I've got at least 18 good reasons you should favour representatives who propose a Job Guarantee scheme rather than a UBI. (I think there could be several more reasons, write to me if you can think of more.)
Required reading: Tcherneva, "The Job Guarantee - one pager"
Why is a Job Guarantee superior to a UBI in every conceivable way and more? Consider: (1) A JG provides financial security (it would be politically impossible to eliminate a JG once implemented, it would be too popular).
(2) it provides a living wage plus health benefits (a UBI does not).
(3) a JG is pro-human (by contrast a UBI is cynical and defeatist),
(4) gives people purpose and dignity, and hope.,
(5) keeps people skilled when they can't find private sector jobs,
(6) can be designed to give people freedom to do work they love, provided only it has good social purpose (as broadly defined by Congress).
(7) a JG scheme would be funded without cutting other programs, once a JG administration is staffed,
(8) is not inflationary (in a fiat currency), because the JG is not inflationary (it might give 0.09% inflation, which is good, a low level of inflation makes private debt easier to pay off).
(9) Taxes are not needed to offset the JG spending because the JG is not inflationary.
(10) A JG program produces demand for more services from the private sector, so it boosts private sector jobs.
(11) JG workers earn more than a measly UBI hand-out, and so will spend more, which boosts overall demand and fuels growth.
(12) the JG reduces crime and improves health, so it might overall pay for itself when fully accounted.
(13) much JG work could be purely for social good, it does not need to render a profit, this could be absolutely vital for fighting global ecological crises like global warming (especially if all major economies adopt a JG).
(14) the JG boosts GDP in a sustainable way, since the jobs created need not be based on competitive market demands.
(15) The JG wage is an automatic minimum wage baseline,
(16) is also price stabilizer, as private sector demand fluctuates the JG program takes up or release the slack automatically.
(17) So, in particular, a JG scheme would make the ridiculous welfare system for the rich (aka. Treasury bonds trading) obsolete. Due to the JG stabilizer effect, the Central Bank could set interest rates by the single mechanism of paying interest to banks holding excess reserves, at the desired overnight rate target.
(18) although sovereign government budget deficits are not useful numbers absent the impact on the real material economy and inflation, the JG scheme (In the USA) would only add 2% of GDP or less to the budget, so it is not even politically unpalatable even to deficit hawks.
And yes, deficit hawks are idiots, they are ignorant people who think that, or think as if, currency is still a commodity like gold, it is not. Budget deficits are meaningless out of context, what kills an economy is austerity (budget surplus) and private debt, and inflation. Government deficit increases counteract austerity and private debt, and are not necessarily inflationary.
If you want the full details and modelling of the effects of a Job Guarantee program, this is a good recent work:
Wray, "Public Service Employment" (includes simulations of effects of a JG).
UBI is giving up on humanity, it is a mindset where whatever robots can do will be defined by as menial unskilled labour, but if you truly believe (like I do) in prospects for advanced AI, almost every current human activity could be robot automated, even fine art. The point of a Job Guarantee is to massively expand the human imagination, to see useful social work well beyond what robots can do for us. The definition of "work" is endlessly creative. You can dbe of use to society by simply looking after people in need, or by creating public art works, or even simply by educating yourself and publishing your thoughts --- this is all socially useful work, and anyone not employed by private companies should be given a living wage to engage in such work.
Lastly for a few juicy dunks.
- UBI is essentially the same as tossing bread crumbs to peasants.
- A Job Guarantee program is turning peasants into workers and workers into master of their own fate.
- UBI is capitulation to capitalist oligarchy.
- JG is empowerment of the working class.
- UBI is an embracing of the narrowest definition of "work".
- JG schemes give us all freedom to massively expand the meaning of work.
- AI robots are considered the reason a a UBI will be necessary.
- A JG schemes says robots will free up human time, allowing us all to work less time but for the same wages.
The key to this latter point is to embrace the model of worker cooperatives. A worker cooperative employing more robots can vote to give themselves less work hours without a wage cut. Contrast this with the capitalist model of a firm: the boss employs robots, fires labour, and takes all the profits. That's not a spiritual economics, it is neo-feudalism, in fat worse, at least under feudalism peasants had work to do. So we need to rapidly transition to a new green economy and start developing more worker cooperatives, and then we will see why a job guarantee works for everyone.