Can we stop putting these "universal income" posts on the front page until someone has something genuinely new to say about the idea or there's some news about an actual implementation?
Also, stating "this is old news, don't upvote it" has been done hundreds of times before, so your contribution is not better.
This is an alternative to the model where everyone works for a living. It produces non-work social good that is to the benefit of the recipient and the society they live in.
I think they were all just examples, so perhaps other examples that could be automated could be substituted.
Beyond that, probably less exploitable than the current welfare system (in America), and with less reward.
For instance, isn't "pay them to drive more safely" similar to "make them pay fines when they drive unsafely, i.e. speeding"?
You try to gamify and I think people would game it instead.
Instead, basic income makes you free to figure out what is a worthy endeavour.
All those things you want cost money to verify and adds massive administration costs. Another point of universal income is it's cheap to administrate.
If you want to "pay" people for taking college, just subsidize it.
I just don't think adding bureaucracy is the solution. If I want someone to go to school I don't manage it on the individual, you'll spend half your money on administration. I spend it by subsidizing tuition.
Some people will drink themselves to death, but they already do that in our current system. How does that matter? The only difference I see is they'll have a lot more free time. Maybe they'll waste it, maybe they'll improve themselves.
Of course this is an over simplification because it's easy to overlook the real incentives and impact of such actions. Still, incentivizing positive actions is far better than incentivizing idleness.
1. The person is already at normal BMI
2. Not smoking, no drugs, and no drinking
3. Doesn't drive
4. Not fit to adopt kids (not everybody is fit and we should never make this an incentive to get money. We had many horror stories of froster parents gaming the system to earn more money while neglecting kids). The best way to do this is to limit to 2-3 kids and pay based on the grades, not just because they have a kid.
5. Already took college classes or even graduated but there's not enough jobs in the field. This is one of the biggest problems we have in USA, a lot of high-class graduates but many of them just end up doing jobs that are not related to their majors because there's not enough jobs or the wages aren't enough.
By your logic, this person would be earning far less than the person who is fat, an alcoholic, adopted several kids, and just taking some boring classes that usually might not lead them to anything.
In fact, the main reason I'd support basic income is that it'd lead to people doing more for society than LogicialBorg's idea.
Why?
1. Mothers don't have to work two jobs to support their kids, they can actually spend more time home with their kids. Which would actually benefits our future, led by kids in stable homes. (over-simplication but this is one of the potential benefits).
2. Folks who can't do art projects, read or anything that'd improve their artistic side because they don't have the time or money to do so, would actually be able to do this with the basic income. They're not so stressed about making ends meet.
3. There are many folks where staying idle just upset them more, so they'd go out and do something useful and not have to worry about money to do it. They might be more motivated to do some menial jobs like taking care of elders, cleaning up the streets near them, and so on.
The reality is that the smarter we make our robotics, the less jobs there'll be for anybody, even those who did everything right to get a job, they just won't be able to find a job.