Government Checks for All? 

This week’s overwhelming rejection in Switzerland of a referendum to make the country the first to guarantee all citizens the right to a government income could be seen as a death blow for advocates of the concept in the United States.

“It is the beginning, not the end of a movement,” said Michael Howard.

After all, the idea is nowhere near the stage it is in Europe or Canada. But notwithstanding the 78-percent-to-22-percent vote, supporters said they think its time will come in the United States.

“It is the beginning, not the end of a movement,” said Michael Howard, co-coordinator of the U.S. Basic Income Guarantee Network.

The idea is simple: Everyone, regardless of income and whether they are working or not, should be entitled to an income from the government to meet their basic needs. The system would allow the government to streamline the welfare system and lift people out of poverty, advocates argue. At the same time, freed from the drudgery of work, people could turn their attention to art, caring for sick family members, or starting businesses — all without fear of how they will pay the bills.

So far, though, it hasn’t exactly been a hot issue on the campaign trail during the presidential race. Sen. Bernie Sanders has probably addressed it most forthrightly. He spoke highly of the idea in an interview with the news site Vox last year, but he did not explicitly endorse it and quickly pivoted to his signature issues.

“I am absolutely sympathetic to that approach,” he said. “That’s why I’m fighting for a $15 minimum wage, why I’m fighting to make sure that everybody in this country gets the nutrition they need, why I’m fighting to expand Social Security benefits and not cut them, making sure that every kid in this country regardless of income can go to college. That’s what a civilized nation does.”

Sanders has given similar answers throughout his career when asked about it. Presumptive Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton, meanwhile, dodged the question during a Facebook town hall in July.

“You are asking the kinds of questions that we all need to be asking about the future of work in an age of accelerating technological change,” she wrote. “I certainly don’t have all the answers. But we have to resolve these questions while embracing the promise and potential of these new technologies and without stifling innovation or limiting the ability of working moms and veterans and other people to get ahead.”

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On the Republican side, Donald Trump has said nothing about the guaranteed basic income idea, but onetime rival Marco Rubio last year co-sponsored a tax reform plan that some saw as the beginnings of a universal basic income: a $2,000 refundable tax credit. Another candidate, Sen. Ted Cruz, last year co-sponsored a bill to create the so-called “Fair Tax,” which would replace the income tax and other federal taxes with a 23 percent sales tax. One feature included a “pre-bate” or a monthly payment to all Americans, regardless of income.

The idea has had longtime champions in some conservative and libertarian circles. Nobel-winning economist Milton Friedman proposed a version in the 1960s called a negative income tax, which would have provided payments to people below a certain income.

Charles Murray, a scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, wrote a whole book about the concept in 2006. He advocated a monthly payment to everyone 21 and older totaling $13,000 a year, with at least $3,000 going to health insurance.

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The cash payment would replace most government transfer payments, such as Social Security, Medicaid, and disability payments. Unlike the Earned Income Tax Credit, which supplements the income of the working poor, people would receive the money whether they worked or not. And, up to $25,000, the income level at which taxes would start to kick in, they would not lose any of the money if they did work and receive other income.

Basic income proposals run up costs quickly. Murray estimated the gross cost of his plan at more than $2 trillion. After factoring in surcharges on the grants imposed on people with incomes greater than $25,000, the net cost would be about $1.74 trillion, the same as the initial cost of the program if it had been implemented in 2002.

That is a lot of money, Murray conceded, but he pointed to the rapid rise in the means-tested government programs he would eliminate.

“It would be so much cheaper to do what I proposed,” he said.

Still, Murray said, it probably will take a wider realization that the country is headed for a fiscal crisis to build strong support for such a radical change.

“This debate right now in the United States is just getting started,” he said. “It’s easily a couple [election] cycles away.”