Offering a New Vision for Our Future

Please vote for David Pan

Now that you have received your ballots for the election, you have an opportunity to make some real choices. Please consider carefully the kind of future that I would like to offer to our country.

I am running for Congress because I want to re-establish our freedom to be able to make the decisions that determine our lives. Unfortunately, our government over the years, rather than guaranteeing this freedom, has been taking it away.

Almost two centuries ago, Alexis de Tocqueville, wrote that the genius of our democracy lay in the way in which it combined a strong government that guarantees public safety with a small administration that leaves to its citizens the ability to manage their lives. There is a certain minimum amount of responsibility that the government has for maintaining our safety and security, but beyond that the government needs only to make sure that we have the freedom to lead our lives and develop our relationships in our families, churches, and communities.

Today, that picture has been reversed. 

On the one hand, our government is weak. It fails to provide the basic border security that would protect us against outsiders who seek to harm us. It has been unable to check the terrorists and autocrats who want to create a world order based on fear rather than freedom and equality. 

On the other hand, our administrative state has grown immensely. The main way in which this has been happening is through increasing taxes to build the welfare state. When the government takes our money, it is taking away our ability to decide what we do with the fruits of our labor. By taking over more and more of our money, and with it our decision-making power, our federal government has grown into an administrative state that manages our social welfare, our education, our retirement, and our health care. Because we are increasingly trapped within a government monopoly for all these things, we are no longer able to make the choices that would allow us to take responsibility for our lives.

Reforming Welfare

Our welfare system traps people in poverty by providing benefits like food stamps, housing vouchers, and school lunches that are designed to be spent right away rather than saved for the future. Once someone starts to earn or save money, those benefits are taken away. Consequently, we are penalizing people who work and save, and we are encouraging them to lose the freedom that comes from building up their own wealth. Instead, they are trapped within a bureaucratic government system of surveillance and control over what they earn and how much they save. 

My plan to phase out our welfare programs is to close them to new applicants and offer existing recipients the opportunity to trade them in for a universal basic income of $16,000 per year for everyone 21 and older for the rest of their lives, with no restrictions. Eventually the current programs would disappear through attrition, and everyone would be able to use their universal basic income to build their own lives in the way they see fit. Instead of using their time and energy to navigate and game a government bureaucracy, they would have the freedom to work, save, and invest in their futures.

The biggest beneficiaries of my plan would be working families, who currently just pay taxes and do not receive any benefits out of our existing system. By providing each of these individuals with $16,000 per year, my plan would return to them the money they have been paying in taxes and allow them to use this money to improve their lives and invest in their futures.

Reforming Social Security

My plan would guarantee for anyone 37 and older their existing Social Security and Medicare benefits under the current system but would also allow them to switch to the universal basic income at any time. Those under 37 would start receiving their universal basic income right away and would be able to invest part or all of it on their own for their retirement. 

Such a system provides both security and a comfortable retirement for everyone. If someone were to invest $6000 per year of their $16,000 universal basic income into a stock market index fund from the age of 21, by age 67 they would have over $750,000 in today’s dollars, assuming a very modest 4% average annual inflation-adjusted return. This would be enough to purchase an annuity that would pay $54,000 per year for life, plus they would continue to receive their $16,000 per year. This would be much better than the current maximum Social Security benefit of $45,864 per year at age 67, which is only available to people who have earned $168,600 per year for 35 years.

Reforming Health Care

The US currently spends 18% of GDP on health care, which is 50% more than any other country in the world. Meanwhile, the US ranks 43rd in life expectancy. Something is fundamentally wrong with our system, and it has to do with the way in which the people receiving care are not the ones who are paying for care. 

My plan would free people from the government monopolies on health insurance in Medicaid and Medicare. $4000 per year of the $16,000 universal basic income would be in the form of a health insurance voucher to be used on the private market. Medicaid and Medicare would be privatized and still be offered as an option for those who wish to pay for them. We would have universal health insurance in a completely private system. 

$4000 per year would be enough for an individual to purchase a catastrophic health insurance plan, which comes with an $8000 annual deductible. After this deductible, such plans cover people for major medical expenses. But for day-to-day care, for a cut or a broken arm for instance, people would interact directly with doctors and nurses. This system would create a larger market for health care in which the people paying for care would be the same ones as the ones receiving the care. This will encourage health care providers to compete to offer the best services at the most reasonable prices.

Please Help

If you agree that my plan to trade in our current welfare system for a universal basic income of $16,000 per year would give people their freedom back, please vote for me and tell your friends, family, and neighbors as well. If you have a few dollars to spare, please consider donating at DavidPanforCongress.com to help me get the word out. Thanks for reading!