Even in the best year (2008, $3269) this isn't remotely enough to live on. That's less than $9 a day, and that's an exceptionally high payout! In 2012 it was $2.40 a day. Maybe you could live on that in India or Vietnam, but not in the U.S.
I would disagree in that during my starving student years I occasionally submitted tax returns vaguely resembling those kind of figures. You need roommates and can't be too picky about food and entertainment, but its possible. Its certainly a lot easier to live on than $0 !
This does have certain implications where either it gets indexed to some kind of cost of living index, probably very corruptly, or it gets polarized into some kind of coastie/non-coastie or urban/rural issue.
