The alternative to the living wage.

[Heywood]

Ok that sounds doable. As your explaining it, I'm liking the idea of it more and more. I think that this kills two (or maybe several) birds with one stone. It gives a universal safety net, allowing people to not worry about hitting complete bottom and autonomy in their career choice. It also provides for the fact that their will always be a certain amount of the population that will try and do the least amount of work possible, which if I'm getting this correctly could give employees better leverage in determining their wages. If everyone automatically has enough money to live minimally without a job even if they choose to work, and a portion of the population chooses not to work, that means there would be a higher demand for employees. McDonald's can pay $8.00 an hour and not give a raise because they have their employees by the balls, there is a lot of people looking for work and only so many jobs. If I have the money to walk out any time and not worry about starving, and if there are less people willing to work, it means at the end of the year the cashier can leverage a raise out of his employer.

What it does is create an environment where the labor market consist of those who want to work to better their lives instead of a labor market consisting of those who only want to work to get by. The work force would be more productive.

Would such a system generate comparable governmental revenues as today? I don't know. It wouldn't need too though because huge swaths of government go away. Social security and all the bureaucrats who administer that program....gonzo. Food stamps and all the bureaucrats who administer that program....gonzo. Unemployment compensation and all the bureaucrats who administer that program....gonzo. I could go on and on.

One area I see where it would increase government spending is military. The military would have to pay higher to recruit...and if there were a particularly bloody conflict....we might have to conscript(but I think that is the case today).