True, most of Europe has some sort of social welfare system. But that system has a massive cost overhead: to determine who qualifies and who doesn't, to support it there's a complete system of lawmaking, administration, monitoring and fraud detection and prosecution (and probably a cottage industry of fraud assistance as well). I have seen some back-of-the-envelope calculations detailing how those costs don't cover the whole cost of UBI, but I don't think I've ever seen a comprehensive overview. But regardless of the cost, UBI would results in a smaller government apparatus than the current system.
Finland tried a small UBI experiment that failed.
Failed on what measure? The people in the program reported less stress and more happiness.
> but that system has a massive cost overhead: to determine who qualifies and who doesn't, to support it there's a complete system of lawmaking, administration, monitoring and fraud detection and prosecution (and probably a cottage industry of fraud assistance as well). I have seen some back-of-the-envelope calculations detailing how those costs don't cover the whole cost of UBI, but I don't think I've ever seen a comprehensive overview.
The back of the numbers estimates make it sufficiently obvious that the claim that these costs are a miniscule fraction of the additional cost of a UBI for UBIers arguing otherwise to have never attempted to produced a comprehensive overview. Assessing whether people are looking for work is relatively expensive in terms of administrator time, for example. But the administration system ensures that only 2% of the working age public actually get that benefit, not 100% of the population (or even the 20-30% of working age people who aren't economically active but aren't actively looking for work either). There's a reason nobody's doing studies to understand whether you could cover [most of] the costs of paying a benefit to 100% of the population by removing some of the admin staff that check the eligibility of the 2% currently receiving it, and it's the same reason perpetual motion machines aren't tested.
Figures are based on UK [pre-UC] JSA claimant figures, but there's nothing particularly unusual about them globally; looks like the non-COVID figures for US unemployment benefit claims are lower and non-participation in the workforce higher. Unemployment benefit is the eligibility tested benefit UBIers universally agree should be entirely replaced with UBI payments [UBI advocates' views on retaining separate, variable disability allowances are more mixed, but there remains same basic logic that only a small fraction of the population currently receives them].
The existence of eligibility criteria ensures that unemployment benefits are, in normal times, paid out to only a small fraction of the population, because only a small proportion of the population is unemployed and looking for work. Eligibility testing admin isn't cheap, but it certainly isn't more expensive just paying everyone.
For comparison purposes, according to it's own stats the entire DWP admin bill is in the region of £6b, including all admin for all types of benefit to all ages of people and a typically overpriced new govt IT project. Even if UBI could get that down to zero which it clearly can't, it wouldn't pay for many people to receive a UBI.
Finland tried a small UBI experiment that failed.
Failed on what measure? The people in the program reported less stress and more happiness.