Universal basic income trial in the US

[jamil]

Uh... on the historical bit... I think it is equally as plausible (based on my reading over the years) that the "earlier" version of why the colonies had trouble was influenced by politics more than the current version.

Don't get me wrong - I find SIGNIFICANT issues with public school curriculum (to the extent I'm aware of it). I'm just not convinced that is a valid argument - the communal living being the problem.

It was a cold war era teaching, I think. That seems plausible at least, given all the anit-Marxist stuff going on.

The part it got wrong is that communal living on a tribal scale is sustainable. The native Americans at the time were communal, and they had been surviving like that for who knows how long. I think as far as what works, communal living works great in the tribe, because that's at a scale where everyone can truly have a greater-good mentality. That just doesn't scale well beyond the tribe.

Of course there were more factors than just systems which caused their failures. But it may have been that communal living contributed. And it could be that switching to a different system helped them overcome those failures, at least a little. But it's not a deep enough analysis to stop at the failure and say the system itself was to blame. You take fairly diverse people from their European society, that had barely gotten past feudalism, and then try to make them survive together in a communal system, it seems self-evident they flat out wouldn't know how to do it. Contrast that with the natives' success. It's not the system as much as the peoples' cultural compatibility with the system.

I guess I'm saying that if you're going to say socialism doesn't work, it needs to go much deeper than looking at a group that failed. It seems evident that culturally homogeneous people with shared common interests, can make a successful run with socialism. They're not going to be the most innovative people. But they can sustain it. But it's not well scaled beyond the tribe. As you get more diversity, it becomes more necessary to control to the point of tyranny.

 

[T.Lex]

It was a cold war era teaching, I think. That seems plausible at least, given all the anit-Marxist stuff going on.

So here's the odd part... I'm a product of that era, too (was graduating college when the Wall came down). But I don't remember any of the anti-communal stuff being taught.

The part it got wrong is that communal living on a tribal scale is sustainable. The native Americans at the time were communal, and they had been surviving like that for who knows how long. I think as far as what works, communal living works great in the tribe, because that's at a scale where everyone can truly have a greater-good mentality. That just doesn't scale well beyond the tribe.

Of course there were more factors than just systems which caused their failures. But it may have been that communal living contributed. And it could be that switching to a different system helped them overcome those failures, at least a little. But it's not a deep enough analysis to stop at the failure and say the system itself was to blame. You take fairly diverse people from their European society, that had barely gotten past feudalism, and then try to make them survive together in a communal system, it seems self-evident they flat out wouldn't know how to do it. Contrast that with the natives' success. It's not the system as much as the peoples' cultural compatibility with the system.

I guess I'm saying that if you're going to say socialism doesn't work, it needs to go much deeper than looking at a group that failed. It seems evident that culturally homogeneous people with shared common interests, can make a successful run with socialism. They're not going to be the most innovative people. But they can sustain it. But it's not well scaled beyond the tribe. As you get more diversity, it becomes more necessary to control to the point of tyranny.

So... Marx kinda agrees with you. At least, in terms of how societies start out communally and how it shifts more to an owner/producer dynamic.

I think the more interesting thing is how - and I think this is undeniable - the generations since Marx seem to be adopting socialist principles among the more "advanced" nations. There are, as mentioned in this thread, experiments with it. That some fail is not a problem with the principles, necessarily. Capitalism and democracy have had equal failures.

It seems to me that in the next hundred years, if the current arc continues, Marx will be more right than wrong. (Most of the wrongness being on the revolution part. I think he underestimated peoples' interest in not getting killed.)

 

[GodFearinGunTotin]

That's another one of those self-evident things, that the extent to which individuals take responsibility for themselves, makes the society they live in better. If everyone in society can provide for themselves, and behave themselves, to the extent that they're capable, that society is superior to a society which requires lots of laws prescribing behavior. It's a society that can handle liberty. But postmodernism is producing a society incapable of handling liberty. It seems a lot like a religion of itself, except it's producing a fake morality that looks to me like it requires people control.

Agree 100%

 

[GodFearinGunTotin]

So here's the odd part... I'm a product of that era, too (was graduating college when the Wall came down). But I don't remember any of the anti-communal stuff being taught.

I do. I mean, I remember being taught the stuff about the pilgrims I posted up thread. I remember being indoctrinated with the socialism/communism bad, captialism/free markets good...standing on your own two feet, eschewing government hand outs was the honorable thing to do.

In retrospect, owing to the fact I was raised in the midst of widespread acceptance of progressivism and its byproducts (social security, for example), I see there was quite a bit of hypocrisy there. The same people that taught me "we don't take welfare, government hand outs are for lazy, n'er-do-wells" are the same ones that thought FDR (and his programs) were terrific.

 

[jamil]

You pay for Mary's needs with the understanding that, should you find yourself in the same situation, your needs are met in the same way. Like insurance, you aren't just paying for other's claims, you're funding the safety net that will catch you if you fall as well.

That said, this actually is the tradition among some Arabic and Asian cultures. The eldest children are your safety net. It works well for wealthier families, as I've seen first hand with my in-laws. For poor families, it simply increases the chances of generational poverty. If I'm paying for momma, that's less money I have to train for a better job or to send my kids to college, etc. For the poorest of families, it means you don't get any help other than what you can convince charities you require and your outcome is more bleak. Additionally, it makes it harder for children (or adult children) of poor families to move to follow job opportunities, etc. There's always trade offs. On one hand it enforces family bonds and reduces social burden, on the other it reduces mobility (both physical and economic) and can lead to more poverty down the road. I also wonder if it doesn't contribute to larger families than you can actually support (if you only have one son and he dies, you have nothing to fall back on), but I don't really know.

This is an area I agree on the problem, but I'm not sure we agree about solutions.

Take old people, for example. Some people are responsible and do the due diligence to prepare for their retirement, and retire comfortably enough, without the need for government help. Some people who could do that don't do that. And their lack of due diligence sets them up to be poor when they're no longer capable of making a living. For both of these types, in a socialized system, the one type becomes a burden on the others, and this isn't fair to the ones who prepare. But it's nuanced. The responsible guy can have unforeseen calamities of no fault of his own, and his savings decimated. Now he's either going to retire in poverty, or be a burden on society. But so is the irresponsible guy. And most people are the irresponsible guy.

Then there's the problem where people who might be responsible, and prepare what little they can, but are too impoverished for that to be of any help. I think most people would be more okay with a social safety net if we could make the less responsible people more responsible for themselves. Then it would be a much cheaper and sustainable burden on society, and the more conscientious people would be more okay with it.

 

[T.Lex]

I do. I mean, I remember being taught the stuff about the pilgrims I posted up thread. I remember being indoctrinated with the socialism/communism bad, captialism/free markets good...standing on your own two feet, eschewing government hand outs was the honorable thing to do.

In retrospect, owing to the fact I was raised in the midst of widespread acceptance of progressivism and its byproducts (social security, for example), I see there was quite a bit of hypocrisy there. The same people that taught me "we don't take welfare, government hand outs are for lazy, n'er-do-wells" are the same ones that thought FDR (and his programs) were terrific.

Yeah, that last part I remember.

It wasn't until I got to high school that I learned about the court packing scheme and some of the back story on how that all got passed.

 

[GodFearinGunTotin]

This is an area I agree on the problem, but I'm not sure we agree about solutions.

Take old people, for example. Some people are responsible and do the due diligence to prepare for their retirement, and retire comfortably enough, without the need for government help. Some people who could do that don't do that. And their lack of due diligence sets them up to be poor when they're no longer capable of making a living. For both of these types, in a socialized system, the one type becomes a burden on the others, and this isn't fair to the ones who prepare. But it's nuanced. The responsible guy can have unforeseen calamities of no fault of his own, and his savings decimated. Now he's either going to retire in poverty, or be a burden on society. But so is the irresponsible guy. And most people are the irresponsible guy.

Then there's the problem where people who might be responsible, and prepare what little they can, but are too impoverished for that to be of any help. I think most people would be more okay with a social safety net if we could make the less responsible people more responsible for themselves. Then it would be a much cheaper and sustainable burden on society, and the more conscientious people would be more okay with it.

But not on a national level.

Local charities/churches know who really needs the help and who's just gaming the system. Being private, they can call BS and send people that can and should be able to take care of themselves packing. Generally speaking, the best, most efficient answers to solutions are as close to the problems as possible. There's just something about when it's somebody else's money, when there's real accountability to it, when you have to treat everyone the same -- because that's what government has to do that sucks in waste, fraud, and abuse like a dry sponge does water.

 

[jamil]

So here's the odd part... I'm a product of that era, too (was graduating college when the Wall came down). But I don't remember any of the anti-communal stuff being taught.



So... Marx kinda agrees with you. At least, in terms of how societies start out communally and how it shifts more to an owner/producer dynamic.

I think the more interesting thing is how - and I think this is undeniable - the generations since Marx seem to be adopting socialist principles among the more "advanced" nations. There are, as mentioned in this thread, experiments with it. That some fail is not a problem with the principles, necessarily. Capitalism and democracy have had equal failures.

It seems to me that in the next hundred years, if the current arc continues, Marx will be more right than wrong. (Most of the wrongness being on the revolution part. I think he underestimated peoples' interest in not getting killed.)

So you're probably close to a decade behind in school then. I don't think this was taught in college, but it was definitely taught in grade school and up through high school. I still remember my US History teacher teaching it. My wife, 3 years younger than me, from a different state than me, said she was taught that. And I asked my mother-in-law, who graduated high school in the 50s. She was taught that too. How widely taught it was nationally I don't know. But everyone who is near my age that I could think to ask, was taught that at least in k-12.

Marx got some of the problems right, but he got the causes wrong, and he completely missed on the predictions of how human nature would react to the problems. As far as getting the problems right, if you get the causes wrong, it seems the rightness of anything else is accidental. So I feel very confident about saying Marx was mostly full of ****.

 

[T.Lex]

You confidence in your assertion was never in doubt.

 

[GodFearinGunTotin]

You confidence in your assertion was never in doubt.

This is INGO...it's what we do.

 

[jamil]

But not on a national level.

Local charities/churches know who really needs the help and who's just gaming the system. Being private, they can call BS and send people that can and should be able to take care of themselves packing. Generally speaking, the best, most efficient answers to solutions are as close to the problems as possible. There's just something about when it's somebody else's money, when there's real accountability to it, when you have to treat everyone the same -- because that's what government has to do that sucks in waste, fraud, and abuse like a dry sponge does water.

You've pretty much nailed down the fraud and abuse issues. California lives as an example of how social safety nets turn into way more than that, and are full of abuses.

To give UBI its due, it eliminates that kind of fraud and abuse. The way we do safety nets now, it's means tested. To reduce fraud you have to test people's means more accurately. It's currently open to people faking their means to game the system because of all the things you said. However, if everyone gets the same stipend the "means" scamming becomes irrelevant. My problem with UBI is the impact I think it will have on society, that tends to make society further erode self-responsibility. I also think it's self-evidently true that UBI is a horribly inefficient way to provide a social safety net. The negative tax rate is a more efficient way. But still we're essentially taking money away from the people who earned it, and giving it to those who didn't. If I don't agree with irresponsible people taking resources which could be more efficiently given to the people who really need it, forcing me to give it is pretty much theft.

 

[Fiddle]

Is it safe to assume that most people who are for a UBI would also support a flat tax rate?
A Universal Basic Tax Rate !!! UBTR

Everyone participates in the income - everyone participates in paying for it.

 

[Shadow01]

All social systems in place require the forced taking of those with and giving it to those without. Their existence is solely reliant on those that have. If we make a universal income for all and as a society the majority decide to live within that stipend, who will we choose as the haves to derive that income from? If the haves are a disproportionate few, are we willing to take large percentages of what they have to keep the UBI from failing? If your answer is that the UBI is not intended as a livable income, then it really is only serving as redistribution of wealth and nothing more.

 

[Fiddle]

I don't believe that anyone is trying to deny that this is a plan designed for the redistribution of wealth.

 

[T.Lex]

I don't believe that anyone is trying to deny that this is a plan designed for the redistribution of wealth.

Welcome to 1933.

 

[Fiddle]

Welcome to 1933.

Repeal of Prohibition???

 

[T.Lex]

Repeal of Prohibition???

Although I'll be among the first to raise a pint to toast that event, look back on FDR's first hundred days.

 

[Fiddle]

I was just trying to find something good from that year.

 

[T.Lex]

I was just trying to find something good from that year.

Well, that depends on who you ask.

The people that lived through the Depression were very happy with FDR (well, mostly). Things like the TVA certainly helped a great many people.

That benefit, though, came at a significant cost to the American experiment.

 

[jamil]

Is it safe to assume that most people who are for a UBI would also support a flat tax rate?
A Universal Basic Tax Rate !!! UBTR

Everyone participates in the income - everyone participates in paying for it.

I'd say it's not safe to assume that for most supporters of UBI. There's still the belief that the people who make the most are the most responsible for the poor. UBI doesn't change that.

I like the idea of a universal basic tax rate. The tax plan I thought of a few years ago I called the "put your money where your mouth is" tax plan. So the idea is that it doesn't matter how much you earn. We figure out about what the flat tax rate would have to be to fund basic government. I mean the constitutional responsibilities of government. Not wealth redistribution, not crony capitalism.

Strip all that out. What does it cost to run the minimum government necessary to fulfil its mission. Figure out what the flat rate would have to be to pay for that, and that's the fixed, basic tax rate. Everyone pays it, even kids' procedes from their lemonade stands. Say it's 10% (I think it would be much lower than that.). You earn a dollar minus expenses, you pay a dime. No exemptions, no tax returns filed. You pay taxes out of your own profits or payroll check periodically.

Then, for those who want government to do more, when they pay their taxes, people can opt to put their money where their mouth is. If they want the government to fund the green industrial complex, add that to your tax payment, and specify it to go towards funding for green energy.