[AJ007]

At some level definitely.

The whole concept of countries creating way too much currency to pay their bills is a good reflection of this -- Zimbabwe and Venezuela being two recent and current examples. The irony is that all of that "extra" money actually means the recipients become substantially poorer as the supply chains get fucked up.

If it is just a little extra injection, the outcome would not be as extreme. In the most general cases, my guess is somewhere with a tight housing market would see a lot of the money just flow to landlords, in a renter's market the money might flow to consumable goods like drugs and alcohol.

If social & welfare programs are removed in exchange for BI, it is possible all the money would just have to be spent on medical and education. I don't really know the math behind everything but it could just be a restructuring of things that are already occurring. Do extra marketing and "profit" costs exceed government waste? Who knows. Certainly the ability for the government to influence social behavior would be reduced by a lot.

[sokoloff]

If UBI seems possible to pass within 5 years, that will be signal to ramp up investments in low-end rental properties. You have to do it before it's certain to pass (else the purchase price runs up), but I can't see anything happening to rents other than a sharp move up.

[AnthonyMouse]

I still don't understand this argument. The vast majority of people who would receive the UBI are not homeless. They live somewhere now. Why would the same number of people suddenly demand substantially more housing?

[djrogers]

Have you ever counted the number of families that live in a single low-end housing unit? It's not uncommon for it to be 2 or 3 in more expensive areas. If those families each get $20k/yr in UBI, many of them would be looking to move out on their own.

[AnthonyMouse]

The families who live two and three to a housing unit are the ones who qualify for as much existing welfare as the UBI would provide. It would be trading food stamps for cash but you have to expect most people are still going to buy food.

Replacing housing assistance with the equivalent cash might even reduce rents because then people can decide they would rather live in cheaper housing and use that money to go to college.

The whole thing with a UBI is that unless you make it more progressive than the existing system, all you're really doing is replacing vouchers with cash. If you do make it more progressive (i.e. provide more cash than you would have provided vouchers) then you get the same economic consequences as providing more vouchers (i.e. possible price inflation), but it's still more economically efficient than providing more vouchers, because then people can choose between college or better housing or better medical coverage etc., instead of having the government decide for you.