I've been disparaging of Presidential candidate Andrew Yang. I may have to retreat a bit on my analysis of his main platform, being a monthly check from the G. I must admit I have not researched any of his positions. I only came across the Wages for Housework movement in Britain, and that growing into the Universal Basic Income idea as it has become. Just for breathing oxygen you get money. It is a radical idea, and I will give Yang credit for the proposal. He can carry his own water, though.
My interest is in solutions, not poverty pimp-dom. It has been increasingly apparent to me that people in this country don't want to work. They simply want enough money to fulfill their needs. What does any large corporation - which the US Government is - do when they have too many employees? before laying off and skedaddling to Mexico, that is. Typically, they offer an early retirement package, or buy-out of the contract you signed when you started to work there. This country has a large segment of the population that is raised generationally in social democratic welfare alphabet agencies. They have never worked for a weekly pay check, nor are they ever going to. On the other end of the spectrum, people have worked their entire productive years contributing into Social Security and feel entitled to remove ten times the amount they put in in their lifetimes. Either end put together, these are the unproductive of society, pay stub deduction type, the non-fleeceable. They don't want to work, they simply want money.
There is a movement in Congress now attempting to "reform" (bend over taxpayers) the Pension Benefit Guarantee Board or PBGB federal law bailout for private and institutional pensions. Many corporations have used this to escape liabilities in bankruptcy, the Board paying a dime on a dollar from other plans doing well in this economy. They want to expand the margin to much higher %. If your plan is doing well, funded at 100%, your plan has to pay more into the Deadbeat Club. Chgo and IL have plans going down in flames and Jabba the Pritzker, the current Gov, wants to combine all state plans into one, the floating, nearly fully funded downstate plan has to take on the liability of City of Chicago, Cook County, IL. Some city funds are funded at 30% or less. Public funds are controlled by the City Treasurer and mayoral appointees. State, county and city funds are run politically, the result being an example of pillage and greed on the backs of those doing the work. I wonder how the tradesmen and laborers left hanging by the bankrupt City of Detroit are doing. Good bye pension. Kaput.
ERISA - Employee Retirement Income Security Act is the law, I think Nixon put it in, with some legal protection for private pension agreements and guidelines. Of course, made way too intentionally complicated, but generally run by a Board of a company and worker or organization of employees. Direct contribution like 401(c)3, or defined benefit, a Taft-Hartley plan of Industry and Trades Groups. Money is never defined clearly as a contribution or a deduction on wage package. Most T/H plans are in better, if not good shape. The public plans are Biafra babies of the economy.
My point being after they destroy the current pension arrangement by tossing the lead life preserver of public institutional investors and their fiduciary liability on the private debt side. Socialism at its finest. The State caused the problem, the State solves the problem. The only thing left is Social Security and the clamor will be to put the people screwed out of their contractually negotiated pension by the State, to be placed on another G payroll, at a fraction of the benefit. 'Downsized', if you will. A life time monthly benefit for all the old, disabled and lazy. If only: 1) they pay for their own health care 2) buy their own food 3) find affordable housing 4) find babysitters for their children. They can secure a job without losing the benefit. They are responsible for minor children, in every way, schooling included.
Starting in 2020, every child born will be given a stipend put into his or her Trust account. Upon reaching the 18th birthday without felonious behavior, a check will sent. Accepting the buy out, using the money to start a career or travel, or drug induced coma, there will be no Unemployment Insurance, no food stamps, Aid to Dependent Mothers, SNAP, or any other social program sponsored by G for that person's lifetime. As time goes on all those Welfare Agencies will dry up. The monthly stipend would continue until incompetence or death.
The
Ham and Eggers ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ham_and_Eggs_Movement) were a political party in California in the 30's. Their constituency were mostly old gold miner types of Calaveras, Eldorado, and Placer counties. Every registered voter got $30 a week, straight up. What would that be today, as soon as I figure that up, I'll edit this post.
A Universal Basic Income, with conditions of responsibility, is a radical thought. With a little guaranteed bump in the budget, a person may quit that lousy job, leave that abusive spouse, might have the basics of a healthy life at hand. It's a gamble that the joy of freedom will bloom.
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