Quote:
Originally Posted by Oling_Roachinen
The idea that someone getting the absolute bare minimum, not even enough to support a family, would simply quit working is based on fear rhetoric and not reality. You're just perpetuating the offensive stereotype that poor people are lazy.
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A great many people in the workforce work part-time. Or live at home with their parents. Or are young and have little responsibility. Only a fraction of workers support a family on one income.
It's not an offensive stereotype to point out that many Canadians - among them, my own 20-something self - would prefer to spend every day doing as they please and make $2k a month to working 24 hours a week for $500 a month more.
You see it in parts of the country with generous seasonal EI provisions. A hefty proportion of the population works exactly the minimum weeks required to collect EI the rest of the year - not a week longer. I'm not vilifying people who make that choice - it's perfectly understandable and rational.
Edit: And the black market comments are bang on the money too. I've talked to people in the CRA who say the black market in Canada is so large the government won't even publicly disclose their estimates, out of fear it will embolden even more activity in the underground economy. And we know that working under the table is especially bad in those provinces I mentioned with generous seasonal EI, where double-dipping is a time-honoured practice. With a UBI, we'd likely see the problem explode.