> This is one of the primary gripes that I have with UBI. You've just described means testing!
There's no way to avoid means testing - the money has to come from somewhere, and this inherently means that some people pay more money into the system than they receive from it.
The point of UBI is to make this whole setup as transparent and low-overhead as possible.
The nice thing about it is that, in theory, because the redistribution is basically regulated by just two knobs (size of the UBI check, and how progressive the taxes are), adjusting them is politically easy, and adjustment range is pretty much unlimited. I'm hopeful that it would result in fewer situations like the ongoing ACA "debate", where right wing just wants to sink it altogether and replace it with something else entirely, because they can't get where they want by tuning it. If we can get this to work, UBI would always be there, but more left-leaning or more right-leaning governments would simply adjust the knobs more or less gradually depending on how much "freeloading" they're okay with.
And smooth adjustments are easier to adapt to, and cause less social upheaval (think of the shock to the society and the economy if Republicans somehow manage to repeal ACA, say, tomorrow...)