[Politics] Universal Basic Income anyone?

[Horton's halftime iceberg]

current welfare budget is £126bn, for 46m working age population thats ~£52 a week each. if there is to be more taxes, thats acknowledging need for larger budget.

In the financial year ending 2017, the UK government spent £264 billion on welfare, which made up 34% of all government spending

ONS

 

[beorhthelm]

In the financial year ending 2017, the UK government spent £264 billion on welfare, which made up 34% of all government spending

ONS

i believe thats the number including pensions. if so have to include them, 52m population, thats £100 a week each.

 

[Baldseagull]

I'll give the same reply to that as I gave to beorthelm - there'll be very, very few people who'll choose not to work - people want to go to pubs, buy birthday presents for their kids, run a car, go for meals out etc. This may shock you but there families now who don't work; however UBI is calculated, it will mean that a family living on benefits will be worse off. I don't think it's going to be tricky at all for a government to say we're going to cut the money for those people who choose not to work, I think that it will be more of a vote winner.

I do agree that the problem of who gets UBI is a trickier question. As you say, giving it someone who's just landed on Hastings beach would be problematic but I don't see someone born in Bangladesh or Jamaica who came to England as an infant and has spent 30 years working and paying taxes in the UK should be denied it. There's also a flipside to this: what about British ex-pats and non-doms: should they receive it if they have lived abroad?

These are fine details that need to be sorted, not something that can be done on a football message board. I'm just talking of the advantages of UBI in general.

People seeking asylum would get more than the UBI amount, asylum seekers are not permitted to work until their claim is succesful, so need support.

 

[Gwylan]

People seeking asylum would get more than the UBI amount, asylum seekers are not permitted to work until their claim is succesful, so need support.

He didn't mention asylum seekers specifically but, yes, asylum seekers would be treated as a separate category

 

[cheshunt seagull]

The devil would be in the detail but I am generally in favour. It will enable people that want to carry out charitable and caring work to commit to this and for people who want to start their own small businesses to take calculated risks. Currently the time that claimants spend going through endless bureaucratic hoops could be spent contributing something useful. The other aspect is that it can give more people the confidence to perform the role of consumers which is kind of important for the economy.

 

[Baldseagull]

He didn't mention asylum seekers specifically but, yes, asylum seekers would be treated as a separate category

I guess he didn't, but I reckon most other arrivals would not be getting here by dinghy to Hastings? A successful asylum claim would seem to make the applicant eligible for any UBI scheme at some point, if not immediately after asylum was granted, which could be a further draw to the UK if UBI was here and not elsewhere, or if the rate was deemed more generous here than elsewhere. I like the idea, and believe if all the wrinkles could be ironed out, it would be beneficial in very many ways, but I have little hope of seeing it in my lifetime.

 

[Horton's halftime iceberg]

i believe thats the number including pensions. if so have to include them, 52m population, thats £100 a week each.

Well your making a huge assumption that 52 million people will all ask for their money. I mean millions haven't even claimed back PPI, which is their money in the first place.

I still think its the way forward and if the government wants to be seen as radical they should adopt it.

 

[cunning fergus]

I'll give the same reply to that as I gave to beorthelm - there'll be very, very few people who'll choose not to work - people want to go to pubs, buy birthday presents for their kids, run a car, go for meals out etc. This may shock you but there families now who don't work; however UBI is calculated, it will mean that a family living on benefits will be worse off. I don't think it's going to be tricky at all for a government to say we're going to cut the money for those people who choose not to work, I think that it will be more of a vote winner.

I do agree that the problem of who gets UBI is a trickier question. As you say, giving it someone who's just landed on Hastings beach would be problematic but I don't see someone born in Bangladesh or Jamaica who came to England as an infant and has spent 30 years working and paying taxes in the UK should be denied it. There's also a flipside to this: what about British ex-pats and non-doms: should they receive it if they have lived abroad?

These are fine details that need to be sorted, not something that can be done on a football message board. I'm just talking of the advantages of UBI in general.

Even if you are right on the numbers, you still have a tricky message politically, and that was my point.

The academic argument may be sound, but that kite still has to fly with the general public.

As we can see all too clearly today politicians cannot make decisions based on simply a straight academic expert analysis.

I read recently that when D-day was being planned, the experts predicted around 100,000 casualties, and Churchill was shocked because that number was a repeat of the first day of the Somme for the U.K. In the event it was much lower, so a political decision he made in face of expert advice thankfully was paid off.

Political decisions are not academic decisions.