UBI could enhance production for some people, if it enables them to invest more in job skills or other forms of capital. The argument for every social program—the military and police, vaccination, education, infrastructure, scientific R&D, and so on—is that they produce more value than they cost.
This also applies to forms of welfare. For example, the ER visits circumvented by housing the homeless may save the taxpayer more money than providing the housing costs.
The essential argument about UBI is not whether greater leisure time is worth the cost.
It’s whether we can get more leisure time and more production at a net savings to the taxpayer with UBI.
For example, I am currently in school preparing for a degree in bioinformatics, but I am also working part-time in my old job as a piano teacher. Society could allow me to pump more STEM knowledge into my head if I didn’t have to work 20 hours a week providing an after-school activity for bored rich children. It could also reduce the risk that I’ll burn out before I make good on my investment.
Whether this sort of dynamic outweighs the productive loss from people choosing to live off UBI and not work at all is an empirical question.
UBI could enhance production for some people, if it enables them to invest more in job skills or other forms of capital. The argument for every social program—the military and police, vaccination, education, infrastructure, scientific R&D, and so on—is that they produce more value than they cost.
This also applies to forms of welfare. For example, the ER visits circumvented by housing the homeless may save the taxpayer more money than providing the housing costs.
The essential argument about UBI is not whether greater leisure time is worth the cost.
It’s whether we can get more leisure time and more production at a net savings to the taxpayer with UBI.
For example, I am currently in school preparing for a degree in bioinformatics, but I am also working part-time in my old job as a piano teacher. Society could allow me to pump more STEM knowledge into my head if I didn’t have to work 20 hours a week providing an after-school activity for bored rich children. It could also reduce the risk that I’ll burn out before I make good on my investment.
Whether this sort of dynamic outweighs the productive loss from people choosing to live off UBI and not work at all is an empirical question.