Giving away “free money” without the incentive to work is socialism on steroids.
Via Fox News:
New Jersey’s largest city plans to test whether universal basic income is feasible, making it the latest government to flirt with a program that would guarantee income for residents whether or not they have a job.
Newark Mayor Ras Baraka announced his decision last week to create a task force and pilot program to study whether the program is possible.
“We believe in Universal Basic Income, especially in a time where studies have shown that families that have a crisis of just $400 a month may experience a setback that may be difficult, even impossible to recover from,” Baraka reportedly said, adding that one-third of the city still lives in poverty.
According to Fox 5 New York, Baraka did not release any further details of the plan, like how it could be funded or when a final decision would be made.
While Newark (where 2020 presidential candidate Sen. Cory Booker used to serve as mayor) is still in the very early stages of examining the program, it has seen little success elsewhere.
In 2017, Finland tested the program, giving 560 Euros ($584) to 2,000 unemployed Finnish citizens per month, with no requirement to find a paying job. By 2019, Finland scrapped the program entirely.
Last summer, Ontario, Canada, also announced it would end a program that gave money to people in low-paying jobs—instead of welfare benefits—after the government found it was “not sustainable” and “expensive.”