Comment by mlyle | Hacker News Reader

Comment by mlyle | Hacker News Reader

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> One would have to be extremely credible to believe the claim that UBI would remove deadweight loss. Throwing any kind of massive wrench in the market can safely be expected to introduce it.

We already have the massive wrench in the form of benefits programs and EITC, etc. I say: restructure them to be UBI instead.

Milton Friedman advocated for a negative income tax which is much like a UBI, and most economists agree that giving out welfare in this means-tested way is extremely distortive. Maybe all these economists are "extremely credible": https://mitsloan.mit.edu/ideas-made-to-matter/negative-incom....

> If UBI proponents ran on the platform of "eliminate all welfare and replace it with UBI" I would probably support them.

I favor not quite this. I favor "eliminate most welfare and replace it with UBI". It will cost more, but it will also benefit a larger slice of people.

The proposals from the farthest left generally have UBI mutually exclusionary with receiving other benefits (from Yang et al.). So even there, we're talking about mostly eliminating other welfare.

In any case: refusing to discuss good ideas because we don't think they'll be politically tenable is a recipe for them to remain politically untenable forever.

I agree that UBI would be less distortive per dollar than what we have now, but unless there's a credibles strategy to make this happen, why bother discussing it? I suspect it's a pipe dream. Politics is a gang fight; any pretense of social optimization is just a thin veneer. Whose votes can you buy with the promise of UBI replacing extant welfare schemes? Every extant welfare scheme is a vote buying program which you're now nuking.

Even Yang proposed making UBI mutually contradictory with receiving other benefits.

> Every extant welfare scheme is a vote buying program which you're now nuking.

While some peoples' votes will be bought with welfare money, others will support it because they don't think it's OK to let the poor starve or don't want the poor to riot. E.g. me: I don't receive public assistance. I think welfare programs are necessary (though it's better if most of them are implemented in the form of a UBI).

Your well-intentioned vote isn't enough to eliminate the system we have now. Getting the welfare schemes we have now in place took both credulous moral voters and the voting blocs who constitute the self-interested recipients of these welfare schemes. The recipients of the current schemes are never going to vote to get rid of the current schemes. They would net fare worse under a more efficient scheme. So who are you going to team up with to get the votes?

> They would net fare worse under a more efficient scheme.

If I were such a person, I would prefer UBI cash to welfare with strings.

Are you saying you'd prefer to receive benefits in-kind as e.g. housing assistance instead of cash?

Don't conflate "more economically efficient" with "gives recipients less".

I am very confident that the modal welfare voter would prefer the current system, which was specifically designed to buy their vote, to any system which appeals to utilitarian-minded technocrats and costs within a factor of 2 of the current system.

Without justification.

Look, well-minding paternalistic peeps are behind the current system of "you can only buy some kinds of food with SNAP" and "you must spend this particular money with only certain providers of housing!" It's not the benefit recipient demanding that they be restricted in how they spend their benefits.

Less strings on the money is A) cheaper, and B) nicer for the recipient. I have no doubt that if you offered any poor person the choice between $600 in cash each month and $600 of section 8 credits, they'd take the former.

But, you know, you might deal with someone spending it all on crack (which is why we currently restrict the usage of funds). At least it'll be economically efficient, instead of them selling their SNAP card for crack for 50 cents on the dollar, like is the current outcome.

The cost of administering that $600 monthly award is way above $zero.

It takes entire agencies scores of hours to receive, verify, investigate and cure deficient applications, handle appeals, and execute wage garnishment orders due to their own overpayment/accounting errors -- not to mention approvals.

"Oh we just figured out you made too much money 5 months ago. Sorry bub, you gotta pay back The State the past 5mo of benefits, and re-apply" (with a 90 day waiting period... && Watch out kid, next time this happens it'll be a 180day wait.)

After that's done, they then turn around and do it all again every 6 months because they're forced to re-collect(and vet/process/cure) the same information again via a mandatory "beneficiary 6mo survey".

> The cost of administering that $600 monthly award is way above $zero. It takes entire agencies scores of hours to receive, verify, investigate and cure deficient applications, handle appeals, and execute wage garnishment orders due to their own overpayment/accounting errors -- not to mention approvals.

Sure-- not sure if you're agreeing with me or arguing? It is more costly to give aid with strings attached and complicated qualification requirements, and it is worth less to the recipients.

[Not to mention the costs that this bureaucracy imposes on the recipients. Time that they spend jumping through hoops in a bureaucracy is time and attention they can't spend on bettering their situation].

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