How to keep the Senate (if we win in Georgia) and the House in 2022? Do what Andrew Yang suggested:

[LaMouffette]

Begin $1,000-per-month payments to Americans as a way to compensate American workers for the thousands of jobs that have been outsourced to other countries.

Yang suggested these payments as a way to offset job loss due to automation, but it's just as valuable as a way to offset job loss due to outsourcing. He proposes paying for it with a value added tax (VAT). From a 2019 PBS News Hour article:

As Andrew Yang takes his place among the top 10 Democratic presidential candidates during a debate in Houston this week, the entrepreneur’s central campaign proposal — and the new tax he wants to use to pay for it — could soon come under increased scrutiny.

Yang plans to give every American adult $1,000 a month in universal basic income, as a way to offset job loss from automation. The first-time presidential candidate proposes paying for the monthly distributions, in large part, by implementing a new 10 percent value-added tax (VAT) on goods and services.

[link:https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/how-would-andrew-yang-give-americans-1000-per-month-with-this-tax|


I think we should do some form of the value added tax, but more importantly, pay for it by taxing the profits of the American corporations who have moved their production, call centers, and IT departments overseas.

Many people voted for Trump in 2016 because they were angry and frustrated over the loss of manufacturing jobs to overseas outsourcing. Trump declared that he would bring manufacturing jobs back and make companies who outsourced face consequences. He didn't do that, so I have no clue why people voted for him again in 2020. But that anger over disappearing jobs is still very much there.

The Democratic Party could begin to convince lower-income Americans that they truly are the party of the people by actually enacting consequences against those companies. A tax on companies that outsource used solely to fund a monthly $1,000 payment to American workers would be something concrete and incredibly beneficial to lower-class and middle-class Americans.

[LaMouffette]

8. I couldn't agree with you more! Congressional Dems need to get their faces OUT there.

And hire a branding consultant and marketing advisors.

I've always wondered why they don't do more televised press conferences on the "regular" TV channels (NBC, ABC, CBS) to give the Democratic Congress members' side of the story to counter the Republicans' lies on Fox and elsewhere. Pay for the airtime, if need be.

[trueblue2007]

10. FANTASTIC IDEA. And raise the tax on the RICH 10 to 15 PERCENT !!!!!

[trueblue2007]

24. 10-to 15% more plus what they are paying now. What is wrong with that idea

[jimfields33]

2. Do we exempt food, clothes, education, transportation at least?

10 percent added to all bills would be a bit daunting even with a thousand a month.

[LaMouffette]

9. Great idea! Exempt the basics, VAT the luxuries.

[Hermit-The-Prog]

3. a VAT is just a sales tax by another name and it's regressive -- hurts poorest the most

[LaMouffette]

11. Yeah, that is a valid critique of the VAT. That's why I think a mix of VAT (and mainly on luxuries),

combined with a tax on the profits of corporations who outsource their production to other countries, would be best.

[Polybius]

5. 2022 looks terrible at this point

I hate to be frank, but there's a 90% chance we lose the House. I think they only need to pick up 4 seats. 5 tops.

[LaMouffette]

12. Maybe . . . but the ghost of Trump could keep Democratic voter turn-out high in 2020.

[moonscape]

20. Agree. Having McCarthy nightmares already. n/t

[maxsolomon]

6. Non-starter.

Although I personally support UBI, the broader American public would need a massive, years-long education effort to see this as anything other than rewarding sloth. Which is what the GOP is already screaming about UBI anyway.

[Cosmocat]

7. YEP - their most persistent and effective slander is socialism

I don't disagree with Yang's assessment, but to push this would result in a 2010 time blood bath.

[LaMouffette]

14. Yes, but maxsolomon and Cosmocat, to Republican voters, it's only socialism if it benefits others,

and not themselves!

Republicans hate Medicaid because it benefits the poor, but they are just fine and dandy with Medicare and Social Security. Strangely, they are okay with huge subsidies to corporations, too. They might grumble about it a little bit, but since the big corporations are run by the rich people they so admire, they find a way to exempt corporate welfare recipients (e.g., they are the job creators!) from their resentment.

I really think the Universal Basic Income would go over pretty well. Just look at how well received the news of a possible $2,000 stimulus direct payment was.

More proof is found in the Alaska Permanent Fund Dividend. Paid for by oil revenues, every Alaskan gets a big check every year just for being alive and living in Alaska. In 2020, the payment is $900, but in some years, it's $2,000, $3,000 . . .

Alaska is about as Republican of a state as they come, but you don't see them turning down their yearly Permanent Fund Dividend check because it's *gasp!* socialism!

Here's a Vox article on it:

[link:https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/2/13/16997188/alaska-basic-income-permanent-fund-oil-revenue-study|

Actually, the PFD is not technically a pure example of socialism, since the oil companies are privately owned, as an Anchorage Daily News article explains:

In simple terms, socialism calls for public ownership of property and resources, not private ownership. The community is a cooperative, and everyone who works is entitled to a share of the good life.

Communism is where the government owns everything and is supposed to distribute the wealth more or less fairly — except Russian President Vladimir Putin’s friends, who get extra supersize shares.

I guess the Permanent Fund and the annual dividends are a form of socialism, in that a portion of Alaska’s resource wealth is held out for the public. That doesn’t make the PFD good or bad, it’s just a fact that the dividend is an individual benefit derived from a common asset.

[link:https://www.adn.com/opinions/2019/07/23/the-boy-who-cried-socialism/|

I think that last part of this excerpt, "the dividend is an individual benefit derived from a common asset," would make sense and sound reasonable even to those brainwashed into mistaking socialism with communism—maybe.

So if Democratic Congress members could push a Universal Basic Income through, I think it would be an asset, not a liability in 2022. They could point to Republican candidates and say, "They're going to take your UBI check away!"

[Cosmocat]

23. Remember Obamacare

Which was THEIR version of healthcare reform? The model of Healthcare reform THEIR candidate for potus in 2012 implemented in his state.

They ran against that as socialism, the gravest threat to democracy in our history, and slaughtered us in the house and senate.

You are thinking logically.

When was the last time this country thought logically when the conservative media whores start screeching?

[LaMouffette]

26. Sadly, appeals to logic don't hold much sway with Republican voters.

That's why I think we need to, essentially, buy them off with Andrew Yang's Universal Basic Income program and then let Republican Congress members just try to take it away from them.

[marlakay]

15. As soon as something like that started

You would never be able to take it away, like universal healthcare why republicans fight so much against it.

[LaMouffette]

16. You are so right!

You would think Republicans would want us little people to have more money to spend and thereby keep the economy humming, but I think they are too greedy and too short-sighted to think of this.

[JonLP24]

21. I'm against Yang's UBI

If I wanted Yang's UBI I would have voted for him . I don't have a problem with a UBI for homeless people or a stackable UBI (though I would prefer not to have the UBI).

Andrew Yang wants to sell you universal basic income. Beware if you have disabilities.

(Snip)

Andrew Yang’s success, however, demands that Americans take him seriously as a candidate. Unfortunately, he and his campaign make this task difficult, particularly when it comes to disability policy. Every major candidate has addressed the issue of care for disabled and elderly Americans. And while no platform is perfect, most candidates have a basic understanding of the social safety net, or at least their advisers do. Except maybe Yang’s.

On Monday, Yang finally released his health care policy plan, with a section on people with disabilities. I read it. I also read his book, The War on Normal People, combed his website on details about disability programs, and asked his campaign for comment. And as a disabled person who has relied on various social safety net programs in the past, I am still left confused as to how disability benefits would be affected by the centerpiece of Yang’s policies, universal basic income, or what he calls the Freedom Dividend. His health care policies for disabled people also raise more questions than answers.

How Yang’s Freedom Dividend affects disability benefits
With the Freedom Dividend, the government would pay every American $1,000 per month, no strings attached. This is unlikely to ever make it through Congress. But let’s say, for the sake of argument, that it did. Then what would happen to disability benefits?

It is difficult to analyze the impact of the Freedom Dividend on other social safety net programs like Social Security, Medicaid, or food stamps. Andrew Yang’s new health care plan and the “Care for People with Disabilities” section say absolutely nothing on the matter. When Vox contacted Yang’s campaign for clarification, his national press secretary insisted that Yang’s plan “touches on aspects” of disability benefits, but did not explain how or in what way. I was repeatedly given answers and sent links to parts of the website that were totally irrelevant to the questions I’d asked.

https://www.vox.com/first-person/2019/12/19/21026925/andrew-yang-disability-policy

[LaMouffette]

27. Thank you for the link to the Vox article! It pointed out a lot that I hadn't considered,

including the effect on disability benefits, and I apologize for that.

I just thought a UBI would be one tactic, among many necessary tactics, to prove to working-class voters that when they vote for Republicans, they are voting against their own interests. And that the Democratic Party, as imperfect as it is, is made up of more politicians who actually care about the well-being of the people they represent.

[brooklynite]

22. So we should advocate the policy of a candidate who won no Primaries...

...and earned no Delegates?

[panader0]

28. I get it that Yang went nowhere with his candidacy, but looking ahead,

it seems that many jobs will disappear, and already are. Automation will take a bite into many
professions, from cashiers, restaurant workers, farming and now truckers. Other jobs will follow and
employment opportunities will fade. UBI seems like it may be inevitable. I don't know, what do
you think?