LogFAQs > #943754970

You could make a cutoff range and you could also just increase the amount to a point where nobody is caring about 1000 month anymore.

40% of americans make over 80k a year. Most people making 80k or more a year don't care enough to cheat the system just to get an extra 1k a month (even with taxes they are probably bringing home 5-6x that).

That still almost halves the number of americans actually getting UBI, and just because it's called "universal" doesn't mean you HAVE to make it for EVERY american. If you are netting more then 5k a month, you don't need an extra 1k from the government.

IF your making min wage or near it, you ALREADY need the extra 1k to survive in most places (or at least rent your own place).

This would also allow for more americans not to work if they can't, don't want to etc, and would get rid of disability/social security/unemployment etc. It would also drastically reduce the prison population (especially if you cut back alot of the drug laws).

The problem is 40% of this country is barely getting by, living paycheck to paycheck and is on the edge of disaster if their job goes poof etc. The next 20% are doing better and have some savings etc, but could still use a bit of help. The top 40% don't need a monthly payment from the government at all, and it would be a waste of resources to give it to them (and they would barely even notice it).

Couple that with a bit of an extended deduction (increase the base deduction from 12k per adult to 16k per adult) with 10% tax for the next 20k over that) and get rid of all the social security etc taxes that take away 10% of your income no matter what, and you would drastically increase the ability for people just getting by to survive, allow people to work less than 40 hours and still live comfortably, but still provide incentive to try for better jobs, go to schools and get trained etc.

We need to transition to a setup where the average citizen can live comfortably without needing to work, or needing to only do minimum amounts of work per week. It doesn't have to be right away, we have a good decade before I think we will see radical changes, but it's a transition that we will eventually need to make. There is almost no reason for most menial labor at this point, it costs companies more, it's inefficient, there is more likelyhood for error etc.

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