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RE: Is Basic Income Becoming an "Inevitable" Part of the Future?

in Silver Bloggers28 days ago

Saudi Arabia does not offer UBI. They have a state-monopolized petroleum industry. Assuming it works as you say, this is still not proof UBI works. That political monopoly entrenches a political class, but at least there is actual industrial production of a market good, and not just money printing, behind such a scheme. It isn't sustainable, though. Even if the Saudis weren't deeply corrupt, there is still the economic calculation problem. We saw what happened when Venezuela relied on state oil monopoly. It was a miracle of socialist success, until it collapsed that is.

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Saudi Arabia has what is called a Citizen's Account Program, which is similar to UBI. It seems to work okay in their culture.

I agree with you that Saudi Arabia has never been free from corruption, but they do appear to keep their poverty down to a minimal. When I was living in Los Angeles, California in the 1990s, I toured a museum of Saudi Arabian culture; and I learned that one of the highlights of their society is that all of their college education is free. For decades they haven't had the collective poverty that you see in India.

Nevertheless, I see what you mean about the dangers of a nation printing money blindly. Also, I realize that even if UBI could work well in one nation, it might not work at all in another nation inasmuch as every nation has a different situation than the other. A very bad mistake on Joe Biden's part was cancelling the Keystone XL Pipeline, which killed a number of jobs.