(02-10-2018 02:17 PM)SoMs Eagle Wrote:  

(02-10-2018 01:30 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  

(02-10-2018 01:10 PM)Old Dominion Wrote:  I think I characterized it correctly.
"Set the income floor high enough to support subsistence but low enough that getting a job is highly incentivized." Seems you also tied in some form of health care and tax incentives. If dems could do this, they would. Repubs would blow a gasket. You may be more, shall I say, progressive than you think. God Forbid!

Nope, you are misunderstanding something. The democrats would want to set such an income at $20,000-$30,000 or more, plus single payer health care, which would disincentivize working for many. Plus at that level either you have to make it go away at some point, thus having "poverty trap" impacts, or we can't afford it as a society and economy. This concept is more around $8,000 or so plus Bismarck health care, so getting a job is still attractive.
Actually this--in the form of the Boortz-Linder prebate/prefund--is part of the Fair Tax proposal that is almost exclusively a libertarian/republican concept. And it essentially revives the negative income tax proposal by Milton Friedman, who is also associated with classical liberal (libertarian) principles. I have not heard or read of a single democrat championing it, although I'm sure that among millions there may be one somewhere.

This is from Politico. Hardly a conservative rag. Read it and understand this. They don’t dispute it they just say it’s wrong because the recipient doesn’t get cash to spend as they wish. $20.83/hour ain’t bad for waiting around talking on your obama phone till the check comes in.
http://www.politifact.com/rhode-island/s...-2083-hou/

That gets at my point, with so many diverse programs, the person who seeks to manipulate the system can get that much, whereas someone who may be more needy and deserving doesn't. And while very few may get $40,000, a lot get most of that. Under my approach, the family of 3 would get about $8,000 plus another $7,500-8,000 in medical benefits. A full time minimum wage job would be another $15,000, which would put them above the poverty line which is about $27,000. Without that job, they'd be surviving but poor. Now, the states would save the cost of their share of Medicaid, and they would be free to supplement with that money. Some would do so more than others.

But you wouldn't have the situation where zero income plus maxing out the various benefits gives you $40,000, while working for $55,000 disqualifies you for benefits and after taxes you are somewhere in the $45,000-50,000 range. Hardly makes the hassle of work worthwhile. The smart ones have figured out that they can do better manipulating the system than getting a job.

You can't make it universal if it's too high. That would bankrupt us. And if it's not universal, then it has to go away at some point, and at that point you get an inevitable "poverty trap" effect. A system where you basically just cut checks (or do automatic EFTs) is going to be a lot cheaper to administer than one with a lot of gatekeepers. The people who get hurt are the ones who are manipulating the current system and the bureaucrats who administer it. I'm perfectly fine with both those groups being worse off.