Simplified welfare state

OK, I think people aren't understanding what I'm saying, so just to be clear.

Lets say minimum wage here is £6.08 per hour (approx $10 per hour). Since decimal numbers make more sense to me, lets go with a minimum of $10 per hour for further calculations.

Full Time IMO is 37.5 hours per week (8 hours a day minus half hour lunch break), for ~52 weeks per year. So lets set welfare at that level:
52*37.5*10 = $19,500 per annum.

Everyone then is guaranteed that much. I would then phase out welfare at no higher a rate than taxation. I as an average earner get taxed at about 32% of income (tax plus NI), so cap welfare phasing at 32% too.

Then if someone who is working full time they would get:
$19,500 they've earned + $19,500 (maximum welfare) * 0.68 (minus phasing/taxation). Which is then $19,500 + $13,260 = $32,760 take home pay. As they're still on welfare they pay not a cent in taxes.

Anyone working then would be significantly better off than anyone unemployed.

Under this simplified system the crossover point is about $61k: anyone earning under $61,000 would get welfare, anyone earning over $61,000 would pay tax, nobody would get both.

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Originally Posted by RandBlade

OK, I think people aren't understanding what I'm saying, so just to be clear.

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I don't think you understand just how different your system would be from that in the United States.

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Lets say minimum wage here is £6.08 per hour (approx $10 per hour). Since decimal numbers make more sense to me, lets go with a minimum of $10 per hour for further calculations.

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And here the Federally mandated minimum wage is $7.25. Some states have higher, but the Federal minimum is again $7.25 per hour.

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Full Time IMO is 37.5 hours per week (8 hours a day minus half hour lunch break), for ~52 weeks per year.

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Full Time is 40 hours per week, 8 hours per day of work (30 minute lunch breaks are not included in the total and are unpaid), for ~52 weeks per year.

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So lets set welfare at that level:
52*37.5*10 = $19,500 per annum.

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52 * 40 * 7.25 = $15,080 per annum.

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Everyone then is guaranteed that much. I would then phase out welfare at no higher a rate than taxation. I as an average earner get taxed at about 32% of income (tax plus NI), so cap welfare phasing at 32% too.

Then if someone who is working full time they would get:
$19,500 they've earned + $19,500 (maximum welfare) * 0.68 (minus phasing/taxation). Which is then $19,500 + $13,260 = $32,760 take home pay. As they're still on welfare they pay not a cent in taxes.

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So right now with your system I'm going to take home nearly $12k more per year (I'm uncertain how phasing would work in as I'm making above minimum wage in the US, but just barely above your minimum wage)...and also no longer have to pay taxes (About 1/5th of my income now goes to State and Federal taxes).

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Anyone working then would be significantly better off than anyone unemployed.

Under this simplified system the crossover point is about $61k: anyone earning under $61,000 would get welfare, anyone earning over $61,000 would pay tax, nobody would get both.

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Again...whats the plan for when Lewkowski-esque Republicans flip out? We already see Cain and Ogre protesting a minimum wage increase, I can only imagine this would not make them happy either.

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Originally Posted by Illusions

I don't think you understand just how different your system would be from that in the United States.

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That's kind of the point, this is not a real system its a proposal.

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And here the Federally mandated minimum wage is $7.25. Some states have higher, but the Federal minimum is again $7.25 per hour.

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Again, it should be set at the right level not whatever level it is today. My figures were just to demonstrate.

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Full Time is 40 hours per week, 8 hours per day of work (30 minute lunch breaks are not included in the total and are unpaid), for ~52 weeks per year.

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Are you not double-counting? What are standard working hours? Normal here is "9-5" as the song says, so that's 7.5 hours if you exclude lunch.

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So right now with your system I'm going to take home nearly $12k more per year (I'm uncertain how phasing would work in as I'm making above minimum wage in the US, but just barely above your minimum wage)...and also no longer have to pay taxes (About 1/5th of my income now goes to State and Federal taxes).

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Do you object to that?

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Again...whats the plan for when Lewkowski-esque Republicans flip out? We already see Cain and Ogre protesting a minimum wage increase, I can only imagine this would not make them happy either.

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Yet its the left attacking me? I expected to be attacked from the right, unusually for this forum.

I don't think 90% income taxes are right for anyone, yet that's what we currently "tax" the poor in order to insure you get no welfare and pay taxes. Plus there's a lot of giving with one hand, taking with the other, which would be eliminated in my system.

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Originally Posted by RandBlade

That's kind of the point, this is not a real system its a proposal.

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A proposal should theoretically be possible or at least plausible. I have a greater chance of being elected King of the United States of America than this proposal ever passing.

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Are you not double-counting? What are standard working hours? Normal here is "9-5" as the song says, so that's 7.5 hours if you exclude lunch.

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I worked 9 - 5:30 today. Thirty minutes of that was lunch. I was paid for 8. If I work 39 hours in a week instead of 40, I was actually at my job for 41.5 (39 + .5*5). Retail in the United States is different. Ever work a shift one day from 2 PM to 11:30 PM, then the next day work from 6 AM - 3 PM? No? Welcome to retail in the United States.

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Do you object to that?

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Passing up free money that kind of free money would be stupid, but I don't see how it is even remotely feasible to implement, or what problems would be solved that would make us better off than the problems it would create.

Do you think its right that the poor face an effective tax rate of 90%?

Still don't get this system for simplified welfare, so far you have only spoken about non-taxation of a minimum income and how people who work besides recieving welfare should benefit from this. But I still have no idea at all what welfare means in your simplified system.

Don't you think you should know what you want before you start thinking how to pay for it (and of course if that is affordable).

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Originally Posted by RandBlade

Do you think its right that the poor face an effective tax rate of 90%?

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I'm sorry but you kind of lost me there. Even without doubling the pay of someone on minimum wage, they pay zero taxes in your scheme, so how would they have an effective tax rate of 90%?

I don't really see why you would put the minimum wage on ~12k, and then hand out another 12k just like that, and it seems like massive entitlements.

edit: nvm, read it again, I get your point.

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Originally Posted by Hazir

Still don't get this system for simplified welfare, so far you have only spoken about non-taxation of a minimum income and how people who work besides recieving welfare should benefit from this. But I still have no idea at all what welfare means in your simplified system.

Don't you think you should know what you want before you start thinking how to pay for it (and of course if that is affordable).

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This system would ensure everyone a minimum income of welfare (even if unemployed) but would remain paying it to people long after they're earning an income. This'd remove any existent disincentives to work and Make Work Pay. There'd be zero incentive to stay at home as while you're getting enough to survive, if you put the effort in you get to keep what you earn.

The problem is people look at tax and understand it to be tax. They look at welfare to help the poor and think [insert viewpoint here] but the removal of welfare is a tax by another name. Once you think along those lines, why should we tax the poor so much? Every time we add another means-tested benefit, that's another tax on aspirational poor people.

This system could be more expensive, but I'd be happier paying taxes for a fairer system like this that encourages people to earn themselves more (thereby costing us less) than the existing Poverty Trap which I find morally wrong.

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Originally Posted by Illusions

Full Time is 40 hours per week, 8 hours per day of work (30 minute lunch breaks are not included in the total and are unpaid), for ~52 weeks per year.

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Well we have 42 hours per week (netto) and 48 weeks per year.

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Originally Posted by RandBlade

This system would ensure everyone a minimum income of welfare (even if unemployed) but would remain paying it to people long after they're earning an income. This'd remove any existent disincentives to work and Make Work Pay. There'd be zero incentive to stay at home as while you're getting enough to survive, if you put the effort in you get to keep what you earn.

The problem is people look at tax and understand it to be tax. They look at welfare to help the poor and think [insert viewpoint here] but the removal of welfare is a tax by another name. Once you think along those lines, why should we tax the poor so much? Every time we add another means-tested benefit, that's another tax on aspirational poor people.

This system could be more expensive, but I'd be happier paying taxes for a fairer system like this that encourages people to earn themselves more (thereby costing us less) than the existing Poverty Trap which I find morally wrong.

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So why don't you call it what it is? What you describe appears to be a tax-credit system.

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Originally Posted by RandBlade

I would propose a few changes:


4: Welfare payments (and thus Minimum Wage and the start of taxation) should be sufficient so we don't have anyone in real poverty.

I would consider these 4 premises to be "fair" and reasonable.

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Number 4 is impossible. People will still piss away money due to bad decisions. Even if a single man can live on 20k a year for example (easily done) a subsection of those 20k will get pay day loans, buy too much car, waste money on gambling or other vices and still 'need' assistance when they get thrown of their apartment or home. And there you have poverty again.

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Originally Posted by Hazir

So why don't you call it what it is? What you describe appears to be a tax-credit system.

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Negative Income Tax is the proper name for it.

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Originally Posted by Lewkowski

Number 4 is impossible. People will still piss away money due to bad decisions. Even if a single man can live on 20k a year for example (easily done) a subsection of those 20k will get pay day loans, buy too much car, waste money on gambling or other vices and still 'need' assistance when they get thrown of their apartment or home. And there you have poverty again.

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Is that poverty though? Is Charlie Sheen spends all his money today on crack and hookers then is his problem tomorrow one of poverty?

Ok, I don't like it already. Main reason for not liking it is that it turns a very important principle upside down; people should first take care of themselves, then if it is shown they can't do that the state may have some role in gripping them under the arms. I don't like ideas that work the other way round. You're sort of telling everybody on a low income to install trainer wheels even if they know perfectly well how to ride a bike.

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Originally Posted by Illusions

Again...whats the plan for when Lewkowski-esque Republicans flip out? We already see Cain and Ogre protesting a minimum wage increase, I can only imagine this would not make them happy either.

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Actually, the thing about Cain, is that he's not a high school drop out, and therefore doesn't really give a shit about the minimum wage. As I pointed out, increasing the minimum wage actually has the effect of hurting the very people that minimum wage laws are supposedly created to help, so it's just another example of government's incredible capacity to fuck up any and every endeavor it embarks on.

It doesn't impact me, or influence my emotional state one way or another... and minimum wage moronery would be the very least of the sins for which I'd hold our overlords to account for, in point of fact. Like charging one of those school shooters with littering for failing to collect or properly dispose of his brass. Yeah, sure, technically they're all guilty of littering too, but that hardly matters compared to the dozen+ counts of capital murder.

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Originally Posted by RandBlade

Negative Income Tax is the proper name for it.
Is that poverty though? Is Charlie Sheen spends all his money today on crack and hookers then is his problem tomorrow one of poverty?

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I'd say poverty is not having the immediate means in order to acquire a minimal subsistence level of goods and services to include shelter and food. So if Mr. Sheen goes flat broke and can't afford things like a room and board then yeah he's in poverty.

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Originally Posted by Illusions

I worked 9 - 5:30 today. Thirty minutes of that was lunch. I was paid for 8. If I work 39 hours in a week instead of 40, I was actually at my job for 41.5 (39 + .5*5). Retail in the United States is different. Ever work a shift one day from 2 PM to 11:30 PM, then the next day work from 6 AM - 3 PM? No? Welcome to retail in the United States.

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Welcome to life. I worked 41.5 hours by the time I went home on Tuesday (last week). And worked another ~40 the rest of the week. And got paid for 40. It's not a retail in the US thing, as much as it's life outside-of-Soviet-colonized areas.

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Originally Posted by RandBlade

Do you think its right that the poor face an effective tax rate of 90%?

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Yes. Does that make me a baby-eating fat-cat or something? TANSTAAFL.

Someone's gotta pay for all those social programs that the poor use, may as well be the same people who use them and demand they continue to exist. Personally, I think the better option would be to let people keep their money, and remark on how they're not "poor" anymore, now that the government isn't "helping" by taking most of their money... but that's not on option, given that the average voter is dumber than dog shit and wouldn't be on board with a proposal that would actually benefit them.

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Originally Posted by Lewkowski

I'd say poverty is not having the immediate means in order to acquire a minimal subsistence level of goods and services to include shelter and food. So if Mr. Sheen goes flat broke and can't afford things like a room and board then yeah he's in poverty.

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That's not a workable definition of poverty, because "immediate" is too vague. Probably why you don't understand that some working poor rely on pay-day lenders for "immediate" needs, like gas for the car, until their next paycheck.

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Originally Posted by CitizenCain

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Someone's gotta pay for all those social programs that the poor use, may as well be the same people who use them and demand they continue to exist. Personally, I think the better option would be to let people keep their money, and remark on how they're not "poor" anymore, now that the government isn't "helping" by taking most of their money... but that's not on option, given that the average voter is dumber than dog shit and wouldn't be on board with a proposal that would actually benefit them.

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Which "social programs" do you mean? Does that include public education?

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Originally Posted by RandBlade

This system would ensure everyone a minimum income of welfare (even if unemployed) but would remain paying it to people long after they're earning an income. This'd remove any existent disincentives to work and Make Work Pay. There'd be zero incentive to stay at home as while you're getting enough to survive, if you put the effort in you get to keep what you earn.

The problem is people look at tax and understand it to be tax. They look at welfare to help the poor and think [insert viewpoint here] but the removal of welfare is a tax by another name. Once you think along those lines, why should we tax the poor so much? Every time we add another means-tested benefit, that's another tax on aspirational poor people.

This system could be more expensive, but I'd be happier paying taxes for a fairer system like this that encourages people to earn themselves more (thereby costing us less) than the existing Poverty Trap which I find morally wrong.

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Seems to me you're mixing process with principle. Or conflating "taxes" with "welfare". I'd agree with you that we have a poverty trap, which is morally reprehensible. But I'd prefer a progressive tax system that invests in things like public education and public health. It might be "more expensive" in the short term to certain groups of tax payers, and they may whine like stuck pigs, but in the long run....it would be better for a whole nation to have a well educated and competitive populace.

You don't have schools in the US?

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Originally Posted by RandBlade

You don't have schools in the US?

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I understand how reading GGT's posts may lead one to that conclusion, but I can assure you that there absolutely are school in the US. I've seen several with my own eyes, and have even slept in a couple. :downcast:

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Originally Posted by RandBlade

You don't have schools in the US?

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I think she meant that they don't have a sufficiently well educated and competitive populace. Unless you think investing is the same as getting the results one wishes for/dreams of.

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Originally Posted by RandBlade

You don't have schools in the US?

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Originally Posted by Aimless

I think she meant that they don't have a sufficiently well educated and competitive populace. Unless you think investing is the same as getting the results one wishes for/dreams of.

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Our public schools are funded predominantly by local/state property taxes. The schools in poor areas don't necessarily get the funds they need to provide a great education to every child in those districts, while richer areas end up with Olympic sized swimming pools, college sized sports arenas, and state-of-the-art technology. I'm sure you can figure out the rest.

I think wellfare should be substinance level, and only for people who don't have the income or means to - very modestly feed, clothe and house themselves - it should not be enough to save money from or pay any luxuries. I think children living in such families should be entitled to have a right to have certain things, club memberships, school stuff and the likes paid for them (but not as a payment to their parents). All wellfare should be on application only.

I am not in favor of a minimum wage. The idea of not taxing income under a certain threshold I like. Benefits above wellfare should be on the basis of an individual mandate, capped (yes big earners, that sucks) and preferably not government run.