FLINT—Eight days after entering the world, Khi’Meir Taylor made another debut — this time in what could be a national spotlight.
Wednesday was the first day of a $55 million experiment to test whether cash payments can protect children from the toxic stress of poverty.
Calling it now: They’ll find that it works, but then nothing will change once the experiment concludes. Bought and paid for politicians will protect the wealthiest instead of allowing the poor enough to get by, doing everything they can to prevent UBI from being widely implemented.
You kind of need to help pay for it by getting rid of government programs to allocate money piecemeal. That’s a huge change and a huge commitment, and politicians aren’t good at that.
…. Although I don’t know why the libertarian and other small government folk haven’t latched onto that opportunity
I am looking forward to the results. It’s about time we start testing Universal Basic Income.
Really, we already have the results. And they’re good results. Every single resident of Alaska gets oil dividends. I don’t like that it’s how they have a UBI, but it does give them one and it does help. The only problem is that the amount entirely depends on the oil revenue generated by Alaskan oil in any given year.
Agreed.
I only wish it weren’t a state or local-level thing. If we can find hundreds of billions for other countries’ wars, in my mind, there’s no excuse for UBI not being the law at the federal level.
Same, although I do understand that at the moment, it’s only a local or state level thing because it’s still in its early stages. I feel like once enough states or cities experiment then we can gather all that data to create a national system based off what works and find ways to limit abuses on the system.
I’m more interested in paying for domestic and reproductive work i.e. paying people to take care of their kids, cook their meals, mow their lawns, take out their trash, etc. Society can only function on the back of this unpaid labor after all.
UBI is okay too, though.
I get what you’re saying, but at the same time, the income isn’t replacing your entire income. I see more as supplemental income, kind of like a monthly food allowance where people won’t have to worry about struggling for basic necessities.
Even parents who work 9-5 still need to do a ton of work around the home and for their children. That would also fulfill the supplemental role.
But more importantly, it would actually compensate people for the work they need to do to be part of society and keep it running.
UBI achieves that because the person who does those things still gets an income without needing a job.
to test whether cash payments can protect children from the toxic stress of poverty
The answer is yes. Obviously.
I keep seeing these pilot programs and small experiments in UBI, and they all prove that people prosper and thrive more when they have more money. Nobody is surprised. Was that ever even in question?
I want to see UBI experiments, plans, etc. that tackle large-scale implementation. We’ve proven “BI”; that was never the hard part. We need to focus on the “U”.
