undefined | Better HN

0 pointsianbicking1y ago0 comments

How far is it from meeting basic needs? "Basic" should imply very modest living, not even "normal" living standards.

For a living situation "basic" implies a shared space (family or otherwise). For food it would imply enough food to be healthy, but nothing about the form of food.

I think $1000/month/person probably is "basic" income. You can survive on that indefinitely.

(Healthcare is the other big expense, but I don't think UBI can reasonably cover healthcare, it's to complex and variable)

0 comments

lolinder1y ago

> I think $1000/month/person probably is "basic" income. You can survive on that indefinitely.

I think part of the problem is that people are assuming that you can and should pick a number for UBI that is sufficient for basic needs everywhere.

$1k/mo is probably not enough in San Francisco. But should our UBI be set up to allow anyone to meet their basic needs anywhere they'd like to live, or should it be set up to allow anyone to meet their basic needs if they're willing to leave the high cost of living areas and go out into the rest of the country where rent and food and transportation is cheaper?

ianbickingOP1y ago

Housing can be very variable, to the degree there aren't any reasonable options in San Francisco even if you have a lot of people sharing a space. I don't think basic food varies nearly as much. A 5 pound bag of rice costs a little more in San Francisco, but not much more. I think there's less geographical variability in cost of living (excluding housing) if you constrain costs to basic needs.

Also a UBI shouldn't have to facilitate living _everywhere_. Santa Monica is lovely. Should we arrange it so anyone can move to Santa Monica and be able to live there fully supported on their UBI?

I hadn't really thought about transportation costs, and am inclined to leave it out of UBI calculations as it doesn't feel like a necessity. But in a rural area transportation is necessary just to buy food, so I guess that adds some complexity.

jncfhnb1y ago

Kind of tangential. The thing that annoys me is people saying payments that they don’t believe cover basic needs still counts as UBI.

I think $1k does count as sufficient for basic needs, personally.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse