albacore_futures

One of the biggest arguments put forth for Scotland's independence is that they want more input over fiscal / monetary policy, because the Bank of England has been too austere. Yet, Scotland wants to use the Sterling (removing any control over monetary policy), and might very well join the Euro, which would effectively require several years of immense austerity cuts and then require Scotland to derive its fiscal policy from Berlin, instead of London.

In the short term, big companies like RBS have announced they would relocate. Scotland's economy would be dominated by alcohol exports, tourism, and maybe oil / LNG depending on if they get the fields or not. Scotland would also have to take on its share of the UK's debts - it can't just leave without paying for its part of things - which would immediately create a large debt, on top of the estimated 6% of GDP deficit it would have at the start.

In other words, a newly-independent Scotland would be unable to control its monetary policy, would immediately enact severe cuts in its much-cherished government spending, and (if it joins the Euro) would eventually cede what little fiscal control it had to Berlin.

What's the point? Isn't more devolution of powers from London to Edinburgh preferable to the above scenario?

Scotland has influence over monetary policy via Parliament, which is as much influence over monetary policy that anyone has. Further, the BoE takes Scotland's economic situation into account at present when determining its policy. Should Scotland leave the UK, the BoE has stated that it will no longer take them into consideration - and that is a worst-case scenario. Who wants to claim economic independence when the currency they're using isn't planned with their economy in mind?

There's been a pattern over the last few years for greater autonomy within Scotland. Certain programs, particularly the healthcare initiatives and free college tuition, are proof that Scotland isn't as dominated by English politics as the independence movement claims. And this referendum has clearly scared the crap out of the UK; should it get defeated, it is highly likely that many powers get devolved down to Scotland's control.

I think it's highly likely that the result of Scottish independence is celebration in the streets followed by 3-4 years of severe austerity, several changes in its parliamentary leadership, and general economic badness. Should they join the Euro, that badness would only get worse as they struggle to meet fiscal requirements set forth by the EMU.

Is it that you think the people that would use it responsibly outweigh the deadbeats that would completely waste it?

Yes. There will be those that sit on their couch doing nothing, but (a) $1000 a month is not enough for most people to truly be lazy and do absolutely nothing, and (b) the number of people who would spend their time productively is still larger. You can review decent-sized tests which have been carried out in a few places.

But I'm always resistant to the idea of just giving people other people's money.

We already give people other people's money. We do it in our tax code via deductions, we do it explicitly via welfare and other "overt" programs, and we do it when we decide where government funds are going to be spent on the military, infrastructure, and the like. Giving some people more than others happens every time any economic decision is made by the state. It's inevitable. Furthermore, tax deductions are the same thing as spending programs economically, they just don't require the state to process and send out checks. If you benefited from any tax deductions, then you received someone else's money.

The biggest critique of UBI has always been cost, but critics fail to understand that UBI is conventionally pitched as a replacement for, not supplement to, the welfare state. If you think of it in these terms, imagine that all government social welfare spending could be abolished and just replaced with a check sent out, to everyone, every month. The administrative overhead savings would be tremendous because all that duplicate overhead goes away, and the problems with having 30 bureaucracies all touching on different aspects of the same question go away. The solution isn't "stop spending government money" - that hasn't been the solution since the 1930s, and it's not going to be the solution going forward. The solution is finding more efficient ways of not having people die of starvation on the streets in this, the wealthiest time in human history. And UBI happens to be a great way to do that.

I can give a long opinion on why I like UBI, but will save that for another day.

How much did you find that socio-economic factors contribute to people's responses? Did you find that one group favored certain responses (for example, say a strong military) more than another?

I could see the answer to "what makes a country great?" being very different when asked to someone without a job and with poor prospects versus somebody on Wall Street versus somebody enrolled in college.

You guys are doing fantastic work. Every time I come to Georgia I grab 2-3 6 packs of stuff by you I've never had, and hand it out to others who have never heard of Orpheus. Transmigration of Souls is fantastic. And your brewery on the beltline is quite nice too; I got to see it while back in Georgia a while ago.