The simplest thing to solve the problem (way more than finagling UBI rules) is just doing the opposite of what the Republicans are currently doing re: sex education, defunding of Planned Parenthood, and restrictions on abortion and birth control.

The important thing is that the latter step is general: it safeguards the interests of children who get any kind of income, including child actors, child competitive-tournament winners, etc. If this were just part of the decision process of granting the money as income in the first place, then these side-benefits would be left unrealized.

It's the same as the mechanism/policy separation of Internet infrastructure: instead of trying to create a physical-layer transport with perfect reliability, we create a simple physical-layer transport (Ethernet) and then reliability is a policy decision made at a higher level, compensating for a physical layer where "potential unreliability" is taken as axiomatic.

We should strive for "foundational" laws that set up universal systems of incentives—because that lets us predict how society will shift in aggregate. Then, having done so, we should be able to write specific, ephemeral laws that assume such incentives exist, and then create multiplicative or countervailing forces to shift those incentives for the specific case.

The one obvious example of where the law does this is in terms of inalienable rights. The constitution "grants" them universally (though the language is more like "these rights are already axiomatic in the cultural fabric, and we're just making them explicit in law so they can be pointed at.") Then, legislation and caselaw just work in terms of them, layering new things above and around them to achieve an effect, rather than being able to say anything like "and in this case, [some right] doesn't apply."

For any given area of policy, having a low-level non-changeable core policy that can always be trusted to be true—and then a high-level set of situational laws to attenuate the output of that core, rather than overriding it—is both easier to legislate, easier to adjudicate, easier to enforce, and easier to learn.

Everyone including later policy-makers can know and rely on the core policy always applying, so they don't have to worry; there's no combinatoric explosion of "if we add this, then will that other thing that was intended to be countervailing now go too far when this branch of the core decision tree is taken?"

Instead, we just get the equivalent of D&D's "non-stackable bonuses": an explicit notion of a "non-core law" (like a notion of a "bonus") where the core law can set meta-policy on how policies combine.

Yikes

In fact, let's talk about that: on the planet versus in a country. If we do not make it planet wide, it is not actually "universal income." If we make it planet wide, how do we peg it? $500/month is nothing in San Francisco. In some countries, many people live on about a dollar a day for the entire year. Further, if we do it country by country, then we create all new problems for the immigration process.

If you are American and you want a check for existing, my understanding is that Alaska gives its citizens a check for existing (or used to) due to money from the Alaska oil pipeline. In part because I am homeless, I gave contemplated moving there in order to get paid to exist. I have chosen to not do so and I strongly suspect the existence of the "tax rebate" in Alaska is not some highly guarded secret, yet you do not see Alaska being flooded with inbound migrants from other states. Why is that?

Perhaps being cut a check for existing is insufficient incentive for most people to leave family, friends, familiar territory, etc to go live in the relatively harsh conditions in Alaska. Perhaps a check alone is not as valuable as people who are pro uno think it is.

No matter how you frame this, there are inherent problems in giving everyone a check. It is a simple idea. It is not a simple thing to effectively implement. Further, it is not an elegant solution. Elegant solutions are simple. Simple solutions are not automatically elegant.

But, I don't really have more time to argue this. You are not going to change my mind. I am unlikely to change yours. If you persist in being wrong on the internet, I shall have to simply let it stand as I have other things to do.

Adieu.

Given federal-level Basic Income, Alaska still wouldn't be truly equal to other states in livability metrics—it's still remote and constant snow is a hassle—but you'd see the "poverty-class" bracket eliminated from federal inter-state relocation flow. The homeless would no longer drift from other states toward San Francisco because it's a place where they won't freeze to death at night. (Or, as in the case here, there will be far fewer homeless relocating from Ontario down to Vancouver to escape the cold—which is a big problem for Vancouver.)

I'm not sure why Universal (as you said, planet-wide) Basic Income would need to be "pegged" to some particular cash-value in some particular currency. In economic terms, I'd prefer to calculate it as a multiple of a given area's CPI: UBI should give you the ability to buy a constant N loaves of bread/shirts/bicycles/houses, with that translating to a different amount of money wherever you might be. (And culling market outliers, such that unlivably-expensive cities aren't propped up and people become incentivized to move away from them—because now they're not stuck there given that "that's where the jobs are.")

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All that said, I wasn't actually arguing in favor of UBI; I really just wanted to argue in favor of mechanism/policy separation for law with UBI as an example. I'm not actually sure where I stand on UBI myself; I haven't given it much thought, and am mostly just picking apart your arguments with objections because they can be picked apart by these objections, rather than trying to convince you of anything per se. There might be a knock-down argument against UBI; you just haven't given it here.

Thank you. That's useful feedback.

Though I honestly do not have time today to try to come up with a "knock down" argument for basic income and I am not sure it is possible to do so if you simply do not see what I see with regards to "cutting a check for every single person has inherent problems." I did the full time wife and mom thing for many years. I am horrified at the idea of women cranking out babies for the increased income. I view motherhood as something sacred -- the I was entrusted by "god" with these little souls and it is my responsibility to do right by them. I see setting up a financial incentive to crank out babies as something that will go horrifying places that will be detrimental to the foundations of human society, no matter how you handle it.

As someone who is currently quite poor, I find it deeply troubling that if I am poor, you wish to have the state butt into how I spend my funds. I think that will have draconian repercussions as well.

However, the odds are very high that you are male and men (or even childless women) frequently just do not understand where I am coming from. There may be no means to cross that chasm.

I am likely to be mostly okay regardless. I fear that the world is going to hell in a hand basket. I would hate to passively stand by and watch it do so without so much as voicing my concern. But, on the other hand, far more people have been assholes to me than have been caring and compassionate. So I care less about the welfare of other individuals than I used to. My one remaining hesitation to give up arguing my case is that if the entire world goes to hell, then I shall wind up living in hell. I would rather not do that.

I think there was a misunderstanding here, perhaps? My hypothetical CPS financial-auditing branch wouldn't care how parents spent their own Basic Income (or non-BI income.) It would only care how parents spent money that was given in the form of a check with the child's name on the recipient field, because that child has the right to that money, as the child's private property, just as much as they would an inheritance or a working income.

Do note that I'm not suggesting the "CPS shows up at your house and sees whether you're being a good parent" schtick would apply to these cases; just that the bank statements on the child's (legally-mandated separate) bank account would be looked at similarly to a tax return, to find something similar to tax fraud. (In fact, this is currently part of the IRS mandate, insofar as there is such a thing as "dependent fraud" where people claim others' dependents as their own, make up dependents, etc.)

What I'm saying is basically, you don't want the world to get more draconian, but it already is this draconian. Part of the mandate of public-school teachers is to report if they think parents have been neglecting their children. The government fundamentally does not trust parents to have their children's best interests at heart. From the state's perspective, they have the base responsibility of raising/taking care of children, and they delegate that responsibility to parents insofar as those parents manage to observably do a good job. When new laws are drafted, they're drafted from this perspective.

That means that the government, where it can more efficiently ensure a child's well-being by creating a core mechanism that happens regardless of parents' involvement (e.g. school lunch programs, in-school vaccinations, etc.) than by delegating that task to the parents, will always end up doing so.

You can say that that's wrong, you can try to change that, but you can't argue against a particular implementation of a law for having this property when this property is "cultural" to the technocratic-politburo nature of Congress, with its research-assistants and lobbyists and think-tanks.

I really would not wish to go there. I know what is best for my kids better than you do and if I have resources to allocate for the welfare of the family, then butt out and let me allocate them.

One of the problems with this proposal is that it inherently will impact the lives of women more directly than men. Women are far more often doing the single parent thing.

I wonder if you are a parent? I mean, I find your ideas truly horrifying.

These are issues I have spent many years contemplating, studying formally and informally, and working on to whatever degree I was able, given my other obligations in life. And this is just not the right way to do this at all.

I do everything in my power to light one small candle rather than curse the dark. The controlling position you are taking makes things worse, not better. It makes them far worse.

Currently, the world is draconian by happenstance, not design. Happenstance is far easier to push back against than designed evil.

We need policies that are more supportive of parents and families, more loving, compassionate and so on. Not more controlling.

I blog because this is the kind of thing I do incredibly well as an individual and there is demand for that info. In part because I am a woman and in part because people think I am telling tall tales (and in part for other reasons), I have, so far, failed to get much traction or get the kind of professional feedback I need in order to make my work do what it needs to do.

People need better methods. They need ideas and examples and information that they can pick and choose from to apply selectively to the specifics of their situation. They absolutely do NOT need some central authority coming up with universal one-size-fits-all answers and standards and then cramming them down the throats of everyone who makes the mistake of reproducing. Or even existing.

You want a better world? Help parents take better care of their families. That has a proven track record of leading to less crime, etc. down the line. And we don't do that. And UBI isn't going to do it either, but what it will do is break the relationship between income and positively incentivizing behaviors we desire from people.

Every time humans have tried to say "No matter who you are, we will take care of you just because you exist, no strings attached" we have wound up with freeloaders who do not contribute. It rapidly makes things fall apart. It fundamentally does not work.

Automation "taking our jobs" doesn't change that. I have blogged about this and really should be doing other things. so I really don't feel like trying to expound upon that overly much today. But, please, god, NO.