Housing, food, health care and education are basic human rights and thus should be free.

@Jexie I think that's really my point in the core, there are some good things, I agree. And I also agree that there should be more. But shouldn't the end goal be that it should be free? I mean if you continue following that train of though. For example let's say you spend $1000 a month for food, rent, insurance, etc. what if then instead you pay $1000 more taxes each month but on the other hand get these free in return? For the average person it wouldn't change something but I think for some people it would greatly help them.

@Luke73 According to that you wouldn't get to choose what type of food you want, the house you want to live in etc. It would be no different from communism

@Jexie I don't think that's what they're saying.

@Jexie It depends how it is done, for example what if you got for those basics from the government each month $1000 dollar to spend on those things. With that you still have the choice but you don't have to directly pay it.

@BlueVeins He's saying to substitute the money spent on living, lodging and food with taxes, from what I gather. And essentially you would get those things in return for free from the establishment. So basically everyone would end up being at the same economic level

@Luke73 Why would someone spend $1000 more in taxes when they're just gonna get the same amount in return?

@Jexie That doesn't mean people wouldn't get to choose their housing or food though. Like if you're a SNAP recipient, you get free food but you still buy what you want at the store.

Also, this doesn't mean people don't have varying amounts of disposable income in addition to the basics being provided for. You still work a job and whatnot.

@Jexie That was just an example but for example if a person makes only $900 a month, then the government would support them with the extra $100 for example. And if a person makes much more, they would pay more than $1000 a month to make up for it.

@Luke73 That's just like investment tho. Just invest your money in the bank and same deal

@BlueVeins People can indeed choose what they want but the amount of money doesn't change, excluding their income, so essentially same economic level

@Luke73 If you do it that way, that creates the adverse incentive of disincentivizing low income workers from working. Like if you make $1,000 a month under that system, they can cut their hours in half and rake in the same amount of money (or quit their job entirely). You want the benefit amount to go down at <$1 benefit / $1 income.

@BlueVeins I don't think that's true, aren't there some studies that support an uncoditional basic income or whatever it's called in English?

@Jexie I think that's kind of the point.

@Luke73 Yes but they don't decrease the benefit with income in such a way as to keep every poor person at the exact same level financially.

@BlueVeins People need motivation to pay more in taxes. And currently there's no solid one

@Jexie There's very much a solid one. They just withhold it from your paycheck and if you don't pay it, they take you to court. That's the easy part.

@BlueVeins I haven't looked at it in detail, and I'm not an economist.

@Luke73 The problem here is very basic. If I can work 4 days a week and make $1,000 a month or I can work 5 days a week and make $1,000 a month, why would I ever work 5 days? You don't have to be an economist to understand that logic.

@BlueVeins But what if you could work 5 days a week and make $1100 a monthd. I'm not saying you only get that much. Of course you can work and put effort in to earn more.

@Luke73 Fair, but there are going to be some people in low paying positions where making >$1000 a month isn't feasible. And for that subset of the population, there's no incentive to work.

@BlueVeins Why would there be now then? And besides you have things like minimum wage for example that help.

@Luke73 Because right now for people making bad wages, they still get more money if they work more than if they work less. Like if I only make $800 a month at my shitass job, that's still preferable to making $600 or $400.

@BlueVeins There are two options then. Either they like working there, that would mean that they'd continue too. Or they have no other option but given the option, rather would do something else.