Hello, I’m not that informed about UBI, but here is my arguement:

Everyone gets some sort of income, but wouldn’t companies just subside the income by raising their prices? Also, do you believe capatilism can co-exist with UBI?

  • @Misspelledusernme
    24•9 hours ago

    My pie in the sky hope for UBI is that it would be large enough so that you don’t need to work to live, maybe with some frugality.

    At that point I’d be fine with scrapping minimum wage altogether. Companies would have to offer a job/salary that attracts people who aren’t desperate.

    It would be much easier to quit a job. And I think it would broadly increase the value of labor. Automation would increase, but that wouldn’t be a problem, because its no longer a problem to be unemployed.

    • @cm0002
      9•8 hours ago

      Exactly, UBI (or direct payments from the gov, whatever works ig) to support everyone’s basic needs. Housing properly sized to each family, food, water, electric, heating/cooling, healthcare and yes even internet. Maybe even a little extra disposable so people can have recreational activities and you know, live.

      If you want luxury items, like the latest, greatest most expensive iPhone or whatever thats where you need to get a job to earn extra above the UBI

    • darreninthenetEnglish
      1•5 hours ago

      I love the idea but how would it be paid for? Quick back of the envelope sums says if you pay every adult the government living wage in the UK, it would cost around 950bn… uk government expenditure for everything is just under 700bn a year at the moment…

      • @Misspelledusernme
        1•3 hours ago

        I don’t know how it would be paid for. It’s probably prohibitively expensive. But I think it would be cheaper than the product of UBI*population. Poverty is very expensive for a country, and would be reduced by like 80% (made up number).

        I’d draw money from my other pie in the sky policies, like ~100% marginal tax on wealth above $500M, and on incomes above $5M/yr. Realistically, I think this would cause wealth flight, so it would have to be global to work.

        I don’t expect any of this to happen in my lifetime. A more realistic hope is a UBI that you can’t survive on, but that keeps you from poverty. Maybe a UBI that equals the poverty line. But then I’d want to keep the minimum wage.