Scrap Benefits and pay every adult, working, non working or retired, an unconditional basic income of £15,000 a year? Discuss

[CorruptBstard]

Hi

Ok Mumsnet, what do you think of this?

Pay every adult in the uk £15,000 a year, with no conditions attached, so that every adult is free to use their time to do stuff, just for the love of it.

This basic income would cover basic needs for food and shelter, if people wanted to earn more money they could go and work for someone else or start a business of their own

This would abolish poverty in one fell swoop.

Wheres the money coming from to pay for it?

well apart from scrapping all "state benefits", we could also scrap income tax and fund it all by taxing money every time its spent.

ie Government gives me £5. I pass that £5 round a group of 10 friends. By the time the £5 comes back to me, it has been "spent" 10 times. Creating a turnover of £50. If the government taxes that spending at 20%, it raises £10 in tax. Making a profit of £5.


Thoughts?

If you recieved £15,000 a year unconditionally, what would you do just for the love of it?

[merrymouse]

The table seller doesn't pay any VAT, he passes it on to the end consumer. VAT registered businesses collect VAT but don't suffer it themselves. The table seller gets £48, keeps £40 for himself and passes on £8 to HMRC.

Each part of the chain passes VAT onto the next person. The amount of VAT only increases as they each add value to the product. Finally, the end consumer pays £8. However , if everybody was just passing the goods on at cost, the end consumer would only be charged £2, and this would be the only VAT received by HMRC.

[Redbindy]

It's inflationary and a ponzi scheme that makes barclays look honest. You may as well promote women empowering women as your financial model.

[AmberLeaf]

If I gave you £15k basic income, index linked to inflation every year for life. What would you do with your time

Same as I do now.

Any chance you could answer my questions in my first post?

[CorruptBstard]

It's as n

[CorruptBstard]

It's as inflationary as QE or bank bailouts. It's as inflationary as paying everyone £15,000 to do a 40 hour week.

The basic income is index linked to inflation.

At some point an item is sold for £48 and only £40 of that goes to the seller. The rest goes in tax. Therefore it is a tax on "sales" just not EVERY sale. Only difference, is if it was EVERY sale it would raise more in tax revenue.

The money doesn't disappear under VAT so it wouldn't with a tax on EVERY sale either. Plus the tax revenue is put straight back into the system by giving it to people as a basic income to spend.

[CorruptBstard]

There are not only 10 pineapples either. New Pineapple crops grow every year.

[CorruptBstard]

Hi amberleaf, still thinking about your question. I did answer to say nobody should be worse off, not sure how to make sure this happens though. You've still got me stumped, for now

[Chubfuddler]

I don't earn 15k for a 40 hour week. And QE and bank bailouts are inflationary. Glad you agree about that.

[MoreBeta]

This idea has been around for quite some time - it is called a 'Universal Credit'.

It is a good idea because everyone gets it whether rich or poor and it is simple to administer like Child Benefit and hence widely supported.

Making it Universal means you could scrap all other benefits completely and also all tax allowances. It would massively simplify the tax and benefit system. Interestingly it also allows us to introduce a Flat Tax system as well because once you get a Universal Benefit then everyone is free to work or not and if they do work they pay the same marginal rate of tax but obviously people on lower wages pay a lower average rate of tax once the Univeral Benefit is taken into account.

There would be an incentive to work yet no resentment of people who could not work or who chose not to work.

We should have introduced a Universal Benefit years ago and it would help us get out of the current recession/depression.

[freestallFrank]

great idea.

my yearly heating bill is £35, well due to a gas price rise its now £45/50. it'll be cheaper costing £0 when our bio fuel willow starts growing well. My place is owned outright, so I have no house/land costs. electricity is 4 batteries every 10 or more years and two replacement bearings for the windmill. If I didn't run a motor tricycle and didn't run a telephone and laptop, because I was richer by having my loved ones and more community in the vicinity then my living costs would be much lower than the average £80/week they are now, and I live very very well on £80 per week. and I know I'm very very rich. on a world scale.

and on that I'm probably much richer than a lot here because I don't have a land lord to work for nor a fancy car to work for nor fancy holidays to work for, nor the latest brand and fad to work for.


and living on 7 acres of orchard country , hill ,woodland, stream I'm already in paradise.

So your £15000 per year or £300 per week is amazing, I could save £220 of it every week and put it into our coops land account . the land account is a savings account to purchase land for other coops who wish to have the money to purchase land outright to reduce to Moneyless living.

Work wise, yes I'd love to earn lots and lots more at a job I liked, preferably self employed as now and also put that money into the land account too. I would carry on doing what I'm doing, working on free projects.

when does a person say they have enough.?

years ago I'd look at my pay packet and say to myself, now what do I need this for?

I would say the only things I need are the 4 physical needs, and my community, and medicine. Most other things just aren't very important.

community includes community regulation, which is governance, community sharing, looking after the elderly, the children, of all of the community work.

On a country level I think most people would find they were happy on £ 15000 and not bother looking for any more paid work. They would be free then to do interesting work, work of the community, and work of the family.


when we put our spoon to the breakfast cereal and put that cereal into our mouths, that's real work.

if we have land, and we are hungry and we go out and pick a cauliflower apple or potato we've grown and cook it on a stove we've made in shelter we've built on plates we've made,

that is exactly the same as the work of eating that breakfast cereal. outside the body or the work the body does automatically inside the body, no matter, it is all work. whether you get paid for it or not.

[freestallFrank]

great idea.

my yearly heating bill is £35, well due to a gas price rise its now £45/50. it'll be cheaper costing £0 when our bio fuel willow starts growing well. My place is owned outright, so I have no house/land costs. electricity is 4 batteries every 10 or more years and two replacement bearings for the windmill. If I didn't run a motor tricycle and didn't run a telephone and laptop, because I was richer by having my loved ones and more community in the vicinity then my living costs would be much lower than the average £80/week they are now, and I live very very well on £80 per week. and I know I'm very very rich. on a world scale.

and on that I'm probably much richer than a lot here because I don't have a land lord to work for nor a fancy car to work for nor fancy holidays to work for, nor the latest brand and fad to work for.


and living on 7 acres of orchard country , hill ,woodland, stream I'm already in paradise.

So your £15000 per year or £300 per week is amazing, I could save £220 of it every week and put it into our coops land account . the land account is a savings account to purchase land for other coops who wish to have the money to purchase land outright to reduce to Moneyless living.

Work wise, yes I'd love to earn lots and lots more at a job I liked, preferably self employed as now and also put that money into the land account too. I would carry on doing what I'm doing, working on free projects.

when does a person say they have enough.?

years ago I'd look at my pay packet and say to myself, now what do I need this for?

I would say the only things I need are the 4 physical needs, and my community, and medicine. Most other things just aren't very important.

community includes community regulation, which is governance, community sharing, looking after the elderly, the children, of all of the community work.

On a country level I think most people would find they were happy on £ 15000 and not bother looking for any more paid work. They would be free then to do interesting work, work of the community, and work of the family.


when we put our spoon to the breakfast cereal and put that cereal into our mouths, that's real work.

if we have land, and we are hungry and we go out and pick a cauliflower apple or potato we've grown and cook it on a stove we've made in shelter we've built on plates we've made,

that is exactly the same as the work of eating that breakfast cereal. outside the body or the work the body does automatically inside the body, no matter, it is all work. whether you get paid for it or not.

[Chubfuddler]

I grow my own cauliflower. And I earn quite a lot of money too. It's not an either/or.

[freestallFrank]

the point is the earth owes you a living.

you are an animal of the earth.

you were not born to have to pay an admission fee. a permanent ongoing admission fee.

you were not born to be a commodity with a price tag.labour tag.

you were born to live here and consume the earth without having to pay for it, where are you expected to live as an animal with a full life?

outer space.!

do monetized humans object to primitive humans living on the earth without paying.?

our bodies are made of the earth.

we are the earth.

we do only one worthwhile job in return for the energy we get from the sun the food and water and air that we get from the earth.

that one worthwhile job we do , and all of us do it,

is our job. when we in to the loo.

we are earth makers.

we fertilize the earth.


the most stupidest job done on the earth.

is to sluice all that goodness out to enhance the life in the sea.

while we are denied common land Earth from which to live

we have a right to fair monetary compensation

for doing our only useful Job.

The Job.

[Chubfuddler]

Come in number five, your time is up.

[Margerykemp]

I think it's a great idea. It works for students so why not for the rest of us. Employers would live it cos they would have an 'as and when required' workforce. It would boost spending in the economy because poor people with cash spend it. Education could be valued for its own sake. Millions would be saved on the admin of benefits and tax. Disabled people would get a decent standard of living. It would give women more economic power in their relationships. It would reduce domestic abuse. Parents could take longer parental leave. Everyone would feel valued and I'd imagine people would contribute to their communities more.

[MrJudgeyPants]

CorruptBstard I ran through the figures for how much this idea would cost and came to a conservative estimate of an additional half a trillion quid over and above what the welfare state already costs. This would have to be found this year, next year, the year after and so on. You retorted with "where did we find the £350 billion we've recently bailed out the banks with, and "quantitatively eased" into the economy?"

I hope I don't have to explain the difference between finding the money for a once-in-a-century event and annual expenditure!

It has also been asked what we would choose to do for work if the government gave everyone £15k per annum. Well once we've all joined freestallFrank on his farming collective, or established our community based organic basket weaving groups, there will be sod all money left in our economy, or anyone arsed enough to go to work, to pay the taxes, to keep the lights on, the water running or our hospitals open, let alone any of the more complex yet necessary jobs we do to keep civilisation ticking over with any degree of modernity.

I did warn at the top of my last post that we were sailing perilously close to the 'magic money tree' approach to economics - this thread has well and truly hit that tree, felled it with a chainsaw and chopped it up into match wood.

[freestallFrank]

There are two economies existing in the world. The larger of the two is the gift economy.

This is the free economy, the economy that is not paid for.

But nevertheless in monetary terms were the work in the gift economy to be paid for, it would be the larger economy of the two.

The beaches , the mountains, the home work and home life and many other benefits that we all have access to are run by gift economy. There is no entrance fee to be paid. And because there is no entrance fee none are excluded.


I put it to you that one of the largest and richest entities in the world is run on Gift Economy lines.

They are the worlds religions. Paid for on donation. No one is excluded.

the richer pay what they do and the poorer pay what they do, and the ones who have nothing, pay nothing, yet it works.
and entrance fees to museums can work this way too.

On our free stall we didn't magic £12000 from thin air. It came from people giving. yet everything on the stall is always free.

The money economy excludes people. That's what monetizing something does. That's what they did to Londons roads they started charging to use them and so now only the richer use them. That's what they did to water in India, they started to charge for it, so now the richer can afford to waste it leaving less and none for the poorer while at the same time falsely reporting that there will be water shortages, when all the time it is the monetization of water.

That's what has happened to land. That's why most live now in cities and towns.

When it is applied to lifes needs and money is the only way those lifes needs can be accessed then people are excluded and they starve, which is what we see in the world.


So the gift economy then can be seen as a very important serious and vital thing.

as far as I am concerned only for basic needs.

exchange away and use money for your cars and every other lesser thing.

it is not important if those things are scarce.

a basic income is a basic right . while the source of our life which is the land is denied us, then income to access our needs is fair compensation.

[freestallFrank]

There are two economies existing in the world. The larger of the two is the gift economy.

This is the free economy, the economy that is not paid for.

But nevertheless in monetary terms were the work in the gift economy to be paid for, it would be the larger economy of the two.

The beaches , the mountains, the home work and home life and many other benefits that we all have access to are run by gift economy. There is no entrance fee to be paid. And because there is no entrance fee none are excluded.


I put it to you that one of the largest and richest entities in the world is run on Gift Economy lines.

They are the worlds religions. Paid for on donation. No one is excluded.

the richer pay what they do and the poorer pay what they do, and the ones who have nothing, pay nothing, yet it works.
and entrance fees to museums can work this way too.

On our free stall we didn't magic £12000 from thin air. It came from people giving. yet everything on the stall is always free.

The money economy excludes people. That's what monetizing something does. That's what they did to Londons roads they started charging to use them and so now only the richer use them. That's what they did to water in India, they started to charge for it, so now the richer can afford to waste it leaving less and none for the poorer while at the same time falsely reporting that there will be water shortages, when all the time it is the monetization of water.

That's what has happened to land. That's why most live now in cities and towns.

When it is applied to lifes needs and money is the only way those lifes needs can be accessed then people are excluded and they starve, which is what we see in the world.


So the gift economy then can be seen as a very important serious and vital thing.

as far as I am concerned only for basic needs.

exchange away and use money for your cars and every other lesser thing.

it is not important if those things are scarce.

a basic income is a basic right . while the source of our life which is the land is denied us, then income to access our needs is fair compensation.

[MrJudgeyPants]

Good luck bartering for a hip replacement in a world without money.

Good luck bartering with HMRC.

Good luck finding and refining your own oil.

Good luck if your crops fail.

Without money, and the protection that our taxes buy for you (Police, judiciary and an army to fend off the barbarians), you'd be screwed. Yes, your way of life works for the time being, but if we all decided to live like that, we'd be back to where we were in 410 AD within a few generations.

[freestallFrank]

MrJudgeyPants,

you said

'but if we all
decided to live like
that, we'd be back to
where we were in
410 AD within a few
generations.'

you obviously don't realise that most people pay for what can be free.

you obviously don't realise our homes are left naked with little insulation/ clothing in the winter while we switch on the power station.

but I'm not pressing for people to live as you described.

I want diversity of economics .

Not as now a monoculture of money.

So there is no threat. On the contrary. It would be a greater choice.

[merrymouse]

if it was EVERY sale it would raise more in tax revenue.

Which is fine, but then you would have the situation as described by Chubfuddler where each person has less money to pass on as more and more money is passed on to HMRC. However, you might as well just pass the money around a few times and then give a fiver to HMRC. I suppose in your system they then give it back to the first person?

There are not only 10 pineapples either. New Pineapple crops grow every year.

Which is great - as long as people value pineapples the pineapple trade will grow. However, printing more money just inflates the price of each pineapple, however many you have.

As I said before, money is just a way of simplifying the trade of goods and services in an economy (of which banking is one). You can't create wealth just by printing money.

[merrymouse]

If I gave both of you £15k basic income, index linked to inflation every year for life. What would you do with your time?

Actually, I told you way back - I'd go and live somewhere really cheap but beautiful and surf all day.

However...

For me this is a great idea as I live somewhere where currently £15K doesn't support living costs. I'd love to live somewhere cheaper, but have to live where the work is. However, what does the government do when I take my labour out of the workforce? I'm living simply now, using freestallFrank's gift economy to trade with my chums. I don't have much money, but I don't have to earn it and I don't have to spend it. I'm certainly not giving much of it back to you.

You might have a bit of a problem when I claim my NHS hip replacement though. Amberleaf might be a bit fed up because she is still having to be a carer so can't go surfing and £15K doesn't really cover her costs.

My landlord has put my rent up because now everybody wants to come surfing with their free £15K. However, thats fine because your index linking my £15K to inflation - fabulous! Not quite sure where your going to get the money from to do that.

Anyway, I'm not really questioning whether giving everybody a fixed minimum income would work. Just pointing out that fundamentally we have be to making things and providing services to grow the economy, not printing more money.

It's generally agreed that we then give according to ability and provide according to need, so that we all have a basic standard of living.

[KatyMac]

At the moment a lot of the problems are about;
"I work really hard & they get their house for free/very cheap"
"I can't afford another child (right now) & they keep having babies (paid for by tax payers)"
"Why do I work this hard & they get (all that money) for doing nothing"

If we all had say £200 a week adults & £100 a week per child and then taxed earned income at 50% there would be none of that "they have more than me & yet I work"

All benefits except carers allowance and DLA would be scrapped; ad the money saved in wages and actual benefits would pay the bill

I really think this would work

[CorruptBstard]

The current average wage in UK is £26,000.

If landlords and utility companies know we have this amount of money to spend why don't they increase their prices to take it off us?

Why would giving a basic income of £15,000 which is £11,000 less than the average wage, mean these landlords and utility companies would increase their prices and therefore cause inflation?

[CorruptBstard]

Katymac. Top post ;-)