Deciding what a 'basic standard of living' (i.e. enough to live on but without Shiny Toys) actually is, especially when people have children (who need a stimulating environment to grow up in), turns out to be a massively thorny problem, alas.

If you're still relying on extrinsic rewards for employment, you have an extra pressure on defining it low enough that the difference is worth working for (otherwise you get what people call the 'benefit trap', where you're actually worse-off doing an official working job because at the very least you suddenly can't do all the casual labour that was making ends meet previously).