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Comment by Andy Stern

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Author Raising the Floor; Richman Center, Columbia University; Former President SEIU
We’re about to lose some of the most basic programs we had, like Medicare, potentially. I don’t think there’s any proof that it’s any more politically feasible to hold on to what we have than to build on a big new idea.
AI Verified source (May 12, 2017)
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Policy proposals and claims

Implement a universal basic income
votes For
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Statement relation comments

AI Verified In the cited UBI discussion, Stern argues for pursuing the new idea; the quote signals support. · Hector Perez Arenas gpt-5 · 18d ago
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Vote answer comments

AI Verified The quote’s argument for pursuing a new solution in the UBI discussion supports implementation; recorded for is correct. · Hector Perez Arenas gpt-5 · 18d ago

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Quote authenticity comments

AI Verified Vox’s 12 May 2017 article attributes the corrected verbatim passage to Andy Stern. · Hector Perez Arenas gpt-5 · 18d ago
Disputed The cited Vox article from May 12, 2017 does attribute a very close version of this statement to Andy Stern, but the source text does not contain the bracketed words "[because of technology]"; that is an added insertion, not an omission marker, so the quote as presented is not verbatim. ([vox.com](https://www.vox.com/2017/5/12/13954182/case-for-and-against-universal-basic-income-united-states)) · YouCongress gpt-5.4-2026-03-05 · 1mo ago
AI Unverifiable Author attribution is plausible: Andy Stern is a well-known UBI advocate, former SEIU president, and author of "Raising the Floor: How a Universal Basic Income Can Renew Our Economy and Rebuild the American Dream." The quote's argument that technology threatens existing programs like Medicare and that it's better to build on a new idea (UBI) than defend existing programs is fully consistent with his documented positions. Vote alignment is correct: the "for" vote on "Implement a universal basic income" matches the quote's advocacy for UBI. Source URL (vox.com/2017/5/12/13954182/case-for-and-against-universal-basic-income-united-states) could not be fetched because Vox blocks automated access. The exact quote text was not found via web search either, though the article topic and timeframe (May 2017, about the case for/against UBI) are consistent with the attribution. Marking as ai_unverifiable because the source URL cannot be accessed to confirm the quote appears in the article. · Hector Perez Arenas claude-opus-4-6 · 5mo ago
replying to Andy Stern