
Many Kenyans refusing basic income experiment - Todd
http://www.businessinsider.com/givedirectly-basic-income-experiment-unexpected-trouble-2016-9
======
labster
When I first read the headline, I saw "Many Keynesians refusing basic income
experiment", which confused me because I thought Keynes fans would totally go
for UBI.

But yeah, free money looks a lot like colonialism if you squint. I can see
people avoiding it. You get $500 a month now, and then 3 months later, they
come asking for a "favor" in return, and it would be a shame if something
happened to your kneecaps. This is not reality of course, but let's just say
I've been trained to avoid emails offering me free money in the past.

~~~
elementalest
That is something I had never considered. If many people become dependent on
UBI, they are entirely dependent on the state - to the point they can be taken
advantage of if power is abused. UBI in some ways does take an element of
freedom from people, granted it may provide other forms of freedom.

What is to stop the government from changing the laws to require everyone only
on UBI (no job) to perform some form of community service for a set number of
hours per year. What i to stop the government from increasing it further? So
whilst you may gain security for the basic living needs, you may trade it for
a less freedom.

~~~
ahoy
The same thing that, presumably, stops government from doing those things now
- voters.

That's not to say that system of checks works. Places like Florida have
enacted mandatory drug testing for welfare recipients, so there's obviously
some political will to punish and regulate the poor.

~~~
elementalest
It not the kind of thing that would happen suddenly, but gradually. A little
change here, a little change there and after 10 years, its changed a lot.

All it would take is the right political climate and circumstances, combined
with ad campaigns and lots of lobbying. Many arguments would be put forth to
convince people a minor change is a good thing, that due to the current
circumstances, its necessary. Many people would likely agree, despite the risk
it opens up the potential for the system to be abused with another minor
change in the future. And its voted through by popular demand.

A few years later, the political climate changes and the government isn't
perhaps as trustworthy/predictable as it might have once been.

Now of course it could go the other way. However, power creep rarely goes
backwards.

------
sangnoir
Different cultures have different attitudes towards gifts and favors: which
the Basic income could be classified as one by the recipients. I suspect the
researchers did not take this into consideration.

In some cultures, gifts are just that, and have no strings attached. Yet in
others, gifts create an obligation to the recipient to 'return the favor' at a
later date, so accepting a gift is a liability. A lot of research has been
done in this area, comparing different cultures[1] or focusing on a specific
one [2]

1\.
[http://web.stanford.edu/~jacksonm/socialquilts.pdf](http://web.stanford.edu/~jacksonm/socialquilts.pdf)

2\.
[http://www.japanintercultural.com/en/news/default.aspx?newsI...](http://www.japanintercultural.com/en/news/default.aspx?newsID=266)

------
rusanu
I'm speculating and have no evidence, but my thinking is that offering money
with no strings attached is a threat to those that offer money (or other help)
_with_ strings attached. Spreading rumors would be a defense strategy to
protect those interests.

~~~
fsiefken
Hi Rusanu, some people or subcultures have a higher propensity to magical
thinking. In Kenya for example all kinds of conspiracy theories exist about
the origin of AIDS. There doesn't need to be an extra agency that
intentionally spreads disinformation to explain this phenomenon. That there
are agencies involved in this type of manipulations in general is a fact
though, not sure who the parties would be that are threatened by this. NGO's
would welcome reliable results I think

Also read this: [http://www.nationalreview.com/article/427625/no-fbi-didnt-
cr...](http://www.nationalreview.com/article/427625/no-fbi-didnt-create-
chicagos-street-gangs-kevin-d-williamson)

~~~
PostOnce
Counterpoint: [https://harpers.org/archive/2016/04/legalize-it-
all/](https://harpers.org/archive/2016/04/legalize-it-all/)

Nixon's Chief Domestic Advisor, quote:

“You want to know what this was really all about?” he asked with the bluntness
of a man who, after public disgrace and a stretch in federal prison, had
little left to protect. “The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House
after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand
what I’m saying? We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the
war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with
marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we
could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their
homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the
evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.”

This is not the only thing the government did, or continues to do, to destroy
various peoples' faith in it.

~~~
arkades
As I understand it, this "quote" was provided second-hand decades after it
happened, and only after Ehrlichman was no longer in a position to deny its
accuracy (read: dead and in the ground). Harpers is probably one of the few
places where that sort of thing that could get past editorial scrutiny. (Or,
maybe not, maybe I'm just being insufficiently cynical.)

And yet between here and reddit, I think I see this pop up every other week.

~~~
PostOnce
Even if it turns out to be untrue, what does it say that it sounds so
plausible/believable, so many people are quoting it?

Either way, it seems people don't have a lot of faith in the government, and
there are plausible examples of things the government has done to put itself
in this situation.

Another example from the same era, gulf of tonkin incident. It doesn't matter
what it costs the people at the bottom if the people at the top get what they
want, that's the impression I think many of us are left with.

~~~
tdb7893
To play devil's advocate the thing that could make it sound so plausible is
confirmation bias.

------
Todd
This seems like the kind of surprising result that the scientific method begs
for. Instead of trying to understand it, or profit from its prevalence, the
organization is attempting to reduce it.

It doesn't seem likely that this type of thing will be a long term concern,
but perhaps something can be learned about how society adapts if a significant
subset decline the payment.

~~~
Normal_gaussian
To be blunt it shows how out of touch those involved are. Firstly they
obviously had very little understanding of African / 3rd world culture,
secondly they haven't considered what we do when people offer us free stuff.

Consider if somebody walked up to you and offered to pay you 6k/mo, you would
be insane not to question it. And in a country where "free stuff" doesn't
happen, where corruption and entrapment are common, you would also be insane
to accept it.

Several of my friends have spent time in 3rd world countries. Most had the
modern, egotistical, charity tour and I would suspect that their particular
brand of experience is what the experiment used.

There are many well run charities and organisations operating in these
countries which fully understand the problems of interacting with people there
and would have seen this situation a mile off. Those that have spent time with
these charities have rightly laughed at my naivety and false superiority when
talking about problems those countries face.

The upshot is - this is _not_ a surprising result, this could have been
expected and appears not to have been due to the poor practice of the
organisation running the experiment. They are jeopardising their own
experiment and have dealt a blow to both its credibility and the credibility
of other BI experiments which already suffer from accusations of low quality
science and superiority complexes. This is the long term concern.

~~~
dilemma
How their local representative responds is troubling:

>They find it "hard to believe that a new organization like GiveDirectly would
give roughly a year's salary in cash, unconditionally," Le writes. "As a
result, many people have created their own narratives to explain the cash,
including rumors that the money is associated with cults or devil worship."

Le creates his own narrative about the locals as less educated and less
civilized than himself - why else would they refuse his charity?

It is clear that neither he nor his organization see the locals as equals.

~~~
TazeTSchnitzel
What makes you think Le is imagining this?

~~~
dilemma
Where's the substance? What do you know that makes you think it's fact?

~~~
TazeTSchnitzel
The phrasing does not imply it's a hypothetical, so why do you think it's
_not_ true? Do you believe they're lying?

------
hacksonx
Perhaps not the biggest reason behind the refusal but the fact that it is
mentioned warrants discussion. Che Guevara is said to have travelled to the
Congo to train Guerrilla militia there and stopped when instead of focussing
on training, the people focused on voodoo magic to protect them. A similar
phenomena was witnessed in South Africa with the Marikina massacre of 2012,
where miners believed that herbs provided by a witchdoctor would make them
invisible.

The best approach to such situations is, as the organisation is following, to
educate the people. It might be hard with low literacy levels but it's
possible, especially for a cash studded organisation such as theirs.

 _edit: Fixed Gorilla to Guerrilla_

~~~
gioele
> A similar phenomena was witnessed in South Africa with the Marikina massacre
> of 2012, where miners believed that herbs provided by a witchdoctor would
> make them invisible.

The US market for homeopathic products was $6.4 billion in 2013:
[http://www.pharmacytimes.com/publications/issue/2013/Septemb...](http://www.pharmacytimes.com/publications/issue/2013/September2013/Homeopathic-
Products-A-Growing-Segment-in-OTC)

In Italy, post-earthquake survivors are being provided homeopathic products:
[http://www.ilpost.it/2016/08/27/regione-marche-terremoto-
ome...](http://www.ilpost.it/2016/08/27/regione-marche-terremoto-omeopatia/)

Credulous people are everywhere.

~~~
zdkl
Surely you understand the difference between middle class people taking some
sugar and people believing unwaveringly that herbs will protect them from that
shotgun.

~~~
sangnoir
> Surely you understand the difference between middle class people taking some
> sugar and people believing unwaveringly that herbs will protect them from
> that shotgun.

I don't understand it; please spell it out for me because all I see is magical
thinking. If you think homeopathy isn't a matter of life and death, you might
have not considered the people whose lives could have been saved had they
turned to real medicine.

~~~
zdkl
I'd love to hear from negative consequences _directly attributable_ to
homeopathy and not caused by the state of mind of those seeking it
exclusively.

~~~
phessler
Steve Jobs and Jim Henson

~~~
zdkl
...neither of which had access to 'common'/appropriately researched medicine
of course

------
zzzcpan
Aren't those basic income experiments kind of useless?

Giving people money for a limited time doesn't give them the notion, that they
can rely on the money supply for the rest of their lives. They still have to
earn an equivalent sum once the supply stops and make their decisions
accordingly.

~~~
UVDMAS
This UBI experiment is novel because, GiveDirectly, the non-profit
implementing this experiment, plans giving recipients UBI for more than 10
years.

------
Rustydave
I understand why people don't want to take this money. Basically, here in
Kenya we're brought up in a way that there is nothing for free, you have to
work to get what you want. So someone giving you free money is very suspicious
there must be something they want in turn.

~~~
skybrian
Yes, it's understandable that people are suspicious. But before, GiveDirectly
was able to convince them that it's not a scam so it's a bit surprising that
it didn't work this time.

~~~
zouhair
White people giving free money never ends well most of the time, especially in
Africa.

------
DanielBMarkham
Interesting.

I have no desire to dump on UBI -- I want to see how these various experiments
pan out -- but I am reminded of a thought experiment.

Imagine it's 10,000 years ago. You arrive in pre-history with all of the
technology of today: electricity, communication, medicine, automation, and so
on. Your mission? To destroy mankind.

Assuming infinite resources, how would you go about doing it? Sure, you could
build out an infrastructure, create a robotic army, and begin hunting humans
down. Or, you could build out about the same amount of infrastructure and just
give people whatever they want: food, housing, warmth, and so on. After all,
what would a bunch of hunter-gathers really want? It'd probably be easier than
hunting them all down and fighting them. As long as you're not under any time
pressure, what's the difference between killing them immediately and waiting
four or five hundred years for them to stop breeding?

The premise of UBI is that this would not eventually eliminate the species,
that individuals here and there would still learn new skills and advance
knowledge. The main criticism of UBI (aside from the moral one) is that while
stress and struggle for individuals can be a terrible thing, for the species
as a whole it results in evolutionary survival.

It will be interesting to watch these populations over time to see how
adaptive they are compared with control groups.

~~~
skybrian
Oh come on, what is this crap? You are talking about people like they're
almost subhuman. People more more adaptable than that. Maybe not everyone, but
at least some will take any advantage they get and put it to good use, and the
rest will follow.

"Primitive" people are most likely smarter and harder working than you.
Surviving off hunting is not easy - you have to know a lot about the
environment you're in.

Also, historically many scientists were well off people who did it as a hobby.
By this theory they should have done nothing with their lives.

~~~
DanielBMarkham
_"...You are talking about people like they're almost subhuman...."_

Anything but. The fact is, I am not looking at individuals. I am looking at
the population. A population is not a human.

You make a good point. When we talk about UBI, the relevant examples should be
the independently wealthy. Many have done great things with their lives. Some
have destroyed themselves. Some have had positive effects on others,
encouraging them to also do better. Some have had negative effects on others,
causing despair or disillusionment.

Why the difference?

Beats me. So let's experiment.

On a personal level, we should always be kind and treat people with respect
and love. But that doesn't make any of these population questions go away.

------
mulle_nat
Some people want to live their own lives and not be dependent on "gifts" from
someone else.

------
dahart
I think just as many Americans would refuse basic income too.

"experts say that Americans –- going back as far as Colonial times, when
Elizabethan poor laws were in vogue — have never favored unlimited government
handouts that are not contingent upon work."

[http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/12/10/why-do-
american...](http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/12/10/why-do-americans-
still-hate-welfare/)

Personally, I'd also be afraid to start something like that, since it's would
end abruptly, and could easily end early if research funding runs out.

Plus, we're all conditioned to know there's no free lunch - someone who offers
one is probably hiding something. There are probably strings attached, any
reasonable person might be forgiven for thinking.

It doesn't seem surprising at all that people in Kenya or elsewhere are
skeptical.

~~~
skybrian
I can understand some skepticism because when people offer free money it's
usually some kind of scam. But would you really refuse free money just because
you don't think you could handle it responsibly? You couldn't even handle
giving it away?

------
pipio21
"Too good to be true" is a valid concern. When someone gives you something for
free, this person could have further objectives that you don't see now, but
will become evident later.

It is well know the drug dealer strategy of "The first dose is free, until you
become hooked. This equally applies to a lot of products we use today.

For example when Facebook started giving a very good service for free it was a
bargain. Basically a useful service for free with no strings attachment, no
advertising, all paid with investor's money.

Then they started gradually monetizing the people to levels that a new
participant in Facebook would consider obnoxious, but being gradual people has
gotten used to it and consider totally normal. In some ways now you are forced
to be in Facebook because your social circle is in Facebook, you are hooked
now.

For a service like Facebook I certainly prefer to pay and my data or personal-
social information be mine.

In the same way, making your income dependent on some external entity makes
yourself lose your independence and your freedom from this entity.

Never forget that an entity powerful enough to give you most of your income
has to be equally useful to take, steal, or seize the income of someone else,
those who create the wealth.

This has been done and it is called "socialism". It is nothing new. Part of my
family had to ask for a car or a house or a TV to the Government because
"everybody had equal rights to it". Of course some were "more equal than
others" and my family will wait for years for his totally shit car or house,
but the people near power will get it instantly, and their houses, cars or TVs
will be great because whatever excuse(like because you are in the Party's dome
you need the best TV or car for your job).

For my family to have this "right" meant giving away most of their income in
taxes and earn a misery compared to other West societies for equal jobs like
being engineer or University teacher.

As an example today you can't earn more than 30 dollars or so in Cuba, that is
the limit you have, you can be a doctor or engineer. The only rich people in
Cuba are the Communist, but not officially of course, officially they earn 30
dollars like everybody else.

I consider this movement to "basic income" neosocialism. There are powerful
entities like Central Banks that want to go back to a centralized economy,
they being in charge of the new system, of course.

In my opinion, the way to face the "robots taking our jobs" is to share the
ownership of the means of productions(the robots and computers), locally, but
never globally.

~~~
dajohnson89
You lost me at the last paragraph. Could you elaborate on what you mean by
local means of production?

------
bsbechtel
Maybe people really do have an innate sense of ethics that tell them if
they're receiving free money, it means it's being taken from somewhere else.

~~~
Noseshine
The world is not a zero sum game and handing out free money is a proven
concept - as long as the recipients are big firms and banks... you already
forgot the "financial crisis" and the entire last decade?

Money does not work in such simplistic ways except for on a tiny scale, for
example within the circle of family and friends. Already when you take out a
credit your sentence becomes untrue: Debt is created by commercial banks out
of thin air - _you yourself_ "pay" for it, because the "debt" promise you give
is worth as much as the money you get (plus interest).

When a government hands out "free money" the promise is not direct but
indirect but essentially the same: They think that the money will "pay for
itself" in the end through economic activity that would otherwise never
happen. This is the same thing that happens with _every single credit_ , only
that then the responsibility for "repayment" is only one step removed instead
of an indefinite amount.

In this context (about the nature of modern money, not UBI), before anyone
wants to tell me money for credit comes from other people's savings, I
recommend reading "Money Creation in the Modern Economy" (2014) written by the
Bank of England. I link to the Guardian article by Graeber, the actual PDF is
linked near the beginning of that article though, but it has a summary on page
one where it already supports the main points of the article.

[https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/mar/18/truth-...](https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/mar/18/truth-
money-iou-bank-of-england-austerity)

    
    
        > It's this understanding that allows us to continue to talk about money as if it were 
        > a limited resource like bauxite or petroleum, to say "there's just not enough money" 
        > to fund social programmes, to speak of the immorality of government debt or of public 
        > spending "crowding out" the private sector. What the Bank of England admitted this 
        > week is that none of this is really true.

~~~
wcummings
>The world is not a zero sum game

This is only true as long as there is economic growth.

~~~
witty_username
Any trade is non zero sum, infact it's beneficial for both people. If I trade
one pepe meme for 1$, it's mutually beneficial and each person got something
better.

~~~
bsbechtel
Taxing people and redistributing the money (as BI or other) is not trade,
however, and it is zero sum.

------
norea-armozel
I think the fact that strangers are giving "free money" anywhere in the world
results in rejection isn't surprising. I don't think the specific excuses
aren't unusual either because how many times have we've seen similar scams in
the US? I know as someone who's been poor I've had people try to give me
supposedly "free money" only later on ask me a favor or try some other
nonsense like proselytize me. It's just not worth the risk if you think about
it. I hope the organization continues to improve how they inform people
because I think UBI is a good idea. I just think you have to think like a poor
person where every gift is just a deposit on a favor in the future.

------
DavidWanjiru
"Many Kenyans refusing basic income."

I'm not sure how representative this project is. I mean, if someone tried a
pilot project in San Antonio, would the results of that project be taken as a
representative outcome for Texas or the United States? Remember, this
"sampling," such as it is, is different from the kind of sampling they do on
opinion polls, why they query a small but representative sample of the
population.

My guess as to why they're failing is that they're not clearly elucidating
their purposes and intentions. For instance, I can confirm to you that if you
came to Kenya where you gave, say, high milk-production breeds of cows to
dairy farmers, or any other similar thing with a clear quid (if not pro quo),
then the uptake would probably overwhelm you.

But with free basic income, it's a very counter-intuitive idea. What do you
mean you're giving me free money? Where is it coming from? What's your
intention? What do I have to do for it?

If they were to explain that they're conducting an experiment (I bet they're
not clear on that point) where they want to see what people would do with
their lives if they had a certain basic income guaranteed by someone (say,
government), then Kenyans would take you up on the offer, I'm sure. After all,
many Kenyans expect and often call upon the government to help in all kinds of
areas, so if you took that basic-income-provided-by-government angle as your
ultimate goal, I think people would listen.

That lack of clarity is what is most likely causing people to shun the money.

It's not that Kenyans don't want free money. We probably do. After all,we seem
to be very keen, for example, on these churches where you "plant a seed" (give
money to the church in exchange for "blessings"), and money given out during
political campaign seasons (we have one coming up next year) always seems to
be taken up very well. But in these cases, the financial logic is not clear.

Where is the logic with free basic income? If you don't clearly and
understandably explain that to people, you're going to fail. Especially if
when they ask you to explain and your response is something along the lines of
"Why do you care? It's free money, you sucker living below the poverty line."
(I'm not saying that's what happened. But I wouldn't be surprised if it was).

PS: Just because I'm Kenyan doesn't make me an expert, or even basic informed,
on Kenya. Just because you live in a country doesn't necessarily mean you
understand it. Exhibit A: Trump supporters. Exhibit B: Brexit.

Edit: typo.

~~~
ilaksh
I agree on both points. First I think the headline is wrong because this only
happened in one area of Kenya rather than reflecting the whole country. Also I
think it is almost certain they did not successfully communicate the purpose
and context.

Part of the context they might mention, since apparently it was only $30 per
month, is the income difference in the United States where even some
relatively lower-income individuals can afford to donate that. So to me a
program like this could partly be about reducing the overall income inequality
between countries. But at least if that income difference (how much money it
actually is in rich countries) is part of the explanation it may seem like it
is less likely to be an obligation.

------
dilemma
Ivan Illich's To hell with good intentions is applicable here:

[http://www.swaraj.org/illich_hell.htm](http://www.swaraj.org/illich_hell.htm)

------
PieterH
Given the "gift in one hand, gun in the other" history of western actions in
Kenya and other African countries over the last centuries, it's hardly
surprising there's going to be the random pocket of paranoid skepticism, no
matter how good the UBI marketing/education.

I'm personally confused as to why anyone would think it's a good idea to trial
UBI in Kenya, as a sort of private charity initiative, given the sordid
historical background. It cannot be feasible to get any meaningful data from
such projects. There is so much background noise.

Put the funding into microloans or (unfashionable in the west and yet a vital
layer in Africa's commercial middle class) labor organization (= unions).
Protect the free media and lobby for laws against corruption in politics.
Invest in documentation of the continuous crimes against the public interest.
Help break the sociopathic power elites that run most African capitals and
national economies. Invest in schools. Pay families that keep their children
in school. Create demand for local high technology skills, by looking for
local partners & experts before flying in foreigners. Name and shame
organizations that don't do this. Name and shame national and international
companies that overcharge for Internet, for transport, for medicines, for
books.

There are surely so many ways to spend money to help Africans continue to
break free of the grip of generations of thieves in power (as they are doing
in many countries), and pull themselves out of poverty.

In this context, UBI seems... extraordinarily misplaced, and I can't fault
people for refusing it.

~~~
michaelt

      There are surely so many ways to spend money
      to help Africans
    

Give Directly works on the theory (and they have some studies that seem to
back this up [1]) that the Africans know what they need better than you and I
do; and that they have the incentive to see donations spent in the most
effective way.

[1] [http://blog.givewell.org/2012/12/26/the-case-for-
cash-2/](http://blog.givewell.org/2012/12/26/the-case-for-cash-2/)

~~~
semi-extrinsic
On the contrary, there are a large number of examples from e.g. South African
shanty towns that if people living in tiny metal shacks with dirt floors get a
bit more disposable income, many prefer to stay where they are and buy
satellite TV and the latest iPhone rather than save that money to try and move
to a better place.

~~~
massysett
That's exactly the point. The satellite TV is cost-effective, high-value
entertainment. The iPhone is a supercomputer that offers information and
vastly improved communication with family and friends. Yet outsiders who think
they know better somehow believe that people are dumb to prefer an iPhone
rather than moving out of the shanty. Maybe the iPhone is a better marginal
buy than a better house.

~~~
SturgeonsLaw
That's right, and it reminds me of the people who scorn the homeless for
owning a laptop or smartphone. The opportunities that are unlocked by being
connected to the world's digital backbone are far more significant than the
benefits one would get from moving into slightly nicer accommodation.

~~~
internaut
Going from the specific to the general.

Are you denying that particular people or even groups of them could have
failure modes?

It seems like a reasonable proposition to me that humans have developed
strengths and weaknesses.

------
zekevermillion
I just got an email from Shroud of the Avatar last night -- apparently the
developers are worried about unequal SotA gold distribution and are
implementing some sort of UBI-like scheme in that game. Would be interested to
see how that works out, given the ideal virtual circumstances for enforcing
such a law (ie, no cheating or corruption possible).

------
Noos
I'm curious at about how much freedom the Kenyans have after they accept it.If
it's an experiment, there will be data collected. Having someone record every
purchase you make and giving you constant interviews or more for ten years
might be a lot of hassle.

------
known
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stockholm_syndrome](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stockholm_syndrome)

------
zouhair
This is not a Basic Income experiment. This is a foreign entity giving money
for a certain amount of time.

------
Falkon1313
One thing to note about these experiments is that they tend to paper over or
ignore both the Universal and the Basic parts of Universal Basic Income.
(Those are the hard parts.) They end up just experiments to see what happens
if you give some people a little money. In this case, what if 6,000 out of
45,000,000 people get $1 per day (which is about 1/9th the GDP PPP per capita)
for a limited time.

I don't know about the cost of living or employment situation in Kenya, but by
GDP PPP per capita, that calculates to about the equivalent of $17.42/day in
the U.S, or $522/month ($6,264/year). That's way below poverty level, and not
likely to cover housing, utilities, food, and healthcare anywhere in the U.S.
Of course, that would be helpful to anyone with low income, but it is not a
basic income. The situation may be different in Kenya, but by the math it
doesn't sound promising.

If it only affects 1/100 of 1% of the population, there is no way to observe
the societal effects of a universal income. That's a long way from universal.
Also, because it is an experiment rather than a social contract, there is no
way to observe what people will do if they have it as a safety net, because
they can't rely on it. To be fair, if it is going to run for 10 years, that's
something, but still not representative of lifetime security.

\---

Regarding the comments about poor people buying TVs and cellphones, etc. -
there are many reasons for this, but it really is utility and value. These
people aren't stupid. The economy works completely differently when you are
poor. Thinking that they should invest their $300 tax refund in a diversified
stock portfolio is nonsense. With fees of $10/transaction, they would lose
1/3rd of their money just buying into 10 cheap stocks, and an equivalent
amount selling it. They would need > 100% return just to break even.

Likewise, money in the bank is a liability. It detracts from foodstamp
allowances etc. But they don't send people around to appraise your TV when
they're calculating your foodstamps. And in a pinch, you have things that you
can trade, sell, or pawn. If you leave the money in the bank, it will be lost
to bills, bank fees, etc. And sure, you could have caviar and shrimp instead
of ramen and rice cakes, but it'd be gone as soon as the meal is done. A
stereo will still be there tomorrow.

Generally speaking, if you are working poor, trying to save up to improve your
position costs you and you lose. Buying things saves you money, maintains the
status quo, gets you things which you can sell in an emergency, and makes your
life better until then. Consider states of matter - solid, liquid, gas. Things
work quite differently depending on the state of matter. Likewise, the economy
works quite differently if you are lower class, middle class, or upper class.

Telling someone poor that they should spend their money more wisely is often
like telling someone trapped in ice that they should just swim up to the
surface. In the latter case, physics just doesn't work that way. In the former
case, economics just doesn't work that way.

