The Beauty Of Guaranteed Minimum Income
Forget about minimum wage. Minimum income is the new black.
…there is a way to reconcile the needs of people to earn a living with the desire of greed-centric corporations not to pay higher wages. It is to provide everyone with a basic income. The state takes in tax money; everyone is granted a certain sum to provide for their basic needs; and everyone can then work without feeling that they must beg a faceless corporate monster for enough income to cover rent and food and child care. And what do you know: the idea of providing a minimum income is catching on. It is somewhere near the realm of reality in Canada; it’s been instituted in a Dutch city; it’s being tried in Germany; it’s popular in Finland and Switzerland. In other words, the most civilized nations in the world, with the highest standards of living and strongest social safety nets, are leading the way on the minimum income issue.
A minimum basic income would allow us to dismantle vast bureaucracies that exist to police welfare recipients, and just cut everyone a check. And it would take a great deal of pressure off the movement to raise the minimum wage, because everyone’s income would have a floor already, meaning even low-paid workers would be less vulnerable to financial disaster. It’s a large-scale way to smooth out some of the inequality that plagues our nation. And it would allow fast food CEOs to stop bitching.
How would we pay for it? Partly by redirecting money we already spend, and partly by taxing the rich, like fast food CEOs, and by taxing corporations, like fast food corporations.
Copyright 2015 Liberaland
22 responses to The Beauty Of Guaranteed Minimum Income
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
mea_mark December 28th, 2015 at 13:57
If you really want less government and want to create efficiency, this is how you do it. It will happen, it’s just a matter of time and how much.
Gina Bousquet December 28th, 2015 at 14:09
Looks like a wonderful, viable solution.
William December 28th, 2015 at 14:11
How about just a living wage.
rg9rts December 28th, 2015 at 16:49
The reichwing will never get it
Jimmy Fleck December 28th, 2015 at 16:52
With a living wage you are only helping people that are working. Under this plan, everyone would be given money whether they held a job or not. Why don’t you want to help people that are not working?
William December 28th, 2015 at 17:28
Where exactly did I state I was against helping people without a job? I bought up a point. IE, people should have a decent wage.
If you are going to troll, at least try to attach your trolling to a subject I’ve actually addressed. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/822d1115aea4ec645e258aca9b6ad5ef6c4c2699cc022d396c272eaa8533fc70.jpg
Jimmy Fleck December 28th, 2015 at 17:42
Well this policy addresses your concern of giving people a “living wage” without the necessity of them having a job. So your comment “How about just a living wage” seems to indicate you do not want to help those without a job.
William December 28th, 2015 at 18:00
Lets review shall we? I wrote
“How about just a living wage”.
along with that I posted the results of a community that raised wages. Not one single word from me about people without a job.
That tired old troll sctick IE “So what you REALLY mean/are saying/thinking” doesn’t work here.
Your troll skills really suck. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/39fb7289d3bfd3c8a3852ac2635bbc9ecc7cf23ae9a757682e05a0d425eee6f0.jpg
Jimmy Fleck December 28th, 2015 at 18:19
So what did the Seattle policy do to help the 3% still unemployed? Or the people that are too old to work, gave up looking for work, or have decided to stay home and raise the kids (all of which do not count as unemployed)? To be clear, are you against this policy of setting a minimum income for all regardless of work? Do you only favor raising wages for those with a job? Seems you could have just said so if that is the case.
mea_mark December 28th, 2015 at 19:12
I think your use of the word ‘just’ was probably not the best choice. It implies that, that is all that is needed.
Hind site is great, using that, I would say, ‘Let’s start with a living wage’.
anothertoothpick December 28th, 2015 at 14:40
We already had a goog sytem in place from the end of WWII until raygun.
It was called colective bargaining with strong unions.
Have the repiglacans been so successful with their propaganda that we forgot about the unions?
mea_mark December 28th, 2015 at 19:16
That doesn’t help the unemployed or those with minor disabilities or those trying to get disability. There are too many holes in the safety nets and the cost of maintaining the bureaucracies of the safety nets is money that can be better utilized.
anothertoothpick December 28th, 2015 at 19:33
Yeah sure, I am all for it. Except for one thing, read the last paragraph in the article.
For some reason I just don’t see any corporation (the donator class) giving up that kind of money or power.
mea_mark December 28th, 2015 at 19:37
How we work out the funding is something to work on. First we have to say that this is a better way to allocate resources and help Americans.
anothertoothpick December 28th, 2015 at 19:57
You got my vote, but there is a bigger problem than “how do we pay for it”.
The gop is far more worried about the poor not working than the poor not eating.
They still think ACA is a give away and have voted to destroy it 60 times.
Just imagine how hard this idea would be to even get out of a repub controled congressional committee.
mea_mark December 29th, 2015 at 09:34
The country is moving to the left, it will happen. I wouldn’t expect for it to happen though until we vote out the unthinking selfish partisan bastards.
Jimmy Fleck December 29th, 2015 at 11:55
We get to shift all the funding from Section 8 housing, food stamps, unemployment insurance, medicaid, CHIP, Social Security, Obamacare subsidies, and all the other programs that currently aid people below the poverty line or pay Senior Citizens. Once everyone is guaranteed a minimum livable income, they will be responsible for paying for their own housing, food, health insurance, etc. We also could shift funding from other bloated government programs such as defense which needs huge cuts. Cut the defense budget back to where it funds the defense of the United States and not the world. We don’t need to attack another nation, we need to be able to defend ours from attack. Close the foreign bases, bring our troops home to defend our borders and protect our citizens. You could easily cut defense spending in half if not more.
mea_mark December 29th, 2015 at 13:24
I am guessing the real problems will come in the transition period. You can’t just switch things like this that fast without unexpected problems coming up all over the place. My guess is, that it will happen in stages.
Jimmy Fleck December 28th, 2015 at 16:52
This sounds like a good and fair plan. This would give equal money to all people so all people would be equal under the law.
Mike December 28th, 2015 at 17:18
It’s called Mincome and was a Canadian social experiment back in the 70’s (very successful)
The town was Dauphin, Manitoba and although there was never an official report filed, the take away was mostly very positive. It shattered a lot of myths about welfare and the desire to work.
Google it sometime.
BillPasadena December 29th, 2015 at 13:58
“partly by taxing the rich, like fast food CEOs”
Does every solution the left has involve more taxes?
BillPasadena December 29th, 2015 at 14:01
Wouldn’t a “living wage” be dependent on where you live?
A living wage in Arizona is much different than a living wage in San Francisco.