Aggressive Distinction With Minimum Income or Basic Income Guarantee
Some proponents of basic income speak aggressively against minimum income. This wiki page's history used to forward to Basic income guarantee, and that page has an excellent list of example implementations, and other sources, but unfortunately repeatedly conflates basic and minimum income. The core basis for opposing minimum income is its effect on work disincentives as per this example:
A Guaranteed or minimum income of $15000 means that every eligible recipient receives a socially funded cheque equal to ONLY the difference between their other income sources and $15000. So, they receive nothing if their income is $15k or more, receive $1k if their other income is $14k, and receive $15k if they have no other income.
To understand why basic income and guaranteed income are drastically different, in the context of work:
- Basic income (of $10k) is identical to giving every full time (40 hour/week) worker a $5/hour raise, and every half-time worker a $10/hour raise.
- Guaranteed income (of $15k) reduces every full time worker wages by at least $7.50/hour, and every half-time worker wages by at least $15/hour. In exchange for a $15k payment.
The other main criticism of guaranteed income is that it sounds very good as a political slogan if no one considers affordability. It reflects well on the compassion of the proposer. Guaranteed income offers greater promises than basic income to organized labour and those that refuse to work, but it has no funding predictability, and no basis for sustainable economic stability due to the fact that the impact of refusal to work rates cannot be predicted.
Basic income avoids all work disincentives by not basing the benefit on income level, and has predictable funding costs.
Read more about this topic: Basic Income
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