Federal taxes of any kind are not needed to fund federal programs, including a Universal Basic Income.

Every proponent of the Basic Income could benefit from reading Robert Heinlein's first (posthumously published) book, For Us, The Living: A Comedy of Customs. As a novel, it's obviously an amateur work. But the story is set in an America that has a Basic Income. Heinlein mathematically proves that it can work with ZERO taxes.

Next, you might want to watch Martin Armstrong's Solution Conference 90 Minute, in which he explains how we can eliminate ALL federal taxes and still fund federal programs.

The basic idea is to switch from debt backed currency, which is what we have now, to a government backed currency. No more "backed by the full faith and credit of the..." Just, "backed by the full faith of..." Kind of like a federal version of Bitcoin, with or without the crypto part.

Where a basic income is concerned, the treasury could simply debit the accounts of every citizen. Do it twice a month, like a paycheck, once a month, like a salary, or whatever. The logistics are a relatively minor consideration. But it can be done.

Won't this be inflationary? No. Growing up in the Chicago School of Economics with a smattering of Austrian Economics from my favorite authors, I used to think so. But through thousands of blog posts on his website, Armstrong Economics, Armstrong explains why not. And in his Solution Conference DVD, he explains how to eliminate the existing federal debt by means of a debt-equity swap. No default needed.

Until I realized that automation is going to create massive long term unemployment, I opposed a basic income. I thought that Joseph Schumpeter's "creative destruction" would create new jobs. But I came to the realization that this time is almost certainly going to be different. If we eliminated all property taxes so that people could live on their plot of land and use automation to provide for their basic needs, that might not be so bad. But first you have to pry property taxes out of the frantic clutches of local municipalities.

My libertarian and conservative friends (and as a classical liberal I'm usually lumped in with them) would say we should set people free to determine their own fate. Thing is, when you've got hundreds of millions of citizens with a good work ethic and a hungry family to feed, they're not going to be willing to listen to libertarian or conservative arguments. Starvation can drive the staunchest conservatives to form torch and pitchfork brigades to demand government solutions.

The basic income is that solution, and we can pay for it without taxes. Heinlein and Armstrong explain how.

Regards

Rod Van Mechelen

Rod Van Mechelen is the author of What Everyone Should Know about Feminist Issues: The Male-Positive Perspective (the page now includes several articles by other authors), and the publisher of The Backlash! @ Backlash.com. He is a member of the Cowlitz Indian Tribe and served for 9-1/2 years on the Cowlitz Indian Tribal Council.