Economists, like Kling, support UBI as a solution to the problem of marginal taxation. That is a problem, but does UBI solve it? How?
The idea seems to be the classic empty ultimatum. Ok poor people, we will give you $ and you need to use it wisely, or else!
Or else what? Does anyone believe that giving poor people cash will end poverty? And when poverty and all the problems inherent with it persist, then welfare will be expanded.
I can't get over the dissonance of UBI economics. Intelligent people know that "democracy" doesn't work because too many people don't know what is good for them. Yet UBI is classic democracy. It is giving people money on the premise they will know how to better use it. Why would we think that?
The legalization of vice - marijuana, sports betting, drug legalization etc - is revealing that a portion of the population is not wise. They consume the vice to their own destruction. Not all consumers are bad decision makers. But a portion of people do not know how to care for themselves. UBI won't solve this. So what do you do then? You add back a social safety net. And then you are literally paying people to be poor and dependents of the state.
“Economists, like Kling, support UBI as a solution to the problem of marginal taxation. That is a problem, but does UBI solve it? How?”
UBI solves that problem *when used as a replacement for all the other assistance programs* (save perhaps healthcare, which personally I would leave alone).
The elimination of those programs is a solution to the problem of marginal taxation because it is the various eligibility requirements - and associated phaseouts - of these programs which create the obscenely high marginal tax rates that the poor face. Those high tax rates are the key element in the Poverty Trap.
Economists, like Kling, support UBI as a solution to the problem of marginal taxation. That is a problem, but does UBI solve it? How?
The idea seems to be the classic empty ultimatum. Ok poor people, we will give you $ and you need to use it wisely, or else!
Or else what? Does anyone believe that giving poor people cash will end poverty? And when poverty and all the problems inherent with it persist, then welfare will be expanded.
I can't get over the dissonance of UBI economics. Intelligent people know that "democracy" doesn't work because too many people don't know what is good for them. Yet UBI is classic democracy. It is giving people money on the premise they will know how to better use it. Why would we think that?
The legalization of vice - marijuana, sports betting, drug legalization etc - is revealing that a portion of the population is not wise. They consume the vice to their own destruction. Not all consumers are bad decision makers. But a portion of people do not know how to care for themselves. UBI won't solve this. So what do you do then? You add back a social safety net. And then you are literally paying people to be poor and dependents of the state.
“Economists, like Kling, support UBI as a solution to the problem of marginal taxation. That is a problem, but does UBI solve it? How?”
UBI solves that problem *when used as a replacement for all the other assistance programs* (save perhaps healthcare, which personally I would leave alone).
The elimination of those programs is a solution to the problem of marginal taxation because it is the various eligibility requirements - and associated phaseouts - of these programs which create the obscenely high marginal tax rates that the poor face. Those high tax rates are the key element in the Poverty Trap.