The negative income tax concept has been proposed in the USA (in the mid-20th century) as a replacement for public assistance. It would replace a variety of welfare programs such as general assistance, SSI, WIC, Section 8 housing, Food stamps (SNAP), and perhaps medicaid. The flaw is that any level of aid that is enough to survive on will mean that many people will choose to live off the “entitlement” and not seek employment. This is easily observed among frum Jews, many of whom lose interest in increased parnassah once they have enough to survive and spend their time on Torah and Mitsvos (unfortunately, many non-Jews when reaching that same level of income are more likely to devote their time to less constructive activities).
If the goal is to make employment more lucrative for the poor, it would be better to eliminate the payroll tax (however the payroll tax is largely dedicated to paying social security, so that’s a problem) and to increase the zero bracket amount of the income tax (something Trump did).