In the
previous posting on this subject, we examined the case for Universal Basic
Ownership as opposed to a Universal Basic Income. We decided that Universal Basic Ownership was
better on many grounds, one of the chief being the logical question as to where
the money is supposed to come from.
From taxing the
rich? Let’s run a few numbers just for
the United States. Given that the
(official) current population of the
United States is little under 330 million, the fifteen richest Americans
have a net worth of $921.9 billion, and Andrew Yang is calling for $1,000 per
month for every child, woman, and man in the U.S. (he wants to limit it to those 18 and older, but it wouldn't be "universal," then, would it?), how long would the wealth of
the fifteen richest Americans last if every cent was taxed away to fund the
program?
328 x 106
x 1 x 103 x 12 = 3.936 x 1012, or $3,936,000,000,000 per
year ($3.936 trillion). . . or 4.26 times the total net worth of the fifteen
richest Americans. That means that the
fifteen richest Americans would be beggared after the first quarter of the UBI,
making it necessary to start confiscating wealth from others before the end of
the first year . . . assuming the rich didn’t revolt or leave the country and
take up residence in a tax haven somewhere . . . or any other country willing
to sell them citizenship for a few measly billion and favorable tax treatment. Did you know that Denmark’s GDP is $356 billion
with a national debt of $120 billion?
The fifteen richest Americans could pay off the entire Danish national
debt, still have most of their wealth intact, and have the leverage for a deal
to live tax free for the rest of their natural lives. And get free beer.
Of course, the
real issue is not the income gap, but the productivity gap. Most people who lack sufficient income are in
that position because they cannot produce enough by means of their labor to
generate an adequate and secure income and don’t own any capital to make up the
difference. The solution — as we
discovered the last time we looked at this subject — is not to redistribute
income, but to make it possible for people to produce marketable goods and
services with both labor and capital, thereby generating their own incomes.
The question, of
course, is how.
Most simply put,
the most feasible program developed to date for empowering ordinary people with
direct ownership of capital was explained by Louis Kelso and Mortimer Adler in
their two books, The
Capitalist Manifesto (1958) and The New Capitalists
(1961). CESJ expanded on this in its
book Capital
Homesteading for Every Citizen (2004) and recently prepared a
short paper on the subject relating to how the current pandemic is handled
could easily determine whether people come out of it with a more or less whole
skin, or what we’re seeing is just the beginning of the end.
 |
| Louis Kelso |
Very briefly (for
the proposal is explained better in the short paper linked to in the preceding
paragraph), it is entirely feasible and, indeed, financially sound to enable
people without capital to purchase capital on credit under certain conditions:
·
The individual purchasing the capital on credit
is “creditworthy” (which can be done for everyone with capital credit insurance), and
·
The capital being purchased on credit is
reasonably expected to pay for itself with its future earnings within a
reasonable period of time.
That, of course,
is at the individual level, and assumes certain social and financial conditions
far too numerous to mention here. There
are, however, certain obvious things that must be present in society in order
to carry out a program of expanded capital ownership:
·
A society must be politically stable and private
property rights secured,
·
The State should have only a limited economic
role, e.g., should not create money or establish or maintain monopolies,
·
Free and open markets within a strict (and
coherent) juridical order,
·
A fair and coherent tax system, and
·
A uniform, stable, and asset-backed currency and
money supply (money is more than currency).
Given these
things (and many more that we won’t go into; these are just the essential high
points), there is one more thing that must be done in a situation like a
pandemic, famine, war, or other widespread disaster:
·
Take care of people’s immediate needs by all
legitimate means.
Given these
parameters, the
program outlined in the linked paper may be the optimal solution to the
current situation.
#30#
