live on welfare and you dont have to worry about food and you can be "free and creative".

As you are right to a certain degree I have to disagree. The money you receive from wellfare is sufficient enough to make you stay at home and don't start any trouble, but it's really not enough to be "free and creative".

You are especially not "free" as you have to stay put for appointements in the jobcenter when they are requesting your presence. You might get put into a program (Maßnahme) where you have to be for 8hrs every day over weeks to "learn how to write job applications and the like.

I can tell you, it really is not fun to be stuck in this kind of system.

I've been "unemployed" for 4-5 months before I've started college and had a surgery due (5 weeks hospital + 8 weeks recovering after), yet the Jobcenter insisted that I take part in one of those programs where I learned to put the right phone number on my application, not to misspell my name and stuff like that, we made roleplaying on how to act/ behave in a job interviews and I had to write 20 applications per week (even though they knew that I will not start a job in the first place as I have to go to the hospital for surgery and will start college after).

I turned completely braindead in that time. I was sitting there 8hrs per day over weeks with people who did not speak basic german, 55 year old housewives who hardly will get a job again no matter how hard they try and college drop-outs and we got treated like 4yr old kids and criminals who are just plain stupid and need to be kept in check 24/7.

The stigma is high when being unemployed and living off wellfare and this really is no time to actually get creative and feel free, my impression during that time was the complete opposite.

Basic income would be different as you can take your time to relax, focus and start over with something you love to do without getting bossed around in a very bad way.