Universal Basic Income

[Belsnickel]

(01-13-2022, 03:59 PM)basballguy Wrote: Here we go again with your personal definition of "not doing enough" and "difficult to navigate".  How do you know they aren't doing enough?  Before covid, poverty and homlessness rates were steadily declining.  Welfare spending has tripled in the US over the last 20 years.  (https://roanoke.com/lifestyles/the-us-states-spending-the-most-on-welfare/collection_32a3bdb8-67bc-5b4a-ab63-36c146adaed3.html#1)

The US spends roughly 750bn a year right now on welfare...and that's going to people that need it.  How much do you think that's going to be if we started giving everyone money...especially the ones that don't need it?  

Again, you'll get no argument on the "we can do better" front.  We can always do better.  However, giving everyone in America a UBI of say 1k/month or 5k/year or whatever.....when you're only trying to help 10-15% of America....is not practical.  

I have discussed how in many models there are mechanisms in place that mean if you don't need the money, you aren't getting it. UBI can actually save money due to administrative cost reductions.

As for the rates going down, they do fluctuate. However, there are better models out there that could make them lower. That's the point of looking at policies like UBI. We could be doing better by adopting better policies.