The case for a universal basic income in the era of A.I.
The case for a universal basic income in the era of A.I.
https://www.americamagazine.org/short-take/2026/03/23/universal-basic-income-ai/
Publish Date: 2026-03-23 16:49:00
Source Domain: www.americamagazine.org
I remember when George McGovern, the Democratic presidential nominee in 1972, promised that if elected, he would send each citizen a check each year for $1,000. In today’s dollars, that would be nearly $8,000—hardly a small sum. For high-income recipients, most of that $1,000 would have gone right back to the U.S. Treasury when they paid income taxes. But for those with little or no income, the McGovern payment would have functioned as a “negative income tax,” or what would have amounted to a universal basic income.
Support for a universal basic income has not been limited to the left. Milton Friedman—a key advisor to Barry Goldwater, the 1964 Republican presidential nominee, and to President Richard Nixon—advocated for a negative income tax in his 1962 book Capitalism and Freedom. Friedman’s primary argument was that a negative income tax would not erode the incentive to work, unlike many welfare programs, such as food stamps and Medicaid, which recipients fear losing if they enter the work force. In true libertarian fashion, Friedman noted two other advantages: the reduction of administrative overhead inherent in traditional welfare bureaucracies and a respect for the freedom of recipients to choose how they could best use their benefits.
Both the McGovern and Friedman proposals fell into obscurity during the Reagan and Clinton eras of welfare reforms. Those reforms, of course, emphasized a return to personal responsibility and incentives to find work. Friedman proposed a negative income tax with precisely these goals in mind, but perhaps Presidents Reagan and Clinton simply could not accept the optics of sending out checks to those in need.
Now this half-century-old idea may be on the verge of a comeback, thanks to the threat of artificial intelligence eliminating jobs.
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