I'm using 2011 figures, because it's what I have, but it should be close enough:
Total US Population in 2011: 311.6 million (today:331.9 million)
Money needed to give every American (and only Americans) $10,000: 3.116 $Trillion
TOTAL wealth of all billionaires, globally: 4.18 $Trillion
So, if you drained all of the wealth of all billionaires globally, a ONE TIME operation (since they'll have zero wealth afterwards,) that gives everybody in the United States (and only those in the United States:) $13,400. So everybody would get a ONE TIME boost of about $1,000 / month. And then that source is sucked dry.
If you took the COMBINED total income of ALL Americans, it would be (2011 numbers): 10.52 $Trillion
So, if you took all of the wealth of ALL Americans, and redistributed it evenly across ALL Americans, you would be giving $33,760 as the total yearly income, to all Americans. After that, there would be no more money to give. And you'll have taken ZERO in taxes. Every single social program would have a budget of ZERO. No social security, no medicare, no medicaid, no veterans assistance, no unemployment insurance, no housing assistance. The United States would instantly default on all debt, because there'd be no money to pay it. All of that, for a grand total of: $33,760/year/person.
Like -- I want to understand how this is supposed to work. I love the *idea* of an UBI. I don't buy any of the arguments that: "Well, nobody would work," and "Life would lose meaning," all of these kinds of arguments. I'd *love* for a UBI to work. Bring on a post-scarcity world.
But where's all that money supposed to be coming from?