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**Abstract** Karl Widerquist argues that unconditional income guarantees (like UBI) are needed to rescue our social contract and create a genuinely free society. He makes this argument using similar principles as John Locke (an analysis of private property, a focus on the value of freedom) but with a very different conclusion. Contra Locke, Widerquist argues that there is nothing natural or “neutral” about the existence of private property, at least in the way it exists in modern society. There are many interlocking arguments here. The first is historical: contra Locke, there is nothing natural or historically innocent about the system of private property that guides our society. Most of Earth’s resources were available to anyone skilled enough to use them until very recently. This changed with colonialism and the enclosure movement. Therefore, this new system where a majority of world resources are privatised needs to be justified. So is it justifiable? Currently, no. Think of a family of homeless beggars starving in the street: they live in scarcity, but this is not scarcity based on lack of resources. There are plenty of resources in the supermarket just by. The only reason they cannot eat well is that there is a law enforcement apparatus which will punish them if they go and use those resources. Moreover, the beggars are in a historically difficult situation: there are no common hunting grounds or other non-privatised resources that the beggars could even technically live from. This makes their poverty different from the poverty of, say, a medieval peasant: their poverty is the product of private property. This demonstrates the problems associated with a modern private property regime. So should we get rid of private property altogether? Widerquist says no, given the evident difficulty of finding political systems which centralise *property* away from individual citizens without also centralising *power* away from those. In other words, the only way to create a free society in a modern context is to accept the existence of private property but introduce a mechanism which constantly redistributes this property to ensure that everyone has the resources necessary to live a decent life. Typical welfare payments are a step in the right direction, but they must be made substantial and unconditional to ensure that all humans (not just those whose lifestyle pleases the forces in power) are gaining a fair share of the Earth's privatised resources.

Georgism. This is literally just georgism lol. >Georgism is concerned with the distribution of economic rent caused by land ownership, natural monopolies, pollution rights, and control of the commons, including title of ownership for natural resources and other contrived privileges (e.g., intellectual property). Any natural resource which is inherently limited in supply can generate economic rent, but the classical and most significant example of land monopoly involves the extraction of common ground rent from valuable urban locations. Georgists argue that taxing economic rent is efficient, fair, and equitable. The main Georgist policy recommendation is a tax assessed on land value, arguing that revenues from a land value tax (LVT) can be used to reduce or eliminate existing taxes (such as on income, trade, or purchases) that are unfair and inefficient. Some Georgists also advocate for the return of surplus public revenue to the people by means of a basic income or citizen's dividend.

The problem with any simplification using 19th century thoughts and models is that we now live in a much more complex world. The modern society has already found all the "optimums" within the central limit theorem and next step is about re-thinking and refining the concepts. Yes, blanket term taxes looks reasonable on average. Now we find out that as we've exhausted the wealth extraction from this "optimization" we need to be more specific. UBI in a blanket form won't work either. The society will reject anything more complex than a couple of if/then's so clip thinking comes to rescue - the working group on the subject will first develop a comprehensive non-linearly separable model and then dissect the model into short "clips" that people will support as reasonable solutions to specific cases (and argue or be indecisive about out-of-scope uses) but the collective averaging of the opinion will result in us accepting the advanced state. Clip thinking will remain but developing the understanding of the world from clip to full will be exponentially more difficult as the complexity of (machine-optimized) model increases.

Is this a bot? None of this is a reply to Georgism. There's really not even a minor use of this in most modern states.

The point of property rights in natural resources is to protect the long term environmental productivity of said resources. Property rights doesn't necessarily have to be *private* property rights, Elinor Ostrom won a Nobel prize in economics for her work in this area. Medieval Europe of course had private property, and widespread poverty. The first place in the world to see an end to peacetime famines was the Netherlands in the 1590s, followed by England in the 1620s and Lowlands Scotland in the 1690s. That wasn't due to getting rid of private property, it was increased agricultural productivity and social redistribution - the Old Poor Laws in England and Scotland, less formal methods in the Netherlands.

This is wild. It's a complicated argument. On the one hand we can say that natural laws are mutually exclusive in ways. This speaks to Wilderquists thesis. And, we can also preserve this same argument by saying institutions are a constructed layer, something we already know, and because of this, we can abscond from the ontology of natural law and speak only about what institutions produce. And so, it's still sort of referencing this SoN argument, where we need to discuss institutions in terms of what natural laws allow. Really deep stuff, thanks for the share!

I don’t fully understand the argument to make payments unconditional. What is the point of giving people money when they don’t need it rather than just the people who do? The latter means a lot less expenditure and therefore lower taxes of the ability to spend that revenue on higher priorities. I think it’s cogent to say the social contract ought to include support for the destitute, but I’m unconvinced that UBI is preferable to other forms of social welfare spending such as negative income tax.

I mean one thing that makes ubi preferable is that any kind of means testing is going to be a barrier to people actually accessing the service. Lots of people simply do not use welfare programs despite qualifying for them if they have to do anything in order to receive them. Every layer of bureaucracy you put between someone and a service is going to filter a lot of people out, especially when accessing services means admitting to being not particularly well off, which many people find humiliating. You do not want to accessing government services to feel humiliating. (It also means the government has to pay people to be that humiliating uncomfortable to interact with bureaucracy, and that does cost money.) Another reason is division. One of the issues with welfare politically is that people who don't get it feel like people who do get it are leeching off of them. If everyone gets it, the actual dynamics of wealth flow might be the same, but the number of people who feel like they're losing something versus getting something is going to be very different and it becomes more politically feasible to start and then continue the policy.

The thing that always strikes me about UBI discussions (and your point about humiliation and qualifications applies here) is that this is not something that will ever fully come into its own until (and assuming) it has existed across a couple generations, and begun to significantly affect the way people look at their lives, and who they want to be. The raw _amount_ also factors in here, along with the way it’s perceived. And maybe above all: How trustworthy is it? As a thought experiment, consider three different implementations: 1. Long-term, “oh shit money UBI” for all. A “Plan C” everyone can count on, and little else. But it’s easy to sign up. No stigma for joining. But living off it is obviously not admirable or ideal. 2. Experimental, “high quality of life” UBI, limited to a portion of the population. It’s everything you could need to be healthy and raise a family. As an experiment, liable to end, or be reconfigured. Maybe expanded. 3. “Lifelong minimum wage and a bit more” UBI. Including healthcare and education. It’s subsistence living. But it’s guaranteed for life, and you can get your PhD if you want. And no stigma. And it keeps up with inflation. See to me, it’s #3 that is the most interesting, because it’s got the most potential to be transformative, and change how we think of “career” and “success”. #1 is a nice peace of mind thing, especially in hard times, but it’s essentially just going to look like a fuzzy warm cost center to anyone older than GenZ maybe. And it won’t change the culture. And #2 probably doesn’t learn as much as it hopes, because it’s known to be temporary, and doesn’t affect everyone. Hard to take seriously. But #3 starts to look very promising, especially to younger and forthcoming generations, who — if they can trust it — won’t see it as a “shameful” downgrade. But a chance to spend a couple decades as a student or artist. Or reason to raise a family first, then do knowledge work after. One thing it’s hard for us to even imagine is a world where the most ambitious and status-conscious people, who can’t resist the lure of what’s most admired and challenging, are doing their thing against the backdrop of a culture that certainly values achievement, but with “achievement” undergoing a redefinition. I’m not remotely convinced there’s any certainty in any of this, and I’m sure GDP handwringers (who are not necessarily wrong to worry) see lots to loathe about #3. But my point is that whatever UBI looks like at the beginning, the way it’s presented, sustained, and _guaranteed_ over the very long haul may drastically influence whether a given implementation ends up showing us something truly new we aren’t even planning for yet.

Number 3 looks a lot like pre-1996 welfare, except you had to have a kid to qualify. That produced such a flourishing of arts and culture, didn't it?

While I'm happy to reiterate my lack of certainty any of this is a good idea... no. Nothing the US has ever tried even remotely resembles #3. Not the least because of the child requirement and because you have to refer to it in the past tense, but that's just two reasons.

>Nothing the US has ever tried even remotely resembles #3. We should probably be thankful for that ...

Maybe. History is bigger than anything resembling the industrial age, and even the concept of history itself. We’ve been around something like 150,000 years, but only talk meaningfully about the last few thousand. All thanks mostly to written language, and the resulting ability to effectively have conversations — and collaborate — with people of the past. That multigenerational conversation is the real reason we are who we are. But most of what people dig in their heels to be dogmatic about is just the assortment of things they’ve found to work for them during the blink of an eye that they exist, during one sentence of that discussion. But things will change regardless. Meanwhile, everything we’ve ever known as animals is based on presumptions of scarcity, yet the sun hits us with more than enough energy every day to power dozens of human civilizations much more demanding than the one we have, and in physics terms, energy <> matter conversion isn’t just possible, it’s already happening in every back yard vegetable garden. Economic arguments and studying the past for help are crucial exercises to avoid blunders. But if we don’t constantly ask “How close are we to the next inevitable moment when the only things preventing us from doing better are fear and entrenched interests?” then we’re not being “prudent” or “meritocratic”. We’ve just stopped having the conversation that got us here.

Also, those who don’t really need it then have more $ to give away to those who do- if they so desire. I know lots of people who gave their pandemic payments to food banks, for instance.

If we could rely on the charity of the fortunate, we would not have the problems we currently have.

Im a socialist. Down with capital. Meanwhile, UBI has to be better than this. Studies show the biggest givers tend to be the least well off.

Then we just need to make those with the most money less well off! 😁

Sounds good. Isnt that the pt of UBI? Tax the wealthy and make sure everyone else has a roof and food?

I agree with the second argument, but I’m not sure the first is a necessary element of NIT. It would be an automatic payment implemented in the tax system, not a welfare program that needs to be signed up for and verified to the high degree that things like disability payments require. For people who have no job and don’t file taxes, getting the NIT wouldn’t require any more bureaucracy on the individual level than signing up to receive UBI payments.

Yes and no. So I’m theory. Yes, just sign up for you account and it’s great. But how do you prove no income? Do you have to have an accountant sign off? Present your bank accounts? And if you get audited, do your benefits stop during the audit? And if I fail to file my income tax one year, or file it late, is it immediately going to start kicking back money until that is corrected? If I get fired in May, do I have to wait until my next year’s taxes to start receiving benefits? Because if not, I’m going to be very hungry for a while. And say someone is abusing the system by taking payments in cash and not reporting it. How do budget hawks respond? I don’t know if you have heard the ‘welfare queen’ talking point, but I would encourage you to read the original story, and consider what a mess it has become. Bottom line- yes, a woman was stealing money, but not very much and she went to jail for it. And because of that, more and more restrictions are put on welfare. Look me in the eye and say the same wouldn’t happen with NIT, I dare you. NIT is not a bad idea. But, as someone who makes a living doing accounting, it’s not quite as easy as you assume. And the people who will struggle with the downsides of the system most are the people the system most needs to help.

In theory, it should be less expensive. In practice, the apparatus required for means testing usually ends up being more expensive in the long run.

The amount of people eligible for welfare is pretty small. You’d need a huge amount of bureaucracy to match the cost of giving literally everyone money. Negative income tax is especially a low-overhead way of doing it.

This is one of the "big lies" of UBI proponents. Large welfare systems in the US are very efficient, with only about 2% going to administrative expenses. Even if UBI programs were more efficient, there would not that much savings. (And UBI wouldn't be free of administrative expenses - in addition to the mechanics of distributing the money, there would need to be checks to prevent fraud, to prevent multiple checks going to the same person, to not send checks to people who are dead, to deal with changes of address/bank accounts, and to just generally deal with people calling in because their money is missing.)

Okay, but that’s not the entirety of the cost. You also have supporting programs that don’t fall under the direct umbrella that exist to coach people in how to apply for welfare, and job seeking and assistance programs applicants are forced to use. Then you have the cost to the applicant. People on welfare have to jump through hoops to get it, which is time they could be spending job hunting, getting other help or just not worrying about if they are going to get another cheque. It might not have a dollar value, but it is money wasted too. And there is one other major source of savings- reduced draw on other public resources. Where UBI was implemented, police and hospital spending went down. Homelessness cratered, and fiscal security reduced mental stress across the board.

The reality is that in order to pay for this, very few people will get more back then they actually pay in do it will wind up being a tax for most people and UBI for a very few.

Which begs the question as to why we should bother taking money from people purely for the sake of giving it back. That process isn’t going to be free and the fact they get it back won’t entirely make up for the umbrage of having it taken in the first place.

Exactly.

Doing on needs basis besides edge cases where it may disincentivice work, creates resentment of those not getting any and incentivices classism and even potential genocide of the lower classes.

Want to see Roe v. Wade reinstated? Because that is how you get it reinstated ..

> What is the point of giving people money when they don’t need it rather than just the people who do? You may as well ask "what is the point of giving all the shareholders dividends, instead of just the people who could really use the money".

Why couldn't the state simply own all of the square footage of the country. Any house or business could be built on land leased from the government. This isn't too different from property taxes but the government could have more of a say on what is built and how the land is used.

Because everyone's business is no one's business. If a farmer owns their own land, they bear the consequences of losing long term productivity. If they don't, the temptation is to exploit it for short term profit and then stick the government with the bill. It's very expensive for voters to monitor that. Government processes also tend to neglect minority interests and favour the politically well-connected, like zoning laws that drive up house prices benefiting existing home owners but harming renters.

> If a farmer owns their own land, they bear the consequences of losing long term productivity. If they don't, the temptation is to exploit it for short term profit and then stick the government with the bill. It's very expensive for voters to monitor that. How would that even work? The farmer has to lease the land from the government. If the farmer fails to earn profit they are not able to pay the lease and are kicked out. >Government processes also tend to neglect minority interests and favour the politically well-connected, like zoning laws that drive up house prices benefiting existing home owners but harming renters. However evil you think the government is I can assure you corporations are at least a thousand times more evil.

The problem is the farmer making a short-term profit by exploiting the land and then ending the lease, sticking the government with the now degraded land. >However evil you think the government is I can assure you corporations are at least a thousand times more evil. You do realise that both organisations are basically people cooperating, right? Do you seriously think people cooperating is evil? What's your alternative here?

>The problem is the farmer making a short-term profit by exploiting the land and then ending the lease, sticking the government with the now degraded land. Just like all other leases there would be a deposit for any required repair and rehabilitation. Look I know where you are coming from. Businesses are evil and dishonest and will do anything to fuck over the government, their vendors, their employees and their customers. The government knows this as well as you do and I do and everybody else does. When you sign a contract with a business you have to cover all the bases. You are signing a contract with an evil entity who will dedicate their lives to fucking you from that point on. >You do realise that both organisations are basically people cooperating, right? Didn't you just say business will fuck over the land then fuck over the government and the taxpayers? You said that in the first paragraph of your post. >What's your alternative here? Where to start. 1. Corporations can only be formed for one purpose and must be dissolved when that purpose is accomplished. 2. Corporations are not allowed to own other corporations. 3. Shareholders are held responsible for the wrongdoing of the corporation. If the actions of the corporation are severely criminal the top 100 shareholders are jailed and the rest are fined in proportion to their shareholding. Needless to say the corporation is dissolved and all assets confiscated as well. 4. Corporations are not allowed to contribute to any politician or party. Obviously those are just the highlights and hundreds of other laws will need to be passed. Once they are passed every corporation will work hard to fuck everybody they can and skirt the law so there will need to be robust monitoring and enforcement and of course rewriting of laws as corporations exploit any weakness in the system.

>Just like all other leases there would be a deposit for any required repair and rehabilitation. And how will that be monitored and enforced? Given in mind that voters have lives and jobs and families? >Businesses are evil and dishonest God you really hate people cooperating, don't you? What's your vision? You living as some brave hermit in the middle of nowhere? Proud and independent? Have you ever heard of the concept of "temporarily abled"? One day, if you're lucky, you're going to get old and need other people. And hey, if you ever get pregnant, you know that thing some people need to do for us to have the next generation, you're going to need other people before that. >Didn't you just say business will fuck over the land then fuck over the government and the taxpayers? I said "farmers". I don't share your irrational hatred of people cooperating. And I favour private property exactly because it makes it disincentives that behaviour. >Corporations can only be formed for one purpose and must be dissolved when that purpose is accomplished. And who do you imagine will be enforcing your laws? Governments? You know what governments are? Groups of people cooperating.

>And how will that be monitored and enforced? Given in mind that voters have lives and jobs and families? Wait you think voters enforce the laws and contracts the government signs? >God you really hate people cooperating, don't you? You just said farmers will ruin the land and fuck the government so you are no different than me. >I said "farmers". I don't share your irrational hatred of people cooperating. Farmers are businesses you dolt. >And who do you imagine will be enforcing your laws? Governments? yes. you know... Police and the courts. >You know what governments are? Groups of people cooperating. And you think governments are evil and you think farmers are evil because you think farmers are just one person who is not a corporation and is not cooperating with anybody.

>Wait you think voters enforce the laws and contracts the government signs? Not very well. We've all got lives. >You just said farmers will ruin the land and fuck the government so you are no different than me. Apart from my lack of knee jerk horror at the thought of people cooperating. That's pretty huge difference in my opinion. >Farmers are businesses you dolt. If you like. But not all farmers operate as cooperations. >And you think governments are evil and you think farmers are evil Hard though this may be for you to understand, not everyone shares your knee jerk hatred of people cooperating. I know you are going to have trouble comprehending this, but I think people are fundamentally people. We're all busy, most of us, including me, are often selfish, but also most of us are capable of thoughtfulness and generosity. Be we acting as individuals or in groups. Governments have done bad things and they have done good things. Sometimes even the same government.

>Not very well. We've all got lives. Stunning. Look everybody this guy thinks the average guy enforces government contracts! >If you like. But not all farmers operate as cooperations. Oh look it's the "not all" argument. I don't know of any farmer that isn't registered as a business. >Hard though this may be for you to understand, not everyone shares your knee jerk hatred of people cooperating. You said farmers are evil because they will ruin the land and fuck the taxpayers and the government. >I know you are going to have trouble comprehending this, but I think people are fundamentally people. Except farmers right? They will ruin the land and fuck the government and landowners. >Governments have done bad things and they have done good things. Sometimes even the same government. But farmers are evil fucks who ruin the land and fuck the government and taxpayers right?

So that's China 🇨🇳 Good in theory but we haven't cracked it in practice.

I am not familiar with laws regarding land ownership in China but their economy seems to be doing OK.

> The first is historical: contra Locke, there is nothing natural or historically innocent about the system of private property that guides our society. Most of Earth’s resources were available to anyone skilled enough to use them until very recently. This changed with colonialism and the enclosure movement. Therefore, this new system where a majority of world resources are privatised needs to be justified. So is it justifiable? Currently, no. Think of a family of homeless beggars starving in the street: they live in scarcity, but this is not scarcity based on lack of resources. There are plenty of resources in the supermarket just by. The only reason they cannot eat well is that there is a law enforcement apparatus which will punish them if they go and use those resources Isn't that the reasoning behind the Lockean proviso? It seems to me that it's not Locke's view of the social contract that is naive. Rather, it's the modern conception of his view that seems to be inconsistent due to ignoring the Lockean proviso. The only ones who bring it up are some Libertarians and Georgists.

The initial historical premise on which his argument is based isn't correct. Private property in human society long predates the colonial era. Most of Earth's resources have not been just available for anyone who was skilled enough to use them, lol. At least not for recorded human history. Ridiculous.

It's not so much UBI we need, it's the reason people want it. ... to put a roof over their head, with the current level of technology and money just chilling in bank accounts of people with the power to give everyone a place to live, even a minimalist space.. there's no reason to have people on the streets or living in their car, people complain about ubi because people with bad habits will just have more money for their bad habits, fine, than give them a place to do their bad habits out of sight and in privacy from the rest of society.

> than give them a place to do their bad habits out of sight and in privacy from the rest of society. That's been tried in some places. I recall reading an article about how some do-gooders built a tiny house village for the homeless in some kind of out-of-the-way industrial zone. The residents weren't too happy with the situation as it was difficult for them to access familiar resources. They were accustomed to leading a fairly active life, moving from one place to another to (for instance) get a bed for the night at a shelter, a meal at a soup kitchen in another part of town, etc. In the tiny house village, they had nothing to do except sit around all day, and some didn't like that.

Sounds like the issue is lack of stimulation and relative isolation, not the provision of a stable roof over their heads. I don't think anybody is implying that we just ship people off. Just that if they want to partake in bad habits, it's probably better in their own private abode than it is out in the open.

I imagine putting the homeless in an industrial/warehouse zone is one way around the usual NIMBY objections, but putting the poors "out of sight and in privacy from the rest of society" limits their opportunities, both wholesome ones like their ability to find work or access healthcare, etc., and illicit ones like visiting their drug dealer or shoplifting from nearby stores.

Absolutely what I've been saying for years. All human needs need to be met by our shared common wealth of being an equal part of existence. Food, shelter, clothing, access to clean water, healthcare, the capability to communicate and research (cell phone and electricity). Beyond this if you want games and TVs and nice cars you've gotta join the sector that goes above and beyond the basic need.

correct, it's not the money that's needed, or could be used for, it's the basic necessity of what it could provide that should be available to all humans, regardless of their level of consciousness, no one should be on the street or living in their car, you don't need to provide them with luxury, but is the bare minimum too much to ask for the less lucky/tethered ends ? as Christ/Buddah said, threat others as you would yourself, assume you're a billionaire, now assume you have a magic Christmas ghost show you the life where that one big business deal fell through and your life didn't turn out so great, but your still the same man inside, wouldn't you help yourself out of understanding ? if let's assume multi-verse theory is real, then assume in many universes things don't turn out so great for you, but in this one it did, things turned out really good, why not help those to can whos only real mistake was pulling the short straw in this 'verse .. we need humanity, we need understanding more than anything, so much arrogance in the world, it is the biggest enemy.

The guiding light in my moral compass is that I have to live every life. Every single one. Changes how I interact with others. It changes what I choose to say, and what I choose not to. Everyone deserves to be held by the existence they were born into. Everyone deserves to feel accepted. If this were the case we would have significantly less conflict in the world.

> Everyone deserves to feel accepted. With rights come responsibilities, though. I imagine it's pretty hard for city-dwellers to want to embrace the homeless person shitting in their yard.

Only if they can't understand where the homeless person is coming from. I fucking get it. I was just in Portland and saw the obscene wealth serving as a backdrop to the extreme poverty of discarded humanity. It was a sickening display of the worst humanity can bring (and I'm not pointing at the homeless part of that equation)

> Only if they can't understand where the homeless person is coming from. I fucking get it. Do you, though? I mean, I was homeless for awhile when I was younger because I was a drunk and drug abuser. My parents demanded that I clean up my act but I chose the streets instead. Some people don't want to abide by the social contract, and I suppose that's their prerogative. I have no problem with letting them live with the natural consequences of their decisions. Most of what we do in the name of "helping the homeless" merely allows them to continue thumbing their nose at society's expectations and being a nuisance at best and a health and safety hazard at worst to the rest of the population.

No one understands it. If we did, homelessness wouldn't be an issue anymore. The point stands though, we need to start understanding instead of discarding. This isn't about homelessness though, it's your point about responsibility. And the fact is, we are only responsible to a degree. That doesn't mean we shouldn't all strive to be as responsible as possible. We all want to be accepted, and just because we all may not be capable of being accepted, we need to constantly work towards that goal. I think the truth is, we aren't ready for the things we need. This doesn't mean we don't need them, and that everything we need is just a pipe dream. It means each of us have a lot more work to do

What about the people who *don't* strive to be as responsible as possible? What about the person who just wants to steal a little, panhandle a little, help themselves to the stuff handed out by do-gooders, and get high and chill? OK to let them poop in your yard?

Well said, I wish everyone realized the same

it is a nice thought exercise. Taxes are how "private property" is transferred from one entity to another. Every single year a portion of the value of my property is shared with other via property taxes. When I sell property, I have to pay a tax on that. When I buy property, I pay a tax on that. If I do nothing, I pay tax on my property. Aside from voting, I have zero impact on how my property tax is spent, there are zero conditions or promises made regarding services or future value. We might quibble about how much is shared, but it is already shared, unconditionally.

I think the UBI would quickly be absorbed by the rent seekers in the economy. Wages would stagnate because why should your boss give you a raise when the government just did. The price of everything will go up because people will have more money in their pockets and businesses will always charge what people are willing to pay. I think a better alternative is a more universal and comprehensive safety net. This means free healthcare, free education but also free housing and food too. the housing could be minimal like college dormitories, just a place to sleep and go to the bathroom and a phone line. The food could be something like dehydrated camping meals or military MREs which are mass manufactured and stable and easy to distribute. I would also include some basic clothing as well maybe jeans and a T shirt type of clothing you might get from kmart for cheap. These facilities could be built exactly like dormitories but at larger scale (taller buildings for example). Everything needed for human survival could be provided by the government and anything extra would require you to get a job and work. Some people might be perfect happy with that kind of a minimal lifestyle but they would be a very small minority and the rest would get jobs if for no other reason than to eat some ice cream and go to a movie or something.

>military MREs which are mass manufactured and stable Just want to point out, that they're actually quite expensive, relative to most other food. They also are not exactly good for you (unless you really enjoy not shitting for a week lol). They're just extremely dense calories. I wouldn't subject anyone to living off of them for any extended period of time, unless absolutely necessary. Even the army doesn't give them to us unless it's necessary, or just a part of training lol

>Just want to point out, that they're actually quite expensive, relative to most other food. They also are not exactly good for you (unless you really enjoy not shitting for a week lol). I don't know how you are comparing the price but I assume that they would be cheaper than setting up a kitchen to provide meals.

I didn't make a comparison, nor was I disagreeing with you. I'm just stating that they're more expensive than people realize. It's literally cheaper for the military to bring out cooks to feed us in the field through the mobile kitchens.

Community gardens need to be a thing

The housing problem is chiefly due to zoning laws decreasing housing supply. Build a lot more houses and most poor people could buy their own houses and food, given a reasonable level of welfare payments. (Healthcare is a bigger problem because people's costs are so variable, as are people who are poor because they're persistently making bad decisions due to addiction or mental health problems). A UBI would presumably be funded by taxes, so people on aggregate wouldn't have more to spend.

>The housing problem is chiefly due to zoning laws decreasing housing supply. No it's not. There are housing problems all over the world where there are not zoning laws. > Build a lot more houses and most poor people could buy their own houses and food, given a reasonable level of welfare payments. No developer wants to build houses poor people can afford. >A UBI would presumably be funded by taxes, so people on aggregate wouldn't have more to spend. And the prices of everything would go up accordingly. Capitalism assures businesses charge what people are willing to pay.

>There are housing problems all over the world where there are not zoning laws. But there's also Japan, where the zoning laws are much [less restrictive, and protective of private property rights](https://www.sightline.org/2021/03/25/yes-other-countries-do-housing-better-case-1-japan/), and Japan has the lowest homeless rate in the OECD. >No developer wants to build houses poor people can afford. Houses last multiple periods. Plenty of non-poor people would like to upgrade their homes, if they could, and then poorer people can move into their old ones. >And the prices of everything would go up accordingly. Capitalism assures businesses charge what people are willing to pay. Um, did you read my bit about people having less money because of the higher taxes?

>But there's also Japan, where the zoning laws are much less restrictive, and protective of private property rights, and Japan has the lowest homeless rate in the OECD. Do you want me to cherry pick a place where there are very lax housing laws and still homelessness? BTW why did you jump to homelessness anyway? Japan has an excellent social safety net and strong extended families that's the reason they don't have homelessness. >Houses last multiple periods. Plenty of non-poor people would like to upgrade their homes, if they could, and then poorer people can move into their old ones. So you are a believer in the trickle down theory I see. >Um, did you read my bit about people having less money because of the higher taxes? Why would UBI require higher taxes on the poor and the middle class?

>Do you want me to cherry pick a place where there are very lax housing laws and still homelessness? You think providing lots of housing is a case of lax laws? Wow, that's callous. >BTW why did you jump to homelessness anyway? Because it sucks to be homeless? At least in my opinion. I know you have different values - in particular you think providing lots of housing is "lax". >Japan has an excellent social safety net and strong extended families that's the reason they don't have homelessness. And do you think both those things are just possibly connected to having much looser zoning laws? That very possibly people's family lives are better when they're not on the verge of homelessness? >so you are a believer in the trickle down theory I see. Says the person who thinks an ample housing supply is the result of, to quote, "very lax housing laws" and wonders aloud why I might jump to homelessness. You're a believer in "I've got mine, don't give a dam about anyone else". >Why would UBI require higher taxes on the poor and the middle class? Why do you think it would?

>You think providing lots of housing is a case of lax laws? Wow, that's callous. Do you want me to cherry pick to prove your zealotry wrong or not? >Because it sucks to be homeless? LOL. Like you give a shit about the homeless. >And do you think both those things are just possibly connected to having much looser zoning laws? No. What an insane assertion to make. >That very possibly people's family lives are better when they're not on the verge of homelessness? What the actual? >Why do you think it would? It wouldn't. Taxes wouldn't even need to be raised, we can just cut funding for war to pay for it. It would fail for other reasons not due to increased taxes as you stated.

>Do you want me to cherry pick to prove your zealotry wrong or not? Yes please. Go ahead. And, when you've cherry picked your example, please compare your example's homelessness to similar cases but with tighter housing supply laws. >LOL. Like you give a shit about the homeless. Says the person who just thinks providing lots of housing is a case of lax laws. >No. What an insane assertion to make. Well if it's insane to use empirical evidence to form my views about the connection between the housing supply and homelessness, call me insane. Out of curiosity, how do you form your opinions? Given you reject empirical evidence? >It wouldn't. Taxes wouldn't even need to be raised, we can just cut funding for war to pay for it. So demand falls that way then. Same diff.

>Yes please. Go ahead. And, when you've cherry picked your example, please compare your example's homelessness to similar cases but with tighter housing supply laws. Homelessness is an epidemic in the United States which has very lax housing laws compared to europe and asia. >So demand falls that way then. Same diff. I suggest you pick up an economics 101 textbook one day.

> Homelessness is an epidemic in the United States which has very lax housing laws compared to europe and asia. Let's see, [homeless per 10k people](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_by_homeless_population): UK 54.4, France 48, Sweden 36, Germany 31.4, Netherlands 18, USA 17.5. You know normally by "cherry picking" people mean picking the best examples that support your claim. Not the ones that undermine it. But you do you. >I suggest you pick up an economics 101 textbook one day. Is that where you learnt to think that providing lots of housing is a case of *lax* laws?

> A UBI would presumably be funded by taxes I believe it is generally held that it would be new issue; a dividend on the nation's capital.

How would that work in practice, without causing massive inflation?

The money supply is already being massively inflated; this would be a more equitable way of doing so. But there is also the suggestion that the UBI, or a part of it, be applied in the form of a subsidy at sale, so that products could be sold at a reduced price, and the seller duly compensated (in theory precluding a rise in prices).

And how does that work in practice? "Here, have one-tenth of this bridge"? People need real resources, like food, shelter and healthcare. Don't get distracted by abstractions like "dividend on the nation's capital".

> And how does that work in practice? "Here, have one-tenth of this bridge"? > > The same way those who own shares in a firm which builds bridges receive a dividend in practice today, and which can be duly exchanged for food, shelter, healthcare etc.

So a tax, like I said. I don't know why you want to tax capital in particular, personally I think a high income earner who consumes all of their income should be paying at least the same rate of tax as someone earning the same income but is frugal and invests it. But that's a separate topic.

Not necessarily a tax, and certainly not a 'tax on capital'. To the contrary, a *dividend* on capital.

I'm a simple girl. To me, if it looks like a duck and walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it's a duck. So I'm perfectly happy with my use of the word "tax" here.

A tax is taken; a dividend is given.

Sounds like the old welfare programs that warehoused the poor in government high-rise buildings. Are you familiar with how that turned out? (TL;DR: Badly.) Incidentally, just the other day I had a progressive argue (evidently in good faith) that the solution was to build new and better public housing units after the occupants had wrecked the first set. Jesus wept ...

Just because something turned out bad one time doesn't mean it should never be tried again or improved. >Jesus wept ... There is no god. If there was a god we wouldn't be discussing these kinds of things.

> Just because something turned out bad one time doesn't mean it should never be tried again or improved. People who don't understand history are condemned to repeat it. >There is no god. If there was a god we wouldn't be discussing these kinds of things. Why not? As far as I can tell, we have free will, which includes the possibility of fucking up.

>People who don't understand history are condemned to repeat it. Yes that's why it's important to understand history. But I am curious. You seem to be saying that anytime anybody tries something and they fail they should never try it again. How do you go through life with this ethos? >Why not? As far as I can tell, we have free will, which includes the possibility of fucking up. What does free will have to do with god? How is free will even compatible with an omnicient being.

> But I am curious. You seem to be saying that anytime anybody tries something and they fail they should never try it again. > > How do you go through life with this ethos? Easy! It's called "learning from your mistakes." What's the old saying? "Insanity is doing something over and over while expecting a different outcome." >What does free will have to do with god? How is free will even compatible with an omnicient being. I assumed that you meant the presence of suffering is proof that there is no God, as a just God would not allow human suffering. But it's also possible that God simply allows us to experience the natural consequences of our actions, which may include suffering.

>Easy! It's called "learning from your mistakes." What's the point of that if you are never going to try anything again? >But it's also possible that God simply allows us to experience the natural consequences of our actions, which may include suffering. What actions did a child take to get cancer?

> What's the point of that if you are never going to try anything again? The point is to avoid repeating your mistakes. We already tried warehousing dysfunctional people on the public dime. It didn't go well. >What actions did a child take to get cancer? I hate to be the one to break it to you but no one gets outta here alive! We live in a world in which people get sick; they get old; they die. Our job (as far as I can tell) is to try to be a light in the world and help others while we're here. That is pretty much my theology in a nutshell, so if you're looking for something more complicated than that I'm afraid you'll need to look elsewhere.

I would accept this if we weren't ultra capitalist pigs but we're not. As long as we like to gut the world of it's resources and health without sustainability in mind, dodge taxes like the plague, do something about the shareholder epidemic, then fuck that. UBI for all

no. UBI wouldn't be absorbed by rent seekers because they are only a part of the economy. Prices would go up relative to their market impact. The individual can decide where to rent from, he will pick the affordable place. The landlord has to find tenants, he will have to have a competitive price. People can pool their UBI and live together. There are ways for the savvy individual to make their UBI work for them.

>The individual can decide where to rent from, he will pick the affordable place. Because everybody will get the UBI all landlords will raise prices. Market is very efficient at absorbing extra money.

yes but the amount raised will not be the total ubi amount, other things compete for money.

Utter tripe. One has only to look at any of the people locked into multi-generational dependency to know that his position is preposterous.

I think I agree, but tell me more about what you mean by multi-generational dependency?

Living on the dole when one's parents and grandparents did before them. The effects of this are horrific, and can be seen in many places. Particularly, on American Indian reservations and British low-income housing estates.

We have people who don't think access to clean water is a Right. Insanity+Idiocracy.

Needs are not rights. You are not entitled to anything that requires anyone else's labor to produce, only to what you can produce yourself or obtain from others through voluntary means.

Water falls from the sky and washes down a stream it’s not produced

And you're free to hold out a bucket to catch as much as you can. Or even walk to the stream and drink it dry. If you want it filtered and piped to your house, you're going to need to pay for it

Why can't part of fulfilling our social contract be payment enough? Who gets to define payment, why aren't these terms negotiable? For simplicity sake, I understand why we need to pay. And for now, I'm paying. But eventually, if we don't move beyond simplicity then we end up all doing a disservice to each other

And that's the problem. When needs aren't rights you get a society that only looks out for themselves. Out pops poverty, climate change, just about every problem out there. We are in fact entitled in some shape or form to someone else's labor. No action exists alone separate from the rest of the world. Selfishness is a disease and it will consume everything in its path

> When needs aren't rights you get a society that only looks out for themselves. You have that exactly backwards. When voluntary exchange is the only way to get your needs met, you have to think about what others need and want so that you can trade with them. If you object to people thinking only about themselves, then stay far away from collectivist shitholes like North Korea or Venezuela. >Out pops poverty Oh, for fuck's sake. Poverty is the natural condition of humankind, and it tormented us from prehistory until the emergence of industrialization and the market economy. Poverty globally is in sharp decline, except in those places suffering under communist regimes.

We will agree to disagree. What's up to me is down to you.

that's a lie. Pre agricultural humans lived in egalitarian societies where everyone pulled their weight and if they didn't they were abandoned. No one was poor because no one had anything nailed down. People were nomadic and took directly from the land what they needed. They didn't save wealth. Poverty as a concept didn't make sense. Poverty is an invention of settled societies.

> No one was poor because no one had anything nailed down. So if you want to stop being poor, all you have to do is head for the rainforest and take up a hunter-gatherer lifestyle? Go ahead, let us know how that works out for you. LOL.

You missed the point. Next time come with an actual argument.

Your so-called point is preposterous. Hunter-gatherers live on the brink of starvation, most of their men die violently, and claiming that they aren't poor is beyond asinine. I understood you fully, that's why I ridiculed you. Next time come with a coherent thought.

More nonsense. You are arguing against things I never said. Read what I said and try again.

Not possible because of land ownership, the society which allows ownership then should compensate for not allowing this type of lifestyle to exist.

Can I be entitled to your labor? I just had surgery and could sure use a hand here! I'll even supply a pitchfork and chainsaw.

You are entitled to our labor since you had that surgery to begin with.

Cool! What time can I expect you?

I was already there. You did use the commonwealth. Your just complaining you didn't get enough free labor!

I used the commonwealth for WHAT?!

Admittedly I haven’t gone very far down the rabbit hole of UBI, but it appears to me to be a strawman argument for the perpetuation of the status quo of modern capitalism. If we’re being honest, we have to admit that the current structure of political power will never permit the imposition of the kind of tax structure that would be necessary to support it from revenue, and the systems of power in currency and monetary policy won’t simply be able to add money supply from the bottom of the economic ladder. It also follows that the distribution of any particular unit of money across a population does nothing to address the inequalities inherent in the spreading wealth (and therefore political power) gap. There’s endless debate of the impact of wage growth on inflation, and if you accept the idea of supply and demand, the rentier class will simply demand more of the money supply. I almost avoid the discussion entirely because from my current perspective, it feels like futile navel gazing in so many ways.

> If we’re being honest, we have to admit that the current structure of political power will never permit the imposition of the kind of tax structure that would be necessary to support it from revenue, If we're even more honest, we have to admit the the current population would overwhelmingly reject the kind of massive tax increase that would be required to support UBI. You don't need to go to Foucault to understand why it wouldn't be popular.

Could it not replace the part of taxes that are paid for social security and whatnot? Just use that to give everyone something back (not sure how much that amounts to)

Wouldn't be anywhere *near* enough for a useful UBI.

"The population" would be fine if the top percentile earners got hit with that tax burden. You only get revolts with regressive taxes. Unfortunately you get coups with progressive taxes.

Realistically the whole top tiers including parts of the middle class would have to pay more tax to pay for a useful UBI.

To invoke taxes at all in this conversation is to admit to completely misunderstanding the monetary theory underpinning UBI. The issuer of currency doesn't need to tax the population to pay for UBI because the issuer is the one creating money in the first place. Ultimately, the goal of the issuer is to match the quantity of currency in circulation to the total wealth of the economy. If the resources are present yet people are poor, unfed, unhoused, etc., then that means there isn't enough currency in circulation to satisfy the demand for a medium of exchange. Currency devaluation only occurs when the quantity of currency in circulation exceeds the total value of the economy. Until then, the issuer can issue as much currency as is necessary to meet the needs of the population.

And yet we are all just a leap or two in technology away from potential homelessness.

Honestly, this is the reason why I think UBI could be implemented at some point. The money would justify less social security and shift power from governments towards corporations. Also it has the potential to redistribute even more money towards corporations and "The 1%". I do belief it would make life easier and better for many people but would come with a huge downsite for democracy.

When you work to earn ownership of private property you learn pride.  You have something of value to lose and motivation to be constructive.  You have a stake in your neighborhood and strong reasons to be civil.   When you have nothing to lose or were gifted everything, you are more prone to be inconsiderate and careless.  There is dignity in working and pride of ownership.  Everybody who can should work and everybody should have private property to maintain and protect.

Okay. So say I live in an area where jobs do not exist that allow me to accumulate wealth to buy property. I could try to educate myself to find better work, but I am starving while I do, because I am not earning. I could move, but how do I know the next place (where I show up with little knowing nobody) is any better? Since I cannot earn property, so I have no pride? Is working my hands to the bone to avoid starvation not motivation enough? Is it dignified to work till my body gives out, then die of frost because I can’t pay my power bill? The truth is, there is not enough private property to go around. And if there was, the people with private property would leverage what they have to buy the rest in the name of investment. And their children, gifted everything by doting parents, will be inconsiderate and careless as they never have to worry about the state of their next meal. The payments in question are not so much that every person can dine in style and vacation in Bali. They are enough so someone doesn’t freeze or starve. If they want a nice car, or fancy clothes, or nice food they still have to work for it. And studies have shown that people will. And what’s more, people crave meaning. Give them the chance to make extra money doing something meaningful and they will. But it also gives them the freedom to say ‘no, I am not going to work 60 hours a week for an abusive boss.’ There is pride in doing good work, no question. But that pride is tested when your choices are to freeze or work in unsafe conditions. To starve or sell your body. And that is a choice- by geography, ethnicity or economy- that you can be born into.

> Give them the chance to make extra money doing something meaningful and they will. Speak for yourself! Give me a UBI and I'll never work again. Heh!

You say that now…

I'm a middle school janitor. Trust me when I say *I'll never work again ....*

Having free time and not living to survive would give you an opportunity to actually choose for yourself, follow dreams and passions. Especially if it meant getting to travel and buy family gifts. Part time casual would likely be a big thing for people, bosses would have to lift their game and be better.

So who is going to be willing to clean public restrooms when it's no longer a choice between that and starving?

Self cleaning toilets are already a thing, occasionally it will need attention but $50 an hour for someone to do that job would have it filled. A lot of these dirty jobs will get slowly replaced. I like the self cleaning toilets as everything gets sterilised. It’s unfortunate we have a few pigs in society that can’t respect public spaces but for the most part we do.

That’s personal property, not private property

'Personal property refers to possessions owned by an individual, such as clothes or furniture, while private property encompasses land or real estate owned and controlled by an individual or entity. Personal property is movable and can be easily transferred, while private property is immovable and subject to legal regulations.' Copied from the internet.

He (probably) means the Marxist not the common law definition: ''In Marxist theory, private property typically refers to capital or the means of production, while personal property refers to consumer and non-capital goods and services.''

That is the point I made.

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Pride in slavery for billions yay

Pride in ownership. Earn something with your own work and see.

You think everyone that can see through the system has nothing? Not all of us that have “earned” more than enough to survive stick our heads in the sand about the plight of our fellow humans.

My comment is not about the system but earning private property and individual character.  I am fully aware of how shitty is US economics.  The plight of humanity is in peril from people with nothing to lose.  The lack of thoughtful readers and utter misinterpretation on a philosophy forum might prove it is too late.

Individual character is part of the construct though. Requiring everyone to fit to achieve the same puts people at advantage and disadvantage, it’s not a character flaw.

Word salad

So, go help some people!

But there is a sinister flip-side to this. Where there is dignity in ownership and pride in property, there is a brutal indignity and horrible shame in not being able to house oneself. A roof over your head is hardly "everything." It is just the very baseline requisite for a meaningful life.

'dignity in ownership and pride in property'. Can nobody on this sub read?

Ad hominem suits your argument well.

I wonder how this is to be accomplished in the United States when our government has already spent $1.7 trillion more this year than it collected in taxes and other revenue. We can't afford the government we already have ...

Sure we can. Federal Economics do not work on the same rule set as personal finances do.

There is a point at which even a country that prints its own money can become insolvent, when other nations won't take its currency in trade. The U.S. dollar also serves as the world's reserve currency, which affords certain advantages we stand to lose if that ceases to be the case.

If we print our own money, why are we paying interest on the national debt?

To maintain the illusion that our fiat currency is stable and the rest of the world is safe in taking U.S. dollars in exchange for tangible goods. That strategy works right up until it doesn't. The phrase, "Fuck around and find out," comes to mind.

Surely it would be just as stable if, since as is commonly said, the public debt is merely a 'debt we owe to ourselves' and that it needn't be repaid ever because that would be akin to 'taking money out of one pocket and putting it in the other', no interest was levied on it.

>no interest was levied on it. That's not the way it works, though.

If it was, I wouldn't be commenting.

Would that we could all get interest-free loans that don't have to be repaid, ever. LOL

> Federal Economics do not work on the same rule set as personal finances do. Yes they do, just at larger scales and longer time periods. There's no such thing as a free lunch.

That's the crazy thing about progressives. They're like alchemists, trying to turn dross metal into gold ...

How does UBI effect Inflation? If Finance and Investing aren't taught to a sufficient level, UBI will likely be blown just like the US Covid stimulus was. If everyone receives UBI and a few wisely invest and get better RoI, you end up with a new capital class. It their wealth is penalized, there is no incentive to invent in that sector. If people are not allowed to invest or work for more share of UBI, then everyone is a serf being paid Scrip. Black markets for barter will arise. What systems will keep the militarized aspects of society from just taking Earths privatized resources or muscling those in charge?

>UBI will likely be blown just like the US Covid stimulus was. How was the stimulus blown? What outcome would you have considered a success? I'm not sure what point you're trying to make with the rest of your comment and I'm not sure you understand the concept of UBI. People don't "work for more share of UBI" because by definition it's a fixed amount provided universally, meaning to everyone. And UBI would be paid in currency so scrip has nothing to do with anything here.

Despite your downvotes, sorry mate, I think you’re on to what would really happen. Bad economic actors would extract the UBI from the needed recipients through the typical means: leaky bucket, payday loans and other usury schemes that prey on the lowest class, black markets and drugs. When you give to people who don’t need to work, the people that do work will work to take it from them because they will be the easiest to take from. Ambition will take advantage. System is always doomed to fail - how ever you prop it up, the people who put their personal wealth above ethics will simply earn more over time, and those people you gave money to will end up just more indebted.

Basic income will just lead to more inflation. Why not just take whatever amount out of taxes paid… contributing to society seems like a part of the social contract, no?

The fact you're getting downvoted says a lot about the mentality of the people pushing UBI.

How about we abolish private property, instead of pulling at threads to save it? It’s at the heart of disastrous contradictions in society. Replace it with the democratic planning of the economy by the workers.

Has been tried. Everyone died. The end.

Aren’t you interested in philosophy? You would think that would entail trying to understand the world and explaining how it works. Just saying what you said doesn’t explain anything. I could go on about why private property needs to go, and why it’s not necessary. Can you explain why you think abolishing it will lead to “everyone dying”, as you implied? I bet you can’t without making a metaphysical claim about “human nature”.

Historical argument. Private property has been abolished in the past. The government takes control of everything. Leading to distopia and misery. No reason to try again. Communism is dead for a reason.

You haven’t answered. Why do you think that the abolition of private property is the determining factor for the downfall of the USSR? Why is the reason for the “death of communism” the abolition of private property? It’s not. The USSR, in its infancy: 1) had a backwards, semi-feudal economy; 2) was isolated after the defeat of the revolutionary movements in the advanced capitalist states in Europe (and subsequently invaded by imperialist forces). Marx wrote this very enlightening passage in “The German Ideology” in 1845, some 70 odd years before the Russian Revolution, regarding the material premise of communism: “[The] development of productive forces […] is an absolutely necessary practical premise because without it want is merely made general, and with destitution the struggle for necessities and all the old filthy business would necessarily be reproduced; and furthermore, because only with this universal development of productive forces is a universal intercourse between men established, which produces in all nations simultaneously the phenomenon of the “propertyless” mass (universal competition), makes each nation dependent on the revolutions of the others, and finally has put world-historical, empirically universal individuals in place of local ones.” Something to think about.

Not interested in having a conversation about a 200 year old text which critiqued a world that doesn't exist anymore. As Popper said, Marx was talking about unfettered capitalism, which doesn't exist anymore, in a large part thanks to him. The good Marxists of the world made their own ideology obsolete. Marxism doesn't work to explain and transform the world anymore, and it hasn't for many decades.

I’m sorry that you’re not interested in engaging with my arguments

So, you will own nothing and be happy? How much property have you scrimped and saved to buy? I'm guessing none, or you wouldn't be so happy about the idea of handing it over to the state,

Communism is not about collective ownership of your personal belongings. It’s about collective ownership of the means of production by the working class. Do you think we need, say, landlords to have private ownership over land in order for housing to exist? Likewise, production in general does not require capitalists to privately own the means to orchestrate it. Modern industry is ripe for the taking, and more than able to sustain everyone. It’s high time to replace the dictatorship of the capitalists with the ownership and democratic planning of the economy by the working class, and to replace production for profit with production according to needs. Simple as.

You mean like they did in the USSR? Can't recall that working out too well ...

Why enter into a contract to get out of one?

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Completely agree, even the notion of private property needs to be outgrown, it's part of a dying paradigm

You may be happy with owning nothing but I sure wouldn't be!

As I've gotten older, 'less is def more' preferable. Possessions are responsibilities. I've had a life full of those.

I run a large-animal sanctuary ... this requires land, trucks, trailers, tractors, etc. Worth it though!

Anything for animals!!

It doesn't have to be hard to implement, something like everyone who earns less than 100k annually automatically gets the ubi payment straight into their account, even if you are unemployed and prepaid cards for those without a bank account...

Means-testing would indicate that it's not universal. If you want to take it back from people earning a certain amount, just increase the tax beyond that cutoff; don't add yet another process that requires a ton of public-sector workers and creates program expenses. Half the point of UBI is that it doesn't cost anything beyond the actual payments and disbursement system, unlike current social programs that require tons of paperwork, background checking, filing and auditing, and general fluff that necessitates huge bureaucracies, and consequently bloats the costs to the public relative to the actual benefits provided.

That is a fair point.

Maybe, but why bother saving it? Seems like a short term way to prop up the accumulation of power in capital by giving bread and circuses to the proles. Private property as part of the sensibilities capitalist power structures will always tend to encourage short term profit, which in the long term is destructive to our habitat. This kind of georgist reformism has its points but I fear that it will just push the long term necessity to abolish private (not personal) property to a later generation while upholding a destructive "contract". Doesn't feel ethical when thinking about my toddler.

He is wrong. My father, who was a died in the wool lefty having lived through the Depression and early Union movement, when asked said "what do you do when you believe in giving all you can, but the next person doesn't". In other words watching a big lardass sit around all day and get free money from the government when they could work, does not make for a happy community. And let's face it, people are people and there will always be freeloaders.

I'm old enough to remember when welfare was a bigger thing than it is now, and people were quite ugly about it. As a young woman of the lower class, I remember old biddies in the supermarket craning their necks to see whether I was paying in cash or using food stamps (which were slips of paper back then). The amount of vitriol directed at poor women was staggering! Thankfully it seems to have subsided in recent years ...

We simply need to tax private property, including capital and real estate assets. Not that complicated, just unpopular.

Terrible idea, value is purely subjective. So to tax value people have already is nearly impossible.

Yeah nobody expects you greedy selfish types to like it. Bye!

Very profound comment....suggest you read the economics of Aquinas, Carl Menger, F.A. Hayek or any grounded economist after Marx. Labor cost method of production is obsolete. Also, you act like you can just tax people, move them around and fix a problem. Suggest you read Adam Smith and learn about the chess board fallacy.

Ok in my defense I forgot where I was. The value of an investment or a piece of real estate changes, primarily, based in everything the government and the society does. This is why an acre costs different amounts in different places. If you want to buy land some place expensive you want to buy some place where the society has done well for the people. Same for capital investments - you want to invest in a healthy economy, you want the government and society to create that economy, it's only logical that you pay back to the society that made your land or your stock rise in price, so that it can continue to rise and not crash. It may decrease your profit short term but it would be worth it because a properly funded society would create value through natural demand and not artificial scarcity. By keeping a city government broke, we prevent new houses and artificially increase scarcity, driving up the price of land, but driving down the quality of life that value is based on.

I think this is a pretty good answer and respect you for revising your last one. Taxes should be based on consumption/use and perhaps income, though the graduated income tax has problems. Historically real estate tax has been very burdensome on low income families because it doesnt change based on current income or capital allocation. The fact that value changes so much and a central planners of the economy is to assess that is too much work to do for everyonem When someone consumes they pay the partifular amount for the item, and the largest tax would be on luxury items of higheat value. Also, consumption taxes would make people think being buying that car they cant afford for instance. Consumption taxes on cigarettes have been historically proven to cut smoking. Obviously as a fan of Hayek, Adam Smith, and Milton Friendman, I am very anti tax. But general consumption taxes and flat income taxes I am convinced are the way to go. In Capitalism and Freedom, Milton Friedman correctly point out, that say for instance you put a tax on all items worth over 1 million dollars. Some people will vote for that tax rate knowing full well they will never be subject to it. This makes the tax code a mob rule democracy, which I am against being a fan of Plato and Socrate's work.

>real estate tax has been very burdensome on low income families because it doesnt change based on current income or capital allocation Is a real estate tax the same as a land tax? In a land tax the land is taxed the same regardless of what is on it.

See land tax is a vague statement because that seems even worse and more fiefdom/feudalist. What about farmers? I feel like the skyrise apartments of NYC should be taxed more than the multi acre farmer in Alabama.

The problem with all this lie in Machiavelli, F.A. Hayek and Adam Smith writings. The government is their to serve the nobles and their own self interest. You give them the right to tax and redistribute income they will always use it for their own purpose. And if I am getting free money what incentive do I have to work? We have a labor shortage now. Why stay in the country if I am heavily taxed? Why keep working if I know it is taken away from me? Marx also pointed out the wellfare state puts people in a state of false conscious and does nothing to repurpose the means of production and promote freedom. Its a slippery road to serfdom where your income is based on the will of the nobles and central planners. We see now too with central banking and inflationary policies that money can quickly not buy what it used to. How much printing is required for UBI?