EncA Fool with CompassionPronouns: He, Him, HisRegistered Userregular
edited June 2015
I hate being the person to point this out, but Nbsp only made an account once this topic was brought up, has only posted in response to this topics, and generally has held a stonewall stance through all of his posts.
It sort of strikes me as paid political poster type of thing, like what I used to see on Fark and elsewhere. It just seems really strange that someone would come to the PA forums and only post on a single new topic stance at the exclusion of the rest of the community.
I hate being the person to point this out, but Nbsp only made an account once this topic was brought up, has only posted in response to this topics, and generally has held a stonewall stance through all of his posts.
It sort of strikes me as paid political poster type of thing, like what I used to see on Fark and elsewhere.
This seems like the sort of thing to report to mods
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EncA Fool with CompassionPronouns: He, Him, HisRegistered Userregular
edited June 2015
I don't know what rule would have been violated by it though. Dogpiling isn't a great thing, regardless of type of poster. But I feel folk in the thread should be aware having lurked through this discussion and the other thread that spawned it.
Enc on
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FaranguI am a beardy manWith a beardy planRegistered Userregular
2. This may have been answered somewhere else in the thread, but would this policy be structured as one lump-sum payment, or over each month? In either case, what is to stop someone from taking their monthly/yearly deposit, going to their nearest casino and putting it all on Red? I have little trouble believing that a number of people that come into larger sums of money than they are used to handling do a poor job of it. Is that the point where we say, "Well tough luck, see you next month/year"? Are there regulations on how the person spends the money? Or do we keep some other social welfare programs around to help those that just refuse to help themselves?
Nothing, but what's to stop people from getting their monthly paycheque and doing the same thing?
I may be wrong, but I thought that some of the current social welfare programs in place in the U.S. - SNAP comes first to mind - had set restrictions on how the money or assistance provided could be spent or used.
If someone was able to hold down a job and manage themselves before this hypothetical change takes place, I'm less worried about them post-mincome than someone who is on a number of assistance programs that provides guidelines and rules for how to manage their resources, which is suddenly replaced by a system that drops off a check and nothing else.
In what way? Are you describing a hypothetical involving ignorance or malice?
More the ignorance part. From what I've read in the thread so far, this kind of program would supersede or replace a chunk of social welfare programs already in place to assist people with few resources for food and income. I was just thinking that, if we replace programs that offer money/food along with guidance on how to best utilize those things, and replace it with a bigger share of money but no guidance, we could see a rise in the number of people that weren't even scraping by before - homeless, mentally ill - taking the money that is supposed to keep their heads just above water, make maybe one or two mistakes with it, and then they don't even have enough to do that.
As an admittedly-anecdotal example, my current apartment in my area(suburban Chicago) is widely held by both myself and my friends/family as a good deal. It's a modest size one-bedroom. Currently the rent is $9000 a year. If we assume that we are sticking with the $10K per year figure given earlier, that's really not leaving people much. And if someone receives this amount of money, and in a moment of weakness splurges on a small luxury, then they have almost nothing left for their time period.
And at some point, I argue that people should be held responsible for their decisions and to live with the consequences. A basic income just changes so much about our cultural landscape that I think it needs to change where we paint that line. (Also re-reading what I've said so far, since it's early and I'm probably not being very clear, I can see an argument that depending on where a person is, a basic income could get less for a person than in other places which is also something to consider)
So you're saying, if instead of giving people $5 a day for food, we give them ~$450 cash every two weeks
they might starve to death
Not necessarily starve to death, I'm just trying to figure that, if we replace modest and directed means with more ample but free-form means, what do we as a society do with the people that spend it poorly, if it changes at all from the way we currently have it.
But I don't think I'm really doing a good job of conveying myself clearly.
One of the best ways to help people avoid spending their money poorly is to provide financial education. And it doesn't need to wait until they have money either. I had a summer school class that was entirely about budgeting, credit cards, etc.
Which, now that I think about it, it wasn't supposed to be about that stuff. The teacher just sort of hijacked the advanced math class to teach all that while occasionally including math.
2. This may have been answered somewhere else in the thread, but would this policy be structured as one lump-sum payment, or over each month? In either case, what is to stop someone from taking their monthly/yearly deposit, going to their nearest casino and putting it all on Red? I have little trouble believing that a number of people that come into larger sums of money than they are used to handling do a poor job of it. Is that the point where we say, "Well tough luck, see you next month/year"? Are there regulations on how the person spends the money? Or do we keep some other social welfare programs around to help those that just refuse to help themselves?
Nothing, but what's to stop people from getting their monthly paycheque and doing the same thing?
I may be wrong, but I thought that some of the current social welfare programs in place in the U.S. - SNAP comes first to mind - had set restrictions on how the money or assistance provided could be spent or used.
If someone was able to hold down a job and manage themselves before this hypothetical change takes place, I'm less worried about them post-mincome than someone who is on a number of assistance programs that provides guidelines and rules for how to manage their resources, which is suddenly replaced by a system that drops off a check and nothing else.
In what way? Are you describing a hypothetical involving ignorance or malice?
More the ignorance part. From what I've read in the thread so far, this kind of program would supersede or replace a chunk of social welfare programs already in place to assist people with few resources for food and income. I was just thinking that, if we replace programs that offer money/food along with guidance on how to best utilize those things, and replace it with a bigger share of money but no guidance, we could see a rise in the number of people that weren't even scraping by before - homeless, mentally ill - taking the money that is supposed to keep their heads just above water, make maybe one or two mistakes with it, and then they don't even have enough to do that.
As an admittedly-anecdotal example, my current apartment in my area(suburban Chicago) is widely held by both myself and my friends/family as a good deal. It's a modest size one-bedroom. Currently the rent is $9000 a year. If we assume that we are sticking with the $10K per year figure given earlier, that's really not leaving people much. And if someone receives this amount of money, and in a moment of weakness splurges on a small luxury, then they have almost nothing left for their time period.
And at some point, I argue that people should be held responsible for their decisions and to live with the consequences. A basic income just changes so much about our cultural landscape that I think it needs to change where we paint that line. (Also re-reading what I've said so far, since it's early and I'm probably not being very clear, I can see an argument that depending on where a person is, a basic income could get less for a person than in other places which is also something to consider)
So you're saying, if instead of giving people $5 a day for food, we give them ~$450 cash every two weeks
they might starve to death
Not necessarily starve to death, I'm just trying to figure that, if we replace modest and directed means with more ample but free-form means, what do we as a society do with the people that spend it poorly, if it changes at all from the way we currently have it.
But I don't think I'm really doing a good job of conveying myself clearly.
Soup kitchens seem the best method.
Nobody ever wants to eat at one but it seems the best method for those genuinely unable to feed themselves.
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EncA Fool with CompassionPronouns: He, Him, HisRegistered Userregular
Something that would be neat to see with this concept would be a state or county level experiment with this idea in an urban district over, say, five to ten years to determine economic re-investment. The 1.9-2.5 trillion number has been thrown around a lot on the previous pages, but how much real taxable stimulus will come out of that. I'm looking at things like how for every dollar you spend on infrastructure you get about 1.5 dollars back into the economy, this could be a functional way to test if you actually end up with GDP growth from such a program.
An alternative to base income, matching this program with public sector service work (such as working at charity/volunteer/nonprofit civic programs or specialized training and educational programs for 10-15 hours a week as a pairing to the amount you receive) could lead to having added value to base income and also help struggling municipalities meet their local obligations while also ensuring folks are getting some form of work experience or specialized training needed in their communities they can use to help launch them back into the economy (if possible/desirable). One of the things we see at my work is that a lot of corporations and public employers now view volunteer service as no different from paid work history for employability, and helping folk get back into more specialized work. Some of our local community colleges are starting such programs as tuition free for certain fields that the local economy desperately needs (only for those currently unemployed or under a certain income level).
Possibly two different programs here, but both would serve the purpose of having a more stable and livable situation for those at the bottom of the economy with new ways to climb up that may not have been available through k-12 education alone.
well with the 1.9 trillion number, because only the bottom 20% or so of earners would get the full amount without paying some percentage of it back immediately in taxes, and people at middle income would get much less net gain
There is some evidence to suggest it wouldn't really be much more expensive than existing programs
see ronya's calculator
but the actual economic ripple effects and amount that comes back (as per the 1.5-2 dollars per food stamp dollar) would be pretty substantial too
Forcing people to work for their welfare has been tried and it's almost universally been a disaster and a legal cluster fuck. I have a feeling you have a problem with the idea on a moral level of people getting something without working for it. The idea of a BGI is that people could pursue their interests, if that means they want to make youtube videos or paint miniatures or build tables, so be it. Some small percentage will just not want to work, but most people aren't comfortable sitting around doing nothing and living on barely anything. It would however open up people taking risks, pursuing passions which might be financially disastrous if tried without it
override367 on
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EncA Fool with CompassionPronouns: He, Him, HisRegistered Userregular
Just from the retail and housing boom from that, I could easily see a rising tide effect where all the ships of the area grow in prosperity from the increase in sales. It would be like the 90s boom in terms of sales tax receipts for local and state governments. Property taxes wouldn't see any effect but indirect taxation on everything from gasoline to general sales would probably explode as folks who couldn't afford to even eat regularly suddenly have enough to live survivably.
As a general note, I like mincome for nothing else than a more efficient solution to all the crazy different social programs we have now. Just give people a lump of cash and be done with it. All the oversight involved with means testing and tapering and other conditional programs is costly and wasteful.
I spend hours and train-money just going to various cities and saying "hi, okay, bye". And that's in a socialist hellscape. And the people I'm meeting are also travelling around and rescheduling things. Nobody in this has time to spare.
i don't think i understand what a basic income would get you that a more conventional welfare system wouldn't
is it just the guarantee that it's yours forever no matter what you do with it? making it unlike the dole in that you can openly declare your intention to never work again and the money will still roll in
My understanding is:
Decreased administration costs due to decreased/limited/rolling means testing.
Increased mobility(employment, social and physical) due to it being assured.
I've noticed that most of the opposition for basic income, no matter what website I'm on, tends to be those people who view themselves as temporarily embarrassed millionaires.
"Well once my financial situation unfucks itself, I don't want to be screwed over by this basic income thing!"
Then they repeat this line for the next 50 years until they retire. Their situation never improves, and they job hop every 2-5 years chasing inflation, or, struggling to get hired. This is exactly the kind of situation we should be aiming to prevent. Oh you can't get a job? Start your own company and live off basic income until you get going. You're a skilled worker, there's probably work for you to be doing somewhere.
The biggest thing it's going to do is move leverage back into the hands of employees. Second to that, you've increased purchasing power of everyone, and it's pretty much an accepted fact that lower and middle class earners spend money. Which means more jobs, which means you will have an easier time finding and getting work, or, starting your business because there's more demand in general.
The problem right now is we have a supply of labor, but no one has money except for the super rich. So it just wastes.
not a doctor, not a lawyer, examples I use may not be fully researched so don't take out of context plz, don't @ me
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FaranguI am a beardy manWith a beardy planRegistered Userregular
@Quid Yes, and I guess my original thought was are those still around post-UBI. I just wasn't sure in these examples how many support structures like those and homeless shelters would remain as-is.
i don't think i understand what a basic income would get you that a more conventional welfare system wouldn't
is it just the guarantee that it's yours forever no matter what you do with it? making it unlike the dole in that you can openly declare your intention to never work again and the money will still roll in
Speaking as someone whose on Job Seekers Allowance (UK benefits scheme for those seeking work) while also helping with my families livery yard and caring for animals not having a strict conditional attached to the benefits would be a huge boost. Not because 'lol I want to slack' or anything but because life isn't some perfect thing where I can put 35 hours a week into job searching guaranteed and the culture at the job centre due to the pressure for them to either get people in work or off benefits is super unwelcoming and in some cases just plain unhelpful.
I'd happily work at some dead end retail spot for nothing over the basic wage too. Letting skills stagnate and not getting out the house has being the reality of my past two years and trust me the whole unemployed bum thing loses the charm alot of Right Wing individuals would like to claim it has real quick.
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EncA Fool with CompassionPronouns: He, Him, HisRegistered Userregular
I've noticed that most of the opposition for basic incomeevery social program ever, no matter what website I'm on, tends to be those people who view themselves as temporarily embarrassed millionaires.
I've noticed that most of the opposition for basic incomeevery social program ever, no matter what website I'm on, tends to be those people who view themselves as temporarily embarrassed millionaires.
It's true!
I've met a lot of nice and smart people.
I don't get this fascination with thinking one day you'll be raking in the millions. Even if you made $100,000 every year for your entire working life (20-70), your max gross earnings would be 5 million dollars. That's nothing. That's your entire earnings forever.
If you think you'll ever enter the echelons of a millionaire as someone who hails from a blue collar middle class life, you're deluding yourself.
The taxes on the rich and ultra rich are a good idea. Stop protecting them, they give absolutely no shits about you and your struggles and how hard it is to find a job and feed yourself and family.
Let's get a share of our motherfucking cake.
not a doctor, not a lawyer, examples I use may not be fully researched so don't take out of context plz, don't @ me
I've noticed that most of the opposition for basic incomeevery social program ever, no matter what website I'm on, tends to be those people who view themselves as temporarily embarrassed millionaires.
It's true!
I've met a lot of nice and smart people.
I don't get this fascination with thinking one day you'll be raking in the millions. Even if you made $100,000 every year for your entire working life (20-70), your max gross earnings would be 5 million dollars. That's nothing. That's your entire earnings forever.
If you think you'll ever enter the echelons of a millionaire as someone who hails from a blue collar middle class life, you're deluding yourself.
The taxes on the rich and ultra rich are a good idea. Stop protecting them, they give absolutely no shits about you and your struggles and how hard it is to find a job and feed yourself and family.
Let's get a share of our motherfucking cake.
and many of the ones that do care will be the first ones to tell you that their taxes are too low/it's too easy to get around paying them
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EncA Fool with CompassionPronouns: He, Him, HisRegistered Userregular
I've noticed that most of the opposition for basic incomeevery social program ever, no matter what website I'm on, tends to be those people who view themselves as temporarily embarrassed millionaires.
It's true!
I've met a lot of nice and smart people.
I don't get this fascination with thinking one day you'll be raking in the millions. Even if you made $100,000 every year for your entire working life (20-70), your max gross earnings would be 5 million dollars. That's nothing. That's your entire earnings forever.
If you think you'll ever enter the echelons of a millionaire as someone who hails from a blue collar middle class life, you're deluding yourself.
The taxes on the rich and ultra rich are a good idea. Stop protecting them, they give absolutely no shits about you and your struggles and how hard it is to find a job and feed yourself and family.
Let's get a share of our motherfucking cake.
I grew up in the servitor class of folks that worked directly for the millionaire/billionaire club, having seen and worked with folks at that level it is a whole other world. And one almost no one will get to live in without generations of planned nepotism (which is how most of them got their wealth) or getting extremely lucky. Whenever I hear people talking about this I usually bring up the best wealth question:
"Which would you do if you had the money: ensure you could pay your three children's college out-of-pocket, remodel your house, or go on international vacations each year?"
If your answer is anything but "why would I choose, I can comfortably do all three right now" you aren't wealthy enough to reasonably side with the top 10% on most economic matters.
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TL DRNot at all confident in his reflexive opinions of thingsRegistered Userregular
i don't think i understand what a basic income would get you that a more conventional welfare system wouldn't
is it just the guarantee that it's yours forever no matter what you do with it? making it unlike the dole in that you can openly declare your intention to never work again and the money will still roll in
In a sense. Existing programs like SNAP have shown that the best value from welfare programs comes from those which allow more autonomy; respecting the agency of citizens in need instead of mandating that aid can only be spent on government cheese or whatever allows them the flexibility to live as they see fit and make the best of their situation.
Basic Income acknowledges that the capitalist premise of eternal growth/expansion is false and sets as a long-term goal an economy that meets the needs of the people while unemployment approaches 100%.
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TL DRNot at all confident in his reflexive opinions of thingsRegistered Userregular
2. This may have been answered somewhere else in the thread, but would this policy be structured as one lump-sum payment, or over each month? In either case, what is to stop someone from taking their monthly/yearly deposit, going to their nearest casino and putting it all on Red? I have little trouble believing that a number of people that come into larger sums of money than they are used to handling do a poor job of it. Is that the point where we say, "Well tough luck, see you next month/year"? Are there regulations on how the person spends the money? Or do we keep some other social welfare programs around to help those that just refuse to help themselves?
Nothing, but what's to stop people from getting their monthly paycheque and doing the same thing?
I may be wrong, but I thought that some of the current social welfare programs in place in the U.S. - SNAP comes first to mind - had set restrictions on how the money or assistance provided could be spent or used.
If someone was able to hold down a job and manage themselves before this hypothetical change takes place, I'm less worried about them post-mincome than someone who is on a number of assistance programs that provides guidelines and rules for how to manage their resources, which is suddenly replaced by a system that drops off a check and nothing else.
In what way? Are you describing a hypothetical involving ignorance or malice?
More the ignorance part. From what I've read in the thread so far, this kind of program would supersede or replace a chunk of social welfare programs already in place to assist people with few resources for food and income. I was just thinking that, if we replace programs that offer money/food along with guidance on how to best utilize those things, and replace it with a bigger share of money but no guidance, we could see a rise in the number of people that weren't even scraping by before - homeless, mentally ill - taking the money that is supposed to keep their heads just above water, make maybe one or two mistakes with it, and then they don't even have enough to do that.
As an admittedly-anecdotal example, my current apartment in my area(suburban Chicago) is widely held by both myself and my friends/family as a good deal. It's a modest size one-bedroom. Currently the rent is $9000 a year. If we assume that we are sticking with the $10K per year figure given earlier, that's really not leaving people much. And if someone receives this amount of money, and in a moment of weakness splurges on a small luxury, then they have almost nothing left for their time period.
And at some point, I argue that people should be held responsible for their decisions and to live with the consequences. A basic income just changes so much about our cultural landscape that I think it needs to change where we paint that line. (Also re-reading what I've said so far, since it's early and I'm probably not being very clear, I can see an argument that depending on where a person is, a basic income could get less for a person than in other places which is also something to consider)
So you're saying, if instead of giving people $5 a day for food, we give them ~$450 cash every two weeks
they might starve to death
Not necessarily starve to death, I'm just trying to figure that, if we replace modest and directed means with more ample but free-form means, what do we as a society do with the people that spend it poorly, if it changes at all from the way we currently have it.
But I don't think I'm really doing a good job of conveying myself clearly.
I get what you're saying. We implement BI, Fred is unable or unwilling to work and spends all his money on cigarettes and novelty belt buckles and is left with nothing.
At that point he would encounter existing support systems - does he have mental health issues? Drug addiction? Maybe he just needs help budgeting? The idea is that we can look at people who we view as squandering public resources and then decide what action to take based on their needs and whether the impact of their actions is significant enough to impede the progress of the model as a whole.
that already happens though and it's mostly a result of the US not giving a shit about the mentally ill and treating addiction as a criminal act instead of a public health crisis
I've noticed that most of the opposition for basic income, no matter what website I'm on, tends to be those people who view themselves as temporarily embarrassed millionaires.
"Well once my financial situation unfucks itself, I don't want to be screwed over by this basic income thing!"
Then they repeat this line for the next 50 years until they retire. Their situation never improves, and they job hop every 2-5 years chasing inflation, or, struggling to get hired. This is exactly the kind of situation we should be aiming to prevent. Oh you can't get a job? Start your own company and live off basic income until you get going. You're a skilled worker, there's probably work for you to be doing somewhere.
The biggest thing it's going to do is move leverage back into the hands of employees. Second to that, you've increased purchasing power of everyone, and it's pretty much an accepted fact that lower and middle class earners spend money. Which means more jobs, which means you will have an easier time finding and getting work, or, starting your business because there's more demand in general.
The problem right now is we have a supply of labor, but no one has money except for the super rich. So it just wastes.
Basic income doesn't move any leverage back into the hands of employees.
If everyone gets it, there isn't enough money in the entire economy to give everyone even close to sustenance level living conditions.
If not everyone gets it, then it provides a disincentive to work. Reduced work reduces productivity which means there's less of everything. Less productivity means there's less to pay workers. Less pay means less incentive not to just take the basic income. Less incentive means reduced work rates. Our economic system is fundamentally built on not doing that. And in an economic recession/depression, the poor don't have leverage over those becoming simply less rich.
Just because some social programs and redistribution are good ideas doesn't mean all of them are. Equating all social programs as the same from Stalinist state economies to simple unemployment is much closer to the most foolish conservative rhetoric than anything in this thread. Painting basic income opposition with that broad a brush is very goosey.
The source of income inequality is largely the decoupling of wages and profitability. This should be connected because workers create profitability. The solution is not to compound that willful ignorance by deluding ourselves into thinking we just have the GDP we have independent of a large and vigorous workforce.
That's a very lazy way to examine a social program, PantsB. You're basically placing value in "work done" and the fact that if everyone's getting GBI they won't do anything at all.
That's not right, at all.
Like I've said earlier, a great many people would rather do other things than clock in just to make rent and eat food. This frees them up. You're basically devaluing everything but factory work ethic at this point. Artists create value. So do volunteers. So do scientists. You might be letting brilliant people disappear because they need to make money to pay the bills. If only the scientists from a wealthy family can afford the $10 an hour paycheck that shows up from a state program... what did we lose? Maybe we lost someone who was the next Einstein.
You would also be ignoring the fact that things like SNAP and EBT actually generate money. For each $1 they spend, it generates nearly $2 in economic growth.
bowen on
not a doctor, not a lawyer, examples I use may not be fully researched so don't take out of context plz, don't @ me
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TL DRNot at all confident in his reflexive opinions of thingsRegistered Userregular
As was pointed out with the Canadian BI trial program, reduced incentive to work was observed only in teens and young mothers. I'm alright with this.
As has been discussed, skillfully designing the payout such that a reduction in benefit is correlated with income can be done in such a way that disincentives are minimized.
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zepherinRussian warship, go fuck yourselfRegistered Userregular
I don't know about basic income so much as just send general sustenance to all people. SNAP doesn't really get to everyone who needs it. We should simply be sending food out instead of food stamps. It would be significantly cheaper and for the same cost we could hit college students, and people who while not impoverished are poor.
We don't spend our welfare dollars very well.
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TL DRNot at all confident in his reflexive opinions of thingsRegistered Userregular
I don't know about basic income so much as just send general sustenance to all people. SNAP doesn't really get to everyone who needs it. We should simply be sending food out instead of food stamps. It would be significantly cheaper and for the same cost we could hit college students, and people who while not impoverished are poor.
Existing programs like SNAP have shown that the best value from welfare programs comes from those which allow more autonomy; respecting the agency of citizens in need instead of mandating that aid can only be spent on government cheese or whatever allows them the flexibility to live as they see fit and make the best of their situation.
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zepherinRussian warship, go fuck yourselfRegistered Userregular
I don't know about basic income so much as just send general sustenance to all people. SNAP doesn't really get to everyone who needs it. We should simply be sending food out instead of food stamps. It would be significantly cheaper and for the same cost we could hit college students, and people who while not impoverished are poor.
Existing programs like SNAP have shown that the best value from welfare programs comes from those which allow more autonomy; respecting the agency of citizens in need instead of mandating that aid can only be spent on government cheese or whatever allows them the flexibility to live as they see fit and make the best of their situation.
I disagree. I believe we should be sending something similar to Humanitarian Rations or MREs to everyone who wants them, because there isn't a markup that way.
I don't know about basic income so much as just send general sustenance to all people. SNAP doesn't really get to everyone who needs it. We should simply be sending food out instead of food stamps. It would be significantly cheaper and for the same cost we could hit college students, and people who while not impoverished are poor.
Existing programs like SNAP have shown that the best value from welfare programs comes from those which allow more autonomy; respecting the agency of citizens in need instead of mandating that aid can only be spent on government cheese or whatever allows them the flexibility to live as they see fit and make the best of their situation.
I disagree. I believe we should be sending something similar to Humanitarian Rations or MREs to everyone who wants them, because there isn't a markup that way.
Treating people like holocaust captives isn't really conducive to fixing harmful social mores. Who cares if they use $100 in tax money to buy a video game this month?
not a doctor, not a lawyer, examples I use may not be fully researched so don't take out of context plz, don't @ me
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EncA Fool with CompassionPronouns: He, Him, HisRegistered Userregular
I've noticed that most of the opposition for basic income, no matter what website I'm on, tends to be those people who view themselves as temporarily embarrassed millionaires.
"Well once my financial situation unfucks itself, I don't want to be screwed over by this basic income thing!"
Then they repeat this line for the next 50 years until they retire. Their situation never improves, and they job hop every 2-5 years chasing inflation, or, struggling to get hired. This is exactly the kind of situation we should be aiming to prevent. Oh you can't get a job? Start your own company and live off basic income until you get going. You're a skilled worker, there's probably work for you to be doing somewhere.
The biggest thing it's going to do is move leverage back into the hands of employees. Second to that, you've increased purchasing power of everyone, and it's pretty much an accepted fact that lower and middle class earners spend money. Which means more jobs, which means you will have an easier time finding and getting work, or, starting your business because there's more demand in general.
The problem right now is we have a supply of labor, but no one has money except for the super rich. So it just wastes.
Basic income doesn't move any leverage back into the hands of employees.
If everyone gets it, there isn't enough money in the entire economy to give everyone even close to sustenance level living conditions.
If not everyone gets it, then it provides a disincentive to work. Reduced work reduces productivity which means there's less of everything. Less productivity means there's less to pay workers. Less pay means less incentive not to just take the basic income. Less incentive means reduced work rates. Our economic system is fundamentally built on not doing that. And in an economic recession/depression, the poor don't have leverage over those becoming simply less rich.
Just because some social programs and redistribution are good ideas doesn't mean all of them are. Equating all social programs as the same from Stalinist state economies to simple unemployment is much closer to the most foolish conservative rhetoric than anything in this thread. Painting basic income opposition with that broad a brush is very goosey.
The source of income inequality is largely the decoupling of wages and profitability. This should be connected because workers create profitability. The solution is not to compound that willful ignorance by deluding ourselves into thinking we just have the GDP we have independent of a large and vigorous workforce.
Looking at your pessimistic view of this, outside the sheer cost initially you are still likely to be wrong here for the financial incentive. Some people may well choose to not work and just live on the ~10k a year dole. Sure. Is that a terrible thing overall though? I'd argue economically and socially: no.
The "freeloaders" will not be taking up the increasingly specialized positions required of the economy, allowing greater employment among those willing to work and make a better life for themselves. Even assuming the freeloader population was considerable (which all social programs show is false as the myth of the "welfare cheat" are typically a very tiny percentage of those using social programs), the amount to given to them pretty much ensures it all gets spent immediately as it won't cover much beyond cost of living without supplemental income from work. While it will ensure housing (with that money going to rental companies and thus property taxes), groceries and necessities (sales taxes and local stimulus), and probably for a small number silly investments like giant TVs (more sales taxes than groceries and more local stimulus to businesses), economies may well see added benefits from this freeloader class than if they were simply being homeless or even working without pay.
It's entirely possible that, thanks to basic income, more people could actually be employed as the ground-level companies selling goods and services would see the majority of this stimulus, rather than corporate goons that hoard the wealth we have now without reinvestment.
I could see plenty of arguments in that there are more economical ways of accomplishing the same task via tax reform and one-time stimulus benefits, but to say workforce problems would be the main detractor just doesn't hold up under any comparable programs we have now.
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EncA Fool with CompassionPronouns: He, Him, HisRegistered Userregular
I don't know about basic income so much as just send general sustenance to all people. SNAP doesn't really get to everyone who needs it. We should simply be sending food out instead of food stamps. It would be significantly cheaper and for the same cost we could hit college students, and people who while not impoverished are poor.
Existing programs like SNAP have shown that the best value from welfare programs comes from those which allow more autonomy; respecting the agency of citizens in need instead of mandating that aid can only be spent on government cheese or whatever allows them the flexibility to live as they see fit and make the best of their situation.
I disagree. I believe we should be sending something similar to Humanitarian Rations or MREs to everyone who wants them, because there isn't a markup that way.
Markup drives local stimulus and grants agency to those using it. Having rations just dehumanizes those who are forced to rely upon them even more than current social stigma already does, and ensures they have even less social support to pull themselves out of low economic circumstances.
I've noticed that most of the opposition for basic income, no matter what website I'm on, tends to be those people who view themselves as temporarily embarrassed millionaires.
"Well once my financial situation unfucks itself, I don't want to be screwed over by this basic income thing!"
Then they repeat this line for the next 50 years until they retire. Their situation never improves, and they job hop every 2-5 years chasing inflation, or, struggling to get hired. This is exactly the kind of situation we should be aiming to prevent. Oh you can't get a job? Start your own company and live off basic income until you get going. You're a skilled worker, there's probably work for you to be doing somewhere.
The biggest thing it's going to do is move leverage back into the hands of employees. Second to that, you've increased purchasing power of everyone, and it's pretty much an accepted fact that lower and middle class earners spend money. Which means more jobs, which means you will have an easier time finding and getting work, or, starting your business because there's more demand in general.
The problem right now is we have a supply of labor, but no one has money except for the super rich. So it just wastes.
Basic income doesn't move any leverage back into the hands of employees.
If everyone gets it, there isn't enough money in the entire economy to give everyone even close to sustenance level living conditions.
If not everyone gets it, then it provides a disincentive to work. Reduced work reduces productivity which means there's less of everything. Less productivity means there's less to pay workers. Less pay means less incentive not to just take the basic income. Less incentive means reduced work rates. Our economic system is fundamentally built on not doing that. And in an economic recession/depression, the poor don't have leverage over those becoming simply less rich.
Just because some social programs and redistribution are good ideas doesn't mean all of them are. Equating all social programs as the same from Stalinist state economies to simple unemployment is much closer to the most foolish conservative rhetoric than anything in this thread. Painting basic income opposition with that broad a brush is very goosey.
The source of income inequality is largely the decoupling of wages and profitability. This should be connected because workers create profitability. The solution is not to compound that willful ignorance by deluding ourselves into thinking we just have the GDP we have independent of a large and vigorous workforce.
Looking at your pessimistic view of this, outside the sheer cost initially you are still likely to be wrong here for the financial incentive. Some people may well choose to not work and just live on the ~10k a year dole. Sure. Is that a terrible thing overall though? I'd argue economically and socially: no.
The "freeloaders" will not be taking up the increasingly specialized positions required of the economy, allowing greater employment among those willing to work and make a better life for themselves. Even assuming the freeloader population was considerable (which all social programs show is false as the myth of the "welfare cheat" are typically a very tiny percentage of those using social programs), the amount to given to them pretty much ensures it all gets spent immediately as it won't cover much beyond cost of living without supplemental income from work. While it will ensure housing (with that money going to rental companies and thus property taxes), groceries and necessities (sales taxes and local stimulus), and probably for a small number silly investments like giant TVs (more sales taxes than groceries and more local stimulus to businesses), economies may well see added benefits from this freeloader class than if they were simply being homeless or even working without pay.
It's entirely possible that, thanks to basic income, more people could actually be employed as the ground-level companies selling goods and services would see the majority of this stimulus, rather than corporate goons that hoard the wealth we have now without reinvestment.
I could see plenty of arguments in that there are more economical ways of accomplishing the same task via tax reform and one-time stimulus benefits, but to say workforce problems would be the main detractor just doesn't hold up under any comparable programs we have now.
The tl;dr of Basic Income is the higher taxation rate on wealthier individuals means that money doesn't sit in a bank account to get invested, it's brought right back out and put to use into the economy more directly.
This means people buy things and demand drives supply, rather than philanthropic drive, or, whatever is going to turn the highest profit through some fancy math equations being the determining factor. It creates a more stable economic model in the long term since your profits aren't driven by biggest bang for the buck Q1-Q2/4 of this year, but rather, what people actually want and need and what fills the gaps.
It's more depression resistant, too, especially if you don't cut the funding. The New Deal worked for a reason.
not a doctor, not a lawyer, examples I use may not be fully researched so don't take out of context plz, don't @ me
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zepherinRussian warship, go fuck yourselfRegistered Userregular
I don't know about basic income so much as just send general sustenance to all people. SNAP doesn't really get to everyone who needs it. We should simply be sending food out instead of food stamps. It would be significantly cheaper and for the same cost we could hit college students, and people who while not impoverished are poor.
Existing programs like SNAP have shown that the best value from welfare programs comes from those which allow more autonomy; respecting the agency of citizens in need instead of mandating that aid can only be spent on government cheese or whatever allows them the flexibility to live as they see fit and make the best of their situation.
I disagree. I believe we should be sending something similar to Humanitarian Rations or MREs to everyone who wants them, because there isn't a markup that way.
Treating people like holocaust captives isn't really conducive to fixing harmful social mores. Who cares if they use $100 in tax money to buy a video game this month?
Fixing social norms to me is less important than feeding hungry people, which we don't do very well. If we just gave food to whoever wants it, then we can work on social norms. I also think we should have jobs for everyone who wants it. Get paid 10 bucks an hour to do shitty government busy work. All other businesses would have to compete with that and it would raise wages.
I don't know about basic income so much as just send general sustenance to all people. SNAP doesn't really get to everyone who needs it. We should simply be sending food out instead of food stamps. It would be significantly cheaper and for the same cost we could hit college students, and people who while not impoverished are poor.
Existing programs like SNAP have shown that the best value from welfare programs comes from those which allow more autonomy; respecting the agency of citizens in need instead of mandating that aid can only be spent on government cheese or whatever allows them the flexibility to live as they see fit and make the best of their situation.
I disagree. I believe we should be sending something similar to Humanitarian Rations or MREs to everyone who wants them, because there isn't a markup that way.
Treating people like holocaust captives isn't really conducive to fixing harmful social mores. Who cares if they use $100 in tax money to buy a video game this month?
Fixing social norms to me is less important than feeding hungry people, which we don't do very well. If we just gave food to whoever wants it, then we can work on social norms. I also think we should have jobs for everyone who wants it. Get paid 10 bucks an hour to do shitty government busy work. All other businesses would have to compete with that and it would raise wages.
I don't have a problem with either of those things. I just think we need to do basic income on top of it.
I also don't necessarily like the concept of "let's create jobs so people have things to do" train of thought either. That boils down to, again, a focus on the factory worker mentality. I need your butt in a seat from 9-5 in order to give you a pay check so we know you're doing something.
Freeloaders are freeloaders, sure. But the great majority of people will be doing something with their day. Volunteering maybe, entertaining maybe, enjoying themselves maybe. I don't personally care. It'd be great to be able to take a sabatical and go camp in the Appalachians for a month without worry. Or travel across the US and meet people. Maybe move somewhere else to go to school.
A lot of those things are out of reach of people because of the old school of thought of how productivity is measured. We're reaching the point where people everyone won't be able to have jobs too. It won't happen in the next decade, but probably within the next century. We should be prepared now rather than limp along and struggle and do it wrong.
not a doctor, not a lawyer, examples I use may not be fully researched so don't take out of context plz, don't @ me
I don't know about basic income so much as just send general sustenance to all people. SNAP doesn't really get to everyone who needs it. We should simply be sending food out instead of food stamps. It would be significantly cheaper and for the same cost we could hit college students, and people who while not impoverished are poor.
Existing programs like SNAP have shown that the best value from welfare programs comes from those which allow more autonomy; respecting the agency of citizens in need instead of mandating that aid can only be spent on government cheese or whatever allows them the flexibility to live as they see fit and make the best of their situation.
I disagree. I believe we should be sending something similar to Humanitarian Rations or MREs to everyone who wants them, because there isn't a markup that way.
Treating people like holocaust captives isn't really conducive to fixing harmful social mores. Who cares if they use $100 in tax money to buy a video game this month?
Fixing social norms to me is less important than feeding hungry people, which we don't do very well. If we just gave food to whoever wants it, then we can work on social norms. I also think we should have jobs for everyone who wants it. Get paid 10 bucks an hour to do shitty government busy work. All other businesses would have to compete with that and it would raise wages.
I don't have a problem with either of those things. I just think we need to do basic income on top of it.
I also don't necessarily like the concept of "let's create jobs so people have things to do" train of thought either. That boils down to, again, a focus on the factory worker mentality. I need your butt in a seat from 9-5 in order to give you a pay check so we know you're doing something.
Freeloaders are freeloaders, sure. But the great majority of people will be doing something with their day. Volunteering maybe, entertaining maybe, enjoying themselves maybe. I don't personally care. It'd be great to be able to take a sabatical and go camp in the Appalachians for a month without worry. Or travel across the US and meet people. Maybe move somewhere else to go to school.
A lot of those things are out of reach of people because of the old school of thought of how productivity is measured. We're reaching the point where people everyone won't be able to have jobs too. It won't happen in the next decade, but probably within the next century. We should be prepared now rather than limp along and struggle and do it wrong.
What if they made it illegal to play video games all day and eat cheetos on the couch
Marty: The future, it's where you're going? Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
Isn't Basic Income just a repackaged version of the Negative Income Tax?
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jakobaggerLO THY DREAD EMPIRE CHAOS IS RESTOREDRegistered Userregular
Don't have time to read through the whole thread right now, but has it been mentioned that Finland is going to be experimenting with some form of UBI soon? I believe the proposal was just passed.
And that's with a conservative/centre-right majority in the Finnish parliament, too. Then again, Milton Friedman was apparently also a proponent of mincome so maybe it shouldn't be surprising.
It's not surprising that a conservative or right centric government would opt for Basic income at all.
Government waste, and all that, it's by far more convenient to bottle all the programs into one giant. Conservatives and libertarians should be all over it. Think of the money you could save just by eliminating hundreds of government programs and the employees needed to measure that red tape.
Left wing just likes it because socialism is pretty swell, but I'd say GBI/UBI is more of a libertarian idea more than anything.
not a doctor, not a lawyer, examples I use may not be fully researched so don't take out of context plz, don't @ me
Posts
It sort of strikes me as paid political poster type of thing, like what I used to see on Fark and elsewhere. It just seems really strange that someone would come to the PA forums and only post on a single new topic stance at the exclusion of the rest of the community.
This seems like the sort of thing to report to mods
Not necessarily starve to death, I'm just trying to figure that, if we replace modest and directed means with more ample but free-form means, what do we as a society do with the people that spend it poorly, if it changes at all from the way we currently have it.
But I don't think I'm really doing a good job of conveying myself clearly.
Chicago Megagame group
Watch me struggle to learn streaming! Point and laugh!
Which, now that I think about it, it wasn't supposed to be about that stuff. The teacher just sort of hijacked the advanced math class to teach all that while occasionally including math.
Soup kitchens seem the best method.
Nobody ever wants to eat at one but it seems the best method for those genuinely unable to feed themselves.
An alternative to base income, matching this program with public sector service work (such as working at charity/volunteer/nonprofit civic programs or specialized training and educational programs for 10-15 hours a week as a pairing to the amount you receive) could lead to having added value to base income and also help struggling municipalities meet their local obligations while also ensuring folks are getting some form of work experience or specialized training needed in their communities they can use to help launch them back into the economy (if possible/desirable). One of the things we see at my work is that a lot of corporations and public employers now view volunteer service as no different from paid work history for employability, and helping folk get back into more specialized work. Some of our local community colleges are starting such programs as tuition free for certain fields that the local economy desperately needs (only for those currently unemployed or under a certain income level).
Possibly two different programs here, but both would serve the purpose of having a more stable and livable situation for those at the bottom of the economy with new ways to climb up that may not have been available through k-12 education alone.
There is some evidence to suggest it wouldn't really be much more expensive than existing programs
see ronya's calculator
but the actual economic ripple effects and amount that comes back (as per the 1.5-2 dollars per food stamp dollar) would be pretty substantial too
Forcing people to work for their welfare has been tried and it's almost universally been a disaster and a legal cluster fuck. I have a feeling you have a problem with the idea on a moral level of people getting something without working for it. The idea of a BGI is that people could pursue their interests, if that means they want to make youtube videos or paint miniatures or build tables, so be it. Some small percentage will just not want to work, but most people aren't comfortable sitting around doing nothing and living on barely anything. It would however open up people taking risks, pursuing passions which might be financially disastrous if tried without it
I would however want to marry it to legislation to protect the new poor from credit card companies
I spend hours and train-money just going to various cities and saying "hi, okay, bye". And that's in a socialist hellscape. And the people I'm meeting are also travelling around and rescheduling things. Nobody in this has time to spare.
My understanding is:
Decreased administration costs due to decreased/limited/rolling means testing.
Increased mobility(employment, social and physical) due to it being assured.
"Well once my financial situation unfucks itself, I don't want to be screwed over by this basic income thing!"
Then they repeat this line for the next 50 years until they retire. Their situation never improves, and they job hop every 2-5 years chasing inflation, or, struggling to get hired. This is exactly the kind of situation we should be aiming to prevent. Oh you can't get a job? Start your own company and live off basic income until you get going. You're a skilled worker, there's probably work for you to be doing somewhere.
The biggest thing it's going to do is move leverage back into the hands of employees. Second to that, you've increased purchasing power of everyone, and it's pretty much an accepted fact that lower and middle class earners spend money. Which means more jobs, which means you will have an easier time finding and getting work, or, starting your business because there's more demand in general.
The problem right now is we have a supply of labor, but no one has money except for the super rich. So it just wastes.
Chicago Megagame group
Watch me struggle to learn streaming! Point and laugh!
also many state benefits take forever to get and in republican states they just flat out put in all kinds of fuck you exemptions
for example, I would have to drop out of school to get food stamps or unemployment, even though I qualify for both otherwise
shit like that is madness
Speaking as someone whose on Job Seekers Allowance (UK benefits scheme for those seeking work) while also helping with my families livery yard and caring for animals not having a strict conditional attached to the benefits would be a huge boost. Not because 'lol I want to slack' or anything but because life isn't some perfect thing where I can put 35 hours a week into job searching guaranteed and the culture at the job centre due to the pressure for them to either get people in work or off benefits is super unwelcoming and in some cases just plain unhelpful.
I'd happily work at some dead end retail spot for nothing over the basic wage too. Letting skills stagnate and not getting out the house has being the reality of my past two years and trust me the whole unemployed bum thing loses the charm alot of Right Wing individuals would like to claim it has real quick.
It's true!
I've met a lot of nice and smart people.
I don't get this fascination with thinking one day you'll be raking in the millions. Even if you made $100,000 every year for your entire working life (20-70), your max gross earnings would be 5 million dollars. That's nothing. That's your entire earnings forever.
If you think you'll ever enter the echelons of a millionaire as someone who hails from a blue collar middle class life, you're deluding yourself.
The taxes on the rich and ultra rich are a good idea. Stop protecting them, they give absolutely no shits about you and your struggles and how hard it is to find a job and feed yourself and family.
Let's get a share of our motherfucking cake.
and many of the ones that do care will be the first ones to tell you that their taxes are too low/it's too easy to get around paying them
I grew up in the servitor class of folks that worked directly for the millionaire/billionaire club, having seen and worked with folks at that level it is a whole other world. And one almost no one will get to live in without generations of planned nepotism (which is how most of them got their wealth) or getting extremely lucky. Whenever I hear people talking about this I usually bring up the best wealth question:
"Which would you do if you had the money: ensure you could pay your three children's college out-of-pocket, remodel your house, or go on international vacations each year?"
If your answer is anything but "why would I choose, I can comfortably do all three right now" you aren't wealthy enough to reasonably side with the top 10% on most economic matters.
In a sense. Existing programs like SNAP have shown that the best value from welfare programs comes from those which allow more autonomy; respecting the agency of citizens in need instead of mandating that aid can only be spent on government cheese or whatever allows them the flexibility to live as they see fit and make the best of their situation.
Basic Income acknowledges that the capitalist premise of eternal growth/expansion is false and sets as a long-term goal an economy that meets the needs of the people while unemployment approaches 100%.
I get what you're saying. We implement BI, Fred is unable or unwilling to work and spends all his money on cigarettes and novelty belt buckles and is left with nothing.
At that point he would encounter existing support systems - does he have mental health issues? Drug addiction? Maybe he just needs help budgeting? The idea is that we can look at people who we view as squandering public resources and then decide what action to take based on their needs and whether the impact of their actions is significant enough to impede the progress of the model as a whole.
Basic income doesn't move any leverage back into the hands of employees.
If everyone gets it, there isn't enough money in the entire economy to give everyone even close to sustenance level living conditions.
If not everyone gets it, then it provides a disincentive to work. Reduced work reduces productivity which means there's less of everything. Less productivity means there's less to pay workers. Less pay means less incentive not to just take the basic income. Less incentive means reduced work rates. Our economic system is fundamentally built on not doing that. And in an economic recession/depression, the poor don't have leverage over those becoming simply less rich.
Just because some social programs and redistribution are good ideas doesn't mean all of them are. Equating all social programs as the same from Stalinist state economies to simple unemployment is much closer to the most foolish conservative rhetoric than anything in this thread. Painting basic income opposition with that broad a brush is very goosey.
The source of income inequality is largely the decoupling of wages and profitability. This should be connected because workers create profitability. The solution is not to compound that willful ignorance by deluding ourselves into thinking we just have the GDP we have independent of a large and vigorous workforce.
QEDMF xbl: PantsB G+
That's not right, at all.
Like I've said earlier, a great many people would rather do other things than clock in just to make rent and eat food. This frees them up. You're basically devaluing everything but factory work ethic at this point. Artists create value. So do volunteers. So do scientists. You might be letting brilliant people disappear because they need to make money to pay the bills. If only the scientists from a wealthy family can afford the $10 an hour paycheck that shows up from a state program... what did we lose? Maybe we lost someone who was the next Einstein.
You would also be ignoring the fact that things like SNAP and EBT actually generate money. For each $1 they spend, it generates nearly $2 in economic growth.
As has been discussed, skillfully designing the payout such that a reduction in benefit is correlated with income can be done in such a way that disincentives are minimized.
We don't spend our welfare dollars very well.
Treating people like holocaust captives isn't really conducive to fixing harmful social mores. Who cares if they use $100 in tax money to buy a video game this month?
Looking at your pessimistic view of this, outside the sheer cost initially you are still likely to be wrong here for the financial incentive. Some people may well choose to not work and just live on the ~10k a year dole. Sure. Is that a terrible thing overall though? I'd argue economically and socially: no.
The "freeloaders" will not be taking up the increasingly specialized positions required of the economy, allowing greater employment among those willing to work and make a better life for themselves. Even assuming the freeloader population was considerable (which all social programs show is false as the myth of the "welfare cheat" are typically a very tiny percentage of those using social programs), the amount to given to them pretty much ensures it all gets spent immediately as it won't cover much beyond cost of living without supplemental income from work. While it will ensure housing (with that money going to rental companies and thus property taxes), groceries and necessities (sales taxes and local stimulus), and probably for a small number silly investments like giant TVs (more sales taxes than groceries and more local stimulus to businesses), economies may well see added benefits from this freeloader class than if they were simply being homeless or even working without pay.
It's entirely possible that, thanks to basic income, more people could actually be employed as the ground-level companies selling goods and services would see the majority of this stimulus, rather than corporate goons that hoard the wealth we have now without reinvestment.
I could see plenty of arguments in that there are more economical ways of accomplishing the same task via tax reform and one-time stimulus benefits, but to say workforce problems would be the main detractor just doesn't hold up under any comparable programs we have now.
Markup drives local stimulus and grants agency to those using it. Having rations just dehumanizes those who are forced to rely upon them even more than current social stigma already does, and ensures they have even less social support to pull themselves out of low economic circumstances.
The tl;dr of Basic Income is the higher taxation rate on wealthier individuals means that money doesn't sit in a bank account to get invested, it's brought right back out and put to use into the economy more directly.
This means people buy things and demand drives supply, rather than philanthropic drive, or, whatever is going to turn the highest profit through some fancy math equations being the determining factor. It creates a more stable economic model in the long term since your profits aren't driven by biggest bang for the buck Q1-Q2/4 of this year, but rather, what people actually want and need and what fills the gaps.
It's more depression resistant, too, especially if you don't cut the funding. The New Deal worked for a reason.
I don't have a problem with either of those things. I just think we need to do basic income on top of it.
I also don't necessarily like the concept of "let's create jobs so people have things to do" train of thought either. That boils down to, again, a focus on the factory worker mentality. I need your butt in a seat from 9-5 in order to give you a pay check so we know you're doing something.
Freeloaders are freeloaders, sure. But the great majority of people will be doing something with their day. Volunteering maybe, entertaining maybe, enjoying themselves maybe. I don't personally care. It'd be great to be able to take a sabatical and go camp in the Appalachians for a month without worry. Or travel across the US and meet people. Maybe move somewhere else to go to school.
A lot of those things are out of reach of people because of the old school of thought of how productivity is measured. We're reaching the point where people everyone won't be able to have jobs too. It won't happen in the next decade, but probably within the next century. We should be prepared now rather than limp along and struggle and do it wrong.
What if they made it illegal to play video games all day and eat cheetos on the couch
Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
And that's with a conservative/centre-right majority in the Finnish parliament, too. Then again, Milton Friedman was apparently also a proponent of mincome so maybe it shouldn't be surprising.
Government waste, and all that, it's by far more convenient to bottle all the programs into one giant. Conservatives and libertarians should be all over it. Think of the money you could save just by eliminating hundreds of government programs and the employees needed to measure that red tape.
Left wing just likes it because socialism is pretty swell, but I'd say GBI/UBI is more of a libertarian idea more than anything.