wal-mart (and the market at large) doesn't value their labor at what it would cost to survive
You're assuming that wal-mart (and the market at large) values their labor incorrectly. What if that assumption is wrong? I.e., what if the actual value of their labor is lower than what it would cost to survive?
I know that sounds harsh, but that doesn't mean it has to be wrong. I don't see any reason why every job must automatically be worth enough, in actual value added, to support the person doing it. (For one thing, many jobs at the low end of the wage scale are not intended for people who have to support themselves. When I worked jobs in high school and college, I was being supported by my parents and financial aid; the money I earned went towards luxuries and savings, not my support.)
if enough charity was going on to uplift the impoverished from poverty, there would be much lower than 15% poverty
Maybe for a short time. But here's what I expect would happen if widespread "charity" in the form of BI or something like it were instituted: within a year or two, there would be a significant percentage of people who were squandering their BI ($10K a year or whatever) on anything from junk food to lottery tickets to drugs, and who were therefore still in poverty, despite receiving BI.
Then the news stories start on how you can't fix fundamental problems in society by just handing people money: you have to teach them how to handle it, what to do with it, etc., etc. Then the government gets pressured to offer "life coaching" and other services along with BI. Then we end up with all the same bloated government bureaucracy we have now, plus the extra expenditure of BI.
For the former, that is what I meant. There is no protection to uplift you from poverty if the value of flesh bodies performing unskilled tasks isn't worth what it costs to keep you alive. That is why wal-mart employees are given food stamps applications when they are hired, it is also why upward mobility at the bottom is nearly impossible - if you make 10% more, you get 30% less resources because of tiered or biased welfare programs that cut you off at fixed intervals. It demonstrates that situational targeted welfare seems to trend towards exploitation by either side of the aisle when possible.
On the second - that is an education problem. It wouldn't solve itself in the short term, but I imagine culturally wasting that money and remaining homeless will be less prominent over time. Right now, there is a hyper-consumerist culture of spending everything you have and then some on immediate pleasure, which isn't sustainable regardless of what fiscal organizing of society you have.
You can't fix fundamental problems with aid - which is just short term gifts. BI would be a raw wealth redistribution with no addons or exceptions, you just implment, say, a 10% exchange tax on all monetary transactions, and divide the proceeds amongst everyone. The poor pay less, the rich pay more, but it isn't a situational game of "for 3 years, we will provide X resource to impoverished people Y". It is bigger than that. I'd argue it is probably the best way to simultaneously have socialism and capitalism - if everyones basic needs are taken care of, you eliminate the worst part of capitalism - needs based wage exploitation - but you also eliminate the worst part of socialism, because the means of production are still in the hands of those who play the game (or their descendents, but I won't go on a bender about the absurdity of inheritance here). It enables massive deregulation because you don't have to fear exploitation of the workforce if people are employed to meet their wants and not their needs.
I imagine culturally wasting that money and remaining homeless will be less prominent over time.
You have a much more optimistic view of how culture evolves than I do.
Right now, there is a hyper-consumerist culture of spending everything you have and then some on immediate pleasure, which isn't sustainable regardless of what fiscal organizing of society you have.
But instituting BI doesn't help this problem, because the main incentive people have for not spending everything they receive is the uncertainty of future income. If everyone thinks they are getting BI forever no matter what they do, they have less incentive to save, not more.
It would be helpful if everyone understood that BI is all that anybody gets--i.e., that BI replaces all the current government services that are given to people, like Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, food stamps, section 8 housing, etc. In other words, if everyone understood that it is their responsibility to use BI wisely. But the only way to enforce that understanding would be to let people suffer the negative consequences of using BI unwisely. You spent all your BI on junk food and liquor, and then you get sick and can't afford to pay for health care? Fine, then you don't receive care.
I doubt that BI would be as popular a proposal as it is if that aspect were included. But without it, I don't see how BI fixes the cultural issues you speak of (which I agree are genuine issues).
I don't think we are operating on a platform where a BI could be actually implemented. Too many intrenched interests (among which are pretty much every single megacorporation that uses wage slavery to keep employees poor) that have too much lobbing money in a political process that is so exceedingly corrupt. And beyond that, you have mainstream media hound dogs at the beck and call of politicians to spread lies and propaganda about any proposal to ruin its public opinion.
I'm just saying if we did it (we won't) it would have to be a hard slap in the face to wasteful spenders of it. The thing is, people can survive and rebound from 2 weeks homeless because they wasted their BI check. But when you don't have a check in 2 weeks to give it another go, you just end up down a spiral into destitution and the bottom dregs of society.
There is no protection to uplift you from poverty if the value of flesh bodies performing unskilled tasks isn't worth what it costs to keep you alive.
And how does BI fix this? Now instead of paying people for doing less work than it costs to keep them alive, you're paying people for doing no work. That makes the problem worse, not better.
The only way to fix this problem is to have the people do more valuable tasks, so that what they are doing actually is worth more, and therefore merits higher pay. BI does nothing towards achieving that, and in fact probably does the opposite, on net.
you don't have to fear exploitation of the workforce if people are employed to meet their wants and not their needs
This is a serious misstatement, because if there are people who are creating less value than they are receiving in BI (which is what your statements imply), there must also be people who are creating more value than they are receiving through BI. That must be true because, for BI to work at all, the total value being created must be at least as much as the value of BI for one person times the number of people in the society. Otherwise the whole system doesn't work, because there isn't enough value being created to fund it.
So consider the position of a person who is creating more value than the value of BI per person, and then sees a significant portion of that value taken away from him and given to people who are creating less value than the value of BI per person. Why, exactly, would that person not have a strong incentive to either (a) create less value, since it's not going to him anyway; or (b) figure out a way to game the system so it seems like he's creating less value than he actually is, and pocketing the difference--i.e., exploiting the people who are creating less value than he is?
I'm sure there are plenty of people who would not choose (a) or (b) in this situation; but I think there are also plenty who would. And it wouldn't take too many of them to destroy the system.
You're assuming that wal-mart (and the market at large) values their labor incorrectly. What if that assumption is wrong? I.e., what if the actual value of their labor is lower than what it would cost to survive?
I know that sounds harsh, but that doesn't mean it has to be wrong. I don't see any reason why every job must automatically be worth enough, in actual value added, to support the person doing it. (For one thing, many jobs at the low end of the wage scale are not intended for people who have to support themselves. When I worked jobs in high school and college, I was being supported by my parents and financial aid; the money I earned went towards luxuries and savings, not my support.)
if enough charity was going on to uplift the impoverished from poverty, there would be much lower than 15% poverty
Maybe for a short time. But here's what I expect would happen if widespread "charity" in the form of BI or something like it were instituted: within a year or two, there would be a significant percentage of people who were squandering their BI ($10K a year or whatever) on anything from junk food to lottery tickets to drugs, and who were therefore still in poverty, despite receiving BI.
Then the news stories start on how you can't fix fundamental problems in society by just handing people money: you have to teach them how to handle it, what to do with it, etc., etc. Then the government gets pressured to offer "life coaching" and other services along with BI. Then we end up with all the same bloated government bureaucracy we have now, plus the extra expenditure of BI.