I can see people's misunderstanding of UBI already leaking into the #EmergencyUBI plans. Let me try and explain. UBI is about creating an unconditional floor no one can fall beneath that lifts everyone in the economy away from the $0 point.
It is not meant as a job replacement.
It is not meant as a job replacement.
I recommend first creating the UBI floor and on top of it utilizing trickle-up economy logic. Some people get paychecks. Make sure they keep getting them. Some people's paychecks are the spending of others. Make the government the consumer of last resort to keep businesses going.
I think the desire to do things like rent and mortgage freezes is out of fear. What we want is to make sure people can pay their rent and mortgage in the same way they already were. If we freeze stuff we have to then bail out stuff later. Focus on maintaining consumption instead.
The trick here is to maintain the circulation of blood to get oxygen to every cell, not decide which organs to shut down to conserve blood. Besides UBI as a minimum floor, I think our local restaurant we love also needs the government to buy close to the average amount of sales.
Basically we need UBI for people as individual consumers, but because we are in a shutdown scenario, we also need to go one step up and have the government buy what we would have been buying in a universe where the pandemic doesn't exist. We need to try and emulate that universe.
Basically, instead of a pause button approach, it's a simulated play button approach. Keep the music going, but do it in a way where the volume is turned down a bit. Then when the pandemic is over, crank the music back up, and keep the UBI as the foundation we've always needed.
Utilize unemployment insurance pipes on top of UBI for those who have been let go.
Send checks to businesses and the self-employed based on a reduced percentage of average sales to avoid people being let go and businesses and entrepreneurs needing to close their doors.
Send checks to businesses and the self-employed based on a reduced percentage of average sales to avoid people being let go and businesses and entrepreneurs needing to close their doors.
It's tempting to throw bigger and bigger checks at this, but the problem is that right now we can't really spend them. We can spend some of the money and need it for our basic bills, but we can't spend it as we usually would at places like the zoo.
The zoo needs its own check.
The zoo needs its own check.
