Will we see a boom in precious metals with the potential future roll out of UBI?

[GoldDiggerDave]

The BBC reported Wales are looking to trial Universal Basic Income (UBI) and Scotland taking a sum of £5,200 per year for every adult.  Would we see a stampede of new precious metal buyers? I watch American YT stackers and many Americans receiving their stimulus cheques are just using it to buy gold and silver and LCS and dealers are selling out fast every time the US government prints a new stimulus cheque.

If you got £5,200 per year regardless of your financial status what would you do with it? I'd buy gold and solid assets like they were going out of fashion.  

Or would UBI just create inflation, we all get £5,200 per year but costs got up the same, they give it in one hand and take it from they other? 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-politics-57120354

 

[Roy]

Give me strength...

If you give poor people money, they will always be poor. If you give unemployed people money, they will always be unemployed.

The only people who will do well out of this are McDonalds, Imperial Tobacco, Golden Wonder and Coca Cola.

 

 

[HerefordBullyun]

28 minutes ago, Roy said:

Give me strength...

If you give poor people money, they will always be poor. If you give unemployed people money, they will always be unemployed.

The only people who will do well out of this are McDonalds, Imperial Tobacco, Golden Wonder and Coca Cola.

 

 

Are these share tips then @Roy guess i will be investing in spuds fags and fizzy pop then!

[Roy]

Always invest in things that are bad for you. I forgot White Lightning or whatever does the job nowadays.

[Jimmock]

31 minutes ago, Roy said:

Give me strength...

If you give poor people money, they will always be poor. If you give unemployed people money, they will always be unemployed.

The only people who will do well out of this are McDonalds, Imperial Tobacco, Golden Wonder and Coca Cola.

 

 

@Roy what utter nonsense,shame on you. It will be Walker's,not Golden Wonder. 

[Roy]

2 minutes ago, Jimmock said:

@Roy what utter nonsense,shame on you. It will be Walker's,not Golden Wonder. 

Oops, it's been a while!

[MythicQuale]

Excellent point. This is why I think cryptos and precious metals are a good solid investment. Both take up minimal room/weight and/or resources, and more can't just be printed if the banks/FRS decide to on a whim.

I'm not totally against the idea of a UBI, especially as robots start taking our jobs and where welfare discourages people from looking for work (why would they if they'll stop receiving benefits once they find a job?), but one can't rule out the risk of the UBI increasingly over time, where even hyperinflation could set in or at least the gross devaluation of the pound.

Edited May 16, 2021 by MythicQuale

[GrahamDiamond]

I think that Hyper Inflation of some form is heading our way, so keep hold of your Gold until it is ready to be Sold. Universal Income just means more sales for the Ganja Dealer's, Profit's rose when Mr Sunak gave UC Claimant's £20 a Week Extra FREE Cash for doing nothing , unusual for a Tory Government. Now the Voting is out of the way we can Prepare for the Nasty Politicians to squeeze our funds Coinsters.

[Bigmarc]

8 hours ago, GoldDiggerDave said:

If you got £5,200 per year regardless of your financial status what would you do with it?

Give it to someone who needs it. 

[HerefordBullyun]

4 minutes ago, Bigmarc said:

Give it to someone who needs it. 

Feel free to post your stimmy cheque to hereford bullyun 10 crapstone villas the cow shed - i definately need it. Or send me the equivalant in silver or gold not fussy!😁

Edited May 16, 2021 by HerefordBullyun

[Bigmarc]

19 minutes ago, HerefordBullyun said:

Feel free to post your stimmy cheque to hereford bullyun 10 crapstone villas the cow shed - i definately need it. Or send me the equivalant in silver or gold not fussy!😁

It's funny how the wealthy always have their hand out first but you can't pull the wool over my eyes bull, I am of a age where I know how much cr*p you have given away in the past. 

[HerefordBullyun]

2 minutes ago, Bigmarc said:

It's funny how the wealthy always have their hand out first but you can't pull the wool over my eyes bull, I am of a age where I know how much cr*p you have given away in the past. 

contradiction in terms there! I wasnt wealthy hence why I had to give away c**p prizes!

[GoldDiggerDave]

8 hours ago, Bigmarc said:

It's funny how the wealthy always have their hand out first but you can't pull the wool over my eyes bull, I am of a age where I know how much cr*p you have given away in the past. 

I could only ever dream of having those prises as a kid, Bullseye was the show of dreams and aspirations that I thought only the very wealthy could afford those prises.  What we now consider a crappy prise of a small portable colour tv was beyond our wildest dreams,  in 1984 it would have cost £249 that's more than of 1oz of gold at the time.    

[dicker]

From what I have seen, free money is usually used to buy big TV’s and PS5’s

[KDave]

I am always in two minds about UBI, previously I would have been with Roy on the issue, but I see how benefits work and if UBI replaces them (I assume that is the intention) then I am all for it. Benefits already keeps my BATS shares paying divis and keeps the off-licence in business, UBI won't make a difference on that front. But it will make things fair, and I am all about that.

I have watched my cousin live a life on the tax payer, handed a living for nearly two decades now for doing nothing. Perhaps half a million in sterling by now if not more. One example of millions. While those that work, pay taxes used to fund this waste and often have a lower quality of life due to not having time. Work you give up time for money. Benefits you give up nothing and get money. Seeing others who have made selfish or wrong choices rewarded with time and money, while I must give up my time, it is a killer. It has destroyed altruism and compassion. 

UBI is a lot more Just than the current system, if it replaces the current system. Everyone gets UBI. Now the worker has UBI plus the wage and is better off for trading his time for money. Work is encouraged and rewarded. Natural order is restored. People who used to cheat and play the system, made a career out of it can no longer do so. I assume the state pension will be paid to everyone now as well, no doubt it will.  

My major problem with UBI is the government. They will use it as a control mechanism. If you say things against xyz no UBI for you. If you don't vote, no UBI for you. If you do stuff they don't like, attend the wrong meeting, talk to the wrong forum member, no UBI for you. It will usher in Social Credit ala Communist China. Its another step on the totalitarian road - but to be honest we are already at the point of no return. Lets keep going. Its pointless arguing against benefits, I am in the minority on this, most think I am heartless when I discuss social security with them, so instead I will say lets have UBI. Bring it on. If we must have tax payer charity then lets have it in the most Just and fair way possible. It will not end well in either case.

[GoldDiggerDave]

2 minutes ago, KDave said:

I am always in two minds about UBI, previously I would have been with Roy on the issue, but I see how benefits work and if UBI replaces them (I assume that is the intention) then I am all for it. Benefits already keeps my BATS shares paying divis and keeps the off-licence in business, UBI won't make a difference on that front. But it will make things fair, and I am all about that.

I have watched my cousin live a life on the tax payer, handed a living for nearly two decades now for doing nothing. Perhaps half a million in sterling by now if not more. One example of millions. While those that work, pay taxes used to fund this waste and often have a lower quality of life due to not having time. Work you give up time for money. Benefits you give up nothing and get money. Seeing others who have made selfish or wrong choices rewarded with time and money, while I must give up my time, it is a killer. It has destroyed altruism and compassion. 

UBI is a lot more Just than the current system, if it replaces the current system. Everyone gets UBI. Now the worker has UBI plus the wage and is better off for trading his time for money. Work is encouraged and rewarded. Natural order is restored. People who used to cheat and play the system, made a career out of it can no longer do so. I assume the state pension will be paid to everyone now as well, no doubt it will.  

My major problem with UBI is the government. They will use it as a control mechanism. If you say things against xyz no UBI for you. If you don't vote, no UBI for you. If you do stuff they don't like, attend the wrong meeting, talk to the wrong forum member, no UBI for you. It will usher in Social Credit ala Communist China. Its another step on the totalitarian road - but to be honest we are already at the point of no return. Lets keep going. Its pointless arguing against benefits, I am in the minority on this, most think I am heartless when I discuss social security with them, so instead I will say lets have UBI. Bring it on. If we must have tax payer charity then lets have it in the most Just and fair way possible. It will not end well in either case.

BINGO! Nice to see another thinking man.  You are spot on it will appear to be free money at first but then you will be controlled by it.  I’m expecting the UBI to be dished out in state controlled crypto wallets with programmable currency I’m sure as sugar it won’t let you buy assets with it if that was to be the case. 

I’m not against it, if it can really help the working poor those who graft all month just to make ends meet then I’m all for it.  
 

It’s likely to replace the currency benefit system and will end up creating a bigger divide between those who do and don’t work. It has to the current system is totally wrong no one should be better off not working than someone who gets out of bed everyday.  

Also I have friends in their early 60’s still working and wishing their life away to get to retirement, it could really help those in this position to work a little less have a better quality of life. 
 

 

 

[HerefordBullyun]

6 minutes ago, GoldDiggerDave said:

BINGO! Nice to see another thinking man.  You are spot on it will appear to be free money at first but then you will be controlled by it.  I’m expecting the UBI to be dished out in state controlled crypto wallets with programmable currency I’m sure as sugar it won’t let you buy assets with it if that was to be the case. 

I’m not against it, if it can really help the working poor those who graft all month just to make ends meet then I’m all for it.  
 

 

 

 

why dont they just give an extra 5k tax relief instead?

[GoldDiggerDave]

1 hour ago, HerefordBullyun said:

why dont they just give an extra 5k tax relief instead?

Because that would to too easy!  And I feel the UBI will be the sweetener/mechanism for governments to open the door on state controlled programmable digital currency.  Once everyone has a state digital wallet it’s not a far step from destroying physical Fiat and shoehorning the population into the new system of control.  I hope that’s not the case but looks like we are heading in that direction. 

Edited May 17, 2021 by GoldDiggerDave
typo

[HerefordBullyun]

1 hour ago, GoldDiggerDave said:

Because that would to too easy!  And I feel the UBI will be the sweetener/mechanism for governments to open the door on state controlled programmable digital currency.  Once everyone has a state digital wallet it’s not a far step from destroying physical Fiat and shoehorning the population into the new system of control.  I hope that’s not the case but looks like we are heading in that direction. 

I think you will find many will be against this. If they kill off physical cash there will be absolute outrage!

[GoldDiggerDave]

10 minutes ago, HerefordBullyun said:

I think you will find many will be against this. If they kill off physical cash there will be absolute outrage!

I 100% agree with you. In 2020/21 ask yourself have you used more physical cash or less? I withdrew a wedge of cash in March 2020 and I’ve still got it, you are treated like a social pariah if you try and hand it over.  Regardless of the current situation you must feel that the population is being kettled into changing their habits and using physical cash is one of them.  

[Bigmarc]

I took a grand in cash last year to center parks. Nowhere on site excepted it. I was furious but I was the only one that was furious. Everyone else thought I was strange taking cash in the first place. It's the way the world is going.

[Bigmarc]

5 hours ago, dicker said:

From what I have seen, free money is usually used to buy big TV’s and PS5’s

Would you prefer to see those who are poor and in need to be staring at a blank wall or even better have nothing. Let's have them all running around in rags whilst we sit there and count our gold.

[Roy]

They could read a book?

Or they could learn to read and then read a book?

Learn a skill perhaps? 

Giving money to the poor is like the old proverb, 'Give a man a fish, you feed him for a day.....'

[Millicent]

Oooh, lots to unpack here.

Yeah, I'm concerned about cash being discouraged. "Just use a card" is all well and good, but our kids don't have cards for pocket money to spend at the shop on the way home from school, and the card payments system restricts trade to people who are big enough businesses to be worth getting a card payment thing, or transactions big enough to wait for bank transfers - putting burdens on the little guy, as usual.

As for UBI - well, there's two different things to think about here.

Firstly, is some kind of welfare payment a good or bad thing?

The argument against is that people should be responsible for their own upkeep, and that welfare systems reward people for slobbing around at home rather than bothering to work, encouraging selfishness. I'm sure SOME people are like that, but most people on benefits I see are either disabled and can't work, or can't work enough hours, or struggling with caring responsibilities or something along those lines, and are generally (a) really stressed because they're barely covering the rent and bills and food and (b) ashamed about being on benefits. I'm sure there IS some piss-taking, but taking away the benefit system because of that just makes life a lot harder for the people who really need it. When we (this account is shared between a married couple, husband is writing this) had just had our first child, my wife was recovering from a bad labour and couldn't walk without crutches, I was self employed and working from home as an IT contractor - and our home was made uninhabitable for a year by a flood. We had insurance, but not for business interruption, and while it paid for repairs to the house and new furniture, it didn't cover the many extra costs of suddenly looking after a sick wife and a small baby without a house - and it was a year before the works were done and we could move back in. Our savings were gone pretty quickly, and we came out of it with massive credit card debts as the banks wouldn't give us a loan under those circumstances, and if we'd applied for benefits we'd have had to somehow make ends meet for months before we got anything - I didn't realise how long the trouble we got into would last for and thought it wasn't worth applying because I hoped we'd be back on our feet before it started to pay out, especially given the paltry amounts we'd have gotten, so never bothered, although in hindsight I should have...

So, the welfare system we have is still pretty miserly, and really didn't support us when we really could have done with it. I am happy that my taxes go towards supporting people who have had bad luck, both because I want people to be happy, and because I think that if you don't provide for poor people, they will be driven to rob you out of desperation, they won't have money to spend in shops to drive the economy, they won't be able to afford to look after themselves so diseases will spread through their population and then infect the rest of us, we'll just end up with ghettos/slums etc etc - it is not only *nice* but in our *selfish best interests* to look out for each other! Trials of UBI around the world have resulted in more people working in the long run, which seems to suggest that the "It encourages laziness" effect is outweighed by factors like making it practical for people to get more training and then go for jobs that were previously out of their reach, etc.

Secondly, is UBI a better kind of welfare payment than the current means-tested system?

Well, if we'd had a UBI when our house had flooded and I couldn't work for months, then we would have still had some income, without needing to argue that we're eligible or wait for it to come through or anything, which would certainly have been nice. A UBI funded from increased income tax is a net positive for people below some income threshold where the tax increase matches the UBI they get, and a tax increase for people above that, so it would do something to close the rich/poor divide, which I'd say is a good thing. The current welfare system is quite expensive to administer, with all the paperwork involved, and a UBI would cut that out, thereby being more "efficient" in the cost of the system turning into actual cash in recipient's hands.

As to whether it would just cause rents and food prices and so on to rise - I am not enough of an economist to predict that. Apparently that's not been seen in trials, but the trials are limited. I think it's worth doing larger trials to find ou!

[GoldDiggerDave]

1 hour ago, Bigmarc said:

I took a grand in cash last year to center parks. Nowhere on site excepted it. I was furious but I was the only one that was furious. Everyone else thought I was strange taking cash in the first place. It's the way the world is going.

I’m self employed and getting paid in cash now is almost as bad as someone writing a cheque.  I have to pay it into a cash machine as no one wants it. Who’d thought we’d get to a stage where cash is no longer king.  If I do a job now and people ask how I want paying I say gold first (gets a few laughs though I’m serious) then crypto, bank transfer or worst case cash.