This is how far left the Democrats have gone. Keith Ellison deputy chairman of the Democratic National Committee, recently praised the concept of a universal basic income, saying it “has a lot of merit.” We’d like to know how Ellison plans on paying for all Americans to basically receive an allowance for doing nothing (see more on this below)

Ellison made the comment at a forum in Minneapolis:

https://www.facebook.com/FreeBeacon/videos/1610635548985462/

WFB reports:

“I personally do think that universal basic income is a [sic] idea that has a lot merit,” Ellison said. “I don’t think that universal basic income means that people sit around; I think it means do other things that are necessary.”

“There are things that are valuable and important that don’t necessarily have a market value that we should have people doing,” Ellison continued. “You know, like in the 1930s, we paid artists to basically document the Depression. We went out and had writers document rural life in America. There were still people who had been enslaved who were still living. During the Depression we paid people to go interview them so we can keep that knowledge, and you can go to the Library of Congress and listen to them today because of it.”

“I think that it is a very important idea. I’ve written on it,” Ellison added. “I’ve actually thought about having a community meeting on universal basic income because I think it’s—to folks to who know anything about it, there’s a lot of unanswered questions.”

Proposals for universal basic income programs can vary, but they generally involve the government ensuring that all citizens make a certain minimum amount of money every year, including people without an income.

MORE ON UNIVERSAL BASIC INCOME:

Forget social security, medicaid and WIC, today’s progressives have moved well beyond discussing such entitlement relics of the past and nowadays dedicate their efforts to the concept of a “Universal Basic Income” for all…call it the New ‘New Deal’.  You know, because having to work for that “car in every garage and chicken in every pot” is just considered cruel and unusual punishment by today’s standards.

Of course, it should come as little surprise that the progressive state of Hawaii, which depends on easily automatable jobs tied to the tourism industry, is among the first to pursue a Universal Basic Income for its residents.  And while the idea of passing out free money to everyone seems like a genius plan, if we understand it correctly, as CBS points out, there is just one catch…figuring out who will pay for it.
Driverless trucks. Factory robots. Delivery drones. Virtual personal assistants.

As technological innovations increasingly edge into the workplace, many people fear that robots and machines are destined to take jobs that human beings have held for decades–a trend that is already happening in stores and factories around the country. For many affected workers, retraining might be out of reach —unavailable, unaffordable or inadequate.

Over the past two decades, automation has reduced the need for workers, especially in such blue-collar sectors as manufacturing, warehousing and mining. Many of the jobs that remain demand higher education or advanced technological skills. It helps explain why just 55 percent of Americans with no more than a high school diploma are employed, down from 60 percent just before the Great Recession.

Hawaii state lawmakers have voted to explore the idea of a universal basic income in light of research suggesting that a majority of waiter, cook and building cleaning jobs — vital to Hawaii’s tourism-dependent economy — will eventually be replaced by machines. The crucial question of who would pay for the program has yet to be determined. But support for the idea has taken root.

“Our economy is changing far more rapidly than anybody’s expected,” said state Rep. Chris Lee, who introduced legislation to consider a guaranteed universal income.

Lee said he felt it’s important “to be sure that everybody will benefit from the technological revolution that we’re seeing to make sure no one’s left behind.”

Read more: Zero Hedge