What If We Just Gave Poor People a Basic Income for Life? That’s What We’re About to Test.

[jwirr]

93. The problem with the idea that you just can't give people

money is simple. 1)They have to be able to GET a job if they are expected to work. As some here know I do not like the Calvinist religion that espouses this idea but Calvin himself plainly stated in "The Protestant Work Ethic" that if the government was going to require a person to work then the government had to provide the jobs where none existed. Bill Clinton's welfare reform forgot that little issue - especially in the inner cities.

2)They have to be capable of work. Disabled people often cannot work. Our local newspaper had a OP about those not getting work - I filled our a resume with my daughter's qualifications and sent it in to them. They did not publish it but they did get the message. For years she has been expected (against my will) to work at a sheltered workshop with a one-to-one aide who moves her hand and pushes it down so that the machine works. She is no more able to hold a job than an infant but yet she has been expected to "work".

3)They are too old to work. At least Social Security was meant to address this issue. But times have changed and we now have a great deal of over 50 people who are no longer considered worthy of hire. We need to expand Social Security.

4)They are children.