Posted on 03/20/2014 2:14:19 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
What if you could receive a guaranteed basic yearly income with no strings attached? Didn’t matter how much money you made now, or in the future. Nobody would ask about your job status or how many kids you have. The check would arrive in the mailbox, no matter what.
Sounds like a far-fetched idea, right? Wrong. All over the world, people are talking guaranteeing basic incomes for citizens as a viable policy.
Half of all Canadians want it. The Swiss have had a referendum on it. The American media is all over it: The New York Times’ Annie Lowrey considered basic income as an answer to an economy that leaves too many people behind, while Matt Bruenig and Elizabeth Stoker of theAtlantic wrote about it as a way to reduce poverty.
The idea is not new: In his final book, Martin Luther King Jr. suggested that guaranteeing people money without requiring them to do anything in exchange was a good way for Americans to share in prosperity. In the 1960s and early 1970s, many in the U.S. gave the idea serious consideration. Even Richard Nixon supported a version of it. But by 1980, the political tide shifted to the right and politicians moved their talking points to unfettered markets and individual gain from sharing the wealth and evening the playing field.
Advocates say it’s an idea whose time has finally come. In a world of chronic job insecurity, stagnant wages, boom-and-bust cycles that wipe out ordinary people through no fault of their own, and shredded social safety nets, proponents warn that we have to come up with a way to make sure people can survive regardless of work status or economic conditions. Here are five reasons they give as to why a guaranteed basic income might just be the answer.
(Excerpt) Read more at salon.com ...
I didn’t say money wouldn’t inflate. But the value would have nothing to do with whether it was earned or given to someone, which is what you said.
Why yes. And Howie Carr was on a screed a while back that this fact combined with the Forensic Evidence being Jimmied ( let 10,000 perps go? ) and the Lawsuit that will probably involve the State of MA (i.e. their blessing of the Lab with the Tainted Injections) add up in a way to denote the Bay State is headed for real trouble. He also mentioned "Romneycare" is also squeezing budgets. With that said, how soon before MA is broke?
Something for Nothing - the oldest scam since the Dawn of Mankind.
Then you need to invade other countries and take what they have - take from people who produce and haven’t been turned into house plants.
“A government powerful enough to give you everything you want is powerful enough to take away everything you have”
The kind of poverty we have in the United States in 2014 isn't the kind of poverty that any amount of money can fix.
But who will work to generate the tax money to pay for those who are content to live off the “basis income?” Or, will the government just print the money to pass out?
Panem et Circenses. (Latin for Bread and Circuses.)
Widespread public support for this sort of economic magical-thinking is the inevitable result of letting the Left take control of the education of our children.
Nothing will get done because nobody will work.
——Just... wow. Are people really that stupid?——
The economic IQ in this country must be below 25....
How can anyone think this idea is even remotely viable must be brain dead....
Impossible. The money has to come from somewhere. "Strings" and consequences will always apply.
Similar to what the Fed is doing?
Friedman proposed a negative income tax.
We have pretty much achieved what he was talking about with earned income tax credits, food stamps, welfare, crazy money, section 8 housing. His plan was simpler. What we have done is provide millions of government jobs to administer 80 different income redistribution schemes.
The logical extension of that idea is that the same government that gives the money out (to people who allegedly need it) then turns around and does whatever it can to get the money right back. That's why lottery sales, for example, are highest in places where people live in poverty.
What the author of this article doesn't understand (among a lot of other things) is that poverty is usually the result of poor decision-making, not unfortunate circumstances. When Rodney King won a court settlement against the LAPD for nearly $4 million after he got his @ss beaten by a bunch of cops, he didn't suddenly become a rich man. He became a poor man with a lot of money ... which is why he ended up dead at the bottom of a swimming pool with alcohol and multiple narcotics in his system.
Sure but then people living on the basic guaranteed income couldn’t afford milk
So they would need more guaranteed income
then the price of milk would go to $15
Now multiply this by every item money buys- shelter utilities food transportation clothing medical care insurance-
Ok, let’s try to find something positive.
If we did this, but also got rid of all facets of government that provide “free stuff” - then slowly reduced the payout of the “basic income” over time.....
I know, it would never happen....
The Treasury Has Already Minted Two Trillion Dollar Coins
“5 reasons to consider a no-strings-attached, basic income for all Americans”
1) It will create a one-party state
2) It will increase crime
3) It will increase bastardy
4) It will increase poverty
5) It will ensure the final victory of communism
Well, there’s five right there! Didn’t take long, either.
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