You can easily save 10 to 20% when unemployed because you don't have to pay for daily transportation (tube/train/car), lunch outdoors every day and a few other things. So the difference in disposable income is about null in most cases.
You can take lunch from home and eat that. I know enough people who do that. People who bought yearly or other long term tickets (majority of frequent travellers) dont save.
Even if that is the case, it's not your choice, as I said before - it does not apply to those voluntarily unemployed. You are projecting arguments of basic income onto an economic solution for a pandemic where people are suddenly forced into unemployment or unpaid leave for a very specific reason...
Given a lack of choice how can paying wages make any difference to their employment behavior. I'll repeat: this is not basic income.
Yes of course, that's exactly what's happening at the minute. Everybody who can't work is having the most terrific fun on this unplanned holiday time they've suddenly been handed where they don't have to pay bills or buy food or support dependents./s
You're surely just being deliberately naïve here, playing the naif? I just don't really see the point I guess
Ignoring the penalization of work is being naive? Ignoring the "not having to work" in calculating how well off someone is, because you can make a snarky remark about how mixed a blessing it is to stay home, is naive? I would say the opposite.
I could just as well ask if you're just trying to be clever devil's advocate here.
Yes, I think you're being deliberately naïve. Maybe if people were spherical cows, you might have a point, but you're just acting as if there is no such thing as society, as if people aren't going to want friends and family (in particular) who can't work to be supported through this period. It's a slightly bizarre way to view this handout, given the situation that is very clearly occurring.
And some people will make that calculation and figure out a way to officially be unable to work and pick up government money. That's always happened, it's called malingering.
Well, I guess if people didn't avoid work because of the incentive effects of social assistance systems, then your model would be better, but that's not the world we live in.
>And some people will make that calculation and figure out a way to officially be unable to work and pick up government money. That's always happened, it's called malingering.
Wait, you agree this happens, despite just having waxed eloquent about "living in society", but then condescend to everyone who suggests it does? Right, I'm the one wasting everyone's time here...
Then what point are you really trying to make here then? Because on its own, what you're saying is a non-sequitur, it's as if you're just ignoring what's going on. Some people will take advantage of this handout. So what? Most people will not, and most working people are not looking at this the way you describe (it doesn't have almost universal public support because everyone is rubbing their hands with glee at the thought of cheating the system).
Edit: it's as if you're talking about a completely different thing to what this actually is: as per the sibling comment, this is a benefit going to people losing their jobs, for reasons they cannot control in any way.