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The Republican case for the Universal Basic IncomeFollow

#27 Jan 14 2014 at 8:31 PM Rating: Default
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January is super busy for me, so I'm just now getting around to responding:

Yodabunny wrote:
There's nothing to address. All developed nations provide various welfare programs that guarantee a basic level of income. Since we're all doing it and people still work your argument is demonstrably false.


Sigh. Some degree of welfare is *not* the same as UBI as talked about in the linked source. I'm not sure how much more clearly I can say this. They are speaking about a very specific form of social system that is currently not in existence anywhere on the planet. No one does it. Not as it's being discussed here.

Welfare programs in western nations all operate on the "need" mechanic. It's not universal. Only those who do not earn enough to support themselves receive assistance, and then only to the degree to which they are unable to provide it for themselves (health care being the one exception to this). A person earning $100k/year does not get a months supply of foodstamps every month. He does not receive a housing credit sufficient to pay for basic housing. He does not receive a free transit pass, nor do his children receive free college tuition. Only people who can't afford those things are provided them.

A true UBI means that every single thing deemed "necessary" is provided to everyone. That's what the Universal part of "Universal Basic Income" means. Everyone gets a housing voucher sufficient to pay for minimal housing, and a food voucher for sufficient food to live off of, and a transportation voucher, and eduction voucher, and clothing vouchers, etc. Everything you "need" to live is paid for whether you work or not. The key point is that this is provided as some form of "income" which you get even if you work. Any income you earn is added to the UBI value. Traditional welfare systems disqualify you for aid based on your income. A UBI does not.


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We're already doing it, and it works just fine, in fact we should do it more. The very society you live in has proven you wrong just by having the programs you speak out against so passionately...it's obvious.


Again. You clearly either failed to bother reading the linked information or failed utterly to understand what they were talking about. And despite me already clearly explaining this, and then telling you I'd explained it and you failed to get it, you responded a third time in a manner which clearly indicates you not only didn't bother to learn what UBI was the first time, but refused to do it again after I told you you'd gotten it wrong.

Want to try again? This time by trying to understand that UBI doesn't just mean welfare programs? Unless 100% of the citizens in your country receive the exact same benefits from the government regardless of their income levels, then you don't have a UBI. And guess what? No one does that.
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#28 Jan 14 2014 at 11:58 PM Rating: Excellent
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It would be much better to conglomerate the existing welfare programs into a single subsidy that tapered cleanly based on income. I think this could potentially be sold as a Bipartisan bill as a way of reducing FWA and always incentivizing work, while protecting the subsidy from being undermined on multiple fronts.
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#29 Jan 15 2014 at 6:12 AM Rating: Excellent
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And it'd never see the light of day.
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#30 Jan 15 2014 at 7:12 AM Rating: Excellent
Timelordwho wrote:
It would be much better to conglomerate the existing welfare programs into a single subsidy that tapered cleanly based on income. I think this could potentially be sold as a Bipartisan bill as a way of reducing FWA and always incentivizing work, while protecting the subsidy from being undermined on multiple fronts.


I believe that's being tossed around as a possible line in the Republican agenda. Give the states the money and let them determine the best way to spend it.

The problem is that if you hand a lump sum of money to the states and say "Here, figure out the best way to use this to help your poor people" - perhaps 10% will go for the intended use and the other 90% will end up in the general fund.
#31 Jan 15 2014 at 9:52 AM Rating: Excellent
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Catwho wrote:
The problem is that if you hand a lump sum of money to the states and say "Here, figure out the best way to use this to help your poor people"
I like it, in a playful Darwinistic way if nothing else.
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#32 Jan 15 2014 at 10:02 AM Rating: Good
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TANF money's are already doled out by the states.

I think Medicaid as a block grant program would be a disaster. I think you'd see people actually moving from state to state based on their health care needs. Need a state funded botox treatment - become a Californian.

More to the point though, TANF has shown that block grant programs react very slowly, if at all, to nationwide financial trends.
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#33 Jan 15 2014 at 3:51 PM Rating: Default
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Catwho wrote:
Timelordwho wrote:
It would be much better to conglomerate the existing welfare programs into a single subsidy that tapered cleanly based on income. I think this could potentially be sold as a Bipartisan bill as a way of reducing FWA and always incentivizing work, while protecting the subsidy from being undermined on multiple fronts.


I believe that's being tossed around as a possible line in the Republican agenda. Give the states the money and let them determine the best way to spend it.

The problem is that if you hand a lump sum of money to the states and say "Here, figure out the best way to use this to help your poor people" - perhaps 10% will go for the intended use and the other 90% will end up in the general fund.


I think the key point is about "handing money" to the states in the first place. Republicans would tend to argue that we should simply not take the money at the federal level in the first place and let the states spend their own money dealing with this. Problem solved. Get the federal government out of the business of welfare.
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#34 Jan 15 2014 at 7:18 PM Rating: Excellent
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That'd be cool and all if the Feds also cut off welfare to the states.
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#35 Jan 15 2014 at 9:27 PM Rating: Good
Problem is, those states would need to raise that revenue at the home level, which would mean stuff like implementing a sales tax or giving a tax hike to people.

Even if doing so meant people didn't have to pay any federal taxes, I can't see any state agreeing to give their citizens a 500% local state tax hike.
#36 Jan 16 2014 at 3:57 AM Rating: Excellent
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gbaji wrote:
Catwho wrote:
Timelordwho wrote:
It would be much better to conglomerate the existing welfare programs into a single subsidy that tapered cleanly based on income. I think this could potentially be sold as a Bipartisan bill as a way of reducing FWA and always incentivizing work, while protecting the subsidy from being undermined on multiple fronts.


I believe that's being tossed around as a possible line in the Republican agenda. Give the states the money and let them determine the best way to spend it.

The problem is that if you hand a lump sum of money to the states and say "Here, figure out the best way to use this to help your poor people" - perhaps 10% will go for the intended use and the other 90% will end up in the general fund.


I think the key point is about "handing money" to the states in the first place. Republicans would tend to argue that we should simply not take the money at the federal level in the first place and let the states spend their own money dealing with this. Problem solved. Get the federal government out of the business of welfare.


We have decided as a nation to subsidize states that lack opportunity or have special challenges associated with them, and as a general rule, richer Northeast states subsidize poorer Southern states.

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#37 Jan 16 2014 at 7:10 AM Rating: Excellent
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Those poorer states have no excuse for being poor. If they just worked harder there wouldn't be any problem at all. Instead of giving them money like the bleeding hearts like gbaji insist on doing, they should be cut off and have incentive to survive.
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#38 Jan 16 2014 at 6:45 PM Rating: Default
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Samira wrote:
That'd be cool and all if the Feds also cut off welfare to the states.


Done! Er, I'm totally for that, and reasonably sure that most Conservatives would be fine with that deal.
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#39 Jan 16 2014 at 6:56 PM Rating: Default
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lolgaxe wrote:
Those poorer states have no excuse for being poor. If they just worked harder there wouldn't be any problem at all. Instead of giving them money like the bleeding hearts like gbaji insist on doing, they should be cut off and have incentive to survive.


You (and others) say this as though that isn't exactly what I think we should do. It's funny that instead of actually discussing the idea, some people almost instinctively respond with the assumption that this isn't really something that conservatives would want because <insert some claim about which states get more or less benefit>. And I'm sure someone will pop in with the stereotypical "but red states get a better deal" bit.

Which is all irrelevant with regard to what we conservatives think we should be doing. Without getting into a long drawn out argument about why various states get more or less benefit from federal spending and to what degree that actually correlates with political parties (and those parties agendas), the reality is that if you actually put this up to a vote, it would be Democrats who would oppose eliminating the taxes and the spending and the GOP who would support it. So all the speculative dancing around the issue is just that: dancing around the issue.
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#40 Jan 16 2014 at 7:06 PM Rating: Excellent
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How surprising that the conservative from California is okay with leaving the red states to wither on the vine Smiley: laugh
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#41 Jan 16 2014 at 7:10 PM Rating: Excellent
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gbaji wrote:
<insert some claim about which states get more or less benefit>
Ha ha, some claims, like the data is made up on a whim. Oh, the lengths you go to to get attention.
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#42 Jan 16 2014 at 7:25 PM Rating: Excellent
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They'd be all for it, until it actually happened and the voters realized just how much they got from the Government without being aware of it.
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#43 Jan 16 2014 at 7:29 PM Rating: Default
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Jophiel wrote:
How surprising that the conservative from California is okay with leaving the red states to wither on the vine Smiley: laugh


If a bunch of conservatives from Idaho said the same thing, your response would be to ignore what they were saying they wanted and instead insisting that they don't really want that because their state would be on the losing end of things. At some point, it ought to occur to you that maybe conservatives don't base their decisions on the same criteria you do.

By your own argument, shouldn't liberals (or at least Dem voters) be in favor of eliminating the portion of federal taxes used to fund welfare and eliminating federal welfare payments to states? Since they don't, why insist on assuming that correlation must be true for Republicans? At some point you should realize that the whole "Republicans don't really want small government because red states get the best deal" argument is BS. Right?
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#44 Jan 16 2014 at 7:30 PM Rating: Default
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TirithRR wrote:
They'd be all for it, until it actually happened and the voters realized just how much they got from the Government without being aware of it.


Wrong.
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#45 Jan 16 2014 at 7:31 PM Rating: Excellent
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gbaji wrote:
If a bunch of conservatives from Idaho said the same thing, your response would be to ignore what they were saying they wanted and instead insisting that they don't really want that because their state would be on the losing end of things.

Only one way to find out.

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By your own argument, shouldn't liberals (or at least Dem voters) be in favor of eliminating the portion of federal taxes used to fund welfare and eliminating federal welfare payments to states?

Which argument is that?


Edited, Jan 16th 2014 7:38pm by Jophiel
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#46 Jan 16 2014 at 7:38 PM Rating: Default
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Jophiel wrote:
gbaji wrote:
If a bunch of conservatives from Idaho said the same thing, your response would be to ignore what they were saying they wanted and instead insisting that they don't really want that because their state would be on the losing end of things.

Only one way to find out.


Sure. What would you say if a bunch of conservatives from Idaho said that they wanted to eliminate the federal involvement in welfare? I mean, I've seen your pattern of responses to this issue in the past (you're the one who brings up the whole "red states receive more aid per tax dollar" bit all the time), so is this really a surprise?


Quote:
Quote:
By your own argument, shouldn't liberals (or at least Dem voters) be in favor of eliminating the portion of federal taxes used to fund welfare and eliminating federal welfare payments to states?

Which argument is that?


The argument that Republicans don't really want to eliminate federal involvement in welfare (or even a broader "small government" angle) because red states receive more dollars from the federal government than they pay in federal taxes. You've made this exact argument in the past Joph. But if that is true, then shouldn't it also be true that Democrats really do want smaller government? If we're to assume that which state gets the best deal reflects that majority party in that state's true intentions with regards to federal spending, then Democrats should be opposed to bigger government.


Since they very clearly aren't, we can assume that the entire line of reasoning is flawed.
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#47 Jan 16 2014 at 7:39 PM Rating: Excellent
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Although, really, if a bunch of conservatives from Idaho were working on this, I would point out that the Idaho state legislature is vastly Republican, its governor is Republican, its federal representatives and its senators are all Republican. If they actually wanted Idaho cut off from the federal teat, there's no better time than now to start that fight, begin refusing any federal monies and work language into the budgets exempting Idaho from receiving any more tax money than they contribute.

I'll be over here waiting for that to happen. Luckily, I bought a large soda.
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The argument that Republicans don't really want to eliminate federal involvement in welfare (or even a broader "small government" angle) because red states receive more dollars from the federal government than they pay in federal taxes. You've made this exact argument in the past Joph. But if that is true, then shouldn't it also be true that Democrats really do want smaller government?

Erm, B doesn't really follow A there. Could be that both are actually fine with the status quo and just the "conservatives" have reason to lie about it to their easily led derps from CA Smiley: grin

Edited, Jan 16th 2014 7:41pm by Jophiel
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#48 Jan 16 2014 at 8:16 PM Rating: Default
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Jophiel wrote:
Although, really, if a bunch of conservatives from Idaho were working on this, I would point out that the Idaho state legislature is vastly Republican, its governor is Republican, its federal representatives and its senators are all Republican. If they actually wanted Idaho cut off from the federal teat, there's no better time than now to start that fight, begin refusing any federal monies and work language into the budgets exempting Idaho from receiving any more tax money than they contribute.


And yet, if someone proposed a law to do that in the US congress, applying to all 50 states, you and I both know that the GOP would vote for it, and the Dems would vote against it. You're making a speculative argument which flies in the face of stated public positions by both parties. I can only assume you do this because it's easier to sidestep the question by insisting that Republicans don't really want small government, than defending your own party's position in favor of it. I could be wrong, of course, but I don't think so.

Quote:
Quote:
The argument that Republicans don't really want to eliminate federal involvement in welfare (or even a broader "small government" angle) because red states receive more dollars from the federal government than they pay in federal taxes. You've made this exact argument in the past Joph. But if that is true, then shouldn't it also be true that Democrats really do want smaller government?

Erm, B doesn't really follow A there. Could be that both are actually fine with the status quo and just the "conservatives" have reason to lie about it to their easily led derps from CA Smiley: grin


Yeah, that makes no sense though. The small government argument is so prevalent across the board on the conservative side of things, that it's hard to imagine how that could be the case. So all conservatives say they are for small government. And all Republicans say they support small government principles (to at least some degree). Conservatives largely vote for Republicans because of that small government position. Yet, we're supposed to believe that conservatives don't really believe in small government, but just claim they do? Which ones? All of them? Some of them? Just the politicians? Just the ones from "red states"?

It seems far more likely that this is the argument that liberals make because it's an easier argument to make than one in support of big government programs which have increasingly obviously been failures over the last 40 years. You can't tell me that during your lifetime (you're only a few years younger than me IIRC), you haven't noticed a shift on the left with regard to how they argue their positions. Back in the 70s and early 80s, flush with anticipation of all the wonderful results of the "Great Society" changes made in the 60s, liberals constantly gushed about their programs. They confidently insisted that only with the aid of government programs could hunger, poverty, racial inequalities, etc be eliminated from our society. But after a couple decades went by and it became increasingly obvious that all those magical wonderful outcomes weren't happening, and hunger, poverty, and racial inequality were just as bad (and actually worse in some cases), people started to think that maybe this Reagan guy was right and that government might just not be the solution, but might be the problem. OMG! Maybe we made a big mistake!!!


And somewhere around the early/mid 90s, the Dems switched tactics. They stopped talking about how great big government was and how it could solve all our problems. They changed instead to attacking Republicans for being heartless and cruel. They stopped insisting that their policies would make the lives of the downtrodden better, and instead focused on convincing people that they would be worse if the GOP had their way. They basically moved into damage control mode, and have been there for 20 or so years now.


So yeah, I don't buy that what you're saying is what conservatives actually believe or want, but it is what the left want's people to think conservatives want. Anything that can cast doubt on the truthfulness of conservative positions or ideology helps the side that's doing damage control. Because it's no longer about arguing *for* your own positions. It's entirely about attacking the other guy using any means necessary. And one of the tactics that I see all the time is the whole "GOP isn't really any different than the Dems on big government". It's the argument you're making when you point out the whole red/blue states and federal funding. It's the argument behind the whole "Obamacare is the same as Romneycare". Hell. It's even the same argument behind the original post in this thread (trying to make people think that Republican political ideology is or should really be in favor of socialism).


Every time someone says that the Republicans are no better than the Democrats when it comes to big government, that's a "win" for the Democrats, right? So which "side" benefits by spreading this idea? It's not rocket science. When your own position's become unpopular, the only way to win is to convince the people that the other guy holds the same ones. And that's exactly what this entire line of reasoning is about.
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#49 Jan 16 2014 at 8:21 PM Rating: Excellent
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gbaji wrote:
Jophiel wrote:
Although, really, if a bunch of conservatives from Idaho were working on this, I would point out that the Idaho state legislature is vastly Republican, its governor is Republican, its federal representatives and its senators are all Republican. If they actually wanted Idaho cut off from the federal teat, there's no better time than now to start that fight, begin refusing any federal monies and work language into the budgets exempting Idaho from receiving any more tax money than they contribute.


And yet, if someone proposed a law to do that in the US congress...

And yet nothing. If those Idaho conservatives were serious about this, there's concrete steps they could be taking this very day that would ensure that they are balanced on federal tax dollars going in and out of the state and are off any sort of state "welfare".

When they do this, I'll believe that those Idaho conservatives really want this.
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#50 Jan 17 2014 at 10:47 AM Rating: Excellent
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People in Idaho should be left to their own devices, just in general. Best not to get any of that on you.

Edited, Jan 17th 2014 8:48am by someproteinguy
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#51 Jan 17 2014 at 11:00 AM Rating: Excellent
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gbaji wrote:

And yet, if someone proposed a law to do that in the US congress...

Idaho trade sanctions. Tariffs on potatoes. This is just a diabolical plan hatched by the Maine Potato Board.

I hear all the time about smaller government. What does it mean? I've asked the question of a few friendly republicans but have not yet gotten a satisfactory answer.

Is the goal of a smaller government fewer federal employees, less square feet devoted to government facilities, smaller military, fewer regulations, less tax dollars, a combination of all of these?

How 'small' is small?

What is the ideal 'size' of the government?

Should the size of the government be in respect to the number of citizens, the quality of life, the level of trade and/or technology?

'Smaller government' is just a frilly catchphrase with a barbed hook used to reel in unsuspecting doorknobs that can't see anything beyond the government taking money out of their paltry little paychecks.
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