Universal Basic Income: Could it save rural America?
Population distribution like you've never seen before
When some Americans hear universal basic income they hear socialism, communism, Marxism, or any of the other isms that scare the middle class. As an American I will admit that’s where my mind went when I first heard this concept. (Mostly because I was literally talking to a communist, but that seems arbitrary at this point) The idea, as I understand it, goes as follows: Every single person gets a basic income.
I’m going to include a pic in every pub, and I’ll probably keep this format of putting it in after the first paragraph
That’s the idea, free money. Simple, sweet, and effective if I may say so.
Now, we could get into the weeds about whether or not it actually works with statistics, facts, graphs, blah blah BLAH. But, that’s not the point of what I’m saying. I’m merely pointing out a version of this idea that I think could work in the U.S.
My idea is that we incorporate universal basic income in the U.S. as a replacement for social programs such as welfare (more like workfare, amirite?). Leftists hate the idea of eliminating huge, bloated systems that are ultimately flawed in the nature of the bureaucratic existence. Ultimately, we live in a constant battle of funding, un-funding, regulating, deregulating, and down right underhandedness. We have devolved into a government full entities that could survive peacefully in reality.
Now, there are great social programs, but on the whole they’re too confusing and we fight about them too much. Raise the minimum wage, great now people don’t have healthcare. Healthcare for all, great now those people are sold out to private companies. The never ending battle between American republicans and democrats is nauseating, and we’re seeing that play out in the most extreme forms.
A staple of my ideals is that I loath the American false dichotomy, and I believe it is one of our root issues among many more. There are MORE THAN TWO solutions to every problem, and quite honestly the system we have never creates fantastic solutions on either side. To that point, no one can ever actually be right because, even if they were, the other side would throw a wrench in their plans and spoil any good ideas that might actually be effective if given a chance. The U.S. is designed to run trial ideas on a state to state basis, not overreaching federal government imposing its ever-changing will…
Woah woah woah, timeout! I’ve been derailed we’re way too far off track. It’s time to rerail this thing (see what I did there? ;)
Rant over, playing field level, false dichotomy strong as ever :(
We have already seen a couple stimmys roll out to us Americans (myself included), and we have seen an economy push full steam ahead through a pandemic despite massive losses to mostly anyone who isn’t rich (big sad). As it turns out, giving Americans money is pretty favorable, and I would argue could have even gotten Trump reelected hadn’t Mitch McConnell had a secret plot against him (maybe I’ll do a piece on that in the future). In truth, Americans like being handed money when most people get included. Some people are scared by the debt that causes, but again we could afford it if we eliminate the broken social systems.
Don’t think of it like a free handout from the government. Think of it more like the U.S. government is employing its citizens as American consumers.
A universal basic income system would tremendously boost the buying power that Americans have. Instead a bunch of people with little money making up most of the consumer force, there would be everyone with enough money to run up consumerism and create exponentially more buying power for Americans. Especially in a post-pandemic economy that needs a recharge. After all, it’s what we’re good at. Why not play to our strengths?
Now for my main idea. In this system, everyone gets free money, but depending on where you live you get more! I’m not talking based on cost of living (although, that would be accounted for) I’m talking about population density. I consider myself a YIMBY, and that housing is a real crisis in the U.S. Especially when millions of people can’t afford their rent, and are forced to look for cheaper housing.
Now, I’ve formulated that the basic income amount would be a certain percentage based on the cost of living in your area. Say we set the UBI to 90%. Americans would receive a check every month for 90% of the cost of living in their area. Ideally it would always be 100%, but I could foresee the UBI percentage being adjusted based on the state of the local economy. Likely that percentage would ultimately result in what democrats and republicans argue about in this system.
Also, I am not an economist, and I’m definitely not smart enough to figure out what the UBI percentage should be. (maybe I will just to prove myself wrong, but it definitely won’t be any time soon)
Regardless, I’m saying let’s take that percentage and beef it up in rural communities. The more rural, the more beef. Let’s allow for rural, middle class people to not only take back the buying power but also encourage them to STAY rural middle class.
Let’s allow people who have less opportunities live comfortably and want to live in places they otherwise couldn’t afford on their own. Bigots might worry about their precious property value once minorities would be able to afford living in their neighborhood, but that’s a whole different take on this. (I’d even propose artificially propping up property value at first in this system to avoid the issue entirely)
As I understand the issue of overpopulation (as it relates to the U.S.) it goes that too many people are leaving dried-up, rural communities and moving to large metropolitan areas to seek better opportunity. It’s not a reproduction issue, it’s the fact that those kids are leaving once they get a college degree. It’s the fact of life that there’s just more jobs in bigger cities. (I even plan to do this in the future because really it makes the most economic sense to me)
It’s not really about pulling people out of cities and moving them to the middle of nowhere. It’s taking those places in the middle of nowhere and making them somewhere. (Bare with me, I read that and I’m letting it stand) It’s about keeping people in rural areas while also attracting people who are looking to live in more rural areas.
After all, isn’t that the middle class dream? To raise a family in a rural community where everyone knows everyone, everybody gets along, and you can live on 5 acres. I’m saying let’s make those dreams a lot more possible.
Also, people wouldn’t feel so pressured to go to college and get meaningless degrees. I believe education is a right, but not a mandatory life sentence. No more propping up hedge funds that are disguised as Universities. In this system the workforce in the U.S. would be astronomical because it would no longer matter how much money people made. We could bring jobs back to the U.S. because people would be willing to work for significantly less. That would also end the minimum wage, and usher in a new era of Americans.
In this system, I believe that the middle class could bounce back from years of abuse, and that people in poverty could be drawn out of cities to move into small towns. Universal basic income already solves a lot of problems, but if it is done right, it could solve a lot more than originally intended.
My next publish; Leftist, Liberal Elitism: Redundantly, politically correct
P.S. (For next publish) In the late summer 2020, I had a close, trusted colleague (you’ll know who you are if you read this) recommend to me a book called “Humankind by Rutger Bregman” and ever since then I have been opened up to a whole new array of ideas and concepts. As a political science major I became extremely cynical because I wanted to be ‘smart’ when in reality I fell into a nasty cycle of liberal elitism and how that leads to muddy subjects like white saviorism and other bad stuff (more on that later, but for now here’s some links)
This link doesn’t exist yet, because I’ll explain it in my next post ;)
Thank you, that’s the zip.
I am currently reading, The Color of Law by Richard Rothstein, and a paragraph regarding population density made me think of and revisit this post. I don't know my full take yet but this was an attempt for dialogue! Is this how it's supposed to work?