WEBVTT - Could A Robot Tax Win the War on Poverty? 0:00:00.400 --> 0:00:03.400 Do Do Do? Or wait, what's the opposite? How about 0:00:03.560 --> 0:00:10.319 do do Do? Do? Sad Trombone Vancouver and Portland, Oregon. Uh, 0:00:10.520 --> 0:00:12.760 we can't come see right now. We're sorry to say. 0:00:12.840 --> 0:00:16.440 It's not us. It's the coronavirus told us not to come. 0:00:16.600 --> 0:00:19.840 That's right. Uh. Local authorities are shutting down shows of 0:00:19.880 --> 0:00:22.840 the size we are not able to come. We are postponing. 0:00:23.280 --> 0:00:26.920 We will have more information coming as far as rescheduling. UM. 0:00:26.960 --> 0:00:29.200 I believe how it works is your tickets are good 0:00:29.240 --> 0:00:31.720 if you want to come to that other show, but 0:00:31.840 --> 0:00:34.560 we don't know all the details yet. To just bear 0:00:34.600 --> 0:00:36.400 with us while we try and figure this out. Right, 0:00:36.440 --> 0:00:38.519 and in the meantime, you can get in touch with 0:00:38.680 --> 0:00:43.560 the Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall and the Chance Center Box 0:00:43.600 --> 0:00:46.479 offices to figure out what's what. Yeah, they'll probably have 0:00:46.520 --> 0:00:50.519 good at phone. But we really apologize for any inconvenience 0:00:50.560 --> 0:00:53.680 and we will eventually see you, guys, we promise. In 0:00:53.720 --> 0:00:57.480 the meantime, stay well, wash those hands and don't panic. 0:00:58.920 --> 0:01:01.200 Welcome to Stuff you should know, a production of My 0:01:01.400 --> 0:01:10.200 Heart Radios How Stuff Works. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. 0:01:10.280 --> 0:01:13.280 I'm Josh Clark and there's Charles W. Chuck Bryan over there, 0:01:13.280 --> 0:01:15.920 and there's Jerry and this is stuff you should know 0:01:16.800 --> 0:01:24.600 the podcast about universal basic income on the podcast that's right, 0:01:24.720 --> 0:01:28.759 you be I baby, Yeah, it's it's like the most 0:01:28.840 --> 0:01:32.680 blamed set of words I've ever seen strung together in 0:01:32.680 --> 0:01:35.240 my life. But they have a big, big punch if 0:01:35.280 --> 0:01:38.000 you really dig into them. Yeah, I found myself kind 0:01:38.040 --> 0:01:40.560 of it was. It was cool reading all this stuff 0:01:40.560 --> 0:01:44.959 and researching it because I I don't think I had 0:01:45.080 --> 0:01:49.040 much of an opinion on it before, and I'm going 0:01:49.080 --> 0:01:51.880 to try to not get too opinionated this time. But 0:01:52.520 --> 0:01:54.680 now you're like, well, all poor people can just die 0:01:54.720 --> 0:01:57.720 off for all I care. A lot of this, A 0:01:57.760 --> 0:02:00.840 lot of this made sense to me. Yeah, especially when 0:02:00.880 --> 0:02:06.360 you're talking about replacing a bloated, kind of broken system. Anyway, 0:02:07.720 --> 0:02:10.240 because my first thought was like, universal basic income in 0:02:10.280 --> 0:02:14.240 addition to um, you know, welfare and food stamps and 0:02:14.320 --> 0:02:17.880 all the other social safety nets, but like replacing it 0:02:17.919 --> 0:02:20.560 with something that's a little more straightforward kind of spoke 0:02:20.600 --> 0:02:22.400 to me a little bit. Yeah, And I think that 0:02:22.440 --> 0:02:24.280 speaks to a lot of people too. And we'll kind 0:02:24.280 --> 0:02:27.160 of explain a little more obviously what we're talking about. 0:02:27.160 --> 0:02:28.800 But one thing that stuck out to me about that 0:02:28.880 --> 0:02:34.040 Chuck was what about people who are physically incapable of working, 0:02:34.200 --> 0:02:37.480 of making a living, and that this would be their 0:02:37.560 --> 0:02:41.799 only means of support, or who have aged out of 0:02:42.040 --> 0:02:45.280 working and and don't have a way to support themselves anymore. 0:02:45.680 --> 0:02:48.240 Wouldn't you still need some sort of social safety net 0:02:48.280 --> 0:02:50.520 in addition to that for those people. I don't know 0:02:50.520 --> 0:02:54.359 if this would replace disability or would it. I guess 0:02:54.360 --> 0:02:56.720 it depends on who whose plan. You know. Some people 0:02:57.320 --> 0:03:00.040 there's a conservative economists who will talk about later on 0:03:00.120 --> 0:03:03.040 named Charles Murray who's like, get rid of everything, this 0:03:03.120 --> 0:03:05.800 is it okay? And he goes on to say, like, 0:03:06.000 --> 0:03:07.640 while he wrote like a whole book about it, but 0:03:07.680 --> 0:03:10.000 I read kind of his synopsis of the book, but 0:03:10.120 --> 0:03:13.280 he he kind of explains, like, here's how this could 0:03:13.320 --> 0:03:16.680 actually work. Um, he doesn't just say that, but there 0:03:16.800 --> 0:03:21.480 is a sense of there's definitely a real disdain for 0:03:21.520 --> 0:03:27.480 the bloated bureaucracy that that is the entitlement or welfare 0:03:27.639 --> 0:03:30.720 system in the United States, for sure, And I get 0:03:30.760 --> 0:03:32.680 the sense that it's on both sides. So that is 0:03:32.760 --> 0:03:35.040 kind of an appealing part of this, that this could 0:03:35.200 --> 0:03:38.720 conceivably replace it under the right circumstances. Yeah, and this 0:03:38.840 --> 0:03:41.920 also made me think a little bit about the push 0:03:41.960 --> 0:03:45.480 for a flat tax that happens every so often, where 0:03:45.520 --> 0:03:49.040 it's like, we've got such a convoluted tax system, can 0:03:49.080 --> 0:03:53.200 we just settle on a very fair percentage that everyone 0:03:53.280 --> 0:03:57.280 pays across the board. The problem with that one, it's 0:03:57.280 --> 0:04:00.440 a great idea on his face, sure, a lot of problems. Problem. 0:04:00.520 --> 0:04:02.800 The basic problem that I have with it is that 0:04:03.080 --> 0:04:06.520 automatically makes it aggressive. If you're a millionaire and you 0:04:06.600 --> 0:04:09.400 pay ten percent, that ten percent is going to mean 0:04:09.400 --> 0:04:12.360 a lot less to you than if you're a person 0:04:12.400 --> 0:04:16.080 living near the poverty line and that ten percent means 0:04:16.600 --> 0:04:19.960 rent or food or something like that, you know what 0:04:19.960 --> 0:04:23.160 I mean. So therefore it's a regressive tax. And I've 0:04:23.200 --> 0:04:28.119 never heard a good way to kind of um set 0:04:28.200 --> 0:04:32.080 up that flat text, uh, to make it non regressive, 0:04:32.560 --> 0:04:36.120 so that that that doesn't just automatically introduce this other 0:04:36.200 --> 0:04:38.960 new convoluted tax code to you know what I mean. Yeah, 0:04:38.960 --> 0:04:40.880 And it's if you look back at the history of 0:04:41.160 --> 0:04:44.360 flat tax proposals, it's usually some super rich, old white 0:04:44.360 --> 0:04:47.400 guy that proposes it. So that makes you kind of 0:04:47.400 --> 0:04:49.480 want to go like, well, wait a minute, right, can 0:04:49.480 --> 0:04:52.520 you loophole your way out of that too? Yeah? Well no, 0:04:52.600 --> 0:04:54.839 I mean it's not a loophole, it's more just it's 0:04:54.880 --> 0:04:58.880 just super aggressive. Um, but that's a different episode. We've 0:04:58.880 --> 0:05:01.160 never done a flat tax up, so right, I think 0:05:01.160 --> 0:05:03.880 we should do it. Yeah, we totally should. I'm actually 0:05:03.960 --> 0:05:06.120 kind of surprised we haven't. But yeah, so that's a 0:05:06.160 --> 0:05:09.480 totally different episode. But um, what we're talking about instead 0:05:09.640 --> 0:05:14.000 is called universal basic income. The universal is really important 0:05:14.040 --> 0:05:18.120 because there's different proposals. But in a universal basic income scheme, 0:05:18.960 --> 0:05:24.480 the government takes X number of dollars, say a thousand 0:05:24.520 --> 0:05:29.000 dollars a month, and mails that check out to every adult, 0:05:29.400 --> 0:05:33.560 say eighteen and over in the United States, everybody, no 0:05:33.720 --> 0:05:36.520 questions asked, no strings attached. You don't have to be poor. 0:05:37.120 --> 0:05:39.039 It doesn't matter if you're rich. It doesn't matter what 0:05:39.080 --> 0:05:40.919 you do with that money. You can go spend it 0:05:40.960 --> 0:05:44.840 all on crack if you want to. It's your money. Like, 0:05:44.880 --> 0:05:47.240 the cops may bust you for buying crack or smoking 0:05:47.279 --> 0:05:50.320 crack or whatever, but you can use it for crack 0:05:50.839 --> 0:05:55.479 or ideally you would use it. Um in in myriad 0:05:55.560 --> 0:05:58.640 other beneficial ways. But I guess I'm just trying to 0:05:58.640 --> 0:06:02.160 point out there's no there's no guidance on how you're 0:06:02.240 --> 0:06:06.080 to use that money. That's your money, and because it's 0:06:06.120 --> 0:06:10.760 coming from the federal government and it's guaranteed basic income, 0:06:11.400 --> 0:06:14.279 you can rely on that every month, and so you 0:06:14.320 --> 0:06:17.160 can start to build your life around knowing that at 0:06:17.200 --> 0:06:21.279 the very least you're gonna have a thousand dollars tax free. 0:06:21.320 --> 0:06:24.360 From what I understand from the government, that would be 0:06:24.400 --> 0:06:27.839 so United States to give you a thousand dollars a 0:06:27.880 --> 0:06:32.160 month and then take back like three right exactly. So 0:06:32.279 --> 0:06:34.919 this was if you were a fan of Andrew Yang 0:06:35.200 --> 0:06:39.119 during his UM I don't want to say brief presidential bid, 0:06:39.520 --> 0:06:41.960 not long enough. I'll tell you that you like Yang, 0:06:42.520 --> 0:06:44.400 I like Yang. Hu was crazy for Yang, but I 0:06:44.920 --> 0:06:48.880 just thought his idea, his ideas were very level headed, 0:06:48.880 --> 0:06:52.440 were very a political. I just thought he was I 0:06:52.440 --> 0:06:55.000 thought he was great. Yeah, he spoke to me too, um. 0:06:55.040 --> 0:06:57.800 But he called it the freedom dividend, And that's what 0:06:57.839 --> 0:07:00.560 we're talking about. A thousand bucks a month, no questions ask. 0:07:00.600 --> 0:07:03.000 If you're Bill Gates, you get a thousand dollars if 0:07:03.040 --> 0:07:05.000 you don't have two pennies to rub together. You get 0:07:05.000 --> 0:07:08.080 a thousand dollars and we'll talk. This is one of 0:07:08.120 --> 0:07:12.560 the few episodes I think we're the history. Uh. Addressing 0:07:12.600 --> 0:07:15.600 that later kind of works, UM, But there is some 0:07:15.760 --> 0:07:19.160 history beyond him, and he's not the only person there. 0:07:19.040 --> 0:07:21.800 A lot of the Bill Gates is and the Zuckerberg's 0:07:21.800 --> 0:07:24.680 and the Musk's of the world. It's huge and Silicon 0:07:24.760 --> 0:07:27.160 Valley right now. It is in Silicon Valley, as we 0:07:27.200 --> 0:07:29.520 will learn, is one of the areas that they would 0:07:30.280 --> 0:07:35.360 that's in the cross here's for providing uh this money 0:07:35.440 --> 0:07:39.760 to a large degree through taxes because uh, one of 0:07:39.800 --> 0:07:42.600 the fears is and it's a legit fear. And I 0:07:42.640 --> 0:07:47.600 know in your Existential Risks UH podcast series, you talk 0:07:47.640 --> 0:07:51.679 about automation and robots, robots and things. But the fact 0:07:51.800 --> 0:07:55.880 is we are automating more and more. Uh. Some say 0:07:55.960 --> 0:07:59.520 that uh in the next twelve and twelve years that 0:07:59.600 --> 0:08:03.880 about thirty of all working Americans will lose their jobs 0:08:03.920 --> 0:08:10.440 to robots. Do you realize what an increase in unemployment 0:08:10.480 --> 0:08:15.080 that is, Huget. I think right now we're at somewhere 0:08:15.120 --> 0:08:18.360 around three percent unemployment, which is really low. It's close, 0:08:18.600 --> 0:08:21.680 very close to full employment, if not like statistically full 0:08:21.720 --> 0:08:25.840 employment all of a sudden and how many years did 0:08:25.840 --> 0:08:28.160 you say? It? Said? Twelve? I mean that's an estimation. 0:08:28.560 --> 0:08:32.040 So that's probably like a sky is falling kind of scenario. 0:08:32.520 --> 0:08:34.480 But there are a lot of smart people out there 0:08:34.480 --> 0:08:37.000 who say, Okay, maybe twelve years is a little soon, 0:08:37.200 --> 0:08:40.240 maybe that percentage is a little high. Definitely some people 0:08:40.280 --> 0:08:42.280 will be put out of work in that time. But 0:08:42.360 --> 0:08:45.280 let's say let's expand that window to thirty years or 0:08:45.320 --> 0:08:48.720 fifty years, then we might start getting into some really 0:08:48.800 --> 0:08:51.320 high percentages of people who are being put out of 0:08:51.320 --> 0:08:55.160 work and not like you know, you could go over 0:08:55.200 --> 0:09:00.000 to company B. Your job's just gone, because we develop 0:09:00.240 --> 0:09:03.040 machines that are way better and way more efficient and 0:09:03.080 --> 0:09:06.600 way cheaper at doing that, uh than you are. And 0:09:06.640 --> 0:09:08.480 so what do you do with those people? And it's 0:09:08.520 --> 0:09:13.240 not just a question for governments, um of what do 0:09:13.280 --> 0:09:16.400 you do with that physical person who's now poverty stricken 0:09:16.440 --> 0:09:19.760 because they their job doesn't exist any longer for for people, 0:09:20.360 --> 0:09:23.600 But all of these social safety nets and a lot 0:09:23.679 --> 0:09:26.440 of other stuff that um that we have in this 0:09:26.520 --> 0:09:29.480 country that those people would need to participate in, those 0:09:29.480 --> 0:09:33.640 are funded by payroll taxes and unemployment tax and stuff 0:09:33.679 --> 0:09:37.000 that is a tax on labor and employment. And so 0:09:37.040 --> 0:09:40.040 if you have a person whose job doesn't exist anymore, 0:09:40.640 --> 0:09:43.559 you can't tax that labor, you can't tax that employment. 0:09:43.920 --> 0:09:46.559 So now you have the problem of somebody who says, 0:09:47.200 --> 0:09:50.800 I need this assistance, and then they're the way of 0:09:50.800 --> 0:09:54.359 providing that assistance has just been removed because we automated 0:09:54.400 --> 0:09:57.480 that job away, right, And there are some people like 0:09:57.520 --> 0:10:01.480 Bill Gates that are saying, hey, companies that are automating 0:10:01.480 --> 0:10:05.079 all this stuff, you're avoiding all these payroll taxes. Now, um, 0:10:05.160 --> 0:10:08.480 you should pay it on the robot as well, which 0:10:08.600 --> 0:10:11.360 what I didn't see necessarily was whether or not that's 0:10:11.920 --> 0:10:13.800 and I assume it is. One of the big benefits 0:10:13.840 --> 0:10:15.480 of automation is that you don't have to pay those 0:10:15.480 --> 0:10:21.400 payroll taxes any longer. If you're in a business, yeah, 0:10:21.400 --> 0:10:23.040 that'd be a huge Yeah, if you can get rid 0:10:23.080 --> 0:10:26.040 of people. People are generally expensive, and if you're just 0:10:26.160 --> 0:10:30.080 strictly a utilitarian business owner, it was it's very much 0:10:30.080 --> 0:10:34.840 in your in your favor of automating whatever jobs you can. Yeah, 0:10:34.880 --> 0:10:36.679 you're not paying payroll tax, you're not having to pay 0:10:36.720 --> 0:10:38.559 for that person the portion of their health care. You 0:10:38.600 --> 0:10:43.280 don't have to worry about union striking people getting sick. Right, So, 0:10:43.360 --> 0:10:46.560 as we become more automated, there are people speaking up 0:10:46.600 --> 0:10:50.760 and saying sure, there's also a lot of job creation 0:10:50.800 --> 0:10:54.840 that happens with automating things. But the person that is 0:10:54.880 --> 0:10:58.360 taking care of your sanitation every week, if that was 0:10:58.440 --> 0:11:02.640 replaced by a robot off driving truck and clamper that 0:11:02.720 --> 0:11:08.120 dumps the garbage in there, clamper trademark wind COO, that 0:11:08.160 --> 0:11:10.320 person is not necessarily going to be the person that 0:11:10.360 --> 0:11:12.199 can be like, hey, I'll just get a job building 0:11:12.240 --> 0:11:15.840 these robots too, right, right, right, yeah, Yeah, which is 0:11:16.120 --> 0:11:20.439 ultimately kind of a it's a supplementary part to this 0:11:20.480 --> 0:11:23.600 whole discussion of you know, we're still going to need 0:11:23.679 --> 0:11:26.480 people to do things like build robots, So how much 0:11:26.520 --> 0:11:28.840 of this should really be how much of this attention 0:11:28.840 --> 0:11:31.880 and effort should be directed towards training people for this 0:11:31.960 --> 0:11:35.040 new economy. Yeah, And it's the same idea when you 0:11:35.080 --> 0:11:39.800 talk about alternative energy. Teach the coal miner to build 0:11:39.800 --> 0:11:44.480 wind turbines and an ideal world. All that happens very seamlessly, 0:11:44.640 --> 0:11:46.280 and they're just like, well, let's just take all these 0:11:46.320 --> 0:11:48.400 people that are out those jobs and give them the 0:11:48.400 --> 0:11:51.800 new jobs. It just doesn't work that way all the time, 0:11:53.080 --> 0:11:56.240 right right, and and yeah, and I mean idealize that. No, 0:11:56.480 --> 0:11:58.959 you can't and you shouldn't like this is these need 0:11:59.040 --> 0:12:02.600 to be like Frank Stark, sober discussions that we have 0:12:02.679 --> 0:12:05.199 about this because we're a little bit we're talking about 0:12:05.280 --> 0:12:10.880 it doesn't hurt. Maybe some nice maybe some nice homemade 0:12:10.920 --> 0:12:15.720 thumb print cookies with the hers she's kissing there, um, 0:12:15.760 --> 0:12:17.520 but the but yeah, you do. We do need to 0:12:17.520 --> 0:12:20.319 talk about the stuff because we're talking about human beings 0:12:20.880 --> 0:12:25.320 and who who are gainfully employed now who maybe again 0:12:25.400 --> 0:12:28.600 poverty stricken because their job doesn't exist in the next 0:12:28.640 --> 0:12:30.560 decade or so. And yes, we need to be thinking 0:12:30.559 --> 0:12:34.080 about this now. And then other people chuck say, Okay, 0:12:34.200 --> 0:12:38.679 that's the real possibilities robot this robot Texas automated economy 0:12:38.720 --> 0:12:41.679 that we're clearly moving toward. We don't know when it's 0:12:41.720 --> 0:12:44.280 going to really kick in. Is it's gonna be twelve years, 0:12:44.280 --> 0:12:45.880 Is it gonna be thirty, is it gonna be fifty. 0:12:45.960 --> 0:12:48.880 We don't know, But basically everybody agrees that that is 0:12:49.200 --> 0:12:52.080 the direction that we're heading you could have to be 0:12:52.080 --> 0:12:55.240 basically cuckoo to argue against that. Right, It's just when 0:12:55.240 --> 0:12:58.640 are the effects really going to be felt? Other people say, yeah, 0:12:58.679 --> 0:13:01.040 that's a big problem, and I'm glad we're thinking about it. 0:13:01.320 --> 0:13:04.559 But we have had poor people in the United States 0:13:04.600 --> 0:13:08.120 and a huge inequality gap basically since World War Two. 0:13:08.440 --> 0:13:13.280 It's a national blemish of shame on our character, our 0:13:13.320 --> 0:13:17.880 country's character that there are people that are just gobsmackingly 0:13:18.040 --> 0:13:22.760 rich and other people who are gobsmackingly poor, and they 0:13:22.840 --> 0:13:26.240 deserve to not live in poverty because because they are 0:13:26.640 --> 0:13:31.280 citizens of the world's wealthiest economy. Just the fact that 0:13:31.320 --> 0:13:36.520 they are Americans says that they shouldn't have a life 0:13:36.520 --> 0:13:39.600 of poverty because we can provide for them at least 0:13:39.720 --> 0:13:42.079 enough so that they don't have to be poverty stricken. 0:13:42.320 --> 0:13:45.720 And that's another argument for universal basic income as well, 0:13:46.000 --> 0:13:49.400 one that was championed by Martin Luther King. Look, we 0:13:49.520 --> 0:13:52.160 can take care of people, and we should. We have 0:13:52.160 --> 0:13:55.360 a moral obligation to. And I've just realized I suddenly 0:13:56.000 --> 0:13:59.720 started just talking like Bernie Sanders. Did you catch that 0:13:59.720 --> 0:14:04.360 that like stammering kind of delivery? That was weird? My 0:14:04.440 --> 0:14:07.600 hair turned white. Just now, didn't it? And shaggy Yeah, 0:14:07.920 --> 0:14:11.560 I hope it grows back to normal. So, uh, maybe 0:14:11.559 --> 0:14:13.440 we should take a break here in a minute. Wait, 0:14:13.480 --> 0:14:15.040 what's what my hair? Do you think it's going to 0:14:15.160 --> 0:14:18.800 go back to normal? Let's take a break now, Okay, 0:14:19.280 --> 0:14:22.800 Bernie and uh because that was a good setup, and 0:14:22.840 --> 0:14:25.640 we'll talk a little bit about what exactly is in 0:14:25.680 --> 0:14:41.760 some of the pros and cons right after this large 0:14:44.840 --> 0:14:51.160 sk Alright, so we talked about the Freedom Dividend from 0:14:51.240 --> 0:14:55.360 Andrew Yang and his his team and where you get 0:14:55.400 --> 0:14:58.000 a thousand dollars a month, whether you're working or not, 0:14:58.080 --> 0:15:01.640 whether your ridge or poor, and it the idea is 0:15:01.640 --> 0:15:05.920 is that it would replace the safety net programs that 0:15:06.560 --> 0:15:11.080 all have strings attached. Right, So, if you are a 0:15:11.080 --> 0:15:13.080 part of the SNAP program and you get food stamps, 0:15:13.480 --> 0:15:15.560 you need to prove that you are below a certain 0:15:15.560 --> 0:15:18.080 income level. Uh. If you're getting unemployment, you have to 0:15:18.080 --> 0:15:20.280 show you're looking for work. If you're getting Social Security, 0:15:20.840 --> 0:15:24.000 then you have paid into that for a number of years. 0:15:24.520 --> 0:15:26.640 If you have disability, then that you have a doctor 0:15:26.720 --> 0:15:29.680 vouching for you. This is no questions asked, which is 0:15:29.720 --> 0:15:33.800 a you know, sounds radical to some people, but other 0:15:33.800 --> 0:15:37.160 people say, just makes perfect sense. Yeah, And and Yank's 0:15:37.200 --> 0:15:40.560 not the only one to um to to address this, 0:15:40.800 --> 0:15:42.280 Like you said, you know, it's kind of a hot 0:15:42.320 --> 0:15:45.600 topic in Silicon valiant has been for the last five, six, 0:15:45.600 --> 0:15:49.200 seven years, UM to the point now where it's probably 0:15:49.240 --> 0:15:51.960 like old news and everybody's moved on to something else, 0:15:52.000 --> 0:15:56.280 like um, debtors prisons are the new thing in Silicon Valley. UM. 0:15:56.320 --> 0:15:59.280 But one of the co founders of Facebook named Chris Hughes, 0:16:00.200 --> 0:16:03.160 he wrote a book. UM. I can't remember what it's called. 0:16:03.200 --> 0:16:05.800 It's like I read that it was half memoir half 0:16:06.840 --> 0:16:12.880 basically policy. Um uh lay out what I would like 0:16:12.920 --> 0:16:15.560 to do. Yeah, and it was basically arguing in favor 0:16:15.600 --> 0:16:18.000 of a universal basic income. And this guy put his 0:16:18.000 --> 0:16:20.240 money where his mouth is. He actually funded a pilot 0:16:20.240 --> 0:16:24.160 program in uh Stockton. I think the UM he said, here, 0:16:24.200 --> 0:16:30.200 take four families, right, five dollars each a month. Know, 0:16:30.400 --> 0:16:33.160 his was five dollars a month. But he hit on 0:16:33.240 --> 0:16:35.360 something that I saw other people have hit on. Two 0:16:35.680 --> 0:16:39.680 that in addition to universal basic basic income, that's pretty good, 0:16:39.720 --> 0:16:41.960 but you have to go a little further, and UM, 0:16:41.960 --> 0:16:46.800 people would need to have at least catastrophic health insurance 0:16:47.160 --> 0:16:50.320 to where if they needed surgery or long term care 0:16:50.360 --> 0:16:52.760 or something like that, they had insurance that covered it. 0:16:52.800 --> 0:16:56.520 That those two things would probably help people get by UM. 0:16:56.600 --> 0:16:59.440 And then there's plenty of other people running experiments on 0:16:59.480 --> 0:17:01.920 the stuff that we'll talk about later, But the general 0:17:01.960 --> 0:17:05.480 idea is that that yes, you just no questions asked, 0:17:05.520 --> 0:17:08.960 no strings attached you, you get some amount per month 0:17:09.119 --> 0:17:12.560 just for being an adult. Some other plans say maybe 0:17:12.640 --> 0:17:15.200 per household would be a good way to cut it down, 0:17:15.480 --> 0:17:18.200 maybe if you make less than a certain amount of money. Sure, 0:17:18.400 --> 0:17:21.560 but one of the things that about universal basic income 0:17:21.960 --> 0:17:26.840 typically is that there's no cut off for wealth. Everybody 0:17:26.880 --> 0:17:29.439 gets it just for being an American, and that it 0:17:29.560 --> 0:17:33.480 isn't per household, it's per individual, which UM really is 0:17:34.160 --> 0:17:39.480 beneficial for a whole segment of society, which are unpaid caregivers, 0:17:39.880 --> 0:17:42.280 everybody from stay at home moms to people who are 0:17:42.680 --> 0:17:46.720 caring for their UM, their their parents with Alzheimer's. Those 0:17:46.760 --> 0:17:50.200 people get a thousand dollars themselves. So now, all of 0:17:50.200 --> 0:17:53.040 a sudden, a household with two adults in it UM 0:17:53.119 --> 0:17:56.919 who pool their resources, has you know, twenty four thousand 0:17:56.960 --> 0:18:00.720 dollars a year rather than just twelve. So that's one 0:18:00.720 --> 0:18:05.080 of the pros um Another is, you know, if you 0:18:05.119 --> 0:18:07.600 are poverty stricken, if you live, if you're one of 0:18:07.640 --> 0:18:12.160 the one and eight Americans, which is striking that lives 0:18:12.200 --> 0:18:16.200 below the poverty line, um, you are probably not doing 0:18:16.240 --> 0:18:18.600 a lot of things to meet your health needs. You're 0:18:18.640 --> 0:18:20.680 probably not getting up every day and saying I need 0:18:20.720 --> 0:18:23.080 to I need to work out and eat really healthy. 0:18:23.119 --> 0:18:26.159 We've talked about the problem, the food problem in this 0:18:26.240 --> 0:18:29.320 country and how the poorest people eat the biggest garbage 0:18:29.320 --> 0:18:33.280 diets because it's cheap. Um, you're not thinking, you're not 0:18:33.320 --> 0:18:36.479 eating well, you're not exercising, you're not uh, you know, 0:18:36.600 --> 0:18:39.879 paying as much attention to your kids doing homework. Sure, 0:18:40.000 --> 0:18:42.640 if you want to idealize everything, you should be doing 0:18:42.680 --> 0:18:45.400 all those things. But if you're struggling day to day 0:18:45.600 --> 0:18:48.840 just to to live and survive, a lot of these 0:18:48.840 --> 0:18:51.720 things go by the wayside. So the idea is that 0:18:52.080 --> 0:18:56.320 a universal basic income would provide you with enough of 0:18:56.359 --> 0:18:59.120 a buffer to where you can tackle some of these 0:18:59.119 --> 0:19:03.480 other things. Or you can maybe go back to school 0:19:03.520 --> 0:19:06.639 and get that degree or start your own business, right, 0:19:06.840 --> 0:19:10.480 you know. And another another thing for the very like 0:19:10.520 --> 0:19:15.840 the poverty stricken working class. Um, they would be given 0:19:15.920 --> 0:19:18.959 this buffer or this this check that everybody gets for 0:19:19.040 --> 0:19:22.040 them would be like a floor that would allow them 0:19:22.080 --> 0:19:24.520 to say, you know what, I don't have to take 0:19:24.560 --> 0:19:27.240 this job because I'm not desperate any longer to put 0:19:27.280 --> 0:19:29.399 food on the table, so I can hold out for 0:19:29.440 --> 0:19:32.199 a better job that affords me more dignity or that 0:19:32.359 --> 0:19:36.120 isn't actually dangerous to do because the working conditions are 0:19:36.119 --> 0:19:41.280 so poor. So there's there's a whole um uh, employer 0:19:41.400 --> 0:19:47.679 exploitation that would largely dissolve when because the working class, 0:19:47.760 --> 0:19:50.879 that the really right around the poverty level working class 0:19:51.119 --> 0:19:53.760 would have this kind of buffer that they could use 0:19:53.840 --> 0:19:58.120 to negotiate better working conditions and higher higher wages. Yeah, 0:19:58.119 --> 0:20:00.760 and we should point out everything we're saying here. We 0:20:00.800 --> 0:20:03.960 should have this term in front of it is this 0:20:04.040 --> 0:20:06.800 is the idea that these things will happen, right, This 0:20:06.840 --> 0:20:10.440 is all the in theory, right exactly. Um. The one 0:20:10.440 --> 0:20:14.439 thing I didn't see listed as a pro which I 0:20:14.480 --> 0:20:17.679 think is an obvious one, is if you make a 0:20:17.680 --> 0:20:20.639 certain amount of money, then I imagine a lot of 0:20:20.640 --> 0:20:23.679 people would treat this twelve grand year as something that 0:20:23.720 --> 0:20:30.160 they could just spend, thus propping up the economy, or donate, right. Yeah, 0:20:30.200 --> 0:20:32.439 I would hope that if you were very wealthy, that 0:20:32.520 --> 0:20:35.840 it would become kind of trendy to just donate this part. Yeah, 0:20:35.880 --> 0:20:38.320 I haven't seen people talking about that in anything that 0:20:38.359 --> 0:20:40.040 I've read, and that just seems like a real obvious 0:20:40.080 --> 0:20:43.000 one to me. That, uh, you know, because a lot 0:20:43.040 --> 0:20:44.719 of people that are doing pretty well and they might 0:20:44.760 --> 0:20:48.200 get a tax return and that's like TV time or whatever, 0:20:48.840 --> 0:20:52.280 let me go buy that flat screen. Well, actually, if 0:20:52.320 --> 0:20:55.400 if we can throw out one of the cons um 0:20:55.720 --> 0:20:58.320 actually dovetails with what you're talking about that there's a 0:20:58.359 --> 0:21:02.120 concern among economists that if all of a sudden, every 0:21:02.160 --> 0:21:05.159 adult over eighteen in America was getting a thousand dollars 0:21:05.160 --> 0:21:07.439 a month, they would be like, heck, yeah, I'm going 0:21:07.480 --> 0:21:09.720 to get a TV this month. Next month, I'm gonna 0:21:09.760 --> 0:21:11.639 go get some clothes, or I'm gonna save up a 0:21:11.720 --> 0:21:15.200 few months and get a car sooner than I normally 0:21:15.240 --> 0:21:18.480 would have. Yes, because if all of a sudden, a 0:21:18.520 --> 0:21:21.440 couple of hundred million Americans are all doing this, spending 0:21:21.480 --> 0:21:24.840 more money, way more than we have been before where 0:21:24.880 --> 0:21:29.280 this is going, that we would outstrips. Demand would outstrip supply, 0:21:29.600 --> 0:21:32.919 and so the prices of goods would go up inflation, 0:21:33.640 --> 0:21:36.240 and so it would cancel out any benefit there was 0:21:36.280 --> 0:21:39.359 from the universal basic income because we would have all 0:21:40.160 --> 0:21:42.600 caused inflation to make prices rise in the cost of 0:21:42.600 --> 0:21:47.040 goods increase. D Oh, totally, it's very valid. But what's 0:21:47.040 --> 0:21:49.560 great about it is people are thinking about it, you 0:21:49.560 --> 0:21:51.879 know what I'm saying. The other thing I like about 0:21:51.880 --> 0:21:54.600 this too is, um, it's not just liberals who are 0:21:54.640 --> 0:21:59.239 crazy about this, libertarians too, and um, some conservatives as 0:21:59.280 --> 0:22:02.040 well are totally cool with it too. For a number 0:22:02.040 --> 0:22:05.680 of reasons. Um, Libertarians like the idea that it would 0:22:05.720 --> 0:22:10.280 conceivably replace that bloated welfare state because libertarians are not 0:22:10.359 --> 0:22:14.919 ones for big giant government bureaucracies. And also in the 0:22:15.000 --> 0:22:19.320 same vein that thing about the universal basic income, just 0:22:19.440 --> 0:22:21.560 being like, here's your money, go do what you want 0:22:21.640 --> 0:22:24.560 with it. Not here's some money. You have to spend 0:22:24.600 --> 0:22:26.439 it on food and wait, wait, wait, you have to 0:22:26.440 --> 0:22:30.400 spend it on specifically these types of food. But libertarians 0:22:30.480 --> 0:22:32.719 love it so because you're all you're just saying like, 0:22:32.840 --> 0:22:35.240 I'm not I'm the government, and I'm telling you how 0:22:35.240 --> 0:22:37.879 to spend this money on this particular kind of food. 0:22:38.320 --> 0:22:40.880 It's here's your money, you know, do what you want 0:22:40.920 --> 0:22:44.679 with it, which is just libertarian dream kind of stuff. Yeah. 0:22:44.720 --> 0:22:48.119 And that economist Charles Murray said he was a conservative economist. 0:22:48.880 --> 0:22:51.600 He's the one that's like, man, this is would cost 0:22:51.680 --> 0:22:56.919 less than Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, the SNAP program, right, 0:22:56.960 --> 0:22:58.920 and the entire welfare state. We could get rid of it, 0:22:59.200 --> 0:23:01.040 and this would actually be better for us in the 0:23:01.080 --> 0:23:04.520 long run. Yeah, and cut down on just the the 0:23:04.560 --> 0:23:08.320