Canada finally reveals the results of its universal basic income experiment
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UBI would also be good for the economy, as it stimulates consumerism. To economists, CEOs and politicians, you have to talk about the positive effects on the economy.
Indeed, it isn’t like the money paid out for UBI just goes into a black hole. Sure, some will save it. But many will spend it.
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You are also okay with those payments going to the ultra wealthy using the core idea of UBI?
yes, why not?
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We’re not quite there yet. Even with offsets by eliminating virtually all other social programs, including socialized healthcare, and slashing the size of military expenditures to almost nothing, doing every single good idea there is to fund it and increasing taxation on the owner class, there simply isn’t enought GDP to support it without spending your way into inflation… not unless you’re a country with a very small population rich in natural resources.
It’s plausible if we can bring the price of energy down to the point that it’s negligible and multiplies productivity almost for free.
We need scalable commercial fusion power to make it work, basically.
I agree with the goal,l. I don’t think people will contribute less without the threat of being unable to meet basic costs of living. I think a lot of people’s contributions to society aren’t adequately captured and recorded by our economic system.
But I’m not naive enough to believe that it can meet all of a person’s cost of living with current tech.
Tell me you don’t know how UBI works in design or in practice without telling me you haven’t learned much about it at all.
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Controlled rent is better than uncontrolled rent, but it suffers from the same problems as minimum wage. And why should landlords even exist? I’m not convinced private rentals should be legal at all. If you’re not using a property for personal use or a place of business, why shouldn’t it be seized and auctioned or rented publicly?
Rentals do have their place for people like students, and some businesses who regularly send employees to a city(rare but it happens). Rentals are not inherently bad, but the expectation that someone should rent as a longterm plan is completely fucked. We do not need this many many rental units in the world, not at all.
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The US spends $880 billion on military spending in 2023. That’s 20% of its annual budget. Source
The US has roughly 350 million inhabitants. Divide that and get that you could give $2.5K annually to each person as handouts. And we’re not even talking about tax reforms here.
Three points.
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This is about Canada.
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From my earlier post: “UBI isn’t the best solution out there, it is a highly polarized idea, and funding for a program on scale would cost Billions, requiring trillions in revenue to be a viable option.”
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You just paid for 1 month of UBI cutting the entire military budget for a year, which took 20% of the annual budget, leaving another 4 months of payment before the country has no budget left.
You keep pretending all over this thread that you would be increasing the income of everyone. You’re ignoring completely that you change the tax system so that wealthy people pay more than at present so it’s not inventing money, it’s redistributing it. You also cancel a bunch of social security programs that it replaces.
Your sums are based on false assumptions and you’re just spreading your FUD which is itself based on ignorance and fear. Stop trying to sound like you know something about it when you keep multiplying the population by the payment as if that was relevant in isolation of everything else that’s part of UBI.
If you want to sound knowledgeable, first so the reading work of learning.
But I think you don’t want to learn you just want to criticise because you don’t like the idea of money going from rich to poor.
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Why don’t you stop and smell the roses?
Jumping to such a conclusion, then blaming the hypothetical reaction, displays ignorance or malice.
I’m pretty sure they meant that “the result they want” (“UBI is bad”) would be peer reviewed and shown to be bunk, but the people who wanted that result will ignore the peer review results.
They weren’t disagreeing with the original comment, just adding to it.
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yes, why not?
Because someone with Billions doesn’t need $300 a month that could go to funding social services for people who need them.
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I’m pretty sure they meant that “the result they want” (“UBI is bad”) would be peer reviewed and shown to be bunk, but the people who wanted that result will ignore the peer review results.
They weren’t disagreeing with the original comment, just adding to it.
If so, then my reaction was ignorant and I retract it
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I would rather see socialized housing, food, and (better) medical coverage than UBI. UBI could (maybe) cause the prices of essentials like housing to increase.
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For every dollar a participant earns through employment they lose 50 cents from their basic income payment. This means the basic income proposal would only apply to individuals earning less than 34,000 CAD ($24,380) a year, or couples earning less than 48,000 CAD ($34,420).
This is not UBI.
UNIVERSAL basic income is UNIVERSAL: It doesn’t matter how much you earn.
Oh, you pulled in a billion dollars last year? Here’s your check for $12,000. To save us postage, we’re including it in the same envelope as your $450,000,000 tax bill.
The universality of the system is the single most important component. We convey to our government(s) our political authority. They use our political authority to provide essential services, such as roads and courts and rule of law. They charge the taxpayer for those services. UBI is how they compensate us, the shareholders of our government(s) for the use of the political authority we grant them.
UBI is not a social program. It is not charity. It is the government finally paying out dividends to its citizen-shareholders.
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Who said anything about ‘fuck you I got mine?’
First of all Canada already has a TON of social supports for anyone who is in need. We have Employment Insurance if you lose your job. We have Old Age Security and Canada Pension Plan for seniors. We have Child Tax Credits for parents and especially single parents. We have the GST credit to give back taxes to low income earners. We have the Canada Workers Benefit. We have the Canada Disability Benefit. We have the Assured Income for Severely Handicapped. We have disability pensions. We have Universal Pharmacare for prescription drugs. We have housing benefits/social housing programs. We have the Canadian Dental Benefit. We have student aid. There are free food banks in every city. And there are emergency funds available for things like rent/damage deposits on an emergency basis from every province through various community agencies, charities, and non-profit organizations.
So WHY do we need UBI on top of all that? If you need help in Canada, you CAN find it. Its already here.
Source: I founded a charity for street kids in one of our major cities thats been operating for 33 years. There is a TON of support out there. The fact is that a LOT of the people on the street know how to use and abuse the system and they dont WANT to get out of it because its what they grew up in and what they are accustomed to. I speak from years of experience.
Democracy is the idea that government receives its power and authority from the general public, not a king, god, or other source. The government utilizes the political authority that we provide them to perform a wide variety of essential services to its taxpayer customers.
We invest our political authority in the government. The political authority is what allows the government to provide and charge for those services. We are investors; shareholders. We are owed a return on our investment.
UBI is the dividend owed to us for our investment.
Those various charitable programs and services you described? Most of those would be replaced by UBI.
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It’s a crime to not have universal basic income at this point. People aren’t only unable to afford basic living expenses, but they’re losing jobs to automation and AI already. What are these people supposed to do? Go beg on the streets?
No, they’re supposed to adapt and overcome. Just like any other time in history when things are tougher. And if you think this is a tough time you havent studied our history well. The Dirty 30’s, the Great Depressions, the first and second World Wars, even the Cold War Era was much more difficult. This doesnt even compare.
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Controlled rent is better than uncontrolled rent, but it suffers from the same problems as minimum wage. And why should landlords even exist? I’m not convinced private rentals should be legal at all. If you’re not using a property for personal use or a place of business, why shouldn’t it be seized and auctioned or rented publicly?
Why should you own anything privately? You dont need two cars, one should be seized and auctioned publicly so someone else could have a car right? Why are you hoarding them?
Because we live in a capitalist society thats why. There are countries that do what youre proposing but they are much weaker economically and people dont have nearly the rights they do in Canada.
And of all the places to rent, guess who provides the most reasonable places to rent in the country? Is is Blackrock? No. Is it a consortium of investors? No. Is it a commercial landlord in your city? No. Its ALWAYS the mom and pop landlords who rent out basement suites and houses. Get rid of them and rent averages go UP.
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I’m pretty sure they meant that “the result they want” (“UBI is bad”) would be peer reviewed and shown to be bunk, but the people who wanted that result will ignore the peer review results.
They weren’t disagreeing with the original comment, just adding to it.
You are correct, this is what I was going for.
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If so, then my reaction was ignorant and I retract it
I probably should have made it more clear that that is what I was going for.
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No, they’re supposed to adapt and overcome. Just like any other time in history when things are tougher. And if you think this is a tough time you havent studied our history well. The Dirty 30’s, the Great Depressions, the first and second World Wars, even the Cold War Era was much more difficult. This doesnt even compare.
That is false. As a lesson learned from the Great Depression and the Second World war most countries made sure to have good social protection and wealth was relatively well distributed through good paying manufacturing jobs. People had access to opportunities in the form of free or cheap education and simple wealth through owning a house or apartment was accessible to a large portion of society.
Then Neoliberalism came up in the 80s to destroy this.
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I would rather see socialized housing, food, and (better) medical coverage than UBI. UBI could (maybe) cause the prices of essentials like housing to increase.
A surplus in the housing market is needed.
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That is false. As a lesson learned from the Great Depression and the Second World war most countries made sure to have good social protection and wealth was relatively well distributed through good paying manufacturing jobs. People had access to opportunities in the form of free or cheap education and simple wealth through owning a house or apartment was accessible to a large portion of society.
Then Neoliberalism came up in the 80s to destroy this.
Free education was a tool to move most of the intelligent workers into white collar roles. Neoliberalism was possible because too few intelligent people were left to organize an opposition.
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I would rather see socialized housing, food, and (better) medical coverage than UBI. UBI could (maybe) cause the prices of essentials like housing to increase.
Thinking about it, UBI will drive the prices of housing down because people don’t have to live where work is available. Companies have to offer cheap housing or people will live elsewhere.
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No, they’re supposed to adapt and overcome. Just like any other time in history when things are tougher. And if you think this is a tough time you havent studied our history well. The Dirty 30’s, the Great Depressions, the first and second World Wars, even the Cold War Era was much more difficult. This doesnt even compare.
hi Thomas Robert Malthus, are you planning another genocide?
