[nradov]

Technology isn't advanced enough to be able to afford this. Have you ever actually worked in a factory or on a farm? Have you done the math to calculate how much taxes would have to raise in order to give everyone a UBI at even the US federal poverty level? This is magical thinking disconnected from the reality of how the economy works.

[batshit_beaver]

Related to this, but is there ANY explanation out there from proponents of UBI that would clarify how UBI can be done sustainably and perpetually, without causing runaway inflation where UBI is always below poverty level anyway?

I'm obviously too retarded for such an advanced concept, but in my head there's no scenario where a utopian UBI-based society is possible, even with more advanced tech. To allow everyone to have food, shelter, and other necessities regardless of their usefulness to society, at the very least we'd have to have severe birth rate restrictions, strong law enforcement, and other fun authoritarian systems that would no longer qualify the environment as a utopia in the eyes of UBI supporters.

Seems like yet another liberal pipe dream that is entirely disconnected from reality, though I'd love to be proven wrong, if anyone has some good reading suggestions on this subject.

[JSavageOne]

Personally if I were in charge, I'd start by slowly phasing it in via distributing it from the proceeds of a land value tax (the most efficient tax, Henry George called this a citizen's dividend). Then the UBI amount is anchored and there's no possibility of runaway inflation.

[batshit_beaver]

I still don't get it. If rich people own land with value X, and you tax it and produce Y amount that gets distributed to everyone, doesn't that Y directly increase the cost of food and shelter or any other thing that the poor people would want to buy?

Moreover, what's to stop rich people from selling their land? Or abandoning it and moving to another country?

UBI doesn't make any sense to me as CONCEPT. Sure you can find some creative ways to raise some money this year and give it to the poor (or everyone), but how do you create a such a system that continues to function over years and decades?

Money that is given to someone just for existing inherently has no value, so it cannot possibly have much purchasing power. The only things it can buy are things that are subsidized by the government anyway and exists already, such as low income housing and food-stamp-eligible food. What I don't understand is that people seem to think UBI would somehow result in a higher standard of living for people who are already in low income housing and on food stamps, and I just can't think of a mechanism for that.

[mlyle]

> I still don't get it. If rich people own land with value X, and you tax it and produce Y amount that gets distributed to everyone, doesn't that Y directly increase the cost of food and shelter or any other thing that the poor people would want to buy?

You seem to be presuming inelastic supply of all of the stuff they'd ever buy. This is relatively true for some stuff (housing supply in the largest urban markets).

But, most of these things are elastic and/or have larger world markets to bid against. Food, consumer goods, housing in other markets, etc. Therefore, while a UBI would be somewhat inflationary, it would still increase the purchasing power of the poor and lower middle class.

> The only things it can buy are things that are subsidized by the government anyway and exists already, such as low income housing and food-stamp-eligible food.

This isn't true, but this is the biggest benefit to UBI: unwind the administrative apparatus involved with entitlements, and remove the lower income regions which have over 100% effective marginal tax rates. A complicated patchwork of programs can be simplified and reduced in scope (SNAP, section 8, EITC, disability insurance, etc..) and we can ensure that people always have a positive marginal incentive to work. Milton Friedman himself proposed a UBI in a form of a "negative income tax" to avoid these economic distortions.