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Comment by ranprieur | Hacker News Reader

This is better than nothing, but the big advantage of the UBI is that there is no bureaucracy deciding who gets it and doesn't get it. If there are any conditions on the income, then there's a constant danger that the program will become another tool of control.

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If you have a requirement that the UBI be for citizens only, or for residents only, you've already introduced bureaucracy.

(Amusingly enough the earned income credit is NOT GMI but it kind of almost is in some cases ...)

The EIC connection is covered in the history pages, which are fascinating in my opinion: https://rgmii.org/history-of-gmi/

As for a "does this person actually live in this area" criteria, I have a hard time seeing that single thing alone as "bureaucracy" -- it's quite common.

The EITC was inspired by advocacy for a Negative Income Tax (which is generally isomorphic to UBI funded by income taxes, despite coming from the opposite side of the political spectrum.) But the designers couldn't avoid giving in to all the same problems with means-tested welfare that both UBI and NIT seek to eliminate, except or the separate eligibility bureaucracy, which integrating it into the income tax system avoided.

Of course, a GMI also differs from a UBI/NIT because that term generally refers to means-tested welfare with a sharp (usually 1:1 but not >1:1, which sometimes happens with means-tested welfare programs in aggregate in some ranges) cliff at starting at $0 in outside income up to the level of the minimum guarantee, whereas UBI/NIT benefits have a (usually much) <1:1 clawback via the tax system.

As a contrast to means-tested welfare the U in UBI (whether “Universal” or “Unconditional”) generally is refers to the absence of means- and behavior-testing, it generally does not actually mean that there is no defined scope of eligibility (usually citizens or legal residents of a particular polity, possibly also with an age floor.)

with GMI the conditions are very simple math: what percent of the poverty line are you within?

I agree that adding a lot of conditions is part of the problem, but "help those who most need it first" seems like a very logical primary (and perhaps only) condition.

Feb 1: receive monthly UBI payment Feb 2: spend all of it on strippers/drugs/alcohol/twinkies/etc. Feb 3: I'm hungry.

Unless you are prepared to let the idiots starve to death, UBI will never work.

Yes yes, your 30 word dismissal completely obliterates all contrary evidence.

I also like getting angry at situations I made up in my head

Feb 1: receive monthly paycheck Feb 2: spend all of it on strippers/drugs/alcohol/twinkies/etc. Feb 3: I'm hungry.

Unless you are prepared to let the wagies starve to death, wages will never work.

Or to put it in less sarcastic terms: Why would UBI payments be more likely to be squandered than any other monthly payments? Especially by people who can't afford food without it. Are there any studies that show such behavior?

EDIT: Wow, I misread.

> in reply to your downvoted post

Huh? My post? It's not.

Oh, sorry.

No worries :)

I suppose the difference is that we have a means-tested program which the wagies can fall into. Was the proposal to have a UBI with a means-tested program behind it? I thought most UBI proponents count on turning off the means-tested program in order to fund the UBI program.

At $1k/month for 340m people, we will double social welfare spending per capita if we don't turn off the existing programs. That will put the US at the tippy-top of per-capita spending above even Luxembourg. Fascinating.

Hmm, means-tested program behind UBI would mean you get more money if UBI is not enough, right? I have heard some arguments in favor of that, for example for disabled people. You are right that those programs need to be a lot smaller and simpler to be worth the bureaucracy. But I doubt "I spent it all on prostitutes" would qualify you for that.

Other UBI advocates don't want any additional program like that. I think healthcare would need to change a lot to make that viable.

Or if you mean spending restrictions like those that exist for food stamps, then yeah, UBI usually means getting rid of those. So the argument there would be "people who are on food stamps instead of a job are idiots (sic) / too irresponsible to spend it wisely, so we must control what they spend it on", which is one of the foundational ideas that UBI advocates disagree with.

I'd like to add that I feel quite strongly "Universal" and "Basic" are hugely probematic words. You end up with massive digressions immediately.. case in point.. look at this AMA for proof:

https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1onb5y8/can_guarantee...

How much of that MASSIVE SET OF DIGRESSIONS (which Neil handled like a gentleman, because he's a truly nice person) could have been avoided by not using "universal" (like, every atom in the universe? every person in the world? every mammal in this country) and "basic" (what is basic, even?) ..

well, none of the study data actually supports these claims, for one thing. Take a look. https://rgmii.org/gmi-study-analysis/

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