n_huffhines
What's it gonna cost?
- Joined
- Mar 11, 2009
- Messages
- 87,335
- Likes
- 52,507
Andrew Yang is running for POTUS mostly on the idea of universal basic income. Even though I love some things about him, like his promise to release all non-violent drug offenders, I’m not going to support him (he’s just too much of a gleeful central planner and an automation doomsdayer). But I don’t mean for this thread to be about whether or not any of us will support him, it’s about the concept of UBI, and if it can work. Here is his plan, more or less:
Every adult citizen of the United States gets $1K every month from the government.
Although the price tag is high (it would be about $3T per year; 248M x $1k x 12), $1.5T is already being spent on our current brand of socialism, in very, very ineffective ways. Current recipients of welfare would have a choice to keep their benefits or take the $1K. A value added tax (at half the European rate) imposed on businesses replacing workers with robots would generate $800B in revenue. The Roosevelt institute projects that putting $ into the hands of Americans would grow the economy by $2.4T (more than 10%) and create 4.6M new jobs. This would result in about $500-600B in new revenue. Savings from reducing public health care costs, incarceration (are you going to commit petty crimes if it might cost you $1k/month? A lot of petty criminals won’t), and homelessness are about $100-200B.
One of the things he doesn’t harp on enough is that our current system discourages people from working, because they get fewer benefits if they work. In this system, you get the $1k regardless.
I don’t know about his projections, but the point is conceptualizing it like that makes it seem possible to find the money without increasing the deficit. His whole basis for all of this is the fact that automation is changing everything and it’s going to wreck our economy. People have been warning about job replacement since the industrial revolution, and I’m not sure that how worried we should be. I’m more interested in the smarter government angle. He’s hyperfocused on trucker jobs (and retail). There are so many truckers and businesses built on serving truckers throughout small town America, and they’re all going to be up a creek when we have driverless trucks.
He had some good responses to criticisms, for example how distasteful welfare is to some Americans. He said we need to look at this as a dividend. We are all shareholders in the USA. Yeah, that sounds like PR ********, but he pointed out that nobody seems to mind the dividend Alaskans get. It’s the same exact concept.
His specific plan?...I don’t know if it’s the right plan, I doubt that it is. I don’t know if it’s the right time, either. But it seems clear to me there is a realistic world in which we could have UBI and see much better results from government spending.
Every adult citizen of the United States gets $1K every month from the government.
Although the price tag is high (it would be about $3T per year; 248M x $1k x 12), $1.5T is already being spent on our current brand of socialism, in very, very ineffective ways. Current recipients of welfare would have a choice to keep their benefits or take the $1K. A value added tax (at half the European rate) imposed on businesses replacing workers with robots would generate $800B in revenue. The Roosevelt institute projects that putting $ into the hands of Americans would grow the economy by $2.4T (more than 10%) and create 4.6M new jobs. This would result in about $500-600B in new revenue. Savings from reducing public health care costs, incarceration (are you going to commit petty crimes if it might cost you $1k/month? A lot of petty criminals won’t), and homelessness are about $100-200B.
One of the things he doesn’t harp on enough is that our current system discourages people from working, because they get fewer benefits if they work. In this system, you get the $1k regardless.
I don’t know about his projections, but the point is conceptualizing it like that makes it seem possible to find the money without increasing the deficit. His whole basis for all of this is the fact that automation is changing everything and it’s going to wreck our economy. People have been warning about job replacement since the industrial revolution, and I’m not sure that how worried we should be. I’m more interested in the smarter government angle. He’s hyperfocused on trucker jobs (and retail). There are so many truckers and businesses built on serving truckers throughout small town America, and they’re all going to be up a creek when we have driverless trucks.
He had some good responses to criticisms, for example how distasteful welfare is to some Americans. He said we need to look at this as a dividend. We are all shareholders in the USA. Yeah, that sounds like PR ********, but he pointed out that nobody seems to mind the dividend Alaskans get. It’s the same exact concept.
His specific plan?...I don’t know if it’s the right plan, I doubt that it is. I don’t know if it’s the right time, either. But it seems clear to me there is a realistic world in which we could have UBI and see much better results from government spending.
