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Swiss Village Votes for Free Money. Now It Just Needs the Cash (bloomberg.com)
A village in Switzerland has decided to go ahead with an experiment on basic income, with a payout of 2,500 francs ($2,570) per month. The next step is to raise money to finance the plan via crowdfunding. From a report: More than 50 percent of the inhabitants of Rheinau, close to the German border, signed up for the project, according to the organizers website. At least half the 1,300 inhabitants needed to say 'yes,' and the count stood at 692 on Monday. The submitted ballots still have to be checked against government data to ensure eligibility. The decision comes two years after a proposal for a nationwide unconditional state stipend failed to pass in a national vote. Rheinau, on the banks of the river Rhine an hour by train from the banking hub of Zurich, was selected by filmmaker Rebecca Panian for the basic income trial. She says she became fascinated by the notion during the national debate before up the 2016 vote, decided to select a village as a guinea pig, and make a documentary.
...and, surprisingly, all the groups involved (city, the council of canadians, 'humans of basic income')...none of them have the budget and all expect someone else to pick up the tab for their free money. Funny how that works.
GENERATION 26: The first time you see this, copy it into your sig on any forum and add 1 to the generation.
Swiss Village Votes for Free Money, Immediately Realizes Problem With Plan.
ex UK PM Margaret Thatcher said
;)
"The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money."
Margaret Thatcher said
Just my 2 cents
And pay everyone with it. It worked for Venezuela.
Now I just need the money
Didn't most of the basic income projects fail, and this says the government wouldn't be able to fund it?!
What am I missing here, how is this not just socialism (or communism) being called something else? That money has to come from somewhere, this trial is donation based, but if this was at the national level it would have to be funded by the the workers, which by this account is less than 1/2 of the people. Why would someone paying most of their wages want to it taxed at over 50% to support people not wanting to work?
Wouldnt it be better for them to just start a commune in some remote area, where the cost of living is extremely low, and let each person contribute? If its so easy they should be able to get people to join freely, with some doing all the work, and some people just living off everyone else's hard work. No hard feelings right?
How you can fund this "Utopia" without taking workers income or owning the corporations to milk them, seems impossible.
When countries are increasing the retirement age, you can be many people in their late 50's will want to quit, working sucks.
Just give everyone a small loan of one million dollars. A village of future Trumps will be a yuuuuuge economic boom to the area in the long run making everyone self sufficient.
Make Switzerland Great Again!
Suddenly, while staring at his declined debit card for a 6-pack of brew with a $20 sales tax, Joe realized "free money" isn't free....someone has to pay taxes to fill the Government coffers for redistribution of "basic income"!
It could work globally, as we produce a huge amount of wealth measured by GDP, but unfortunately most of the money is sucked into financial bubbles by agents out of reach of a Swiss village.
well maybe i should move there and mooch. Where is the motivation to work hard and live within your means anymore?
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If it is funded by outside sources it'll be a love fest since nobody in the village has skin in the game and people just get free money without having to take it from other citizens in the same village.
They ran out of other peoples' money before they even started.
Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard
They should start a GoFundMe page and everyone world wide will send them money ;) And every place else can start GoFundMe pages also and then everyone will send money to everyone world wide ;) And poof you have a socialist world ;)
There was never a lack of people wanting to give other people money out. As long as the distributor is better off, there will always be people saying that you need to give money to others. There is nothing wrong sharing with other people, but wrong when somebody else decides for you where the money go.
Wait- so they are voting themselves free money, and then "crowdsourcing" (I guess online begging) to pay for it? Who do they expect will donate money to such a thing and why would they?
Why not just put the town on "gofundme" with a description of "We want your money, because we want to give it to our citizens. Please give us money, we like money and would like some free money. Thanks"
I'm a proponent of UBI, but this plan is ridiculous. You've basically just seen what happens when you let the lower 50%ile vote for a wage increase (spoiler: they'll say yes every time).
First, this plan is giving out the equivalent of $30,840/yr. Unless the cost of living in that little village is really about 50% higher than it is in the average US city, then this amount is insane. Next, any UBI plan must be self-funding via taxes. For this to work in practice, the UBI payout should be your deductible, and then you pay e.g. 90% taxes on your other sources of income. Finally, limited duration "tests" really don't prove anything, especially if they're funded externally.
In the real world, a full-scale UBI would require that you answer yes to all of the following questions:
* Are they going to allow retailers to raise prices? What about landlords raising rent prices?
* Are they going to remove minimum wage laws and allow companies to pay whatever they want?
And you'll also have VERY strong social programs to deal with addicts (e.g. junkies and gamblers).
Climate change is causing people to have irrational thoughts and support liberal/socialist agendas.
How does this sound?
Funded by taxing the crowd who keep their spare change in Zurich banks.
If you must moderate, please moderate as irrelevent, not something bad, because I'm sure someone will find this interest
Hahaha, the citizens who make the money don't want to fund parasites. Universal basic income always gets the parasites around here excited.
Isn't this sort of exactly scheme Chairman/CEO's typically pull? They run the board of directors and then get to vote on their own pay packages funded by other people's money
"Hmm, I think I deserve a 50% raise this year, all in favor? The motion is carried."
"Next topic, employment expenses are rising drastically, we need to start making company-wide reductions."
This is called 'welfare'.
let's just shut up and see what happens?
In some ways basic income is more efficient than ad hoc benefits that currently exist. The problem is when there is an economic downturn and benefits that EVERYONE relies on are cut. A small percent of population is rioting. Everyone rioting at the same time because benefits they are demanding from each other do not exist in their economy is terrifying.
Borrow or print the money and distribute away. Everybody wins. A future generation of leaders will sort out the details. The current generation of leaders will quietly slip out and take up the new causes in the fields of 'paid speech to banks & hedge funds' and slush-fund management.
Yes, for a real experiment they need to self fund and pair up with a neighboring village who can act as the control. They should also set a much lower amount because $2500 is way above what most people need to live and much higher than what most UBI proponents are proposing.
Step 1: Choose the most peaceful and white nation to subject to an experiment
Step 2: Get results from the experiment
Step 3: Claim the good results was due to the experiment and this can be replicated everywhere
Ask a leftist which nations socialism has worked in. Get a list of white nations.
Revelation above! At the end of the day, someone,... SOMEONE has to still pony up that cash (for them to "give away"). Idiots.
The only way the experiment will yield anything close to credible results is for the "basic income" to be self funded.
Basic Income will never yield credible results and will always need external funding. The problem is that the only way to self fund Basic Income is to provide it Universally. UBI allows the funding source to come from the closing of all the other government social services. BI does not allow this as it is not applied universally to everyone under the care of the government.
It is doomed to fail.
It is also nothing to do with UBI.
They should also set a much lower amount because $2500 is way above what most people need to live and much higher than what most UBI proponents are proposing.
Roughly speaking, the cost of living in Switzerland is similar to the SF cost of living. Could you live for $2500 per month in SF? Rent on a small studio flat in a normal area is just shy of $1460, gasoline is just shy of $8 per gallon and a big mac meal is just shy of $14.5. If I compare that to France... the UBI-equivalent is $1736 per month, the rent for a similar sized small studio flat is $897, gasoline is $6.7 per gallon and a big mac meal is just shy of $9.5.
Socialists want to change the world with other people's money.
it is not replacing all benefits for the basic income.
The point of UBI is to REPLACE current benefits, thus finding additional funds from the increased efficiency.
All this does is add money from an outside source. The result will be a disaster. UBI will be deemed a failure.
Thanks.
A blog I run for the wealth
For a full trial, yes, self-funding is important. A limited trial without self-funding can be useful to see what people will actually do when they receive a basic income. If the basic concept relies on a large number of people looking for work to earn extra income, it's a real good idea to make sure this will actually happen before implementing more ambitious trials.
When someone says, "Any fool can see
If it is funded by outside sources it'll be a love fest since nobody in the village has skin in the game and people just get free money without having to take it from other citizens in the same village.
And make it scrip only valuable in the village otherwise when the prices for everything inevitably rise "because everyone has free money", they can't spend it on cheaper stuff in towns further away. This will cause a slight rise in prices for goods in nearby towns.
Hahaha, the citizens who make the money don't want to fund parasites
Yet they keep pushing money at politicians, the ultimate parasites.
Before any of you 'UBI' fanbois start sperging out over this, yet again: it is ***1300 people***, not ***350,000,000 people***, and they DO NOT HAVE ANY MONEY TO PAY FOR THIS. It's pointless bullshit.
Of course they voted for 'free money every month'; who wouldn't? But there is NO MONEY. Their 'vote' amounts to an 'opinion poll' because there's nothing real to back it up.
UBI fools need to STFU. It'll never work and anyone with basic arithmetic skills can see that.
A village doesn't have the resources or options that a country has. If it's close enough to a city that people commute, it may not have the richest people in the metropolitan area to tax them.
When they have problems, we are doomed, i tells yas.
I have read earlier posts that say we could fund UBI by replacing existing programs where the government gives EVERYONE in the country an equal share of the money that was going into those replaced programs. If we did that, how would it better help those that are currently benefiting from those replaced programs? My family currently does not draw anything from those replaced programs. If I understand correctly, if we switched to UBI, my family of five would start getting $50,000 per year that would otherwise have gone to those that really needed it. Does UBI cause extra cash to enter the equation? If not, then we just redistributed the money in the wrong direction. I guess I could see an increase in available funds by eliminating the administrative jobs for those replaced programs. But, doesn't seem like it would be nearly enough. Would UBI come with a hefty tax increase that would effectively just take another $50,000 in taxes from my family so my net gain is $0? Or is there some other factor that allows for me to get more money while also giving more to those who need it?
Just tax every resident of the village $2600pm.
$2500pm for the ubi and $100 for the government "administrator"
Premise) Basic Income will always need external funding.
Conclusion) You can self-fund by providing it universally.
Sorry, but your conclusion doesn't follow your premise. If it's universal, there is no external funding, but Basic Income will always need external funding.
How is "Universal" Basic Income not Basic Income. You're using other governmental services to jump start the external funding - but where does the other governmental services (and subsequently BI) get their money? From the same people getting Basic Income? It's Universal, so there are no non-Basic Income citizens to get them money from.
oh no, the ones with government in their pockets are the biggest. they're the biggest pushers of money too, chump change for them