In 2013, the city of Stockton filed for bankruptcy amid mismanagement of the public purse. The municipality has had a difficult time trying to return to its glory days. So, how are the leaders responding to the paucity of growth?
Free money!
Stockton Mayor Michael Tubbs is planning to give families $500 per month for a year under a program called SEED. This is part of a trial run to study the positives and negatives, economic and social impacts of offering a basic income. It will also be funded by a private grant from the Economic Security Project.
If we know our politicians, they already have a conclusion in their minds: basic income works!
“I think it will make people work better and smarter and harder and also be able to do things like spend time with their families because we’re not robots. We’re not just designed just to work all day and run a rat race,” Mayor Tubbs said in an interview with NPR.
But Robert Wenzel of the Economic Policy Journal had an interesting tidbit of information:
But should we be surprised that this nutty plan is being launched in Stockton?
Stockton, a city of 300,000 residents, filed for bankruptcy in 2013 for its past mismanagement of government funds. It also should be noted that in a 2010 Gallup poll, Stockton was tied with Montgomery, Alabama for the most obese metro area in the US with an obesity rate of 34.6 percent.
Hey Tubbs, fill me in on the logic of why giving obese people money is going to make them work better and harder.
Poor, obese, free money. Yeah, that’s a recipe for success!
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