> It’s really hard to look at the evidence and say giving people money is wrong, because having enough money means being able to buy enough food.

This person is conflating cash transfers (welfare) with UBI. One can think cash transfers and general welfare are good while still thinking UBI may have fatal flaws. And anyone that paints UBI experiments as approaching what truly Universal Basic Income would look like are deceiving. This person is repeatedly dodging real criticisms.

This article is mostly a verbose emotional string of arguments, but it doesn't do a very good job of explaining either of its two title claims.

Claim 1: Many people say "socialism" to mean top-down social programs funded by taxes, e.g. when people say uncontroversially "Sweden is more socialist than the USA," this is what they mean. UBI is a top-down social program. If you don't think that, ask yourself: What happens to the payments if the federal gov collapses or is incapacitated? (Is unable to organize payments or tax collection). UBI halts everywhere.

As a contrast, Farming is bottom up: For example the government of Afghanistan could collapse and it may take years before remote individual farmers even know that it happened. UBI receivers on the other hand would know as soon as the first check didn't come.

Claim 2: But UBI is "Free Money." That's the point. It has to be unconditional to be UBI, that's how they draw the distinction. Most people who advocate for UBI contrast it specifically with means-tested welfare.

> Have you ever played the game Monopoly? I’m sure you have. Is that a game about socialism? According to “free money is socialism” logic it is, because everyone starts the game with free money and everyone gets free money for simply passing Go.

This is a silly analogy. It's not free money even within the game rules. Passing Go is the condition. You can go to jail in the game, being forced to skip passing Go, even. Citing a game mechanic as a proof that UBI isn't free money is bonkers.

When UBI proponents say universal or unconditional, that's what they (proponents and opponents) are talking about when they mean free.

I made my own criticisms of UBI last week (OP's article is from Sept) where I raise objections that I think are relevant even if UBI is agreeably implemented: https://medium.com/@simon.sarris/after-universal-basic-incom...

Convincing people that it's not socalism or free money is not enough. You have to make the argument that price inflation won't occur, that it can fail gracefully, that destroying the other welfare programs that do more than just give cash (like case workers in medicaid) is a good idea, and so on. UBI proponents ignore these just like Marx ignored implementation details, relying on the World-spirit-of-the-people (an odd kind of hand-waving mysticism) to ensure that it would work.

If you meet someone pro-UBI, ask them this: What happens if it fails or we can no longer afford it, after 30 years running? What does the generation that was never required to work, do?

If they say it won't fail, you know you're not talking to someone interested in creating a robust system. If your ideal is incapable of planning for failure, you haven't really thought about your ideals much. We know what large scale top down social failure looks like, after the last century.