[Cpoll]

> If we remove the fear of starvation (we can afford to feed everyone twice and barely put a dent in our military budget)

327,000,000 people * 365 days * $5/person/day = $596,775,000,000 yearly Or $596 billion

$693 billion is the Wikipedia number for DoD budget, so that actually checks out.

Of course, that's more than "put a dent in the budget," but I'm sure you meant those in need, and not every American (which is the calculation I did).

[thanksgiving]

> but I'm sure you meant those in need, and not every American

I personally despise means testing. There has been so much hatred spewed over "welfare queen" that I am amazed we still do means testing and we have pulled it forward to things like the New York state Excelsior program (college education for first-time college students) and even for the $1,200 COVID-19 stimulus. It is very sad. We don't less means testing, not more.

[fires10]

I despise means testing as well. I also believe the moral hazard argument is over blown most of the time. I would like to see a guaranteed employer of last resort that pays enough for someone to live. This employer (federal agency) could adapt the work that is done to a situation. Provide opportunities for retraining and so forth. This could also provide the psychological safety many are in need of and reduce desperation. Means testing is expensive and causes many to not get the help they need.

[rapind]

Agreed. "Job guarantee" program. There's a write-up here: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Job_guarantee

I also like the idea of UBI combined with a flat tax (losing progressive taxation) for it's simplicity, but imagine all the tax lawyers and accountants that would be out of a job.

[epicureanideal]

It seems like a Job Guarantee program would be something that both Democrats and Republicans could support. I'm surprised it hasn't been done already (other than in the Great Depression).

Questions...

1. How would that program handle people who were unwilling to work? Possible answer off the top of my head: maybe they get sent home or terminated from the program for a period of time, and the pay for the "Job Guarantee" job would need to be somewhat more desirable than the benefits received for not working at all (assuming the person is capable of work).

2. How would the program prevent managers with personal bias against particular people on the Job Guarantee program dismissing them so they are sent home to receive the lower paying "able bodied but unwilling to work" pay? Possible solution: Any dismissal is time limited (or exponential, 1 day, 1 week, 1 month, then in yearly increments), and also the first 3-4 steps would simply involve a transfer to a different manager. To reduce the likelihood of bias, managers should be representative of the general population in any potentially important characteristics such as gender, race, and also political orientation (Democrat, Republican, or other).

3. What would prevent minimum wage employees from moving to the government jobs program instead? (I'm anticipating a potential Republican question.) Possible answer: the pay would be lower.

4. Does this create any kind of perverse incentives for the government or corporations? "Well, we don't need to care about access to college, or jobs in the US, because everyone has a guaranteed (below minimum wage) job".

[fires10]

Those unwilling to work would be sent home and temporarily suspended.

A reasonable appeal process and the ability to change managers or move to a different site.

I would build vocational training into this. You are in training either at your choice or as an assignment. Looking for another job would also be acceptable. If you don't have a GED, your only option would be training. I view unemployment as mismatch between the skills you have and the work that needs to be done or there is a slack in demand and we are trying to figure out what to do. I would build a strong scholarship program for those who demonstrate the ability for university level education. You would demonstrate that by your efforts in other training.

Making the pay less than minimum wage I think would be counter-productive. I would eliminate minimum wage and use this as a counter balance to compete with businesses that rely on minimum wage workers.

[Ericson2314]

Jobs guarantee could be popular like awful "workfare", but it's oftenstill stupidly resting on the assumption that full employment is good, and UBI without full employment is inherently inflationary.

[epicureanideal]

I think a Jobs Guarantee would be a practical, possible-to-get-the-law-passed, interim solution until UBI.

The main benefit of a Jobs Guarantee is it would be palatable to the 50ish% of voters who are opposed to "handouts" without work. And in theory some of the people who work at these jobs might have more self respect, and might maintain good habits that would let them re-enter the regular workforce in time.

Now, if we did have a Jobs Guarantee and something like 25%+ of people were on it, and there are just no jobs for these people to do even for the general betterment of society at large without any profit motive, then that starts to make a good argument for UBI rather than having people do useless work. Start with letting people on the Jobs Guarantee or other jobs, "retire" at an earlier and earlier age, and/or insert 1-2 months of vacation per year, and/or reduce the number of days worked per week or the number of hours worked per day to receive the benefits.

[fires10]

You still need production at times and you don't want people losing momentum. It is hard to go from not working to working at a good pace. Keeping people in a working mind set I think is important.

[jcampbell1]

I’d rather see a $15 minimum wage, and an EITC run in reverse, where anyone that hires someone who is struggling gets a $10 credit for every hour paid.

[Kye]

This seems to be a difference in philosophy. I see your comment and, if I read you right, see a desire to support people by encouraging them to participate in capitalism by paying companies to hire them.

My view is different: public money should go to public good. I don't think that good is served by interfering with markets. If they need $10/hour to justify hiring someone, what is that person going to do for those hours? I think public good is served by training and paying people to deal with collective action problems: failing/at-risk infrastructure, poverty, health care in places with little or no access to it under the private health care and insurance systems, and things like that.

Private companies can be part of that, but the initiative has to be led by the public and the people they elect to lead them, not private interests.

[davinic]

I didn't read this comment as promoting means testing. I read it as "Even if they make the meals available to everyone, mostly just the people in need will use it". It was addressing the moral hazard risk that people often associate with these programs.

NYC will be able to publish just how many people took advantage of the meals. That's the baseline to price the program out nationwide, not the total number of US citizens.

[Ericson2314]

Think of it like banking reserve rules. The program is officially open to everyone, but how much we cook in a day is based on demand.

[Cpoll]

I agree completely. I wasn't trying to make any judgment in my post though, I was just acknowledging "barely put a dent in our military budget," because my math assumes the extreme case that every American takes the $5/day.

[derefr]

I think the suggestion is that we can afford to oversubscribe a program like this, because it'd be a guarantee that you'd be able to eat (i.e. food on demand), not a push-based delivery of the resources (money/food stamps/etc.) required to be able to eat, that people would then feel that they "should" use up, thus using less of their own money.

Any American who didn't take advantage of a demand-driven food supply program on a given month, wouldn't be costing the program anything. It just means that they'd be able to instantly access food when in need, without first qualifying into the program.

Think less "food cash" (like food stamps essentially are), and more "no-limit food credit card" (with the government as the account holder.) You'd just go into a grocery store and buy whatever, and if you couldn't afford it, you'd pay for it with the food credit card (= the government would pay for it.) But if you don't use the card, it isn't accruing or expiring a balance. It's just there, waiting to be used.

One can think of this another way, with a different moral color but the same in-practice effects: imagine if they made shoplifting from grocery stores legal (i.e. every grocery store is now also required to act as a food bank), and the government promised to pay the store back for any shoplifting-related shrinkage. That's essentially what this program would be, except with the store able to track inventory through the till, since the food would still be being "purchased."

[leetcrew]

are you envisioning some mechanism to prevent people from having filet mignon and caviar every night for dinner? I'm not poor, but my grocery purchases would change a lot if I didn't have to pay for it myself.

[harimau777]

Presumably we could come up with some sort of middle ground policy. For example, there could be certain foods that are excluded from the system or maybe only certain products are included. Or perhaps different products could use up more of a person's "food credits".

[ryanbrunner]

This is basically Cuba's policy (well, Cuba in better times, their rationed food has decreased massively in quantity over time). Everyone has an allotment of basic staples (rice, beans, limited meat, coffee, etc.) that covers your basics with little / no extravagance, or you can go to a grocery store for a wider variety.

[derefr]

I think you wouldn't need to actually do any work to get this effect. Consider what happens if tons of people suddenly decides to take home a particular "fancy" food for free. The government pays the grocery store, but the grocery store also runs out of the food and buys more from its supplier. This is driving up demand for the fancy food. Now the fancy food is going to get more expensive, even though people are getting it "for free."

If you take my sibling comment about tax effects into account, this means that, as people over-consume a "free" food, and its price rises, they're effectively making larger and larger "purchases" which will have an effect on their taxes.

On the other hand, if it turns out that the food was only expensive because few people were buying it, in a sort of vicious circle—then when everyone buys it, and forces demand up, it'll force supply up, too, and the food will get cheaper for everyone, not just for people who get it "for free."

For example, if it turns out that we only weren't factory-farming caviar because of the low demand, but it's perfectly possible to do so, then we'll just turn into a society that farms and eats a lot of cheap caviar. No market distortion; just "unlocking" market efficiencies we couldn't previously reach, because the demand side didn't previously have the dollars to vote with. Everybody wins!

[leetcrew]

this seems needlessly complicated. it would be a neverending game of whack-a-mole to get the whitelists / credit multipliers adjusted for every food sku.

if we're already assuming people can budget reasonably well, why not go with a UBI-like food stipend and enroll every citizen? calibrate it so people with zero income get a reasonable (possible COL-adjusted) amount to afford a month's worth of healthy meals and phase it out smoothly respective to income. can't really be abused unless you hide your income and also avoids the fiscal cliff.

[derefr]

Nope; just assuming that the number of people taking advantage of this would be a power-law distribution rather than a gaussian, and so the economics would still work out in favor, even with people "abusing the system."

That, and perhaps the dollar-cost of your "free" food purchases would be taken into account in calculating your tax bracket.

[leetcrew]

maybe I'm just too cynical, but I have a hard time believing it would work out that way. the difference between the cheapest and most expensive brand of pasta is at least 4x. why wouldn't you buy the nicest brand every time? if the tax bracket adjustments had any bite, you would end up with poor families owing more tax than they earned income. this ends up basically equivalent to means testing anyway.

[derefr]

> if the tax bracket adjustments had any bite, you would end up with poor families owing more tax than they earned income.

I mean... they'd be told that that would happen in advance. Wouldn't that then serve as an incentive to avoid making a pattern of taking home the more-expensive food? (They could still do it rarely, though. A one-time $50 bump in spending isn't going to affect your taxes.)

[leetcrew]

if you're really willing to allow that outcome, then your proposal is just an implicit benefit limit that's a bit harder to calculate. how is that different from / better than saying "here's $xxx to feed your family this month; budget appropriately"?

[davinic]

In a couple days, New York will probably release the number of meals served. Divide that by the population of New York and then multiply that by your $596 billion. Even if it's 10% (no way it will be this high), that's $60 billion, or around 9% of the budget, otherwise known as a "dent".

[verelo]

I wish i could reply to the comment below about means testing. The reality is even if this were means tested, many people wouldnt opt into it...so short story, I agree with you, it would be much cheaper than you're describing.

[gnarlysasquatch]

$5/person/day is more than this should require.

Feeding America claims to deliver meals at $0.10 each by rescuing food that would've been wasted, and they claim even buying at wholesale would run about $2/meal ($1.67/lb * 1.2lb/meal).

https://www.feedingamerica.org/ways-to-give/faq/about-our-cl...

[dmoy]

> $2/meal

So, $5/day ?

Rescuing wasted food doesn't work once you scale it to a hundred million people.

Don't get me wrong, I'm definitely in favor of a food/housing program that's available for everyone. I am also a communist though, so it's an easy sell for me.