As a conservative I would not support such a plan. The sick, disabled and poor need to be provided for but Guaranteed Income is a Incentive Killer.
Good Topic! The Fair Tax has a guaranteed prebate installed within the plan whereby each citizen would get X amount of dollars at the beginning of each month which would level the playing field for those low income families and their taxed purchases but other than that….no. As @Lon Tanner pointed out, the incentive to achieve a greater goal would be diminished which I also believe would affect the amount of education each individual would wish to acquire. * Imagine an already dumbed down society turning into totally ignorant human automatons.* The only incentive for excellence would be an improbable move out of the lower caste a person is in and into political or corporate leadership which undoubtedly would only be available for legacy entries. Capitalism and competition have their downfalls but they both are part of the human need to achieve excellence so again, no to yet another plan to guarantee equity to the masses and not equality.
Yes, I'd absolutely support such a plan. Also universal healthcare and education. The social cost of not doing so has been ruinous. As for 'initiative,' a person born into a system that meets vital, basic needs will be better equipped to pursue higher goals than merely subsisting. A kid born malnourished to poor and uneducated parents is unlikely to escape the ongoing cycle of poverty and crime.
Such a plan is only being proposed to buy votes and create a perpetual constituency dependent upon the politicians who provide that income aka the Democrats.
In America, the current labor force participation rate is a little under 62% and continues to decline. About 129 million Americans are currently working at full time jobs. Population is about 330 million. Do the math.
A person born into the system that meets vital basic needs would become dependent on those benefits and perpetuate dependency thus destroying self initiative.
The welfare programs that we already have in place are not helping people to live better lives, and just giving more people money to live on is not going to help , either. People need to learn how to manage their income, and control impulse buying. In the area where we live, a lot of the people get government checks to live on, plus food stamps, and whatever other government benefits that they qualify for. The parents spend the money on drugs and beer, buy junk food for the kids to live on, and nothing motivates these people to try and raise their children to grow up to live better lives. Giving them even more money will not change how they spend it, and that is the real problem here. In theory, this is a good idea, and I agree that people , especially children, should have a good start in life. This is why the welfare program and the food commodities program was started back in the mid-1950’s. I am sure that it did help some families, ones that were trying to help themself and raise their families properly; but even back then, a lot of it was abused. At least back then, the landlord could have the rent money paid directly to them, so the person was not evicted for spending all of the rent money on alcohol. The commodities were passed out every few months, and they were healthy food. Rice , beans, powdered milk, flour, sugar, and canned meats, plus a huge loaf of cheese; so at least the people could have healthy meals, and the mothers actually cooked meals back in those days. Now, many adults can’t cook, and don’t want to. They want food delivered, and easy to make, like pizza and soda pop. Another thing , is qualifying who gets the help from the government. There were two families that I was friends with from church. Both families had 5 younger children, and the fathers were often out of work, especially in the winter. One lady was married to her husband, so she did not qualify for any help; but the other lady just lived together, so she was considered a single mother, and she got assistance for her and the children. This was totally unfair, but how it was determined, rather than the needs of the families.
I did but your analysis renders a large degree of wiggle room. First off, there is no way to tally the actual numbers of employment due to the fact that just because a person might be listed as unemployed doesn’t mean they are not gainfully employed. The employment records will also not take into consideration those people who have fallen off the records after a term of unemployment. Millions of people work under the table and some employers are happy with that because they’re not liable for their side of FICA, health insurance or unemployment insurance. Construction and AG are famous for employees who wish to be off the grid, so to speak. Now, according to the numbers you gave, 62% of the population is working and only 129 million are working full time jobs (40+ hrs wk or salaried) so that leaves 76 million people with part time jobs. (under 35 hrs per week) Note: During the Obama era, part time employment became a standard practice due to government mandates regarding health care and held over into the Trump administration even though the penalties were removed. Now, the most telling thing about the employment rolls is that millions of people who were employed previous to the CV-19 shutdown got on the government unemployment program that actually paid them more than what they were making prior to being unemployed. Even at this late date, employers are begging people to go back to work but a large part of the population has become accustomed to being taken care of have become lazy and some, even to the point of being unemployable with no drive nor need to excel. The Eloi are always dependent on the Morlocks because they furnish the Eloi with everything they need until…….. Ever hear of the Stockholm syndrome? The same thing but on a massive scale.
Uh, no to the bolded. 62% of the civilian labor force is working, not 62% of the population. Not everyone in the population is a part of the labor force. Us old folks, children, military folks, etc, are not included. Sorry I didn't make that clear
Not so, Lon. A system that meets basic, vital needs from birth will instill in a person a sense of self-confidence and trust in the world as a benign place. Further incentive beyond mere, bare maintenance will *come from within that person*, as they grow and mature and know that the tools they need to achieve their dreams are within reach. A system such as we have now, which takes a fatalistic and punitive attitude toward 'the poor' as being inherently flawed and inferior, has the exact opposite effect. It's self-evident that a person born into the system we now have, a person who is literally starved of physical and emotional and intellectual 'food', will base their self-worth on immediate, low-level 'gain' and *end up costing society a lot more that if the system had simply given them a basic income from birth.* As for 'dependency', think of a kid raised by parents who make sure there's food and health care and a good school, but who only gets a modest allowance. The kid has to save up their quarters and dimes if they want anything that costs more than their measly allowance can buy. As that kid gets older, they'll be more than eager to get a job. Or, if junior college is free, they'll aim higher and work to establish a career. FACT --- It's generally 'human nature' to want to do and be more, and to become a valuable and respected part of society. What a waste of our fellow humans, to force so many to rot in a system that stunts all personal growth and blocks all routes to success.
Do please examine the Native American tribes in the U.S. and then look at your analogy once anew. A council chief my wife and I know curses the day a casino was built and each member of the tribe started getting a check each month from the casino. Using your logic, one would think that with a guaranteed check every month, a free education and a totally tax exempt people would want to rise to some form of greatness as individuals but the exact opposite has transpired. Experiential evidence is much greater than inexperienced logic. Now, for the rest of us: When a government gives money away they can determine what you can spend it on. When a government gives away an education they can also say what you can learn. When a government gives you food then they can also determine what you can eat. When a government gives away housing then they can also determine what kind of place it is and how long you can stay.
I really don't see how anyone could use the current Native American situation as an analogy in the case against social and government responsibility for all its citizens. Instead, it looks more like a worst-case example of what happens when an entire population is isolated and written off as 'subhuman' and left to destroy itself as a matter of government policy. Casinos just bring in organized crime, aka predatory capitalism. That dynamic has no interest in the wellbeing or human potential of the 'economic units' which it exploits for its own growing profit and power. It's always seemed odd to me that 'Democracy' and 'Capitalism' are spoken of by Americans as though they were one and the same, indivisible under God. But they're not the same. Not even close. Democracy is a form of governance --- supposedly 'for the people' --- and Capitalism is a financial system by which wealth is transferred 'upward' to the already-wealthy. Capitalism literally depends on the existence of a disposable 'underclass' that can be exploited at will. It has no interest in human rights or simple human decency --- and is therefore profoundly psychopathic in nature. Bottom line, before I go much farther off-topic, it should be obvious to any thinking person that predatory capitalism is one of the 'domestic enemies' that a democratic government is constitutionally obligated to protect its citizens from. Basic income would be just the start of correcting government's massive dereliction of duty. But with the near-fascist tone of 'conservative' discourse today, I have to admit that's unlikely to happen anytime soon.
Way back in 1943 or so, Maslow published his theory about human needs, and arranged them in what we call a pyramid. The idea of a UBI is to see that everyone has the lowest 2 levels of needs met. Food, shelter, clothing, safety. And what we see is that for many people, that is enough, and their is no ambition or perceived need to go much higher. https://www.simplypsychology.org/maslow.html When I lived in Arizona, I saw what life on "the res" looked like, and it ain't pretty. OTOH, it would be worse if we just shrugged, and said, oh well, let them figure it out.