Quote Originally Posted by CoccoBill View Post
I'm not sure how any of what you said after that was relevant. UBI should help, imo, in 2 major ways:

- Cutting down on bureaucracy. Running a system that interviews, monitors, processes, makes decisions etc for millions of people takes an obscene amount of work. If everyone just got a fixed sum every month, none of that would be needed.
I don't see any logical premise for this argument. How is creating a whole new entitlement program going to cut down on bureaucracy??

You can't give everyone the same fixed amount. Seniors, disabled people, unemployed people, people with children, all have different needs. They all have a different definition of what is "basic necessities". So now you need the government to interview, monitor, process, make decisions, etc for millions of people.

Sure, MAYBE, there would be some efficiency gains if this was all administrated by a single government agency. But you're also talking about adding hundreds of millions of people to the roster of benefit recipients.

- Incentivizing labor. Not familiar with the details of your system, but here up north a lot of people are much happier just collecting unemployment benefits, since if you can only get a shitty job, you won't be making much more than from the benefits, without working. Doing even part-time work will cut heavily into your received benefits, making finding a minimum wage job pointless. With a fixed income that's unaffected by your income and that covers some basic necessities but no luxuries, every bit of extra work would be extra in your pocket, as it should be.
But there's only a jillion other ways to incentivize labor. Also, it's hard not to point out the circular pitfall of your suggestion. Over time, markets will adjust prices for the effect of UBI. That means that "covering basic necessities" gets more expensive. Which means UBI needs to be increased. Which prompts the market to adjust prices. Which prompts UBI to be increased.....etc.

Furthermore, unemployed people here have to prove that they are looking for work. You can't get your check until you give the unemployment office a detailed account of your job-search efforts. They will check too. If you turn down a reasonable job offer, you can't get unemployment benefits.

Further-Furthermore, I'm not sure why that's even relevant as unemployment is not a government entitlement program. It's an insurance program paid for by employers via a pricing system where employers with the highest turnover pay the highest insurance rates.