Universal Basic Income Opponents Cite Further Enrichment of the Upper Class as a Downside

Universal basic income (UBI) is a social proposal in which all persons in a given population receive a guaranteed income without conditions. (i.e., without a means test or need to work). It is received independently of any other income and what makes it "basic" is the fact that the amount is sufficient to meet a person's basic needs, at or above the poverty line. No country has yet attempted to implement UBI, and it is generally felt that the chance of such a thing happening is only slightly higher than a snowballs in hell. Typically attacks on UBI come from the right, as one would expect, given that UBI is (probably correctly) viewed as the ultimate welfare program. Of course many of these attacks are lazy, illogical, poorly thought through and easily dismantled, it is the right after all. However, there are some that are legitimate and difficult to counter. Surprisingly UBI also comes under attack from the left, and like there right wing counterparts many of these attacks are nonsensical or very weak, or just plain dumb. One attack from the left which is at least hypothetically plausible has to do with income inequality. It suggests that implementing UBI would only increase the enrichmet of the upper class, and further widen the already wide gap between rich and poor. Proponents of this ideas say this would happen because all the poor people who previously had no extra money to spend on "goods" or digital goods would blow their UBI payments in an orgy of spending madness just as soon as they had the money in their greedy little paws.

There are obviously several problems with this argument, but I will focus on just one key flaw. It presumes that the people who would received UBI would only use it to consume more “goods” and/or digital goods. While this is certainly true for some or perhaps even most persons it is not even close to universally true. There are a percentage of persons who would use said income to for instance; start their own business, travel the world, save it (gasp!), go to college/get educated, buy medicine for themselves or their children, or even give it away to charity. None of these things could be viewed as (primarily) benefiting our digital overloads. We are still free citizens who can make choices, even if they are greatly circumscribed by our financial circumstances. I still think the benefits of UBI (for this set of persons at least) outweighs the theoretical negatives in terms of further enrichment of the upper class. They are getting richer without UBI and they will get richer with it. At least with it some people’s lives will be slightly or perhaps even greatly better off then they would have been without it. In fact, however, further enrichment of the upper class is the only property of UBI which gives it any chance of actually happening. Since the upper classes control all the levers of power in (almost) all societies, if the wealthy feel they could benefit from UBI it might have a shot, if not, forget about it, it will never happen, anywhere.

The interconnectedness of our economy ensures that just about any purchase could be tied to some large digital economy player and increase their profits either directly or indirectly. Even a donation to charity or putting money into a savings account could be shown to have some profit advantage for these large companies given the depth and scope of their reach. That said it does not alter my opinion about the benefits of UBI outweighing the negatives. Even if all of the profits went to the ultra rich the benefits for the receiver of UBI are real, tangible, and felt. With our without UBI the wealthy will continue to get theirs but without UBI everyone else will continue to fall further and further behind. Maybe it is an idea who's time has come?