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RE: Eliminate government assistance - we can do it!

in #politics7 years ago

I realize this is full of sarcasm in the attempt to be funny, but you're actually right about some of the things. However, $56,000 is a bit high to be called a basic income. $12,000 is a basic income in the US because that's our poverty line. That's a floor by the way that everyone can earn on top of, without the discincentives baked into it like welfare has where earning income can make you worse off.

As for inflation concerns, please read this to get into the complexity of that one instead of treating it like a punchline that's entirely obvious. It isn't.

In regards to the rich supporting UBI out of the kindness of their hearts, I think you find this funny based on thinking demand-driven economics is funny. But the thing is, demand is already eroding, even to the point of distorting markets. As automation proceeds, people will lose income, which will hurt their ability to send demand signals as consumers, which will lead to the shuttering of businesses due to insufficient customers, which will lead to a shrinking economy, which means the rich will be worse off if they don't support UBI in order to create the customers they need as owners of capital.

Think of UBI as provisioning everyone with enough money to signal a minimum amount of demand in markets. Without that, markets don't function properly because they are operating on insufficient information.

I highly recommend reading this article about basic income and the Hayekian price system to get a bit more into the above.

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Good comments. Thanks. What I was attempting to do by using the median income is give a starting point for understanding. That's all.

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