Why Finland’s Basic Income Experiment Isn’t Working

[Deleted]

The disconnect here is, still, after all these years of talking about this shit, that people seem to think poor, unemployed people in Finland haven't already been getting "free money" for decades, and that this "experiment" is somehow a new thing.

It's not new.

"Basic income" is just another name for welfare. Finland has had an extensive welfare system for ages now. Incidentally, people who are in that experiment now, are still getting welfare on top of the basic income, because the amount of basic income is less than what Finnish welfare actually is.

In Finland, you can make 300€/month and it won't cut into your welfare. After 300€/month, every 1€ you make cuts your welfare by 50c. This is the case on basic income, as well. However, the basic income forms a minimum base that won't be cut, regardless of your income. While now your welfare will be cut all the way down to 0€ eventually, with basic income, you'd always get the 560€/month or whatever it will end up being. This is meant to allow you to work gigs, part time jobs, and so on, without shooting yourself in the foot, as right now, it's pretty much pointless for a lot of people to do that. We used to have a system where we didn't have the 300€/month cut-free income, and that's when people had absolutely no reason to do any part time jobs, as they wouldn't be making any money at all.

However, for those "lazy people" who wouldn't choose to work, basic income in Finland isn't going to make any goddamn difference to the current system. That's just not something people seem to get into their thick skulls.

[Torrasque]

The drastically increasing unemployment with little to no slowing down (Hell, many companies are sitting on their hands to automate, about to lay off hundreds of thousands of people later this year, most likely) as well as the rising cost of living that isn't being compiled with modern necessities (for example, internet costs aren't factored, cell phone costs aren't factored, disabled care isn't factored, child care isn't factored unless it is through a corporate entity, and health insurance isn't properly factored either. Cost of living, numerically, has been intentionally kept down to make sure that more people do not qualify for their much needed welfare.

Due to all of this, welfare is a massive issue. A staggered, but fair, utilization of basic income could potentially fix a lot of problems with the rising costs, as well as the unfactored probable future costs, of increasing welfare.

[Deleted]

Believing that the poor are having money "stolen" from them is literally just old Marxist rhetoric. There's barely even a shred of truth to it. Your post reflects animus for wealthy Americans outside of any government-specific policies:

Let me explain how capitalism works. You start a business, you make money you prosper, you fail you go under. That's the creative destruction of the market. It can be cruel but it is inherently a logical, coherent system which tends to produce more efficiency over time.

What happened in 2008 was the big banks were about to go under and were handed a trillion dollars in taxpayer money. The state handouts continue to this day in various forms-quantative easing, implicit subsidy etc etc ad infinitum. That is NOT capitalism.

It is accurate to describe this is kleptocracy or theft. Bank bailouts were opposed by huge majorities of electorates everywhere.

To describe opposition to this as Marxism is ridiculous: virtually everyone did. And any one who actually believes in freemarket capitalism would be at the front of the que. Socialists have a long history of supporting state intervention and subsidy and would if anything be less ideologically opposed to it.

[Spectral]

The trouble is people post like what you do and don't realize the entire scope of basic income. You get what ever is decided and its for everyone! Bill Gates gets it and the guy that sits on his front porch all day gets it as well.

The other part they miss is all the social programs like food stamps, housing subsidies, etc go away. Why? Its suppose to be cheaper to just give everyone basic income.

That's the principle anyway. In practice, I flatly don't trust people on the left when it comes to implementation on this. I suspect that within a couple months of implementation, we'd have a sob story about someone who had unexpected expenses and wasn't able to pay their rent, or didn't have food for a couple days at the end of the month. We'd then see the, "come on, we need a safety net for these situations" and promptly start ramping back up the entire welfare state apparatus.

More likely, we'd just never see those programs go away in the first place and the whole thing would just be a bait and switch to incrementally increase taxes and spending.

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Let me explain how capitalism works. You start a business, you make money you prosper, you fail you go under. That's the creative destruction of the market. It can be cruel but it is inherently a logical, coherent system which tends to produce more efficiency over time.

What happened in 2008 was the big banks were about to go under and were handed a trillion dollars in taxpayer money. The state handouts continue to this day in various forms-quantative easing, implicit subsidy etc etc ad infinitum. That is NOT capitalism.

It is accurate to describe this is kleptocracy or theft. Bank bailouts were opposed by huge majorities of electorates everywhere.

To describe opposition to this as Marxism is ridiculous: virtually everyone did. And any one who actually believes in freemarket capitalism would be at the front of the que. Socialists have a long history of supporting state intervention and subsidy and would if anything be less ideologically opposed to it.

I opposed bailouts at the time, but let's be clear, the USG made a profit on them in the long run. It would be much more accurate to describe these as federally subsidized loans than bailouts.

So, sure, if you want to walk your dislike for the wealthy back to really just being a narrow commentary on monetary policy, OK, whatever. That doesn't really jibe with the ridiculous "stealing from the poor" rhetoric though, which would have literally nothing to do with bailouts.

[StayTuned]

Why? It's a service that needs to be done. And how is McD unqualified? I certainly wouldn't know how to operate such a kitchen. I sit on a desk all day.

You'd rather die than to do work you feel is beneath you? Both arrogant and sad.



Why is a burger flipper worth less than say some pencil pusher? A job is a job. Looking down on the working class or service personal is pretty deplorable.

Fuck mate I'm HIGHLY qualified. If I end up in a kitchen because AI took my job I'd seriously rather die if they don't give me universal income.

And flipping burgers is also going to be replaced. I can only imagine the worst kind of jobs to be still performed by humans... only one generation further will adapt and become musicians and artists.

[Fudal]

There are not enough jobs for everyone who wants one to have one. That's a simple mathematical fact.

This is a complete falsehood in the US. There are more jobs available than citizens drawing unemployment. But, a lot of these jobs are manual labor, plus they don't pay the $50k that people think that they deserve to start with. The issue is when people will flat out say that they refuse to work some of the jobs because they get a welfare check and SNAP EBT for sitting at home.

[Spectral]

Fuck mate I'm HIGHLY qualified. If I end up in a kitchen because AI took my job I'd seriously rather die if they don't give me universal income.

And flipping burgers is also going to be replaced. I can only imagine the worst kind of jobs to be still performed by humans... only one generation further will adapt and become musicians and artists.

I suspect that in our lifetimes, it's more that the shape of these kinds of jobs will change rather than them just going away. When thinking of a kitchen, I'm thinking of some of the drudgery of prep cooking being replaced by efficient, capable of machines, while much of the creative work and customer relationships continues to lie with humans for the foreseeable future. The chess world is currently dominated by humans and machines playing as teams - I suspect that we'll see much of the same in other professions until there's some substantial AI revolution.

Most of the neo-Luddites that are convinced tech will result in a sharp drop (rather than a gradual drawdown) of human work requirements just don't seem to have much imagination. They're the same sorts of people that were convinced that the advent of spreadsheets would destroy the accounting profession.

[Deleted]

You do realize those elitist assholes you're talking about, who "bettered themselves", would also get the basic income, right?

The trouble is people post like what you do and don't realize the entire scope of basic income. You get what ever is decided and its for everyone! Bill Gates gets it and the guy that sits on his front porch all day gets it as well.

The other part they miss is all the social programs like food stamps, housing subsidies, etc go away. Why? Its suppose to be cheaper to just give everyone basic income.


Also part of the issue with the motivation and self esteem is that I know a number of people that would go out and "better themselves" but can't. Why? They have to work something 40 hours a week just to make ends meet or to get by. Some even two jobs or whatever. They don't have the time to do it now. Maybe with basic income they would?

Who knows. I guess that is the debate.

'elitist' see people throw these terms around to describe anyone who they think has achieved more and need some sort of excuse to justify why they are there and you are here moaning about 'elitists'.

you say its ok though because bill gates will also get it. You are such scary people for having this thought process and i am glad the majority of people do not share this view.

i was going to become a Doctor and save lives but i thought well i get basic income whether i do or not so i decided to just stay at home.

WOW. scary scary times ahead if people are bringing that kind of logic to the table.

[Deleted]

I opposed bailouts at the time, but let's be clear, the USG made a profit on them in the long run. It would be much more accurate to describe these as federally subsidized loans than bailouts.

So, sure, if you want to walk your dislike for the wealthy back to really just being a narrow commentary on monetary policy, OK, whatever. That doesn't really jibe with the ridiculous "stealing from the poor" rhetoric though, which would have literally nothing to do with bailouts.

This "the banks made a profit so its OK" BS needs to end.

No one has ever done a cost-benefit analysis on the income generated by welfare payments. This is obviously very difficult for people like you to understand but there are very substantial numbers of people on welfare who go on to create successful businesses as a direct result of state aid. I can think of many examples who went on to multi-millions or even billions in tax returns. It acts as a signficant stimulus to the economy.

Basically, you are operating a double-standard. If poor people get taxpayer money it is welfare: if rich people get taxpayer money is a federally subsidized loan. Basically you are a snob operating on the basis of snobbery: poor people are treated by entirely different criteria.

There's an additional point: had the banks been allowed to go bust they would have been replaced by new, more efficient banks that would have to be run by competent individuals. Undoubtedly these would go on to generate vast profits and tax money for the state-that's how capitalism is supposed to work.

[Independent voter]

I suspect that in our lifetimes, it's more that the shape of these kinds of jobs will change rather than them just going away. When thinking of a kitchen, I'm thinking of some of the drudgery of prep cooking being replaced by efficient, capable of machines, while much of the creative work and customer relationships continues to lie with humans for the foreseeable future. The chess world is currently dominated by humans and machines playing as teams - I suspect that we'll see much of the same in other professions until there's some substantial AI revolution.

Most of the neo-Luddites that are convinced tech will result in a sharp drop (rather than a gradual drawdown) of human work requirements just don't seem to have much imagination. They're the same sorts of people that were convinced that the advent of spreadsheets would destroy the accounting profession.

Most advanced countries are seeing a population implosion, perhaps there won't be that many people in the future so these "missing" jobs will go unnoticed.

[Spiffums]

They should have tested it on thirds. 1/3 of unemployed, 1/3 of part time workers and 1/3 full time workers and then collect data and see how each group did. But I'd suspect that the part time workers would have been better off, the full time workers would have saved more than they spent and the unemployed would have had zero chance.

[Spectral]

This "the banks made a profit so its OK" BS needs to end.

That's not what I wrote. It seems like you don't actually know what happened and you're just repeating some pat rhetoric you read somewhere. I already stated that I was against the bailouts, I'm correcting your lack of factual understanding about what happened though.

No one has ever done a cost-benefit analysis on the income generated by welfare payments.

WTF are you talking about? Economists do this all the time, both in econometric work that looks at this empirically and in less empirical work. You're not even trying to have any depth of knowledge if you really think the sentence you wrote here resembles the reality of the world we live in.

This is obviously very difficult for people like you to understand but there are very substantial numbers of people on welfare who go on to create successful businesses as a direct result of state aid. I can think of many examples who went on to multi-millions or even billions in tax returns. It acts as a signficant stimulus to the economy.

Basically, you are operating a double-standard. If poor people get taxpayer money it is welfare: if rich people get taxpayer money is a federally subsidized loan. Basically you are a snob operating on the basis of snobbery: poor people are treated by entirely different criteria.

There's an additional point: had the banks been allowed to go bust they would have been replaced by new, more efficient banks that would have to be run by competent individuals. Undoubtedly these would go on to generate vast profits and tax money for the state-that's how capitalism is supposed to work.

No, I'm saying that bailouts were quite literally paid back to the government. They're a subsidized loan. Your claim here is that welfare is a government investment; that's fine, it might even be true in some cases, but it's economically and substantively different than a straightforward loan.

You're throwing out completely uninformed views that don't seem motivated by anything other than a firmly held conviction that somehow, someway rich people got rich by stealing from the poor. The mechanism isn't clear or even proposed, but you seem to just know it.

[Kraenen]

There are not enough jobs for everyone who wants one to have one. That's a simple mathematical fact.

You know you support policies (immigration-wise) that make this worse... right?

[Deleted]

'elitist' see people throw these terms around to describe anyone who they think has achieved more and need some sort of excuse to justify why they are there and you are here moaning about 'elitists'.

No. It's just that people who think they've "achieved" something are, well, elitists. See that's the definition of an elitist; someone who lives under the delusion they've "achieved" something that other people haven't, when the reality is, they haven't "achieved" anything. 60-120 years, and they stop existing. They achieved nothing.

[h4rr0d]

Finland hasn't seen an increase in unemployment after implementing their UBI, so this is clearly not how this works. In reality, people gain a universal basic income and continue to work for additional income, because living a minimal existence is pretty shitty.

Have you even read the OP? They gave the money to 2000 (two thousand) people, who were already unemployed, that number is so low, you have no chance of noticing any kind of impact even if everyone was from the same city, let alone across the whole country.

Honestly, instead of fucking up the economy even more, I'd much rather if they stopped robbing middle class of more and more money.

[Deleted]

I like the idea of basic income I don't know how it would be implemented, but i would gladly give up some % of my income to keep people off the streets. It could proberly also be used to keep people busy

I think we don't really need much to have a decent living, and if you can cover the basics with a basic income, then people could actually reconsider what to do with their free time. They could engage in social or cultural activities, for example, or spend more time with family and friends. You know, do things which really matter.

We are buying so many things we don't really need.

[Deleted]

WTF are you talking about? Economists do this all the time, both in econometric work that looks at this empirically and in less empirical work. You're not even trying to have any depth of knowledge if you really think the sentence you wrote here resembles the reality of the world we live in.

It is a simple point: find a study where benefits of welfare to the economy are investigated. There aren't any.

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You're throwing out completely uninformed views that don't seem motivated by anything other than a firmly held conviction that somehow, someway rich people got rich by stealing from the poor. The mechanism isn't clear or even proposed, but you seem to just know it.

Vast amounts of money were and are still being given to the banks for failure against the wishes of the population. Most people oppose this and consider it kleptocratic.

Again, a very simple point.

You seem obsessed with repeating buzzwords you learnt on econ 101 and believe this to be some kind of justifiication of your intellect. Most of us know all that shit and learn quite quickly that the unnecessary use of jargon is a symptom of narrowness of vision and poor communication skills.

[dakalro]

I like the idea of basic income I don't know how it would be implemented, but i would gladly give up some % of my income to keep people off the streets. It could proberly also be used to keep people busy

But would you give up on income, I guess so, but not sure how much? Since it's universal you'd also get the same amount as everyone else.

As I see it, taxes would be increased on companies and/or citizens, salaries would go down for everyone as the company has to pay more taxes. But everyone gets a minimum wage equivalent from the state. At the same time all unemployment benefits are removed, and so are social security type benefits. This would in theory also mean a lot fewer gvt employees and paper pushing needed.

I would be curious to see how much extra money would be needed for some country to go from current welfare costs to UBI, even if just a theoretical study.
EDIT: Found one http://wer.worldeconomicsassociation...-5-Periera.pdf ... yeah google

[Spectral]

It is a simple point: find a study where benefits of welfare to the economy are investigated. There aren't any.

There are literally thousands. Here's a Google search for "welfare economics NBER". Here's a Google Scholar search for benefits of welfare. Here's a Google Scholar search for "welfare econometrics". This is a vast field of economic research that you seem to think just doesn't exist at all; it's decades old and something economists have cared about since the advent of modern welfare states. You're too ignorant about this topic to have a meaningful conversation with - this is the equivalent of trying to discuss evolution with someone that until 5 minutes ago didn't realize that molecular biology existed.

[McFuu]

$20 for insurance? where can i get that? i'm paying $130 because apparently i'm an "at risk" driver.

I could pay $33 a month, it's not unheard of. You own your car and don't have a shit driving record, and don't carry any extra superfluous coverage, insurance can be cheap.