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They would still be low wage workers. The baseline would just be a little different. Government gives money to people now and the low wage workers still are low wage workers. They just don't start from zero.
I don't understand your point. I wrote it would help low wage workers which it would.
Have you done the math? $2700/person is almost $130k/year for a family of four. I don't know about where you live, but that's way above what the average family of four lives on here. Even if you just give it to adults, the income for a couple would be over the average income for a family of four here. I could see a lot of people retiring. If they offered me $2700 a month, I would.
I am already retired, but my wife works. Give us $5400/month BLS (Basic Living Stipend) and she will quit in a heartbeat, we will sell everything except the RV and one vehicle, and become full-time RVers, seldom in one place more than a week, traveling around the country visiting relatives.
I don't know how you folks are going to pay for it, but hurry up and gitterdone, I ain't got many years left to enjoy it!
We are waiting...
It is not a livable amount. In fact, one of the reasons the state pays it out is the COL is so high in Alaska that they try and offset it to keep people living there.
Yeah, but it's an anachronism at this point. Alaska really doesn't need to pay people to agree to live there anymore. It's no longer the frontier that it once was.
Besides, if you're gonna live in an icebox, you'd have to pay the unwilling a lot more than that to move there and stay. I just call it what it is...a little socialism.
In any case, i think a basic guaranteed income proposal in this country is preposterous.
This cracks me up. The Romans had a method of "peacefully and passive-aggressively" degredating societies around their kingdom which they found a threat to Rome, by lavishing them with gifts, food and coin. Even in the Roman days, we were smart enough to understand what destroying one's ambition, work ethic, and sense of purpose would do to a population - and now history looks to repeat itself.
It does? Odd then that there hasn't been a land rush of minorities up to Alaska.
In Alaska it's only like 1-2k a year, and you have to live there at least a year to get it. Plus it's cold, but shhhhh don't let the cat out of the bag.
Yeah, but it's an anachronism at this point. Alaska really doesn't need to pay people to agree to live there anymore. It's no longer the frontier that it once was.
Besides, if you're gonna live in an icebox, you'd have to pay the unwilling a lot more than that to move there and stay. I just call it what it is...a little socialism.
In any case, i think a basic guaranteed income proposal in this country is preposterous.
Like AK, it could happen in the USA if the oil industry was nationalized. But of course that won't be happening.
That being said, it would make more sense in the USA to simply reduce taxes during times of economic weakness. Although the effect is similar, it feel better to reduce taxes rather than to helo drop cash. Eliminating payroll and Federal gas taxes would have been the best moves in 2008 with the recession. This would have had a similar effect compared to a national paycheck.
It has little to do with work ethic. The biggest factor undermining work ethic is insufficient pay, i.e. the feeling of getting exploited, which applies to the working poor. That is also the problem in the US, and to a certain extent in Europe as well. And it is why Scandinavia is doing well, everyone working gets a decent income they can easily live on.
Like AK, it could happen in the USA if the oil industry was nationalized. But of course that won't be happening.
That being said, it would make more sense in the USA to simply reduce taxes during times of economic weakness. Although the effect is similar, it feel better to reduce taxes rather than to helo drop cash. Eliminating payroll and Federal gas taxes would have been the best moves in 2008 with the recession. This would have had a similar effect compared to a national paycheck.
Well, we already had a payroll tax cut in effect. I'm not sure what eliminating it altogether would've done besides the fact that it would be an abandonment of Social Security and Medicare funding.
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