If you have paid more than five minutes attention to public discourse, you know that proclaiming a desire to "have a debate" about some radical proposal is really code for actually being in favour of the thing to be debated.

The same thing goes for wanting "to start a discussion" or to "have a national conversation" about something you know will be contentious. Framing things this way is usually a hedge against the potential for backlash if your idea proves a bit too controversial.

So now that Andrew Little has said Labour is "keen" to have a "debate" on whether New Zealand should adopt a Universal Basic Income, you might infer this means that a UBI is something he would like to see happen. And the chances are you're probably right.

Under a UBI, every New Zealander would receive a benefit. Everybody would get the same amount, regardless of their employment status, wealth or needs. There would be no strings attached and so every person would be guaranteed the bare necessities of existence without the need for work (though if mere existence were not enough, you would certainly be free to pursue employment).

Needless to say, such a system would be a pretty radical reform. It is, at the end of the day, a universal dole – a payment for simply being alive. You can see why Little was being guarded.

After all, who but a communist could propose such a thing?

In fact, the idea of a UBI has tempted many anti-socialist thinkers down the years. And I'm not just talking about eccentric cranks here. Nobel laureates Friedrich Hayek and Milton Friedman, arguably the most influential free-market economists of the 20th century, both supported some form of a UBI.

Even Roger Douglas – the great "neoliberal" bogeymen of our protesting Left – included something called a guaranteed minimum family income in his flat tax proposal in 1987. This wasn't quite a UBI since it was targeted at those on low incomes. You could certainly call it a variation on the theme, however.

So what is it about a guaranteed or basic income that seduces these lovers of limited government?

In the first place, these schemes usually operate on the basis that the new system would completely supplant the existing galaxy of benefits, allowances and other payments comprising the constellations of the modern welfare galaxy. For example, the UBI proposed by Charles Murray (an influential American political scientist) would see the termination of all individual social welfare programs in favour of a simple annual payment to all adults of $10,000 USD.

Because the UBI would be so easy to administer, the argument goes, its implementation would allow the wholesale dismantling of much of the existing state bureaucracy. Many on the Right see the existing welfare apparatus as being unavoidable expensive, clunky and impossible to control – and a few even see it as a threat to democracy itself. The UBI looks almost elegant in comparison.

Some libertarians go further and argue that some kind of basic income is a necessary element of human freedom. Matt Zwolinski of the University of San Diego, for example, argues that while we rightly worry about the dangers of government coercion, it is equally proper to be concerned with marketplace coercion. If too much economic insecurity gives employers de facto control over their employees' lives, Zwolinski argues, how can they be expected to exercise the choices and take the risks that are the hallmarks of liberty?

The problem with the concept is not that it is too Left wing. The problem is that it almost certainly could never work in the real world - which is kind of important.

The obvious problem is the cost. A serious UBI would almost certainly consume most existing state revenues. Some would argue the answer would be to fund it through massive tax hikes. The trouble is that you can only do that so much before government revenue actually decreases as the productive sector disintegrates under the weight of ever increasing taxation.

Then there's what could be called the "Goldilocks" issue. Set the payments too low, and people simply wouldn't stand for the difficulties that would then befall seniors, single mothers and everyone else who would effectively see their income cut by the move. Set the UBI too high, and why would people bother getting out bed in the morning? In practice, it would almost certainly be impossible to strike the right balance.

The reality is that a UBI is fun to speculate about, but it is entirely detached from the realities of today's politics.

This is the real problem with what Little said. The Opposition gets a limited amount of free media attention. Why burn it up by calling for a "debate" on something that will never happen?

Shoot for something a little more achievable, I say – like colonising the moon.