UNIVERSAL BASIC INCOME 1600.00 PER MONTH

I think it’s a dreadful idea. I know of people who have NEVER worked and would get paid for a life of bone idleness. It’s like having two fingers put up to those of us who have worked all our lives to provide for ourselves and our families. Where would be the incentive to work ? l have been disabled since early childhood but always worked . Why bother ?

I’m not opposed in principle, but I just wonder who would want to do the roles in hospitality, care etc. which are already understaffed and poorly paid? I can’t imagine if people have enough money to survive on without doing jobs for peanuts, that they will want to work in those types of roles.
I also wonder if it would lead to population shift away from cities, particularly London, because when you aren’t getting housing benefit you aren’t going to be able to afford to live there?

We looked at this in my economics module at uni and I actually think it makes sense. There’s no other benefits paid on top so it’s a simple case of if you have an NI number, you get the UBI. It’s paid for using the administrative savings of calculating and managing the other benefits and you don’t get a personal tax allowance so has some simplifications for HMRC. It’s calculated to allow people to live simply and then if they want a better lifestyle, they need to work to top it up. It could also be introduced hand in hand with things like a 4 day working week, which could stimulate the tertiary sector thanks to increased leisure time and lead to fewer mental health problems which are a drain on the economy.
I also think it will benefit pensioners, particularly those that don’t get the full pension as they should have enough to live comfortably on. And it means people could potentially retire earlier, which opens positions in the workforce.
Also, because people have something to fall back on, it could encourage more entrepreneurs, writers, artists etc!

Its about time they raised the personal allowance for paying tax. If they did that a lot of people would be better off including some of us pensioners. I would love to do a bit of part time work but its not worth it for me as I would have to pay tax on all of it. I'm not sure what the tax implications are for doing voluntary work and getting expenses for it.

DiamondLily

Yes, it's a trial thing.

I cannot see how this would work.

Theoretically, a billionaire would get the same as the poorest.

Unrealistic, and how would it be paid for? 🙄

The aim is to redistribute wealth. Yes a millionaire would get the same as someone on benefits but to a millionaire it would be a tiny percentage of their income whereas a much larger percentage to someone with a low income. It will be paid for by the reduction in Universal Credit etc which will not then be paid. It is just a small trial and I don’t think that the figure of £1600 would be used necessarily if the policy were to be adopted.

Annierob

The idea is every adult has a basic income. You can still work etc and would be taxed as usual.
There would be no benefit system and no state pensions.
Most people would want more money than a basic income.
No poverty, no children growing up with inadequate food.
Money would be saved by no admin to administer benefits etc.
Most jobs done by A1.
Sounds futuristic but that future is coming soon.
It frees human beings to live as they want to.
I think it’s very interesting.

But those that cannot work would need more, especially with rent costs/mortgage costs.

For someone severely disabled, or those caring for children with special needs, this would not be enough.

So, they would need top ups of benefits.

And, back to Square One...😗

i know my mother was annoyed at being dragged down by it.
not able to have any time for herself, or do a job.

i just said 5 as that is when they go to school.
when i was young most mothers had to stay home until they could get the kids off their hands at 5.

Jess20

Having a son with disabilities I think this might be a really good idea. The hours and stress expended on claiming pip and UC is awful and while this is amount is actually less than he gets at the moment, the certainty of a guaranteed income far outweighs what would be lost - at least for us as he lives at home. People will probably want to top up with jobs to enjoy a better standard of living but if AI really does wipe out swathes of employment opportunities there will need to be some strategies to support those not in work, can't just keep increasing the number of benefit 'assessors' driving people to compete for fewer and fewer jobs if there aren't enough to go round. Will take a radical rethink about how we fund people's lives, how and where they will be able to live and so on. Good to start thinking about the potential issues now rather than at the point of crisis and risk huge public protest and possibly unrest.

Totally agree 👏🏻👏🏻😃

welbeck

it would be good if mothers, or fathers, could choose to stay home to look after their own small children up to age 5, if they so wish.
i rather wish i lived in east barnet and had a chance of being in the 30, as it's a lot more than £280 i get.

If this came in couples would have £3200 a month to pay for one (or both) of them to stay at home, so they could do so well beyond age 5 without expecting others to fund them by working, as workers would get it too.

What are the people in the trial actually doing? Seeing if they can live on £1600 a month and reporting back? Surely it would have been more useful to find people already doing that and see how they have got on - short-term trials don't tell us much, really.

I think a large majority of people would work - I would have but I would have been able to spend more time with my children when they little and I would have studied more - I’m pretty sure my husband would have chosen to work pretty much full time

it would be good if mothers, or fathers, could choose to stay home to look after their own small children up to age 5, if they so wish.
i rather wish i lived in east barnet and had a chance of being in the 30, as it's a lot more than £280 i get.

I think it's partly a 'time of life' thing. I am happy to sit about doing not a lot nowadays (just as well, as my health doesn't allow much activity), but would have hated it when I was young.

There is the social side of work, too. I don't think many people would want to sit in the house all day - we had enough of that in lockdown. I think a lot of people might like to work part time, and earn enough to indulge their hobbies and interests.

It's a nice dream, particularly for our children and grandchildren, but I think we need to see the whole plan before getting too excited.

MaizieD

^Making employment optional carries large risks.^

To my mind it raises the question of whether people do really want to work in any way? Does human instinct favour 'work' (of any description) or sitting around doing nothing?

I suspect most people don't want to sit around doing nothing. Whether they want to work for an employer is another matter.

I suspect the crux of it is that most people wouldn't be satisfied with an income that could only buy the basics, so would be forced into some kind of activity which would earn them extra money.

MaizieD

Nauru sounds interesting, Aveline.

Who produced the food that made them fat?

Why were 10% of the population working? Were they doing it from choice? Did they have better conditions than would be generally found in the extraction industry?

What about education, healthcare, policing etc. etc? Who did all that?

I wonder as to the food and plump people.

Hawaii - similar climate and food sources, generally many people are plump as well. Fish, seafood, fresh fruit and veg. don't seem a plump diet, nor does the labour to produce the farm goods. Mystery.

UBI is a concept, not easily workable - yet could happen.

MaizieD

Nauru sounds interesting, Aveline.

Who produced the food that made them fat?

Why were 10% of the population working? Were they doing it from choice? Did they have better conditions than would be generally found in the extraction industry?

What about education, healthcare, policing etc. etc? Who did all that?

There's a Wiki entry on Obesity in Nauru:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obesity_in_Nauru

Apparently, the income from mining was used to import Western-style food from Australia and New Zealand, which contained more fat and sugar than had traditionally been consumed.

Meanwhile, the land which could have been used for farming was stripped by the mines.

The idea is every adult has a basic income. You can still work etc and would be taxed as usual.
There would be no benefit system and no state pensions.
Most people would want more money than a basic income.
No poverty, no children growing up with inadequate food.
Money would be saved by no admin to administer benefits etc.
Most jobs done by A1.
Sounds futuristic but that future is coming soon.
It frees human beings to live as they want to.
I think it’s very interesting.

Making employment optional carries large risks.

To my mind it raises the question of whether people do really want to work in any way? Does human instinct favour 'work' (of any description) or sitting around doing nothing?

Nauru sounds interesting, Aveline.

Who produced the food that made them fat?

Why were 10% of the population working? Were they doing it from choice? Did they have better conditions than would be generally found in the extraction industry?

What about education, healthcare, policing etc. etc? Who did all that?

Having read up a bit about Nauru I found that at the height of the mineral extraction there was 90% unemployment. Basically because people didn't have to. A serious side effect was a large increase in obesity. Although economically the mineral deposits are finished and employment levels are only (!) 23%, obesity is almost universal and there is a very high incidence of diabetes.
Making employment optional carries large risks.

I don't think you are missing anything, Maisie. That's why I think we would need a collective shift in mindset. Not necessarily a bad thing in itself - less consumerism would be good for the planet - but as with any seismic shifts there will be casualties in the process of getting from A to B.

Something like this needs more sophisticated management than any of the current generation of politicians seem capable of doing, unfortunately.

I think it's Nauru that's the Pacific island where there's so much of some mineral that the whole population is given a good pension and no one needs to work. It would be interesting to hear how that's going. Will try to find out.

Doodledog

*What worries me more is the availability of people to staff the NHS if living on UBI seemed a more attractive proposition.*..

Yes, I mentioned that earlier.

But if the NHS doesn't need funding, why isn't it funded? If nobody worked how would any public services be funded? And if no public money is needed to fund things, why do we still have poor countries and rich ones? Surely they could all just fund whatever they needed.

All good questions, Dd. To which I have no answers...

Which is why I am dubious about UBI.

After all, money has value only when it is used as a medium for exchange. (all the £squillions that wealthy people have hoarded away have no value at all until they are used to buy something). If people work less, because they don't need to work so much to have sufficient money for their wants and needs, does this mean that there are less things (wants and needs) being produced for for people to buy? Which would render that money valueless.

It's not even as though there is a massive pool of unemployed people who would be happy to work a few hours to make up the deficit in goods and services caused by people already in work wanting to reduce their hours of work. What happens if farmers want to only work five days a week instead of seven? Or medical staff reducing their hours? Or people making consumer goods? It requires a radical rethink that I'm not capable of envisaging.

( I can only see it leading to hyperinflation ATM..)

I must go off and have a good look at the UBI theorists say to see if I can find what I'm missing when I start trying to work out how UBI would fit into our capitalist consumer society.

I wonder if there’s ever been any research into how many people would give up work if they had a UBI. That is surely information that is essential before going ahead.

There are plenty of wealthy people who have no need to work but they still do (Elon Musk, for one!) and I suspect lots of ‘ordinary’ folk would still do so. It would also free up people who wanted to do altruistic work or develop the arts etc.

Something will have to be done though, as A I does more and more. I think it is a good idea to have these trials, as long as the results are judged on themselves and not on pre conceived prejudices.