Universal Basic Income

[GURPS]

Canada is betting on a universal basic income to help cities gutted by manufacturing job loss


Segal recommended setting the handout at a minimum of three-quarters of Canada’s official poverty line. At that level, a single adult would receive an annual basic income of $16,989, almost double the $8,472 max payment under the province’s current welfare program.

Over 1.7 million people in Ontario live on incomes below the poverty line—$20,676 for a single person, or $41,351 for a household of four, according to 2011 data compiled by Statistics Canada. Many of the province’s poor were laid off between 2000 and 2007 as jobs evaporated in the auto industry and other manufacturing sectors.

One of the hardest-hit cities is Oshawa, which has battled to overcome a series of cutbacks at what was once one of General Motors’ biggest plants in North America. Ben Earle, a social planner with Durham Workforce Authority, a local think tank, estimates that the city, located about an hour’s drive east of Toronto, has lost 4,000 jobs over the past 15 years. He expects many of those jobs will never return. Thousands of former auto workers are now in precarious jobs “that are lower pay, contract-based, [and have] lower benefits—if they have benefits at all, ” Earle says.

 

[Larry Gude]

Critics say testing basic income puts off meaningful action to address poverty.

Ok, so, let's address that. When there are no jobs or they are precarious, part time, can't pay the bills with them, what does 'meaningful' action look like?

I don't know much a'boot Canada so, let's look at the US because this IS coming here, too.

In the US, we use our gummint to protect food, housing, banking, basic retirement, insurance, energy, military, medicine etc, and so on. None of those things are subject to the illusion we like to call 'market forces' or 'capitalism'. Yes, there are competitive components but the backbone of the things are publicly subsidized and protected. The better your education, the better connected your industry, the less you are subject to competition. On the flip side, if you didn't make your way into a protected space, the more vulnerable you are, the less able you are to move or adapt or find a better way, the more subject you are to 'market' force.

No one opened the flood gates to bring in competition to US corporations. We just brought in competition to wipe out the weakest and most vulnerable of us. So, given that, what would meaningful action look like?

 

[This_person]

Canada is betting on a universal basic income to help cities gutted by manufacturing job loss


Segal recommended setting the handout at a minimum of three-quarters of Canada’s official poverty line. At that level, a single adult would receive an annual basic income of $16,989, almost double the $8,472 max payment under the province’s current welfare program.

Over 1.7 million people in Ontario live on incomes below the poverty line—$20,676 for a single person, or $41,351 for a household of four, according to 2011 data compiled by Statistics Canada. Many of the province’s poor were laid off between 2000 and 2007 as jobs evaporated in the auto industry and other manufacturing sectors.

One of the hardest-hit cities is Oshawa, which has battled to overcome a series of cutbacks at what was once one of General Motors’ biggest plants in North America. Ben Earle, a social planner with Durham Workforce Authority, a local think tank, estimates that the city, located about an hour’s drive east of Toronto, has lost 4,000 jobs over the past 15 years. He expects many of those jobs will never return. Thousands of former auto workers are now in precarious jobs “that are lower pay, contract-based, [and have] lower benefits—if they have benefits at all, ” Earle says.

You'd think they'd take that money and put it towards encouraging job growth vice discouraging job growth. See, to pay the "universal income", someone has to pay taxes. To pay taxes, someone has to have an income. This simply cannot work.

 

[Larry Gude]

You'd think they'd take that money and put it towards encouraging job growth .

I doubt you meant to but you just made my point.

In your 'free market' view, you just said let's give welfare to corporations in the hopes they'll create jobs they don't now need or want and not give it to people who need, NOW, to eat, cloth and shelter themselves.

 

[Hijinx]

I doubt you meant to but you just made my point.

In your 'free market' view, you just said let's give welfare to corporations in the hopes they'll create jobs they don't now need or want and not give it to people who need, NOW, to eat, cloth and shelter themselves.

That isn't what he said, it is your perception of what he said.

 

[Larry Gude]

That isn't what he said, it is your perception of what he said.

You'd think they'd take that money and put it towards encouraging job growth vice discouraging job growth.

Ok, smart guy. What does this mean?

 

[Bird Dog]

Ok, smart guy. What does this mean?

For one.....skill training

 

[Hijinx]

Ok, smart guy. What does this mean?

Maybe it means what it says. Maybe it means open some technical schools.
Maybe it means training people in country to do the available jobs.
Maybe it means welfare won't work. Someone has to work to provide money to pay welfare.

 

[Larry Gude]

Maybe it means what it says. Maybe it means open some technical schools.
Maybe it means training people in country to do the available jobs.
Maybe it means welfare won't work. Someone has to work to provide money to pay welfare.

No, it means exactly what it says; gummint spending ON business to get them to do something they're not doing of their own volition. You, like everyone else on here, are in favor of big, active gummint. The argument is on how it goes about spending money, not that it does or does not.

So, what do the folks who need to eat, cloth and shelter themselves do until your gummint program provides them a job by spending THEIR money on supporting 'free market' corporations? Wait? Vote for someone who is more interested in THEM, consumers, than corporations who, BTW, NEED more consumers before they'd want to spend their OWN money on technical training?

 

[Larry Gude]

For one.....skill training

OK. So, that's 3 in favor of gummint supporting business over people.

Anyone else?

 

[Bird Dog]

OK. So, that's 3 in favor of gummint supporting business over people.

Anyone else?

Where does skill trading favor government supporting businesses over people. Government starts skill training at K-12

 

[Larry Gude]

Where does skill trading favor government supporting businesses over people. Government starts skill training at K-12

Agreed. So, we agree we're for a socialized system and all we're doing is debating where the emphasis should be, yes?

 

[Bird Dog]

Agreed. So, we agree we're for a socialized system and all we're doing is debating where the emphasis should be, yes?

No, I don't see where anyone said that. The government has always educated the population.. if you want to pay for a different education, you can. For profit job training, private schools. You can pretty well learn anything at a private for profit institution over a publicly funded one.
I think we are just saying if the debate is Universal Basic Income vs job training, well take job training....

 

[This_person]

I doubt you meant to but you just made my point.

In your 'free market' view, you just said let's give welfare to corporations in the hopes they'll create jobs they don't now need or want and not give it to people who need, NOW, to eat, cloth and shelter themselves.

Actually, while skills training is one thing, another is infrastructure improvement (who would build a factory near a failing bridge so they can't get their goods out, or where their employee's kids would have crappy schools, or where the only internet is dial-up, or.....), another is investing in the useful arts (grants to colleges to look at better ways to build mousetraps like solar energy production, or how to safely store spent nuclear fuel, or how to get more good crops from the same acreage, or how to get 100 mpg from a pickup truck and still be able to pull a 26' Bayliner, or.....).

These kinds of things encourage people to get INTO business, not out of business. Paying people to sit on their asses is a great way to encourage the Chinese to have 3 year olds making cheap tennis shoes.

 

[tommyjo]

You'd think they'd take that money and put it towards encouraging job growth vice discouraging job growth. See, to pay the "universal income", someone has to pay taxes. To pay taxes, someone has to have an income. This simply cannot work.

If you are going to comment, it REALLY helps if you ACTUALLY READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE...and not just GURPS selective cut and pasting...in fact many of GURPS selective cut and pasting leave out the most important parts of an article...GURPS just posts the part that feeds his propagandist ends...always read at the least the next paragraph GURPS ignores. This case is no different...here are the next few paragraphs:

Ontario as a whole makes up about 40% of Canada’s total economic output. A centerpiece of the Liberals’ economic policy is to replace traditional manufacturing with new “knowledge-based” jobs in areas such as medical research and financial technology.

Many economists think a universal basic income could help drive that shift. “It’s time [we] start considering some kind of basic income because of the changing nature of work due to automation,” says Chris Ballard, the minister responsible for the basic income initiative.

“If it is done right and universally accessible, it could provide opportunities for people to either explore entrepreneurship because they wouldn’t have to worry about their basic needs being covered, at least for a short period of time while they develop a business concept,” says Earle. “Similarly, it could be used to back up [people] who want to go back to school. Someone could make the choice to take time out of work to return to education in order to advance their skill set.”

Had you bothered to read the article, you would haven noted two things:

1. GUPRS title is wrong. Canada is NOT testing UBI...the province of Ontario is.

2. The leaders in province appear to have a goal for UBI of incentivizing people to increase their skills sets so that they can obtain better jobs.

3. The legislation hasn't been written much less passed.

 

[This_person]

No, it means exactly what it says; gummint spending ON business to get them to do something they're not doing of their own volition. You, like everyone else on here, are in favor of big, active gummint. The argument is on how it goes about spending money, not that it does or does not.

So, what do the folks who need to eat, cloth and shelter themselves do until your gummint program provides them a job by spending THEIR money on supporting 'free market' corporations? Wait? Vote for someone who is more interested in THEM, consumers, than corporations who, BTW, NEED more consumers before they'd want to spend their OWN money on technical training?

What did those folks do before big government?

In no way am I talking about funding business. Not even a little bit. If I teach someone to weld, isn't it just as likely they'll open their own little welding company than that they will support big business? Of course it is, since most businesses are small.

 

[This_person]

If you are going to comment, it REALLY helps if you ACTUALLY READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE...and not just GURPS selective cut and pasting...in fact many of GURPS selective cut and pasting leave out the most important parts of an article...GURPS just posts the part that feeds his propagandist ends...always read at the least the next paragraph GURPS ignores. This case is no different...here are the next few paragraphs:



Had you bothered to read the article, you would haven noted two things:

1. GUPRS title is wrong. Canada is NOT testing UBI...the province of Ontario is.

2. The leaders in province appear to have a goal for UBI of incentivizing people to increase their skills sets so that they can obtain better jobs.

3. The legislation hasn't been written much less passed.

It's very difficult to encourage someone to go do something when you pay them not to.

What you quoted does not in the least dispute what I said. There's some research in there, but that's it. Medical research is great for saving lives, but what kind of a life is it when you don't earn your keep? I mean, seriously, if all you are is a domesticated farm animal, housed and fed while waiting for slaughter, then why be alive at all?

 

[Larry Gude]

It's very difficult to encourage someone to go do something when you pay them not to. ?

Which is to say it's very difficult to get people to head off into the desert because you say there's an oasis if you just keep going long enough when they see nothing but desert.

 

[Larry Gude]

What did those folks do before big government?

In no way am I talking about funding business. Not even a little bit. If I teach someone to weld, isn't it just as likely they'll open their own little welding company than that they will support big business? Of course it is, since most businesses are small.

That's not the question. Before gummint, you worked to survive. Civilization and success and quest for profit means we no longer need to work to survive. There used to be work. Now, there is not. And, yes, you are talking expressly about funding business. If the gummint spends a dollar to teach you to weld when there is no company that wants a welder and isn't interested in teaching a welder, you're not only funding business you're threatening every welder who has a job.

 

[Larry Gude]

No, I don't see where anyone said that. The government has always educated the population.. ..

No it has not.