Financial viability of universal basic income

Universal basic income (UBI) is an elegant model for economists. It has now been attracting a lot of attention all over the world, including the rich countries. The scheme is that all people in the country will get some cash without any relation to the work. Abhijit Banerjee, the Nobel laureate, in his book Good Economics for Hard Times, has made an elaborate case for Universal basic income. He calls it ultra basic (UUBI) because "any universal income that governments of poor countries can afford will be ultra basic”. Hence UUBI (page295). He further adds: "Given all this, the best combination may be a UUBI everyone can access when they need it, and larger transfers targeted to the very poor