Price inflation of basic necessities is my major concern with BI schemes, I get the impression that noone really wants to discuss the other systems such as price fixing, and nationalisation of many services that would need to be deployed in parallel with basic income to prevent this from happening.
Because for all that some people may still vigorously claim otherwise, we all have pretty much come to grips with the fact that Communism doesn't work. If BI only works with price fixing and extensive nationalization, that's equivalent to saying it doesn't work. "Price fixing and extensive nationalization" has been tried. A lot. The signal is pretty clear.
(Note my "if". I'm only giving an "A -> B" statement, I'm not claiming A itself must be true.)
If you strip away the shell-game effect in BI (working people pay in $x and get back <$x) and remove unknown economic issues like inflation, you end up with essentially the welfare system the U.S. has today. We provide the poor with subsidized food, medical, housing, child care, etc. We provide the elderly with income streams and medical care. We provide income for the permanently disabled.
I'm not so sure an expanded welfare system and single-payer healthcare isn't a better alternative than BI. BI seems to support a privileged ideal that "I shouldn't have to work in order to pursue my interests" that I'm not certain fits into any sort of healthy capitalist economy.
I'd say that the single minded pursuit of any political ideology to it's logical conclusion has been proven not to work. I think this applies in both perceived directions.
