Negative income tax would be a blatant subsidisation of labour, which has it's own issues. In another sense, it's just welfare, but a highly regressive one. More income would go to those who are poor but in work, and less to those for what ever reason (like disability) unable to work.
If you were to further lower the costs of labour, you risk stymieing actual economic growth which comes from improvements in efficiency. For instance, why use a machine when you can just hire more people?
Also what would the effect on monetary policy be? If this was funded though an income tax, would the lower savings rates of the poor, put more money in circulation, thus increasing inflation? Could you account for the change in prices driven by an increase in demand from those who's labour isn't actually valuable enough to sustain their consumption.
I don't claim to have the answers to welfare, but I really think that we should aim for a solution that provides as little market distortion as possible. I sincerely think that a negative tax would be a huge unwelcome and ineffective distortion in the labour market.
> More income would go to those who are poor but in work, and less to those for what ever reason (like disability) unable to work.
Isn't that a desirable outcome ? Shouldn't the able bodied person who is working obviously earn more ? Giving people incentive to work not only helps them rise up but also prevents their exploitation in case they try going to underground economy.
> For instance, why use a machine when you can just hire more people?
If people are more efficient business will use people over machines. I don't think machines are be default always a good choice. What matters is the efficiency.
Free market capitalists who otherwise like machines and automation criticize the minimum wage laws for the same reason. Minimum wage laws force business to invest more in automation by outlawing hiring of people who could compete with machines over cost.
> Isn't that a desirable outcome ? Shouldn't the able bodied person who is working obviously earn more ? Giving people incentive to work not only helps them rise up but also prevents their exploitation in case they try going to underground economy.
This happens anyway in our current system. Someone who's disabled and unable to work already earns less than someone who's working 50 hours a week in a minimum wage job. Negative income exacerbates that.
> For instance, why use a machine when you can just hire more people?
Politics could become a reason -- the people who are being replaced by machines become a powerful force, have a strong work-based ethic (different from "work ethic"), and care more about their well-being than the overall efficiency of the economy.
Either way, I'm curious to see more adoption of UBI - even if it is a small, homogeneous population. Maybe working class beneficiaries of UBI could dedicate a larger portion of their time to volunteering, or re-training.
One reason that comes to mind is that it would just allow the rich to become richer by providing a cheap workforce subsidised by the tax payer. Imagine if a company wanted to pay less than minimum wage, hire a bunch more people and have their new workers' pay topped up by a negative income tax. It'd just be getting people to work for the sake of working while tax payers subsidise profits for business owners.
If you were to further lower the costs of labour, you risk stymieing actual economic growth which comes from improvements in efficiency. For instance, why use a machine when you can just hire more people?
Also what would the effect on monetary policy be? If this was funded though an income tax, would the lower savings rates of the poor, put more money in circulation, thus increasing inflation? Could you account for the change in prices driven by an increase in demand from those who's labour isn't actually valuable enough to sustain their consumption.
I don't claim to have the answers to welfare, but I really think that we should aim for a solution that provides as little market distortion as possible. I sincerely think that a negative tax would be a huge unwelcome and ineffective distortion in the labour market.