A guaranteed income for working people?

I just finished reading “Fair Shot”, a recent book written by one of Facebook many “co-founders”, Chris Hughes, in which he makes the case that “one-percenters” like him should pay their fortune forward in a radically simple way: a guaranteed income for working people.

That's not quite what he says in the book as the funding mechanism would happen by taxing gasoline and other stuff. The idea isn't new and is currently tested and debated the world over.

More recently, it was tried in Finland where it seem to have failed after 2,000 randomly selected unemployed Finns got about $675 a month during a two year test period without having to give anything in return.

I always had some skepticism about the concept and, except perhaps for stay-at-home moms that perform a real serious job, I'm not a believer. This said, I've evolved a bit over time, and really believe that the need for a guaranteed basic income starts with a decent minimum wage.

Currently, our Federal minimum hourly wage is still at $7.25 and I do believe that it should be jacked up to a living wage $15 or more per hour, instead.

For a host of good economic reasons, this shouldn't and couldn't be applied overnight, but gradually, say over 7 years, with a manageable $1.50 a year increase per year, reaching $17.75 on year 7 and then kept up with the consumer price index.

The rest of the proposed ideas are just a pipe dream.