[ksen]

A Basic Income Guarantee results in more mothers staying with their children, more teens graduating high school, better health, and higher wages.

It doesn't result in the Freeloader myth or tyranny.

And before you scream, "SOCIALISM!!!! :doom:" just understand that Freidrich Hayek was for a Universal Basic Income as a necessary part of a great society (see Law, Legislation and Liberty vol 3 page 55)

[ksen]

IB4Z

[Hulka]

Knock yourself out. . .just don't take MY hard-earned money to pay for it.

I earned MY money, I earned my standard of living. I earned everything I have. . .and being a middle-class white male, it wasn't easy.

For every Canadian (”America's Hat”) example of the greatness and goodness of socialism, history is chocked full of dismal (and lethal) failures.

And I'll bet the small community in the Canadian study was more of a ethnically homogenized "community" sharing common cultural standards than an urban jungle where feral thugs prowl and prey. Try that minimum income thing in, say, Wash DC or Detroit and see where it gets you.

[squarebarb]

This lasted for only four years. The article cites the case of a man who finally got a job as a janitor and thenwent on to hold it for 28 years, without the GAI. Only four years does not really show the effects. People were still living on the ‘cultural capital’ of a society that taught work is good, self-sufficiency is good, being married n order to raise children is good, etc.

For the effects after a few more years, another generation, look at Native American reservations both in Canada and the US, also the white working class of Britan, also the African American populations of large cities which in effect have a GAI. Native Ameicans live almost completely on public monies. the results in all these cases are alcoholism, (also: Russia) violence, people without internal controls, fatherless children and the pyschic distortion of women-only families, and I could go on but people already know this.

So this stdy of only four years has no relevance.

[GeronL]

and I bet the other half of the ton paid high taxes to support this?

Oh wait, the money came from outside of town? So how is this experiment worth anything?

The town itself cannot afford to fund this program, the state and federal levels could not afford it either.

Today we spend a trillion bucks and distribute about $300 billion to the “poor” while the rest pays for bureaucracy. We should just merge all welfare into one program for the truly poor, heck add unemployment to it- why make it a seperate program?... Just hand out cash monthly if they show up in person monthly. Abolish 90% of the welfare bureaucracy.

Liberals would never agree to that of course.

Mincome for all is retarded though

[lowbridge]

” A Town Without Poverty...”

...is a town without democrats.

[lowbridge]

” During the Mincome program, the federal and provincial governments collectively spent $17 million, though it was initially supposed to have cost only a few million.”

Typical.

[tiki]

From my observances getting off welfare is about as hard as getting off of drugs and liberal politicians make it that way.

I don’t know the answers but it is way too easy to slide by on welfare than work. A woman with a couple of kids gets everything from health care to housing to food and then she can shack up with a guy who works and not tell the authorities and get that extra cash.

One of the problems is that if you get a full time minimum wage job you are in worse shape than when you weren’t working so there is no incentive.

[Responsibility2nd]

$1200 per year. Probably Canadian dollars. Convert that to US dollars, adjust for 2012 inflation and try offering that sum to the welfare bums in the United States.

They would shreik in protest at being ripped off. Probably 1/10 of what they normally get from Uncle Sugar.

[SargeK]

I'm sure it did make things better for the recipients. And, maybe the recipients mostly did continue to work. But who pays for it? If the value of work is not supported by market economics, then whatever the difference is is being taken from someone else - redistributed as it were.

Two problems with applying this to today. Recipients continued to work because they always did work - work was a habit and part of their culture. Not so with much of todays' American dependent class. Also, paying someone more than the value of their labor is unsustainable if applied to large swaths of the economy. The money either has to come from punishing taxation (a disincentive for productive workers), consumption taxes (regressive) or borrowing and money printing (Like we are doing now - in the long run terminal.)

I'm sure there are legions of post-graduate level puppeteers, avante garde performance artists and street corner stand-up comics who'd love to pursue their vocations and be provided a comfortable income level guaranteed by the Federal Gubmint. I'm sure that the street corners would be more colorful and entertaining as a result. Right up until the whole thing goes bust and we get this:

But, come to think of it, that's pretty entertaining too.

[concerned about politics]

In America, if you're paid not to work - you don't.
People from around the globe come here for their "free gift."

In this study, people were EXPECTED to do well, in fact, encouraged to improve their lives. In America, people are encouraged to VOTE for free stuff so they never have to get out of bed in the morning.

In America, sloth is rewarded at the tune of $40 - $60,000 annually. The average tax payer, who makes an average of only $40,000, is being asked to work harder, longer, and pay more. (Workers in America are severely punished for their disobedience.)

This is why America is broke. The freeloaders and their annual freebies have outnumbered and out-scrounged the laborers. The grasshoppers are bleeding the ants dry, and everyone is about to starve.

A temporary safety net is fine for those who find themselves in financial dire straights, but in America, that safety net broke a long time ago, and it's been replaced by millions of freeloading condos.

Today, those who need the temporary net can't get it, because they're not part of a left wing voting block. They made the mistake of actually trying to work for a living (they "acted stupidly").

[Maine Mariner]

“Conservative senator Hugh Segal has been the biggest supporter of this kind of GI, claiming it would eliminate the social assistance programs now administered by the provinces and territories. Rather than having a separate office to administer child tax benefits, welfare, unemployment insurance and income supplement for seniors, they could all be rolled into one GI scheme.”

In his book Capitalism and Freedom, Milton Friedman said the same thing-abolish all welfare programs etc and provide cash income to the poor. On FR a few days ago we spent $60,000 per person for those in poverty.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO MILTON FRIEDMAN BORN 100 YEARS AGO THIS YEAR. HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO HIS BOOK CAPITALISM AND FREEDOM
PUBLISHED 50 YEARS AGO. His book helped launch the conservative revival.

[SIDENET]

“Mincome” sounds like something from a dystopia novel.

[ArrogantBustard]

HAND OVER YOUR MONEY!!!

That guy over there doesn't have as much as you.

[Hemingway's Ghost]

Give people financial independence and control over their lives and these accidents and illnesses tend to dissipate, says Forget.

Financial "independence" = getting a guaranteed income from the government? Um, doesn't that mean making people financially DEPENDENT on the government?

Fail.

[IronJack]

You again. One question: who was guaranteeing the income for these people?

Oh, and one more: why are you on this site?

[expat2]

“There's very strong feelings out there that we shouldn't give people money for nothing,” Mulvale says.

And that is probably the way it should be. Perhaps that issue could be overcome by expecting something from them, some kind of community service that would make all concerned feel better.

[Utmost Certainty]

To be clear, Hayek didn’t actually advocate that such a basic minimum income be implemented in modern Western societies, because he believed that such policy would attract too many immigrants from other nations who’d overwhelm the system. Not an unreasonable assumption, obviously.

Hayek’s intention with the minimum basic income idea was to undercut specious “social justice” arguments which pit the claims of one group against other groups under pretext of ‘fairness’, and so on (Hayek detested “social justice”). Ergo, in a society where every individual is guaranteed a min. basic income floor regardless of their demographics, then questions per how the haves vs. have-nots are going to divide up the loot, become less relevant.

At least that’s the intention—I make no claim as to whether it would actually accomplish this aim. This link explains more: http://bleedingheartlibertarians.com/2012/05/hayek-enemy-of-social-justice-and-friend-of-a-universal-basic-income/

I can think of ways a minimum basic income standard could be beneficial, if it were used to streamline all the other welfare spending we already do. No medicare, no social security, no food stamps, no housing assistance, etc. Just throw it all under a guaranteed basic income, and then let people make their own choices from there. If they still can’t be responsible, at least nobody can say ‘society’ wasn’t doing anything for them.

[dfwgator]

A Basic Income Guarantee results in more mothers staying with their children, more teens graduating high school, better health, and higher wages.

It means more lottery tickets being sold.