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The idea of a UBI — Universal Basic Income — is gaining traction among liberals. No surprise there. To my knowledge, it’s not gaining traction among conservatives. Also no surprise. But, strangely, the most interesting proposals for a UBI are coming from libertarians. Now that is a surprise. There even seems to be a developing liberal-libertarian alliance around this.
There’s a lot of good info here, and I appreciate that. It strikes me as naïve, however, to think that this would replace, rather than supplement, the welfare state.
There’s theory, and then there’s practical politics. I agree that getting from where we are now to a UBI would be tricky (to put it mildly), but I hope that doesn’t derail the discussion over whether it’s a worthwhile goal in the first place.
Does the “claw-back” count married incomes jointly, or separately? It seems to me it should count them separately, such that a homemaker would qualify for the full $13,000 regardless of her husband’s income. This would be a further incentive to marriage, and without it there would potentially be a “marriage penalty” of up to $13,000.
Can’t disagree. I think most proponents of UBI would agree it won’t achieve what we desire unless it does replace rather than supplement the welfare state
Absolutely. My concern is obviously for the mind-set of the modern “progressive,” and I would think most discussions should entail views on 1) how to get them to buy in, and 2) how to stop them from changing the program when the inevitable carping begins.
It’s preferable to our current welfare programs and if we could eliminate all welfare,minimum wages, food stamps, medicaid and replace all with a UBI designed by Milton Friedman economists, or better yet libertarian economists, and get it through our Congress without major changes, it’d be great. We know that isn’t going to happen. Or just send all welfare with one or maximum one and a half year funding and no mandates, to the states and let them figure out what do. Some will come up with programs that do less damage than the current system, some even more damage and some would eliminate them. Then we wouldn’t have to attack welfare or welfare recipients just assert the importance of local knowledge, local accountability, and eventually local funding as we champion the safety net.
I’m almost certain Murray counts them separately, as it should be. This would, as you point out, not disincentivize marriage. It would also, as Murray points out, make volunteer work (such as teaching literacy within over burdened low income school districts) a rewarding and important form of work. Murray recognizes both marriage and volunteerism as essential features of the American style civil society.
That’s already started, it would seem. One liberal proponent in a discussion with Murray makes it clear he wants the UBI to supplement what we already have. Of course he does. That, of course, would destroy almost everything good about the UBI.
As soon as enough women with kids blow their income in 6 months and the kids get hungry, this goes by the boards.
My view is, the UBI needs to be combined with a flat-tax rate (i.e., replace progressive tax rates) so that instead of “clawing back” the UBI, you get the UBI and pay a high(er) rate on your first dollar of income such that you pay back the UBI (relative to the current tax structure) by the time you make, say, $70k.
That means everyone pays (roughly) the same rate on marginal income, and we eliminate the distortion the progressive tax rates create.
This is undoubtedly a real risk.
One question. If a 10 year old child is orphaned, abandoned, or kicked out of their home is this a death sentence or is there still a program for them?
Not a risk. This is a certainty.
Did I miss a clause that calls for closing of all orphanages?
There will be a program for them, it will just be privately funded rather than government funded.
FWIW, my wife is involved with what used to be called an orphanage in our local town. Several years ago, we went to “reunion” that was initiated by a elderly man whose parents dropped him off there during the depression, he went on to get a PhD.
Today they spend most of their management time jumping through government hoops and they are required by law kick their kids out at a certain age into the state run “foster family” system.
All I can say is, given the horror stories I have heard from graduates of this orphanage, the state run programs are the worst possible place for dispossessed children. These children looked back on their days in this private orphanages as the best days of their lives.
As was mentioned above, the big problem with UBI is not in the theory, but in reality.
Who here believes that the likes of McConnell or Ryan would be able to completely replace the current system with a UBI? They’d first have to believe that smaller government is desirable, a proposition for which there is little evidence other than meaningless political rhetoric spewed forth every couple of years. Anyone think the GOP Congressional leadership, current or future, could or would pull this off? Anyone? Bueller?
But let’s entertain the nearly, but not-quite, impossible notion that they were able to replace enough of the current mess that the resultant mess was at least an improvement over the status quo. Who here doubts that, within 10-15 years, the congress would have reinstated almost every program cut in the first place? Anyone?
So, no, I’m not in the mood to discuss the theoretical desirability of UBI, knowing it would turn out to be just another stalking horse for bigger, worse, more intrusive, and more expensive government boondoggles.
Maybe it’d be different if we had conservative congressional leadership that wanted smaller government rather than just wanting to grow it less quickly than the Democrats want. We haven’t had such leadership in my not-so-short lifetime, so I’m not holding my breath.
This. It cannot happen as proposed by libertarians. Which means it can only happen by coalition, and the only other interested parties are statists/leftists.
Count me out. Good intentions, road to hell, and all that.
What happens to Social Security? Because for many elderly their SS check might be higher than the 1000 dollars a month this UBI gives. If it replaced it you will in essence be cutting their benefits, not to mention the added benefit of Medicare which this also replaces. Cutting benefits to the elderly or soon to be elderly is politically unworkable as we have so often seen. Heck even jigering the benefits puts them into fits.
$10,000? To replace 223 existing programs? What a joke.
I’ve seen estimates that the cash value of transfer and in-kind programs for the poor and indigent are worth well into the upper 30k worth of income. If you don’t start the calculations there, you’re just kidding yourself.
I wonder. Of course some people will do as you describe. But people do stupid and irresponsible things under any system. Under what we currently have, homeless are everywhere, at least here in the Bay Area. That hasn’t caused our current system to go by the boards… unfortunately.
I haven’t read the book. But I get the impression that Murray characteristically goes into great detail on this and pretty much all the objections raised in the comments. Soc Sec and Medicare are probably the biggest hurdles, politically speaking. From hearing him talk, it seems he would phase in the program step by step so that those receiving or close to receiving Soc Sec and Medicare can keep them instead of the UBI.
Considering that Charles Murray is Charles Murray, I doubt that he is kidding himself on the calculations. He does point out numbers such as you describe, and then points out the absurdity of spending that much and still having an endemic and growing homelessness problem. That’s what happens when government distributes the money through arcane, overlapping, contradictory, inconsistently and inefficiently applied rules and procedures. Better to get rid of all that, spend less but make sure it goes to everybody, and then let each person figure out his own best interest. As mentioned in #22 there will still be lots of stupid decisions made by stupid people, but probably lots fewer than the stupid decisions made by stupid bureaucrats whose lives aren’t on the line.
As you and others mention, the political realities are daunting. Personally, I think the whole idea is near impossible. On the other hand, under our current system, we are approaching the point of crisis. Periods of crisis are probably the only time when such a plan might be feasible. We almost turned to the UBI once, in another period of crisis, in 1970. It will be harder this time but the crisis will be bigger, which just might be enough to get us to focus on workable solutions such as this might be.
In any case, the calamitous crisis certainly seems to be coming. Unless we have solutions such as this already current in the national discussion, solutions worse than the crisis itself are almost inevitable. Like you, I’m not holding my breath. I think the great American experiment may be on its deathbed. But on the chance and hope that I’m wrong about that, I’ll continue looking for a way to save the great experiment.
Liberals already like to tout studies claiming things like:
There really are crack moms on welfare (not to mention parents addicted to opioids), and some who simply lack basic budgeting skills (or self-restraint). As a result, the welfare check gets spent and by the end of the month there’s no food in the house and the kids experience “food insecurity.”
There’s really no system short of taking such kids from their parents and putting them in foster homes to ensure the kids never go hungry.
And right there is the #1 Argument against a UBI, as proposed by Murray and company. Anyone with any understanding of politicians and human nature knows with absolute certainty that new welfare programs would be birthed in short order to replace the ones shut down by the UBI.
Now – if there was a Death Penalty Clause in the UBI legislation mandating the immediate public execution of any lawmaker that even proposed a new welfare program… Maybe, just maybe the UBI would work.
Yeah – Kinda what I was thinking.
That’s a big if. An if so big it’ll never happen given the current make-up of our legislative body.
What’s more likely with those cement-brains on the Hill is that we get UBI and still end up kajillions in debt with entitlement programs.
“Food insecurity” is a concept designed to mislead.