Universal basic income and what it may look like

[porkpiesinthepark]

I've been thinking for a while about the criticism of UBI and I think it's due to people not being able to imagine the government trying to 'match' peoples wages. In my opinion, it never will but there will be alternatives to what we have now, which will be able to offer something better.

So say the UBI is £1000 a month for a single person.
We could change the housing market to allow much more public housing with rents set at an affordable level, much more stability, no private landlords and the option to customise/ change your home. Let's face it, home ownership is out of reach for the majority at present. I don't find people are dying to own their own homes but desperate to be out of the instability of the private rental market, out of parents houses, out of house shares etc. If you could offer the next best thing to owning your own house, I think people would go for it.
There would be much more community linked to people having extra time due to not working or not working as many hours. Now, not having enough to do in the day is bad but most people have these huge dreams for retirement and this would just allow them to do some of these things now instead. Also more volunteering, looking after elderly relatives etc.
I don't think that private car ownership would be a thing. There would be a big system like Uber who you could call rides on. There would be a cheaper option, say if ten people wanted to go to the city centre at the same time, they would have to walk to a hub and then the van would pick everyone up, like public transport but based on demand. It would be a status symbol to be able to call a car out just for you.
I think a lot more people would wfh getting the cost of transport and childcare down. Schools might even go remote, as there wouldn't be both parents working and so in theory they could help facilitate the lessons. Then teachers would have small classes of Sen kids like mine, key workers and vulnerable children. Kids would interact with others through volunteering groups with parents, or just playing out as there would be less cars and more parents around to keep an eye on them.
People will either hate this vision as it's so different to what we have now. Or they will like some parts. But what we have now can't continue.

Schools becoming remote would be awful. I work in a safegaurding role and after lockdown it took me 3 months to get up to date on CPOMS. It was mainly from kids who had never previously been a concern.

Schools aren’t just for education.

@orangegato that's kind of sad isn't it? That people just work to live.

Whilst I don't really think OPs solution is practical I think wages should be enough (even for those who clean toilets) to do more than just live.

No one working should be on UC just to survive. Wages should be enough to live and do extra and obviously I don't mean minimum wage should cover fancy holidays or cars but it should be enough to have basic treats and maybe a small holiday.

It's just sad really.

For extras I presume. I guess the UBI would be enough to pay bills and buy food and clothing, but if you wanted holidays, takeaways etc you'd need to work.

The issue with that is, many people working full time now can't afford holidays and takeaways anyway, so they might think they may as well just jack it in if they could have the same lifestyle not working.

We tried that, unfortunately. And yes it was bad

It reminds me of a meme I saw where there are two lions side by side, one in a zoo cage and one out in the savannah.
The caption says "One of these lions has free shelter, food, medical care and security. The other doesn't. Which one would you rather be?"

That's a bit extreme but illustrates that we probably value freedom over everything else.

There's no reason why we can't have both as it seems to be how life is currently, just needs tweaks.

Absolutely ridiculous. Not a society I want to be part of.
Who's driving the vans and Ubers etc? I expect anyone but you.
Remote schooling enables abuse.
No society is perfect but yours sounds like hell.

Well they’ll be driving themselves.

Why can't I go into the shop?

Not us they won't. We have touring motorcycles, and campervan. It's not all about getting from A to B

Have you ever lived anywhere with a every 2 hour bus service? In fact we have "on demand" buses now, but I've yet to be able to use one for work because you can't prebook a time except "within an hour" useless for anything but leisure.

I don't want allocated social housing either. I own my house. My 22 year old dd has just put in an offer for a house by saving up, house buying is very much in reach for those outside of the expensive areas.

Then don't have children and you'll have more free time and money.

You have a choice.

It would never be £1000 a month and even if it was there would be outrage as many on benefits get more than this AND rent paid.
There is a lot of support for at the moment cause the benefits people think they will get it on top of benefits.

Well I was talking more about businesses than individuals.

You still have to earn enough to be accepted for a mortgage. A single person on minumum wage couldn't buy a house.

Sounds like an illiberal, authoritarian socialist nightmare to me. I will continue to earn my own money, thanks. And continue to vote for governments which don’t seek to deprive me of it and hand it over to the stupid, the feckless and the idle who don’t want to support themselves and already receive ridiculously inflated levels of benefits & entitlements. Which I am forced to pay for.

What I would support is a much higher minimum wage, combined with substantially increased tax allowances and massive benefit cuts creating much stronger incentives to work.

You can still work to earn your own money the idea is we are all given a baseline amount as a starting point. You wouldn’t be prevented from working more to buy nice things.

Customer service - you won't know it's an automated response. It'll sound like speaking to a human and it'll be knowledgeable and helpful every time. No more being passed around departments because agents don't want to deal with you or don't know how. AI is going to take A LOT of jobs.

Yes some on mn would like it but countries that have done similar have had to build walls to stop people fleeing

I'm still trying to get past the banana economics

We have UBI. It’s called universal credit and 6 million are currently getting it. Some may say it’s not truly universal, yet this country borrowed £26bn last month alone to pay it to those 6 million people. Any ideas on how it will be funded for 70 million people? More borrowing? Money printing? Well we all know how that turned out during Covid. More taxes? Who is paying these taxes if everyone is on UBI?

Serious answers only please. No sixth form student type brainwaves.

I think OP took the idea of banana republic too literally when coming up with this revolutionary idea.

If unemployment due to AI rises, which seems likely, something will need to be done. I imagine poverty will get quite extreme before a government does anything, as it sounds complicated and controversial to enact. When and if it does come in I think it would be linked to doing a certain amount of work or hours that serves the country. I don't know if it would be good or not. If we do start to see massive hunger and poverty we may welcome it, and there are already people struggling to eat and pay rent. On the other hand, I would be concerned it may be linked to a social credit system run by AI.

Agree. My DD is only 12 and I'm already starting to think about what career paths she should avoid. So many people are going to be without income in the coming years

Bloody hell. Because it would be so easy to completely redesign society. And, of course, everyone will want to live in exactly the same way that the OP is imagining will work for her.

That scenario even has some of the worst aspects of covid lock down baked in - school remote (and women bearing the brunt of the labour!) unless you’re considered needy enough to be allowed inside the building. Urgh.

I’ve never been more relieved I chose not to have kids TBH. People just aren’t getting how completely everything is going to change so what sounds stupid and unworkable now doesn’t matter much because life will be wholly different in so many way. I’m the first to admit I’m most smart enough to come up with any solutions.