Thread by @scottsantens

Number of families in poverty receiving cash welfare in 2016:

Texas: 4 out of 100
Arizona: 6 out of 100
Arkansas: 5 out of 100
Wyoming: 5 out of 100

Median benefit: $450

With UBI, 100 out of 100 would receive $1k per adult (and optimally also $333/kid)

features.marketplace.org/yourstateonwel…

18 states out of 50 provide cash assistance to the poor that's less than $200/mo, and 16 states exclude more than 90% of those living under the poverty line from cash assistance.

A $1,000/mo UBI would lift 100% of every state to 100% of the poverty line.

cbpp.org/research/famil…

If you can look at this state of affairs, and look at the Freedom Dividend as proposed by @AndrewYang, and claim he hates the poor for not boosting those few getting something now above those getting nothing now, you're not interested in reducing poverty. You're just in the way.

This is about creating an unconditional fully universal income floor and raising it up so that everyone starts at the poverty line instead of at zero. With UBI no one is excluded, and no one will ever again fall to zero. The lowest anyone will ever fall is to the poverty line.

If that's not good enough for you because you want more, you may as well walk up to someone living on the streets with nothing, and tell them that you'll defend to the end our not providing them with $12,000 so that they can continue using the programs that provide them nothing.

If it's more important to you to look at my state of Louisiana where 3.9% of families in poverty get any TANF, and what they get is $146, and think 3.9% should get $1k more or nothing, Yang is not the asshole for wanting to provide $1,000 to 96.1% and $854 more to 3.9%. You are.

So why is Yang offering a choice? Because the goal is a universal lift to $1k/mo. Think of it this way. Let's say you are getting $100 in SNAP and we want to raise you to $1000. Does it make more sense to let you keep the $100 in SNAP and provide you an additional $900? No. Why?

Because SNAP is inferior to cash. You are only able to use that assistance on approved food. You can't use it on many needs. By giving you $1k instead of $900 UBI + $100 SNAP, you are better off and total administrative costs go down with fewer people applying for and using SNAP.

But why not let you keep the $100 SNAP and provide you with $1000 cash? Because then you're getting more than all those who were in your exact same situation but not getting SNAP. Is that fair that you get more just because you were already getting more than those getting $0?

This gets to into why you were already getting benefits and someone else wasn't, despite both of you being in equivalent need. Welfare benefits are structured to exclude people. Oftentimes the way that works out is that the least educated, and least able people are denied help.

So if social justice is your goal, is that social justice to lift those who were able to pass the requirements applied to welfare higher than those who were unable to pass those requirements? I would argue no. Justice is providing everyone the same floor.

medium.com/basic-income/t…

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