Back in the hey day of Blair's administration, the phrase "what works, works" was used to explain "evidence based policy making" a third way friendly approach.

This has definitely lost its shine as Blair and Clinton have yet to be re-re-discovered as before their time thinkers (#).

But this disdain for evidence tends to lead to the triumph of "common sense" - policies actively pandering to biases in the voters

And this seems like one of those awful ideas that might just gain traction.

It's a commune, a Kibbutz. A cult on a farm in Nebraska. It's idealism not looking down at the muddy ground underneath. God it's what I tried to create when I was an undergraduate. Let's not go there.

(#) Trust me, everything goes round in cycles

Kibbutzim worked out fine, though. In what way have they been shown as failures by evidence? On the contrary, these types of communes succeed with good charters.

It is reminiscent of the WPA of the New Deal. In the U.S. these efforts have historically been undermined by racism. “When Affirmative Action was White” (https://www.amazon.com/When-Affirmative-Action-White-Twentie...) makes a case for the G.I. Bill, New Deal and other efforts being compromised by segregationist policies. The current U.S. president’s proposal to link social services to country of origin seem to indicate that proposals like “Summer camp” (let alone reparations) are likely to face similar opposition.

"An internet reinvents 19th century anarchism"

You might want to read "Fields, Factories, and Workshops" or "The Conquest of Bread" by Pyotr Kropotkin

Thanks, I read the Reddit comments and I thought I was the only one seeing that.

I mean it's hardly a thought experiment since it's already the basic idea behind Ursula K. Le Guin's "The Dispossessed", which I'm currently reading. The communities on Annarres are really much alike what is discribed by OP

Perhaps the term coop (cooperative) would be closer to the article text than "summer camp". Certainly sharing things like childcare and bulk buying communally seems it would be a good thing? I'm not sure where the fracking and solar power labour comes in though?

This seems to be a reinvention of the workhouse, with a more Orwellian naming scheme. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Workhouse

While I think debating ways to implement UBI is a very valuable thing as it may eventually lead to a realistic solution, it doesn't take reading much into this "thought experiment" to realize it's a naive, New Age sort of happy happy joy joy utopia.

But what if the Kulaks don’t want to go to summer camp?