(Replying to PARENT post)

His point was that the financial arithmetic isn't prohibitive. A box full of stuff costs the same amount whether you give out 5 million or 300 million (in fact, economics of scale says that the US could probably do it cheaper than Finland can). We have 300 million people (or whatever the birthrate is) which is certainly more than Finland has, but we also then have 300 million taxpayers.

Sure, the absolute cost is higher, but the cost per capita is not.

👤tych0🕑12y🔼0🗨️0

(Replying to PARENT post)

Well, about 300 million people, but less than 100 million taxpayers. About 130 million workers in the US [1], of whom about 30% have a negative income tax rate[2]. Doesn't completely change your point, since less than half of Finland's population works as well[3], but I thought it worth mentioning.

[1] http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2011/05/employed-persons-1999-2...

[2] http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2012/09/18/w...

[3] http://www.tradingeconomics.com/finland/employed-persons

👤randallsquared🕑12y🔼0🗨️0