Money for nothing: is universal basic income about to transform society?
https://www.theguardian.com/society/article/2024/jul/14/money-for-nothing-is-universal-basic-income-about-to-transform-society
Posted by BulkyAccident
Money for nothing: is universal basic income about to transform society?
https://www.theguardian.com/society/article/2024/jul/14/money-for-nothing-is-universal-basic-income-about-to-transform-society
Posted by BulkyAccident
31 Comments
Was there anyone in the survey who paid the money so they could give their reaction? I’d have thought that was an important point here.
Secondly we can’t increase income tax by any percent without national outrage, so I don’t see where the money is coming from.
Thirdly, our normal party of government is Tory until such times that they funnel money to themselves or mates and/or implode as in now, so I can’t see this occurring and/or the Tories would soon be in to scrap it and save the vast cost.
At the fundamental level, UBI isn’t that different from something like the NHS. Once you decide that access to medicine shouldn’t depend on financial resources, you raise the question of what other necessities of life shouldn’t depend on wealth. Food? Housing? At a certain point it becomes easier to just provide people with money instead of trying to nationalise every single thing they might need.
You can absolutely have arguments about how to implement it and what the costs and knock on effects might be, but fundamentally it’s not that far of a leap from the existing welfare state.
Not a mention of the cost of what a UBI would actually take.
Because when probed most people in favour of UBI either want it to be conditional (so it’s not universal) or they don’t appreciate how incredibly expensive it would be to have a UBI level that’s 1. Enough to live on. And 2. To an equal or greater level than current means tested benefits.
Money can be raised from companies & corporations and a transaction charge on internet purchases would help. Those that say ” these corporations and companies would leave” fail to grasp that many are already registered in tax havens to avoid paying their fair share of tax.
I’ve yet to see anything from any UBI proponent that represents some combination of, an actually useful income, combined with any plan to somehow fund it.
The 18-64 group itself is 40 million people. At £1k a month (Substantially less than min wage) that represents £486 **billion** quid. It’s a pipe dream and nothing more.
The example is £1200pcm – so 583 billion. That would amount, to around 70% of ALL tax receipts in the UK.
And that’s before we discuss the knock on effect of what that would do to inflation
Total government spending is 1200 billion. Population is about 70 million. So if we switched off the entire government ( no NHS, police, or schools ), we could have a UBI of 17,000 a year each. That’s quite a bit lower than the current benefit cap, so unemployed people would lose money – and lose access to all government services as there won’t be any anymore.
[Betteridges Law](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge's_law_of_headlines): No.
To be honest I think we already have a similar system. The first approx £12K of earnings is tax free. Benefits for those that can’t earn the first £12K.
Finland trialled something like this but I think due to affordability issues the test group was small (about 2,000 people) and they didn’t give people a full basic income; it was something like £500 per person per month, no conditions attached. The test group (which was almost entirely comprised of the long-term unemployed) didn’t have to seek employment but if they did, they still got the same amount of money.
At the end of the trial they found that people’s sense of wellbeing was improved; they felt happier and healthier, probably just because they didn’t have to worry so much about money.
However, it also failed to incentivise people to take up more work, even part-time or temporary. The long-term unemployed overwhelmingly remained thus.
‘UBI at a level which can guarantee an acceptable standard of living is “impossibly expensive… Either the level of basic income is unacceptably low, or the cost of providing it is unacceptably high’. John Kay.
You have to laugh at the submissive nature of some users.
I love that government spending becomes so hotly talked about here when they talk about giving it to people but when it’s issued to private enterprises which we see no return on there is nothing.
Some folk are really really miserable and only want others to be the same.
Universal income would be an amazing thing to bring in and would transform the nation and its economy and allow us to finally switch the clear and obvious decline of Britain.
Where is the money coming from? It just doesn’t make sense.
Conversations about UBI always demonstrate how clueless the masses are about basic economic principles.
In addition to the affordability issues pointed out by the other commentators there’s also the fact that a huge number of people are employed to administer the benefits system it would get rid of. You would certainly never see it under a Labour government for that reason as it would cause a run in with the public sector unions.
I’m not pro or against UBI and I don’t want to get into the debate on whether people would work more or less, but I have a question for people saying it isn’t affordable.
Just keeping things simple. Assume UBI needs to be set at £10k. Everyone gets £10k for free from the government.
Now in order to fund this (and I am just thinking of on average) if everyone gets £10k less from their other income sources, then at a basic level the figures match and it is affordable.
Then the question is, how do we divert £10k per person from current income streams to UBI? If we have a combination of;
* No more benefits
* No more tax allowances
* A bit of fiddling around with taxation percentages
* Employers will pay their staff £10k per year less and instead pay that money into the UBI fund
I know this is very simplistic and would need a lot of tweaking, but surely the figures roughly balance and that would make UBI affordable?
what happens when the people on UBI blow their money on dumb shit and still require welfare?
>The income, which she will receive until September 2025
UBI trials are doomed to fail unless you guarantee the participants get it for life.
If I’m only given money for a year, I’m not going to change anything, I’m going to pad my savings. If you tell me I’m getting it for the rest of my life, I will, and you’ll get more accurate results on the impact of UBI.
UBI doesnt work because we live in a system that exploits the poor for whatever wealth they acquire and rewards the rich for doing so.
Can’t we just have a 4 day week instead?
The whole point of increasing productivity should be giving us more free time to live our lives. We don’t need more money, we need more time.
Giving people time can’t be lost to inflation either.
UBI has some great success stories, and I think there is some merit to it, having a universal benefits system will definitely help some people out but I don’t see how it can work on a mass scale.
The problem I see with UBI is it must be a replacement for other Benefits services. For example, if the government is sending you £30 a month to spend on food, then they will expect to no longer have to provide food stamps to people. thus saving them the cost of running the Food Stamp program.
But inevitably there will be people who have nothing that decide to buy Drugs, Alcohol, Prostitutes, Cigarettes,
gamble or other vices with that money instead. No matter what happens there will be people with addictions or people who just make poor choices. This is just a fact of life, not everyone is a success story.
This means we either give them no safety net, if they make poor decisions they starve to death, Or we give them specialised help. If we give them the help they need then we have to reopen the Food stamp Program raising costs again. And we are now back at step one having a benefits system in place, but we are now also giving away a load of money at the same time, so costs have essentially just doubled.
I’m not sure which way is better but I don’t see a way around this conundrum. as if we adjust the UBI for how vulnerable the person its just a benefits system with a different name.
I simply can’t believe corporations will look at all these people getting “free money” and not just increase their prices even more than they already are.
Gets given UBI
Immediately stops working
Who would have thought?
I think the real question is; if you gave someone a basic income to cover rent, food, utilities etc.
What’s stopping them from misusing those funds and going into debt.
Who then forks the bill?
I’d argue UBI only works if people are put into social housing and the authorities subsidise their living costs on their behalf.
Then food allowance is loaded onto a pre-paid card that can only be used for the purchase of food and essential house items.
UBI wouldn’t be taken up by the UK government. They fail to pay pensioners a decent pension though they have contributed throughout their working lives. How, then, would they pay the whole population a UBI?
My main worry is the technology that might be implemented. Central Bank Digital Currency’s are just around the corner. Basic income might come at a cost of basic anonymity and freedom . The right to own and spend your own money could be taken away.
The definition of inflation is too much money chasing not enough goods.
If people stop working due to free money then less goods are produced and if everyone is given free money there is more money in the system.
This always has been and always will be a stupid idea.
I would rather have everyone getting x amount than the current x% of the population getting it all
So this is what the Matrix will actually look like. You’d better not think any bad thoughts or your income will be stopped…
We have UBI right now for approx 20-25% of the population. It’s called the state pension.
People love to bring all these criticisms up around UBI, but if anyone mentions the state pension you can bet the same people will complain about how pitiful it is and how people have earned it and how no government can touch it.
Personally I don’t think we really know if the costs of implementing UBI are offset by the administrative savings and economic boost that financial security for all would bring.
What I do know is that UBI doesn’t suddenly start working when the recipients hit Tory voting age and start feeling entitled to it.
We’ve been running this experiment for years now, we’ve got the data. Somebody just needs to do a real deep dive into the cost and benefits of the state pension. We should be able to tell from that data whether or not UBI works. If it does, give it to everyone. If it doesn’t, dump the triple lock and head towards a means tested state pension.
UBI is not about to transform society because it is a stupid idea. There is a shortage of housing in the UK, it will simply be easier to find everyone who is already wealthy and give them some extra money, because that is UBI with fewer silly steps
67,961,439 live in the UK.
1000 a month each.
£815 Billion a year to give everyone 1000 a month.
So we are looking at a hole of about half a Trillion pounds to fill… Not to mention that many people will opt out of the workforce. You can squeek by in places in the UK on 1000 a month if you live alone and you don’t need extra shit in your life…
In 2023, the UK government had a total managed expenditure of around £1.189 trillion. This spending can be broadly divided into several key categories:
Social Protection: £320.9 billion, covering welfare, pensions, and social security benefits.
Health: £212.2 billion, primarily funding the National Health Service (NHS).
Education: £106.6 billion, which includes funding for schools, higher education, and training programs.
Economic Affairs: £126.2 billion, involving infrastructure projects and economic development.
Defence: £55.5 billion, covering military expenses.
Public Order and Safety: £44.2 billion, funding police, fire services, and prisons.
General Public Services: £165.8 billion, which includes debt interest payments and central administrative costs.
Housing and Community Amenities: £17.3 billion, for social housing and local government services.
Environment Protection: £13.7 billion, covering waste management and environmental conservation.
Recreation, Culture, and Religion: £14.4 billion, supporting museums, arts, and cultural activities