Legal Insurrection readers may recall that Finland tried a “Universal Basic Income” program before scrapping it in 2018.
More recently, a Democratic state senator proposed giving $500 a month to poor college students as a test program of universal basic income.
As senseless and full of failing as these plans were, they are a masterpiece of statesmanship in contrast to projects being made by Palm Springs.
The Palm Springs City Council approved the proposal at a meeting on March 24, which will kickstart the program with $200,000 to fund initial research and planning.The pilot program would eventually provide monthly payments to a number of transgender and nonbinary residents in Palm Springs, with no stipulations on how the money can be spent.A Palm Springs city council report highlights transgender and nonbinary residents as “particularly vulnerable” due to unemployment, homelessness, assault and discrimination.The program will also look to state funding from the $35 million allocated in 2021 toward guaranteed income programs across California.
The program will launch between October and February 2023. One thousand residents will be chosen to receive $1,000 a month for three years.
One council member explains her vote with both pride and excitement.
Christy Holstege, a Palm Springs City Council member who helped conceive the proposal, highlighted the Southern California city’s history in advancing LGBTQ rights.“We are a beacon in the country and in the world, a place where LGBTQ people have fled for decades to seek sanctuary and safety and their own community,” she said. “And so I think it’s really important for Palm Springs to be on the front lines of supporting the trans community … especially when they’re under attack throughout the country.”
It is important to understand that Palm Springs has a transgender mayor who expresses worry about the ultimate price tag of this virtue-signaling scheme.
Palm Springs Mayor Lisa Middleton, the first openly transgender mayor in the state, expressed some reservations about the plan while stressing that the need for financial assistance is “absolutely real.” There are over 400,000 people living below the poverty line in Riverside County, she said.“My serious concern is the ability of these guaranteed income programs to scale up to the magnitude of the issues that are before us,” Mayor Middleton said.
At least one California politician is willing to go on the record about how unfair this plan is.
Former San Diego City Councilman Carl DeMaio, a Republican who served as the first openly gay member of the city council, called the program “outrageous and discriminatory.””We’re completely opposed to guaranteed or universal basic income programs, because they ultimately cause inflation and raise the cost of living on everyone — they don’t work,” DeMaio said in a statement.”But at least some of them have minimum income requirements to qualify, whereas this one is no-strings-attached ‘woke’ virtue signaling to the LGBT community in a way that is not only offensive but discriminatory,” he continued.
The current plan is for twenty transgender and nonbinary Palm Springs residents will receive the free money funded by the taxpayers for 18 months. It is doubtful any of those people will be better off after 18 checks for $900, especially as we are entering an era of significant inflation.
But spending other people’s money to make yourself feel good as a politician remains priceless.
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