{"id":502129,"date":"2026-10-20T11:00:18","date_gmt":"2026-10-20T11:00:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/502129\/"},"modified":"2026-10-20T11:00:18","modified_gmt":"2026-10-20T11:00:18","slug":"john-seiler-republican-david-pan-touts-ubi-in-his-bid-for-congress-orange-county-register","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/502129\/","title":{"rendered":"John Seiler: Republican David Pan touts UBI in his bid for Congress \u2013 Orange County Register"},"content":{"rendered":"

David Pan<\/a> is one of the most intelligent candidates for the U.S. House of Representatives I have interviewed. He is a professor of German at the University of California, Irvine.\u00a0<\/p>\n

His favorite German author is Heinrich von Kleist<\/a> (1777-1811), who isn\u2019t well known in English translation. Kleist, a contemporary of Goethe, Hegel and Beethoven, wrote stories that \u201care fairy tales, but always kind of shocking,\u201d Pan said. He recommended \u201cSt. Cecilia; or the Power of Music<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

Pan has a tough road running as a Republican against incumbent Democratic Rep. Lou Correa<\/a>, whom I interviewed earlier<\/a> this year, for California\u2019s 46th Congressional District. It includes Santa Ana, Stanton, most of Anaheim and parts of Fullerton and Orange. In 2024, Pan lost<\/a> to Correa, 63% to 37%.\u00a0<\/p>\n

One of Pan\u2019s distinctive issues is his stance on a universal basic income. It\u2019s different from 2020 Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang\u2019s Freedom Dividend<\/a> UBI, which would create a new $12,000 annual benefit financed largely by a 10% value-added tax.<\/p>\n

Instead, Pan\u2019s UBI proposal would replace much of the welfare and entitlement system with an income-adjusted payment of up to $16,000 a year. Existing benefits would continue for those receiving them. But programs would close to new applicants and disappear through attrition.<\/p>\n

I asked how his idea held up to free-market criticism that what he\u2019s proposing is socialism. Pan countered his plan is \u201cthe opposite of Yang\u2019s. It\u2019s dismantling this huge part of our federal government and giving the cash back to people.\u201d<\/p>\n

He further pointed out that his idea isn\u2019t totally alien to free market-enthusiasts. He points to the negative income tax proposal by Nobel economics laureate Milton Friedman, one of my favorite free-market economists. Friedman\u2019s NIT proposal would replace traditional welfare programs with direct cash payments given to poor people through the tax code.<\/p>\n

Pan\u2019s website links a 1966 Friedman lecture, which argued<\/a> the idea was \u201cmore compatible with the philosophy and aims of the proponents of limited government and maximum individual freedom.\u201d At the very least, it\u2019s something to think about.\u00a0<\/p>\n

On the $40 trillion national debt, growing at $2 trillion a year, Pan said savings from his plan and higher economic growth would help the federal government better \u201cmanage the deficit.\u201d If his proposal indeed trimmed the fat from the bloated entitlement and welfare programs, it certainly wouldn\u2019t hurt.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In related matters, Pan also wants to simplify the tax code by, among other things, eliminating the home mortgage interest deduction and the tax exclusion for employer-sponsored health insurance. While everyone likes deductions, getting rid of them would allow for broader cuts in overall tax rates. Such discussions are verboten in the current Congress. But talking about them is useful to get people thinking.<\/p>\n

Given his scholarship, I asked about the rise<\/a> of the Alternative for Germany political party in recent elections. Usually it\u2019s called \u201cfar-right\u201d by the mainstream media. But Pan argues it\u2019s more a doppelg\u00e4nger to the Make America Great Again movement than anything else.<\/p>\n

The four main planks in the AfD\u2019s 2025 platform<\/a> are restricting immigration; reducing Germany\u2019s \u201cclimate change\u201d policies; taking power back from the European Union; and ending Berlin\u2019s support for the Ukraine War.\u00a0 To the latter point, Pan himself supports Ukraine, but backs President Donald Trump ending U.S. financial support in the Russia-Ukraine war.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Speaking of matters of war and peace, I personally agree with Rep. Correa that the Iran war is a disaster. Pan supports the war.\u00a0 \u201cI wish Trump had never let up on the Iranians,\u201d Pan said of the April 8 ceasefire<\/a>. \u201cI think the seesaw was a big mistake. Once we got in there, we needed to see it through.\u201d<\/p>\n

Currently, he said, due to ammo limitations and an \u201caversion to ground troops,\u201d economic sanctions are the best strategy. He \u201cbasically\u201d supports Trump\u2019s actions, but \u201chis vacillations have been a problem.\u201d<\/p>\n

On immigration, Pan said \u201cshutting the border is a big win\u201d and is \u201cthe prerequisite for reform of our immigration system.\u201d He supports a reform that \u201cdoesn\u2019t necessarily mean a pathway to citizenship for everybody who\u2019s here, but certainly some pathway to legal residency for people who are law-abiding\u2026\u201d That could be a future compromise.<\/p>\n

On tariffs, he supports \u201cmostly free market policies.\u201d But like Adam Smith, he said, he would make exceptions for national security, such as rare earth minerals.<\/p>\n

Although I disagree with Pan on many issues, it would be useful to have somebody \u00fcber-smart in Congress. Correa is undeniably the favorite to win, but Pan and his ideas are worth considering.\u00a0<\/p>\n

John Seiler is on the SCNG Editorial Board<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"David Pan is one of the most intelligent candidates for the U.S. House of Representatives I have interviewed.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":502130,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[163,165,164,975,2082],"class_list":["post-502129","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-anaheim","tag-anaheim","tag-anaheim-headlines","tag-anaheim-news","tag-opinion","tag-opinion-columnists"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/502129","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=502129"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/502129\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/502130"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=502129"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=502129"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=502129"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}