[Isomatik]

Some additional downers: - The Roosevelt Institute growth numbers are based on this initiative being 100% funded by increasing the federal deficit. The same report deduced that if the initiative is paid for by increasing taxes on the remaining population, the net effect on GDP, prices, and wages will be closer to zero, just money changing hands. Yang's proposal will fit somewhere in the middle, with roughly one third to half of the cost coming from VAT. The study's model also relies on the following assumptions, both of which I personally do not believe will hold, especially if the main revenue source will be a VAT: "1. Unconditional cash transfers do not reduce household labor supply. 2. Increasing government revenue by increasing taxes levied on households does not change household behavior." [1, page 5,12]

- Over half of means-tested welfare (including Medicaid) goes to people under the age of 18, so these costs won't be touched. "In an average month during 2012, 39.2% of children received some type of means-tested benefit, compared with 16.6% of people aged 18 to 64 and 12.6% of people 65 years and older." The median monthly benefit for these groups was $447, $393, and $303 respectively. The only means tested program that isn't dominated by minors is SSI, the vast majority of which goes to the elderly and people 18 to 64 with disabilities who would not re-enter the workforce. [2, p16, 24]

[1] http://rooseveltinstitute.org/modeling-macroeconomic-effects... [2] https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/publicatio...