Calibrated Basic Income by Derek Van Gorder [pdf]

https://www.greshm.org/files/2025-04-01-calibrated-basic-income.pdf

by Suncho • 1 year ago

56 73 1 year ago

jimnotgym• 1 year ago

I'm interested in this as a faster intervention than QE. $10 given to a low income family will likely be spent that week. $10 of QE will just sit on somebodies balance sheet.

Understanding BI as a tool of monetary policy seems to remove the ideologically charged view we see when it is considered as part of the welfare state

dinfinity• 1 year ago

Another angle: We tell people to "vote with their wallet" to let the better producers rise to the top. That works a lot better if more people actually have something in their wallet to vote with.

dann0• 1 year ago

This doesn't really work because the big firms that consumers boycott have political leverage and magically become too big to fail.

It also presupposes that unregulated capitalism is the best kind of market. But "unregulated market" only means unregulated in ways that benefit people.

BI and UBI are better ways to ensure that the people that governments actually represent are supported when they need it. They are more direct and have quicker market benefits.

What really gets me is that UBI would be great for everyone, even the rich and the big business. It allows more consumers to buy more, ensures only productive, motivated and properly rewarded workers are in the workforce, lets artists create fine art rather than doing meaningless busy work so that they can eat, and even lowers the cost and inefficiencies of social safety nets.

Conservatives can't see how anything can be anything other than a zero sum game. They are always trying to maximise their wealth, they assume that everyone else is too, but really, most of us are just trying to find enough to eat, have a home and stay alive.

They are scared of losing what they have because they want to take what anyone else has. They hide that by saying it's unearned or whatever, but they mostly haven't earned what they have. They have at best grown what they were given. They don't know what it's actually like to have nothing.

creer• 1 year ago

I'm interested in this as a faster intervention than QE.

But BI / UBI's usual argument is that because it would be long term and reliable, it would allow the recipients to make long term choices. Such as taking on an occupation they like rather than one that pays better.

If you make this an intervention medium, you loose this predictability.

The intervention style you discuss has been used during the Covid crisis: just mail checks to people based on last known year income. That's always available. It's not a question of basic income.

trod1234• 1 year ago

Unfortunately, the paper does nothing that I can see to address the criticisms of UBI in general, such as the pivotal 1930-1950 works of Mises on Socialism.

In such an environment, those with the majority marketshare will simply cooperate and adjust their prices upwards through artificial constraint of supply, inevitably creating imbalances which result in chaotic shortfall that will need to damped, and these people do so with a plausible fallback, "we live in chaotic times". The people will need to be bailed out for the shortfall.

Cooperation prevents economic calculation, leading to the chaotic whipsaws described by Mises as the Socialist Calculation Problem.

The only way to dampen the whipsaw is through money printing, and there is a hard upward limit to money printing after which the currency collapses.

That point is what is generally considered stage 3 of a ponzi scheme, after diminishing returns, where outflows exceed inflows. With regards to debt-based money printing (non-reserve/basel3 [based in objective value]), that transforms when GDP < debt growth.

The limit is silently enforced by legitimate market participant producers who exit the market once profit can no longer be made (as the stable store of value is debased and as a monetary property is lost). Since most companies use financial engineering, the time when this is noticed will be long after the critical period since that type of engineering decouples decision-making from short term constraints.

This can lead to catastrophic failure, as the dynamics cascade in similar ways to an avalanche, or a dam break where the trigger is not noticed, and the consequences of mass and motion following a conservation of energy cannot be stopped.

While we are talking about the dynamics of human action, which are not nearly as well defined as physics, the dynamics are no less powerful.

KolmogorovComp2• 1 year ago

UBI is first introduced at any arbitrarily low amount higher than $0. The fiscal authority then gradually increases the payout until the maximum-sustainable level of UBI spending is discovered
Notably, since this policy is proposed to be 'funded' by a monetary policy contraction, it in theory requires no tax or consolidation of existing government programs to implement; nor does it necessarily imply a net increase in the overall money supply.'

What happen if this CBI maximum happen to be a very low amount? Too low to be an ‘income’, for example 10$.

I’m saying that because there has been periods where monetary policies have already been very tight [0] (recently following the subprime crash). According to my understanding of the paper, in the periods there would be no leeway to fund this CBI.

[0] https://www.statista.com/statistics/1470953/monthy-fed-funds...

immibis2• 1 year ago

then everyone gets a free $10 Christmas card every year to say thanks for being a citizen, and at least you didn't crash the economy?

mandmandam5• 1 year ago

What happen if this CBI maximum happen to be a very low amount?

It shouldn't need to be pointed out that that's deeply unlikely, but I'll point it out anyway.

The available monetary contraction is orders of magnitude larger. Economic conditions where it would be constrained to such a low level would likely be rare and temporary. And, it's generally accepted that direct cash transfers increase spending.

65106• 1 year ago

Yours is the first comment that suggests you read the article. At least kinda? Not sure anymore.

US banks create, though lending, 10.7 Trillion per year. If money creation though lending was shut down entirely it would work out to something like 3500 per person per month. You would have the same amount of money in circulation.

Rather than trickle down though clogged tubes it would stimulate spending directly. The economy would then greatly favor companies that do things that are useful to citizens.

Lowering interest rates might stimulate some part but I've never seen it affect my paycheck directly. If the measures don't influence peoples salaries their purchase power doesn't change much and the measures have little effect on that part of the economy that is relevant to citizens. You might improve the economy, if you don't improve quality of life simultaneously the economy increasingly becomes something unrelated to human life - which is bad.

KolmogorovComp2• 1 year ago

US banks create, though lending, 10.7 Trillion per year.

for which interest rate? how much was it creating when it was at its lowest rate?

notepad0x905• 1 year ago

I really wish people would learn to keep emotion out of this topic. There is really one ultimate question here: "Is this the best use of our tax dollars?". Not: "Does this feel like the best use of our tax dollars?".

Show me how much UBI saves police departments, social welfare services, the health-care system,etc.. and how many new tax paying consumers it produces. Is it a reliable investment on people or is it a poor gamble? I've been hearing about this since before the 2016 election, there should be ample data on this, instead of speculation. And I have no problem with cities/states re-attempting and retrying new approaches to UBI.

That said, are there any studies or experiments out there where instead of a blind UBI, people are put in a labor pool of some sort where they get guaranteed income but if they're able-bodied they must make themselves available to perform jobs for the state or clients of the state? I'm thinking this should be the alternative to things like prison labor. Again, take the emotion and speculation out of it, what do we have left?

soco• 1 year ago

Politics are lately more and more about emotion (we're under attack!) and speculation (it will be a catastrophe!) so as much as I agree with you, I don't see it happening. Or rather, I don't see this particular argument getting much attention - as real as it might be.

immibis2• 1 year ago

Is politics supposed to be about maximizing the government's money? We saw where that lead with businesses. I thought the government was there to do things that weren't good profit maximizers but made the world better.

logicchains• 1 year ago

In most western countries there are few state-run enterprises so there's little "government's money". There's taxpayer's money, and they care how it's spent.

contravariant• 1 year ago

Politics is supposed to make maximizing money a good idea.

All things being equal (which they're not) it would be a bit odd to choose a policy that ends up being more expensive. Either money doesn't work as it should or it's a bad policy.

In this case the hidden costs of police and health is a lot higher than the hidden cost in what is effectively a purely administrative change.

spacebanana7• 1 year ago

A government is a collection of politicians. Those people are power seekers by definition. Almost always, the increasing the size of the budget under their control increases their power.

maxerickson• 1 year ago

They are saying that a good justification for a UBI would be if it maximized the value obtained with the spending. If $1 spent on basic income were demonstrated to improve society more than $1 of police spending, and so on.

It's of course harder to measure value to society than it is to measure profit, but it is reasonable to consider it when looking at policy proposals.

vintermann• 1 year ago

Show me how much UBI saves police departments, social welfare services, the health-care system, etc

Sure, people can do that, but remember that it's impossible to measure wealth without distributional concerns. Whenever you ask "will this make us richer", there's an implied wealth distribution in the question, since what's valuable depends on who has money.

notepad0x905• 1 year ago

I'm asking more in the lines of "will this sort of and roughly make for its cost by savings elsewhere, resulting in minimal cost to tax payers?"

65106• 1 year ago

I really wish people would learn to keep emotion out of this topic.

Emotions are the fuzzy result of billions of years of experience. We are capable of great things if the mind set is right. The mind set is almost entirely emotional. You are curious, you learn, you interact with others, you set goals, you accomplish things. If others do the same we can be proud together. It takes very little to disrupt this process and create people who don't give a fuck anymore.

I get that you want things to be analytically sound as anything else would be worthy of paranoia. Just read the article and see it is exactly what you've asked for.

mihaic2• 1 year ago

I think it's even rational to not keep emotion completely out of something like this, since UBI is not meant to maximize economic output, it's meant to improve the quality of life for most people.

In order to asses how that quality of life can be improved, it's necessary to treat humans as humans, and not as some automatons for which a specific KPI needs to be maximized. Any proper assessment of quality of life has to have some instinctive component that models the human element, even if it's only used to picking what weighted set of metrics should measure quality of life.

notepad0x905• 1 year ago

This take is too far removed from reality. There isn't even a good minimum wage for people who want to and can actually work. employment laws are too much against workers and for employers. there are endless social issues that require funding, why would UBI be a good idea given all that?

Yeah, treat humans as humans. the disabled, the elderly, the mentally ill, those who can't care for themselves, they should get help first right? Some situations are not zero-sum, this however is a zero-sum situation where UBI is funded by tax payers who would rather see their money spent elsewhere.

Either it is a general solution that addresses many social issues or it is a welfare program. If it is welfare then it needs to reflect society's appetite on who should get assistance. I do think even when the scope is narrow, it is better than what we have today where you really have to fight tooth and nail and surrender your privacy and dignity to get things like food stamps. But wealth distribution itself needs a huge shake up as well as a dramatic increase in taxation before UBI can be practical at a national level.

neilwilson• 1 year ago

The biggest set of data points comes from the most obvious and widespread UBI - the state pension. Available to a certain section of the population

That's how all UBIs thus far appear to work. You need a fixed exchange rate area where some people don't get the UBI so that the physical output that actually funds it can be extracted from the people who don't receive it. That separation can be physical area, or age.

We can see from the state pension that the majority of people in receipt of it don't work. Instead they live off the output of others.

If UBI was a realistic possibility then the age at which people receive the state pension would be heading down towards 18 (since a UBI is just a state pension where the qualification age is the age of majority). The data tells us that the qualification age for retirement pensions is heading upwards, due to a lack of productivity gains to support it.

We also see complaints about its existence, which demonstrate that the capital inheritance maintained by the older generation and handed over to the young is not seen as sufficient to justify the state pension payment given to the old. Capital hasn't been maintained well enough and doesn't give enough to younger people. To the extent that younger people are agitating to have the state pension reduced or removed.

Switch 'old' and 'young' for 'in area' and 'out of area' and you see why UBI 'experiments' always end or are ended. Those who end up working to create the material output that actually funds the transfer get fed up getting nothing material in return and have the transfer stopped.

Somebody has to do the work to grow the carrots. If you aren't doing anything meaningful in return, (which means what the carrot grower wants you to do, not what you want to do) why won't they stop growing carrots when they have enough for themselves, and have Fridays off?

mandmandam5• 1 year ago

Empirical evidence from UBI pilots shows most recipients continue working. This invalidates your entire analogy and comment.

However there are still some other points worth making:

1. No, pensions and UBI are different things. Asserting that 18 year olds will react the same as 70 year olds to receiving enough money to live on isn't just against the actual evidence, but against really basic common sense.

2. Without getting too into the weeds, UBI doesn't mean that no one works. It changes the bargaining power of the poorest and most taken advantage of. The carrots will still get grown, but it won't be by abused laborers in de facto slavery.

3. "The data tells us that the qualification age for retirement pensions is heading upwards, due to a lack of productivity gains to support it" - False. Productivity has risen for 50 years. Wages have not risen to match.

Somebody has to do the work to grow the carrots. If you aren't doing anything meaningful in return, (which means what the carrot grower wants you to do, not what you want to do)

You seem very confused. The person who does the work to grow carrots is the carrot grower. The person who owns the land and imports seasonal workers 10 to a cabin is an exploiter.

forinti• 1 year ago

A labor pool would add bureaucratic costs and also UBI is a bonus for many, not their sole source of income.

facile3232• 1 year ago

There is really one ultimate question here: "Is this the best use of our tax dollars?".

The government has far more ways of financing things than taxes. I’m not sure why we refer to money this way—it’s fundamentally disingenuous. A federal budget is not the same thing as a household budget in any way.

notepad0x905• 1 year ago

That argument makes no sense, I don't care that the government has other revenue sources, those revenue sources still belong to the people. The government doesn't have its own money, it manages its people's monies. And UBI at significant cost only makes sense if the people agree to that cost.

DonaldFisk3• 1 year ago

There is really one ultimate question here: "Is this the best use of our tax dollars?". Not: "Does this feel like the best use of our tax dollars?".

There have been numerous pilot studies, e.g. those listed on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_basic_income . The problem is that opponents of UBI invariably point out that as only some people received it, and only for a limited time, that it wasn't universal, or that it took place in in some other country, or decades ago, so it doesn't apply in their country, or today.

Show me how much UBI saves police departments, social welfare services, the health-care system,etc.

Its purpose is to ensure that everyone has their basic financial needs met, not to provide those particular government services.

notepad0x905• 1 year ago

Its purpose is to ensure that everyone has their basic financial needs met, not to provide those particular government services.

The government is run by the people. If it increases cost to tax payers over all then the tax payers (people/voters) have every right to oppose this. Even social security alone (for elderly people who can't care for themselves) is untenable, the government has been borrowing from social security funds for decades. Many millennials are at risk of paying for SS their whole lives only to find it can't actually support them at their old age. UBI doesn't make sense at-cost.

The reasonable arguments I've heard state that homelessness, crime, medical cost and similar things will have reduced cost, in which case, sure, why not. But there are a long list of things that need funding long before UBI, if it is at-cost. Another good example is minimum wage, does it make sense to have such a low federal minimum wage and impose UBI on top of that?

arijun• 1 year ago

Perhaps not police departments, but proponents do claim it reduces the stress on social programs. If it allows people to put money where it's needed, then they might need those programs less. An ounce of prevention and all that.

tgv• 1 year ago

I really wish people would learn to keep emotion out of this topic. There is really one ultimate question here: "Is this the best use of our tax dollars?".

That's what you feel. You've already introduced emotion, by using the highly subjective word "best", and the loaded phrase "our tax dollars."

Show me how much UBI saves police departments, social welfare services,

And yet, there is more to UBI than savings. It's also proposed as a means to give people more freedom. Your choice to look at savings betrays an emotional attachment to economic value over all else. But that's not the same for everyone.

That said, I do not believe UBI can ever live up to its goals, and can actually create a worse society, even after initial success. That alone makes it subject to speculation and emotion. The effect of UBI simply isn't predictable. Economists can't even predict a moderate crisis when it's about to unfold, let alone the long term consequences of a radical system change.

UBI is hence a political choice, and one that's tied to personal expectations and hope.

bsenftner9• 1 year ago

There is really one ultimate question here: "Is this the best use of our tax dollars?"

This attitude right here is why UBI will never exist without being a farce, a trap, and those that go on UBI regulated to institutionalized misery.

Plain fact: humans do not give gifts without expecting returns. UBI violates this basic tenant. No, the economic activity generated by UBI is not enough, that's a flat wash, the returns need to be just like investments.

ElevenLathe• 1 year ago

The emotional valence of a policy does actually matter, since you have to sell it to voters (or whoever is in charge in a society). Technocratic governance is not a stable way to run society, as the last 30 years have shown. Any political agenda with a hope of being enacted needs to stir the heart in order to have any hope competing against others. The fact that a policy is provably a good idea and would make everyone better off in a theoretical world where everyone went along with it, is not even necessary let alone sufficient for it to become a real policy.

veltas3• 1 year ago

The issue with the current system is it gives a lot of money and power to banks, and finance.

The issue with the proposed system, is that debt is actually a good thing for normal people. For example if you are young, productive, and come from a poor background, then you might buy a house with a mortgage. If debt is more expensive, then you are less likely -- and older people (and rich kids) are more likely -- to be able to afford these houses.

You might say that the current system is unfair, because wealthy people won't need loans and can put their money to work exploiting poor people. But in a system where we redistribute wealth this way, the impact is harshest on the poorest people. The things that are limited in supply and high in demand will immediately go up in price. The things they wish they could buy, and plan long-term, will become unattainable. And I've not even gotten onto how this would affect productivity.

Everyone is focused on how the rich are getting richer. This is inevitable in liberal societies. The goal should instead be to stop the poor getting poorer, and I'm going to need some serious convincing that handing people a CBI, instead of providing debt, is going to actually benefit and not hurt them and the whole economy.

dominicrose• 1 year ago

What you are talking about is inflation, which is due to more demand or lower supply. Lowering demand or raising supply is the solution. Since lowering demand is anti-human it seems raising supply is the only way.

veltas3• 1 year ago

Except people don't eat money, so raising supply needs to be done in a way that won't kill the economy.

mandmandam5• 1 year ago

Everyone is focused on how the rich are getting richer. This is inevitable in liberal societies. The goal should instead be to stop the poor getting poorer

These things are fundamentally connected. When the wealthy have too much power, they squeeze the middle and the poor too hard.

Unlike much else in life, the pool of money is a zero-sum game (though this is addressed in the paper, notably). When 3 Americans hold more wealth than 50% of the rest of us, that's a real problem. This historic and rising inequality leads nowhere good, and we are in existential crises which require that this be properly addressed.

veltas3• 1 year ago

Focusing on 'wealth inequality' usually leads to policies that hurt the economy, and make us all poorer, and actually increase the inequality. It hurts poor people more than the rich when we make bad economic decisions, and this paper proposes just such a decision. What can we do that won't backfire? We need a strong economy to help poor people.

mertbio• 1 year ago

If people are paying a significant portion of their salaries, one-third or even half, towards rent, does it truly make sense to implement UBI? In my opinion, the answer is no. Instead, we should focus on establishing a Universal Basic Land: https://mertbulan.com/2025/03/02/we-need-universal-basic-lan...

Mithriil• 1 year ago

It seems to me that receiving a piece of land could be a liability. Some probably likes the freedom to choose where they live. Thus receiving money that one uses to pay rent is better than receiving by lottery a piece of land in the middle of nowhere. Some pieces of land live under municipal/regional rules that forces the user to take care of it in some way (build, prune trees, etc.)

An option to choose UB land or UB income when reaching 18yo might be an interesting compromise.

sn9• 1 year ago

Maybe funding CBI with a land value tax.

dwighttk• 1 year ago

In Alaska you have UBI and it comes from the state selling oil… where does the money come from for pie-in the-sky UBI?

mgoetzke• 1 year ago

Basically all industry, all commerce pays dividends/taxes and those get distributed.

People that use their money to invest (time or money) into good companies will profit more, people that use it for just consumption will remain low 'income'.

When companies succeed as a whole (eg move to all solar,robots,ai) all 'shareholders' will benefit. one of those will be the UBI program

emmacharp• 1 year ago

It comes from socially produced wealth and ressources, like all public services?

muth02446• 1 year ago

Aren't there other oil-rich nations that essentially have UBI and could serve as a data point.

ninalanyon• 1 year ago

Not any that are in other important ways comparable. Kuwait has it I think.

bsenftner9• 1 year ago

Every opinion on UBI is short sighted, and does not understand the macroeconomic poison that is UBI. Our economy, all economies, have lowered ethics players operating at the top of each economy. UBI institutionalizes these low ethics players, as well as institutionalizes the UBI recipients and forever casts their offspring into those economic roles. UBI is nothing less than the death of hope and the elimination of any economic ladder up and out of one's birth situation. The only path is stagnant or down.

gampleman• 1 year ago

Can you explain this a bit more?

bsenftner9• 1 year ago

See my comment below explaining a bit more

mandmandam5• 1 year ago

As if current economic structures don’t already entrench powerful players? Lol.

CBI, as outlined in the paper, is funded through monetary contraction; meaning it does not introduce traditional taxation distortions or increase government control over industry.

If anything, UBI/CBI reduces dependence on hierarchical employment structures by providing individuals with a baseline income. This allows more freedom to reject exploitative labor conditions.

Historical evidence suggests that when people receive unconditional income (eg, Alaska’s Permanent Fund Dividend), entrepreneurial activity and workforce participation generally increase.

institutionalizes the UBI recipients and forever casts their offspring into those economic roles

Poverty traps generally result from means-tested welfare programs, not unconditional income.

Many existing welfare programs disincentivize work because earning more means losing benefits. CBI is not means-tested, so earning more does not reduce benefits. If anything, it provides a safety net that makes risk-taking easier.

Pilot programs in Finland, Canada, and the U.S. show that UBI does not significantly reduce employment. In Kenya, cash transfers increased education rates and business activity among recipients, breaking generational poverty cycles.

If you want to declare things like "every opinion but mine is short sighted", it's generally best practice to demonstrate that you understand the relevant arguments and data.

bsenftner9• 1 year ago

It does not matter how bad the current economic structures are, they have a path out. "Trickle down economics" sounded good at the time too, and now it is recognized as a farce. UBI is a bigger farce. There are at least two major issues with UBI:

1) Any system that does not provide an upward ladder to the economic top, despite being better at the bottom, is not better in whole and is actually negative for the species as a whole. Hope and the ability to better one's situation is essential. UBI and it's variants institutionalize economic positions, and that destroys hope short of an overthrowing revolution.

2) UBI will exist in our social human Capitalistic world where any and all expenditures are eyed for reduction. Those on UBI (or what ever name it ends up having) will observe a gradual reduction of their UBI and a gradual criminalization of their economic parasitism. This is human culture. This reduction of the "economic waste" that is UBI is inevitable. Humans do not give gifts for any lasting duration without oversized returns.

Just look at the top posts: they ask "is this the best use of our tax dollars?" as in once UBI is active, such attitudes will immediately seek to reduce it.

65106• 1 year ago

I suppose the question is if controlling the economy with a single lever for interest rate is a poor solution. The answer seems an obvious yes.

I've always thought a basic income should start with 10 bucks so that we can figure out the logistics of it. Have real world data on how hard it is to implement.

throw0101b• 1 year ago

In Luke Martinelli published a paper about a (U)BI trilemma:

As basic income (BI) has ascended the policy agenda, so proposals have come under increasing scrutiny for their affordability and adequacy for meeting need. One common objection to BI has been that it is impossible to design a scheme that simultaneously conforms to these two criteria. In this article, I develop a conceptual framework for analysing the trade-offs that afflict BI policy design. I suggest that while the idea of a policy dilemma between affordability and adequacy does indeed afflict 'full' BI schemes, it is possible to design an affordable and adequate 'partial' BI scheme. However, this comes at the cost of (at least partly) forfeiting some key advantages that motivate interest in BI in the first place, since these only arise as a consequence of the elimination of means testing and related conditionality from the welfare system. Thus, BI proponents face a three-way trade-off in policy design between affordability, adequacy, and securing the full advantages of BI as a radical simplification of existing welfare policy. The trilemma is illustrated with reference to original microsimulation evidence for the UK, which demonstrates that at most two of the three criteria can be achieved in a single scheme.

* https://researchportal.bath.ac.uk/en/publications/a-basic-in...

* PDF: https://purehost.bath.ac.uk/ws/portalfiles/portal/196619819/...

rspoerri• 1 year ago

By subsidizing aspects such as schools, police and other govermental institutions a basic payout / investions to the public is already in place. Expanding this to other basic rights would be reasonable and prevent a lot of social problems that will only heavily increase in the future. And im not talking about the country that currently abolishes all good reason and gambles with social security. Basic aspects such as shelter, food and personal security should be given as a basic right.

Calibrated Basic Income by Derek Van Gorder [pdf]

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