No, basic income as a change from means-tested welfare programs is a step away from institutionalized poverty by removing perverse incentives.
> Give them enough to survive but not climb out of their situation.
The difference between basic income and means-tested programs is that it focus on giving them at least enough to survive but not reducing that if they expend the effort to find additional income, so that recipients are not inhibited from improving their condition.
The actual level of basic income can be more than minimal survival necessity of course; the practical limits depend on productivity and increase with progressive automation (which is what makes it a system well-adapted to deal with an economy evolving in a way in which mass unskilled wage labor is increasingly unnecessary.)
> The danger is that far too many people will accept this standard of living.
If too many people accept the standard of basic income for the economy to support, it will drive inflation which will reduce the standard of living provided by basic income until it is no longer accepted by too many. It has an inherent negative feedback control structure.
> Sorry, seen too many on on SSI/SSID, section 8, and such, to believe that just handing money out helps.
Those programs are not like basic income, in fact, basic income is designed specifically to address the fundamental features of those systems which make them into permanent poverty traps.
No, basic income as a change from means-tested welfare programs is a step away from institutionalized poverty by removing perverse incentives.
> Give them enough to survive but not climb out of their situation.
The difference between basic income and means-tested programs is that it focus on giving them at least enough to survive but not reducing that if they expend the effort to find additional income, so that recipients are not inhibited from improving their condition.
The actual level of basic income can be more than minimal survival necessity of course; the practical limits depend on productivity and increase with progressive automation (which is what makes it a system well-adapted to deal with an economy evolving in a way in which mass unskilled wage labor is increasingly unnecessary.)
> The danger is that far too many people will accept this standard of living.
If too many people accept the standard of basic income for the economy to support, it will drive inflation which will reduce the standard of living provided by basic income until it is no longer accepted by too many. It has an inherent negative feedback control structure.
> Sorry, seen too many on on SSI/SSID, section 8, and such, to believe that just handing money out helps.
Those programs are not like basic income, in fact, basic income is designed specifically to address the fundamental features of those systems which make them into permanent poverty traps.