A Universal Basic Income Is Being Considered by Canada's Government

alphacyberranger@lemmy.world to World News@lemmy.world – 1161 points –
A Universal Basic Income Is Being Considered by Canada's Government
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How will I know now if Im better than someone else if they aren't homeless or begging? /s

I think the real problem will be, “how do we stop landlords from jacking up rent simply because everyone has some extra money now?”

The same way we do with minimum wage: competition among landlords.

Along with companies raising prices of items. As a non Canadian, I'll be curious to watch this play out.

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I wonder how UBI would affect homelessness and addiction. I imagine the mental health and housing crises would continue, but differently?

In all of the studies of UBI homelessness decreased. I don't know about addiction, but drug abuse is generally reduced with increased economic stability since a lot of people use to escape their stressful living situatuon.

In practice during covid, it made it worse. People came to BC, Canada explicitly because it had the best covid benefits, and on TV said that they were collecting the benefits for the purpose of doing drugs with zero intent on helping society.

There will always be some abuse of services. It just turns out to be negligible most of the time. The benefits will far outweigh the losses. Also - people shop for services all the time. If they want to move to a province that has better benefits, that would be normal and smart. If the program ends up being mostly federal, this won’t be as much of an issue as things will be more standardized, though.

CERB (the federal Covid benefits) was federal so B.C. was the same as Alberta which was the same as all the other provinces and territories.

So you are full of shit.

BC Recovery Benefit.

You were saying?

The BC Recovery Benefit provided a one-time, tax-free payment of up to $1,000 for eligible families and single parents and up to $500 for eligible individuals. It was calculated based on net income from your 2019 tax return. Applications were closed effective July 1, 2021.

The BC Recovery Benefit provided a one-time, tax-free payment of up to $1,000 for eligible families and single parents and up to $500 for eligible individuals. It was calculated based on net income from your 2019 tax return. Applications were closed effective July 1, 2021.

Generally, the benefit was available to people:

  • Who were residents of B.C. on December 18, 2020
  • Are at least 19 years of age on December 18, 2020, or meet specific eligibility criteria
  • Have filed a 2019 Canadian personal tax return, or meet specific eligibility criteria
  • Have a valid social insurance number (SIN), individual tax number or temporary tax number

So you're saying people moved to BC between December 8th when it was announced and the cut off on December 18th for $500?

This absolutely is not true, and even if somehow there was a clip of someone saying that, the person saying it was an idiot and/or you misunderstood them, because CERB was federal and BC didn't offer a single cent more than any other province.

BC (specifically the lower mainland aka the area around Vancouver) has always had more homeless and transient people, because it's the only province where the winter won't flat out kill you if you are outdoors.

The documentary of Oppenheimer Park's homeless "camp" has multiple people saying it.

One was a former welder from Ontario.

O...k... And? Anyone can make a documentary and anyone can say stuff. I'm very confused as to how this is proof.

Well whoever they were, they had no fucking clue what they were talking about, BECAUSE CERB WAS A FEDERAL PROGRAM AND PAID THE SAME AMOUNT TO EVERY PROVINCE.

Who cares what anyone said, the entire foundation of your argument is false, this is meaningless to the conversation and I specifically said either they are an idiot or you misunderstood.

Also I notice how you didn't actually link anything, and expect me to go watch an entire documentary (without naming it) to see your "proof".

By that logic, provinces should compete to provide the worst social services so people will move away and they can reduce their spending.

Human beings will always find a way to show they are better than everyone else.

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