[chrispeel]

> Every kind of redistribution must sum to zero across all people. Basic income is no different in this regard. So to say that basic income is different because the right and poor both receive it is pure sophistry.

I agree with the zero-sum idea; I should have been more clear that the point was only that making basic income universal might help psychologically. Here's my comments to a different post along the same lines above: People are foolish. That's the whole basis of behavioral economics. The point is not that a rational homo economicus would be any more comforted by the fact that the basic income is universal, but that normal people would be. I don't think this universal nature is essential to the basic idea, and would be happy to have a negative income tax.