[jchmbrln]

Halfway through:

> These estimates are based on a universal basic income paid for by increasing the federal deficit. As part of the study, the researchers also calculated the effect to the economy of paying for the cash handouts by increasing taxes. In that case, there would be no net benefit to the economy, the report finds.

> "When paying for the policy by increasing taxes on households rather than paying for the policy with debt, the policy is not expansionary," the report says. "In effect, it is giving to households with one hand what it is taking away with the other. There is no net effect."

TL;DR: If we create money, there's more money in the economy. If we don't create money, there's not.

[pitaj]

I'm a libertarian. I think that the UBI could allow for economic growth based solely on the power it as to eliminate the welfare trap. However, this would only work as a replacement for all welfare, though. It would have to replace welfare, food stamps, social security, etc, with the exception of medicaid and medicare.

I support UBI only as a replacement for existing (bad) welfare systems. I think UBI in conjunction with simplified tax code could inject life into the inner cities. Add onto that decriminalization of all controlled substances, and you've got a huge boon.

[paulddraper]

Hello fellow libertarian.

The problem is that very many welfare recipients get more than $1,000/month per adult. Disabled? Single mother with children? You'll easily get 2x that (including check, food stamps, subsidized housing).

And no one is going to want to take away from the poor.

$1,000/adult/month replacing welfare is an impossibility. We'd have to use much larger numbers.

[pitaj]

If two checks are necessary, that's just more incentive for parents to stay together, or if that isn't possible, the child support can be taken out of the check. Also, with a guaranteed income, a family could much more easily move to a cheaper area with more opportunities.

People also don't tend to consider the harms that means-tested programs do to the poor. Subsidized housing is one huge per peeve of mine because it's essentially creating ghettos.

[paulddraper]

> People also don't tend to consider the harms that means-tested programs do to the poor.

True. Still, there will be many who are worse off with $1 UBI.

I agree with your views. But if UBI is ever created it has 0% chance of replacing welfare.

[uoaei]

It would certainly replace unemployment benefits but certainly not health- and family-based welfare.

Though the children could receive something like $800/month for the first, $600/month for the second, and so on up to the fourth which is compensated for $200/month. Anything above that will not be compensated. The diminishing returns will discourage people from having more kids just to have more money, and also will appease those who are afraid of "welfare queens" who only have kids to get money from the state. We know that the contingency of people actually doing that is practically nonexistent but it will assuage those who are still concerned about it.

[dilemma]

UBI is the welfare trap par excellence.

[yuhong]

Printing money would encourage the ad bubble, because the economy would grow based on how much of the basic income consumers spend.

[mrep]

HA! I had just copied those exact 2 paragraphs and was going to paste them here but you summed it up well enough

[Redoubts]

Well, I suppose that's better than making things a lot worse.

[paulddraper]

Tomorrow's headline:

Startups could grow more if they borrowed more money!

[k_sh]

Earth-shattering discovery!