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Comment by SoftTalker | Hacker News Reader

> what are the effects on the overall economy when it's universal?

Inflation.

Hyperinflation.

That depends how it's funded. Printing money? Yes. Taxing economic rents? Probably not. Owning a fully automated workforce? Yet to be determined.

It doesn't depend on how it's funded. It's a simple mechanics: once the word gets out that everybody is getting free money then all the companies raise their prices, trying to capture that money, because why wouldn't they?

Greedflation already exists without any type of UBI in place. UBI is not meant to combat greedflation. You're right to be worried about greedflation, but being against UBI because greedflation exists simply doesn't follow.

There's a big difference between "not combating" and "encouraging". UBI would be much closer to "encouraging".

Alaska has had UBI for a while. It has been studied up and down. Studies show since implementing it, poverty has been reduced, crime is down. I haven't seen anything suggesting it encourages greedflation. You are making this claim about UBI, but the difference is you aren't qualifying it beyond with what appears to be your personal thoughts on the matter.

If you mean the Alaska Permanent Fund, according to wikipedia:

> The amount of each payment is based upon a five-year average of the Permanent Fund's performance and varies widely depending on the stock market and many other factors.

> The lowest individual dividend payout was $331.29 in 1984 and the highest was $3,284 in 2022.

That's not what people are generally talking about with "basic income" - it's not anywhere near enough to meet basic needs, and it's not reliable due to the fluctuations.

I agree with you on this, and I think the best reference point on the question of greedflation specifically would be that pensions exist and yet pensioners often get discounts.

It still isn't universal, merely suggestive.

But... It looks like it's safe, right? Nothing imploded in Alaska because of it?

So how far can we push it before something implodes?

> why wouldn't they?

Laws, price controls, 100% tax rates on profits over certain levels, government ownership of the means of production.

Devil's in the details for what exactly any of those things "should" be.

[citation needed]

Look at Poland since 2015. We don't have UBI per se, but we have uncoditional handouts of free money to families with children, which goes to about 4 millions of families (so, like half of them).

And while the programme is not universal nor the handouts are very big (around $200 per child per month) the costs are astronomical and it’s already driven inflation in the country (along with other social programs). I can’t imagine what would happen to economy if this was expanded.

https://www.grumpy-economist.com/p/fiscal-narratives-for-us-...

https://www.johnhcochrane.com/s/inflation_PPP.pdf

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