People are intepreting Friedman in a less than charitable manner; it seems likely that he supported Basic Income because it replaced all the redistribution of the modern state with one obvious metric.

Once we move to that one measure, there's no room for politicking / special interest subsidies. Granted, it seems unlikely to occur, since not everyone's equal and clearly some people should have at least some additional benefits.

And then we're back to where we are today.