A guaranteed basic income program pilot in Seattle gave 102 low-income residents $500 monthly. Employment among the participants nearly doubled.
  • A Seattle basic income pilot gave low-income residents $500 a month, nearly doubling employment rates.
  • Some participants reported getting new housing, while others saw their employment incomes rise.
  • Basic income pilots nationwide have seen noteworthy success, despite conservative opposition.
    • Bakkoda
      41•2 months ago

      It pays off immediately. The return on investment can literally be seen almost instantly. The problem with UBI in an unregulated market is that “inflation/price gouging/collusion” will begin immediately. It’s just like student loan forgiveness, the benefits are immediate but if you don’t fix the underlying cause, your actual return it’s massively minimized due to the very bullshit that necessitated the fix.

      • bttk
        14•2 months ago

        > If your kid is starving because they keep getting beaten up for their lunch money, you can’t solve the problem by giving them more lunch money – the bullies will take that money too.
        Credit @pluralistic

        • Bakkoda
          6•2 months ago

          That’s a fantastic analogy.

      • Oggie
        1•2 months ago

        @Bakkoda @theotherverion

        It’s actually kinda weird how fast and how clearly it pays off, and at what rate of returns. There is no short term economic reason to not do this. The medium term inflationary issues are a potential problem, depending on how much is given out, but typically less than it seems. It turns out the image of ‘they just collect free money and do nothing’ isn’t a thing.

        Not saying there are no hurdles possible. But the standard objections are just wrong.

    • @[email protected]English
      13•2 months ago

      Right wingers like you supporting UBI is how I know it will just be used as a bait and switch to slash social welfare programs because “now we have UBI!” but UBI won’t be anywhere enough to actually support people and it will get purposefully jammed by the rich in a position of not providing enough money and not rising with inflation.

      Right wing people getting excited about UBI honestly tells you everything you need to know, it is a “solution” to the class war going on that doesn’t require recognizing ANY of the actual politics involved in the class war nor how the rich won’t voluntarily give us anything unless we organize to the point that we scare the shit out of them.

      UBI in the current political reality is a facade of a solution that doesn’t require an honest conversation about the problem, which explains exactly why conservatives like it.

    • Janis (she/her)
      2•2 months ago

      @theotherverion @rimu I’ll be sure to tell my 90-year-old mom (who’s probably got at least 8 years left), to hurry up and get off her ass.

      The knot in the right-wing angle is the belief that the church, the family, or other philanthropy will meet the perpetual need. The harsh reality is that there are and always will be people who don’t and won’t ever have what it takes to provide “enough value,” as defined by people with money, to a free market.

        • Janis (she/her)
          5•2 months ago

          @theotherverion My mom wouldn’t have a pension. She was effectively a clergyman’s wife full time, who has and is still spending spent quite a bit of time caring for my disabled brother, who hasn’t ever been properly “gainfully employed” despite desperate efforts that have now come out in the wash as traumatic, not just to my brother.

          The model works for babies, too. The question is: who pays (etc.) the care workers?

            • Janis (she/her)
              4•2 months ago

              @theotherverion Right, but despite decades of failed and emotionally traumatic attempts at getting him employed, and my mother never having been employed outside the home, now that they’re both past retirement age, who’s responsible to absorb the cost of their utilities, rent, food, and medical care? Or do we let them rot out in a grassy field somewhere?

              I’m not proposing a solution, I’m indicating that employment is frequently not one.