I'll agree 'the devil is in the details' in the 'social wage' structural reform, but that's true of any proposal or situation, including what we have now or something you would prefer.

But still not insurmountable.

The value of raising children to the age where they can productively enter the work force can be averaged out without too much difficulty. Economists figure it out all the time.

The social value of many other types of effort can also be determined locally by, say, the nonprofit sector or the level of government closest to the ground.

Any new bureaucracy could be offset by getting rid of the truly cumbersome bureacracies of the current welfare system.

I like to think of it as a 'universal toolbox' that everyone has relatively equal access to. What they make of it depends on their own initiative.

By the way, it's not completely orginal with me in this 'left' form. Milton Friedman, from the other side of the divide, argued for something similar with his negative income tax proposal.

But if it's bureacracies you're after, let's go for single-payer health care. All sorts of insurance company bureaucracies would bite the dust, although private or corporate ones, rather than public.