centered) faces huge obstacles from the powers that be in our
society.

~~~
stcredzero
Don't forget, in some cases, young.

------
muuh-gnu
> What are the definite benefits of Basic Income?

> It is the most efficient possible form of wealth redistribution

So it is just another deceptive label for outright communism, directly out of
Marx/Mao/Stalin's playbook. Nice.

------
gregcrv
Another missed advantage: it moves the job market from demand/supply type of
market to easy/difficult type of market: the highest paid jobs will be the
ones nobody wants to do.

~~~
ryandrake
That would mean the CEO would be the lowest paid employee at every company.

~~~
dllthomas
I'm not sure if this is intended as snark at CEOs, criticism of the notion
that a shift would occur, criticism of the notion that a shift _should_ occur,
or just general extrapolation.

Personally, I expect we would see unpleasant jobs become more expensive than
they currently are, and pleasant jobs become less expensive than they
currently are. I think it's tremendously unlikely that this effect would be so
dramatic that "the CEO would be the lowest paid employee at every company",
even accepting the implicit assumption that CEO is the least unpleasant job
(which seems false).

------
rdl
It would be fun to start this with an epsilon per year per person basic income
(maybe global, and higher ones per nation or other group). Add to it as you
wish.

------
discardorama
I'm curious: has there been any study done on how much money is spent on the
bureaucracy surrounding the myriad social programs?

------
stevenwagner
[http://www.georgeoughttohelp.com](http://www.georgeoughttohelp.com)

------
ArkyBeagle
"What are people _for_?" \- Kurt Vonnegut, "Player Piano", 1952. 19 _52_ ,
people.

 _Sigh_

------
Mistone
off topic but by far the most interesting comment thread I've read on HN in a
long time.

------
briantakita
Basic Income the only way to prevent the black market from taking over for
many people.

------
lukasm
bureaucratic overhead with proper tech is close to zero. Basic Icome is too a
big leap in social and political context. I am very much in favour of Minimal
Activity proposition. It's way more easier to implement.

~~~
Adam503
There is no way to reduce corruption in society without regulations and
bureaucracy.

------
jpeg_hero
I would like it if my children could peruse poetry... If you know the quote.

------
rubyfan
Get a job.

------
makosdv
Let's just discourage people from earning a living even more....

~~~
dllthomas
For those at the margin currently receiving conditional support, a transition
to unconditional support discourages people from earning a living
_substantially less_.

------
javajosh
BI is required if we ever went to a flat tax, which I firmly support.

------
stretchwithme
I encourage fans of this idea to experiment with it. Find a complete stranger
and give him a guaranteed income if he abstains from government programs. Come
back in five years and share your results.

As for me, I don't wish to be forced into running your experiment.

~~~
dllthomas
Experiments have been done, and have shown good results. I've no objection to
further experimentation, but at some point we should implement the policy that
looks best. There is, mathematically speaking, clearly some non-empty set of
optimal values for a Basic Income. How confident are you that $0 is in that
set, even in the face of argument (from not just the modern left, but also
Thomas Paine and Milton Friedman and some modern Libertarians) and experiment?

~~~
stretchwithme
Go for it then. Hope its worth your money.

~~~
dllthomas
Yeah, I think you're aware of why you're full of it, here...

------
sunseb
I think that digital currencies is the way to go to test this idea.

~~~
dllthomas
Perhaps, but I'm not convinced they help as much as it appears. The biggest
difficulty is the need to establish uniqueness of an _individual_ to the
network, which is really difficult without some centralization.

------
tsotha
Instead of a basic income, let's have a guaranteed minimum wage job, where
people can pick up trash and do landscaping on public property. You can have
your basic income, but you have to work for it.

~~~
jsmeaton
There aren't enough jobs for EVERYONE to be employed though. The number of
unskilled jobs is going to shrink as automation and efficiency increases.
Also, not everyone is capable of working, like the disabled etc.

~~~
tsotha
There will always be enough jobs if the government is paying. It may not be
something that's worth what the recipient is getting paid, but there's always
something to do. Picking up trash, road work, landscaping, sorting trash for
recycling, etc.

Also, most of the disabled are capable of doing something. A guy in a
wheelchair can man the desk at a library, for instance.

------
donkeysmuggler
Make economic inheritance tax 100% with allowances for personal, sentimental
items etc. Distribute the resources amongst public works projects and personal
resource funds for each citizen.

------
aalpbalkan
Totally off-topic: What a domain name...

------
Thiz
It is time for basic government.

------
JonFish85
I may be missing something important, but at a glance there are about 140M
jobs in the US. If we gave each of the ~320M US citizens $20k/yr, that comes
out to roughly $6.4T/year as mentioned elsewhere in this thread.

If there are roughly 140M jobs, presumably there are 140M people working those
jobs, meaning that there are approximately 140M people who must cover that
$6.4T, which works out to be ~$46k/yr for each working person.

If we assume we can completely wipe the following off the books: Social
Security ($773M), Income Security ($541M) and Medicare ($471M), the net cost
per year drops to $4.6T/yr, which works out to be ~$33k/yr for each working
person.

Total federal income tax[1] in 2013 was around $1.3T (Individual) + $273B
(Corporate) = $1.59T. An increase from $1.59T to $6.2T is about a 290% _net
increase_.

I did some very rough spreadsheet-math with [2] and [3] and came up with the
following. If we didn't tax the $20k at all, and left everything the same as
last year, the bottom 77% would be a net negative of ~$1.2T assuming all of
their income tax went directly to pay for the $20k.

I assumed that the number of people in the top 2% made the same average salary
as the top 1% in [4], and came up with the top 2% of income tax payers as
being a net positive of $1.4T. I made that assumption just to make the math
easy and to err on the side of optimism.

The 78-98 percentile come out to be a net positive of approximately $350B.

Looking back at the $1.3T federal income tax total for individuals, this would
mean that after the $20k/person was paid for, the total federal income tax
dollars would be roughly $600B (Individual income tax) + $273B (Corporate
income tax) = $873B.

Looking at [5], it seems that there was a $3.803T - $2.902T = $901B deficit
last year. If we knock off the difference in income tax revenues ($1.59T -
$873B = $717B), then suddenly we have a $901B + $717B = $1.618T deficit again.

This all assumes that jobs stay constant, of course. I realize that all of
these numbers are very rough, but I had some fun doing spreadsheet math so I
figured I would share!

[1] [http://www.usgovernmentrevenue.com](http://www.usgovernmentrevenue.com)
[2]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Household_income_in_the_United_...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Household_income_in_the_United_States)
[3]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rate_schedule_(federal_income_t...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rate_schedule_\(federal_income_tax\))
[4]
[http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/attachments/...](http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/attachments/44604-AverageTaxRates.pdf)
[5]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_United_States_federal_budg...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_United_States_federal_budget)

~~~
whyme
The number of variables to account for are far greater than the number of
ideas coming from within comments here.

I'll give you just one to try and add to your spreadsheet: When you add a
saftey net and provide money to those that, otherwise, would not have it to
spend you obviously increase government revenue through new employment and
taxation. How would you quantify that increase? I don't think anyone can say,
but it would happen and it would be significant.

------
stevenwagner
see georgeoughttohelp.com

------
a8da6b0c91d
If anything like basic income happens expect immigration to be halted and
birthright citizenship grants to be ended. The value and meaning of
citizenship will rapidly change and tolerance for outsiders taking a slice of
the pie will rapidly plunge. I think there will be a lot of ramifications like
this that most people probably aren't considering.

~~~
derefr
Alaska has its Permanent Fund Dividend, which is a kind of basic income coming
from state oil sales. How hard is it to get Alaskan citizenship?

~~~
chavesn
Um, one small difference, you have to be a resident of Alaska for at least a
year, intend to remain a permanent resident and not be absent more than 180
days without a valid reason. [1]

[1]:
[http://pfd.alaska.gov/Eligibility/EligibilityRequirements](http://pfd.alaska.gov/Eligibility/EligibilityRequirements)

~~~
alexeisadeski3
In what way is that a difference?

~~~
MBlume
Living in Alaska for a year is a steeper obstacle than living most places.

------
demoncore
I just spent a year living in South Western France which is the most socialist
part of France. (I'm a US citizen based here most of the time and I'm a CEO).

If you want to see the result of wealth redistribution, go check it out
yourself. You'll meet young men and women in the prime of their lives who
spend their entire day in a coffee shop and later a bar, sipping a beverage
discussing art, culture, poetry, how business - all business exploits the
proletariat, and how government owes them even more than the roughly $25K per
year they get for doing nothing. Then go talk to the entrepreneurs in the same
district and learn where those wages originate and what it costs business both
in taxes and their ability to find and retain staff.

I can assure you that the restful classes are alive and well and are waiting
for this idea to take root and flower into contempt for innovation,
entrepreneurship and hard work with a massive drain on those who do
contribute.

~~~
ende
I agree with you. So don't tax the innovators and entrepreneurs. Leave their
income alone. Tax the land owners who generate wealth for themselves while
contributing nothing to society. Tax the unproductive rent-seeking wealth of
those who attain their position not through innovation but through dependence
on and manipulation of the political class. Institute a land value tax and
leave productive incomes free from taxation. Let the landlords pay rent to
society in the form of a basic income for all.

Also, ban French.

~~~
stcredzero
_Tax the unproductive rent-seeking_

Underlying your position is the assumption that society can properly arbitrate
what is "unproductive rent-seeking" versus "socially destructive entitlement
culture." Depending on your circumstances, your opinion on what these things
are will differ, and in a democracy, the whims of the majority will win out,
regardless of economic reality.

------
benched
The idea that you absolutely must work hard in exchange for the necessities of
your life, is so deeply ingrained in our collective consciousness, like a
fundamental law of conservation, that it seems a lot of people cannot conceive
otherwise.

~~~
avmich
Twenty years ago a lot of people couldn't see themselves using a cellphone or
an Internet.

~~~
enraged_camel
I think this is different, though. They did not have any moral objections to
cellphones or Internet. They simply lacked imagination.

~~~
MacsHeadroom
What if said moral objections stem from a lack of imagination?

~~~
rescripting
Cellphones and the Internet were adopted on a person by person basis. It
became easy to imagine yourself with them once the neighbour got it.

Basic Income takes much more buy in from more people to get off the ground.

I like the idea of it being attempted on the city level though, I'd never
thought of that. It's likely the smallest scale that would work with the least
amount of individual buy in required.

~~~
llamataboot
It has been: [http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/1970s-manitoba-
povert...](http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/1970s-manitoba-poverty-
experiment-called-a-success-1.868562)

------
Eleutheria
Everything that goes against liberty is doomed to fail.

Miserably.

~~~
orthecreedence
Are you equating liberty to redistribution of wealth, or liberty to "I'M NOT
PAYING MORE TAXES SO FREELOADERS CAN SIT AROUND WATCHING TV?"

I don't see what you're trying to add.

~~~
nirnira
Liberty means allowing people to make their own decisions about how they live
and use their resources, as long as they're not infringing on the liberty of
others. It's a universal concept, not just tied to your vilification of
wealthy conservative people.

Thanks for the nasty stereotype though.

~~~
orthecreedence
> Thanks for the nasty stereotype though.

Sure, anytime.

------
Fasebook
Seems like a good idea to me, lets do it. We can always change it back if it
doesn't work out.

------
nirnira
A truly insane and stupid idea befitting an insane and stupid political
culture.

And lo and behold! Embraced with open arms by the Hacker News community. What
a surprise.

------
grondilu
As a owner of shares in the stock market, all I can say is that hopefully the
first politician who will try to pass such a law will get a bullet in the
head.

~~~
dllthomas
That is a horrific sentiment and you are a bad person.

