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Finland’s basic income plan could change everything

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Re: Finland’s basic income plan could change everything

#151

Post by stcredzero »

manyoso wrote: post #126
stcredzero wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is the evidence with regards to the benefit or detriment of the fear of starving?

I can't cite any studies, but I do remember having heard of many studies indicating well motivated employees are more productive and happy employees are more productive. As for whether the fear of starving is 'good motivation' I would say that personally speaking it is definitely not what inspires my best work. Mileage probably varies quite a bit.

I can say that unemployment combined with life changes and other stressors can result in debilitating depression. However, it was falling in love and having something to lose that motivated me to land my current job.

Now that she's left me, it's only fear of starvation that motivates me to keep my job.

Re: Finland’s basic income plan could change everything

#152

Post by r00fus »

nugget wrote: post #6
ZeroGravitas wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you see it as different from any other positive thing about a country? Good educational and job opportunities, lack of pollution, effective healthcare and so on, your children not having bombs dropped on them, pretty much anything that makes a country better for the people who live there will make it more attractive to immigrants.

Basic income would become a part of the whole picture, for sure. But take Norway as an example: 5 million people and around a trillion dollars in sovereign wealth, which could yield ~ $8k per person (man, woman, and child) per year in perpetuity. All Norwegian citizens now own a share of ''Norway Inc'' as their birthright and receive a healthy dividend. Now 5 million people - that isn't a lot, and it's easy to imagin…

So the basic income doesn't induce cash flow by supporting local businesses?

I've heard the (not so intuitive) assertion that unemployment insurance payouts and welfare actually bring back $1.73 for each dollar the government hands out - primarily because the people who need such money are most likely to immediately spend it (and support small businesses who then buy other goods), whereas more wealthy are more likely to bank it and not circulate it back into the economy directly.

Re: Finland’s basic income plan could change everything

#153

Post by beat »

Alupis wrote: post #147
beat wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are those people you mention actually productive now? Most of the people I know who would do nothing are already doing nothing.

> Are those people you mention actually productive now? Well, kind of, but only enough to pay rent and eat. But that's my point, individuals like this, who only work the bare minimum to just keep existing and have no drive or motivation to achieve more, are very likely to just not work anymore at all since their basic needs are now provided. At the moment, they at least work somewhat. This helps keep local businesses…

It's different for me. I know a bunch of people who are deeply creative, artists and musicians and such, who spend enormous amounts of time volunteering their productivity - or what's left of it, after "earning a living". I'd love to see them with the opportunity to not have to worry about eating, so they could make things instead.

The conflation of value and money is one of the worst things about our society. Money is, in many ways, units of suck. Jobs pay because no one would do them if they didn't pay.

Re: Finland’s basic income plan could change everything

#154

Post by flubert »

gnaritas wrote: post #121
vinceguidry wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'll believe it when I see it.

Basic income is a hot topic because forward thinking people who see what's going on in the world right now already see it. You say lets cross that bridge when we get there; that's the point, we're there, you just aren't looking very hard.

Haven't people been saying this since about 1848?

Re: Finland’s basic income plan could change everything

#155

Post by MrTonyD »

petke wrote: post #80

I'm from Finland and the only place I keep hearing about this "plan" is from foreign media. Its just a experimental study. I'd be surprised if anything came out of it. Finland is not some utopia where magical things happen. We are in a long recession and the govt is cutting social benefits left and right. This thing is a fantasy only foreign media takes seriously.

Denmark is also worried about growth. But they have started a program to reduce hours at some select hospitals - to see if they could convert some of the GDP growth into higher quality of life for those workers. And I read that Sweden has been trying a similar program - reducing working hours at some public institutions in order to convert the past decade's GDP growth into a better life. Really, a program for basic income is neither Utopian nor magical - it is just a reasonable thing to try.

Re: Finland’s basic income plan could change everything

#156

Post by jnbiche »

stevesearer wrote: post #92
dawnbreez wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Except that there are strong social incentives for anyone who is capable of getting a paying job and going off welfare to do so Debatable. In the US, many welfare programs are designed to cut off anyone who actually gets a job...even if that job pays less than what you'd get from welfare. This problem gets even bigger as you factor in the fact that multiple welfare programs exist, making it nigh-impossible to preven…

One question I have about BI is if it replaces other forms of social welfare (food stamps, unemployment, etc...), what happens when some percentage of people inevitably make decisions and still cannot afford the basics of what BI should cover? Will a new set of social welfare programs replace the ones that were previously removed?

Yes, it replaces all other forms of social welfare. Here in the US at least, the welfare system is problematic enough (bureaucratic snafus, etc) that a robust private charity exists to back things up.

So there are private soup kitchens, food banks, etc. Someone who used up all their basic income would need to turn to friends, family, church, or these private charities.

Re: Finland’s basic income plan could change everything

#157

Post by bufordsharkley »

Alupis wrote: post #128
stevesearer wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm more speaking to what I believe is the inevitability of some people making bad decisions (like buying a bunch of powerball tickets or betting your money at the racetrack or something.) with the money they receive and then not being able to afford the basics. There would obviously be many people who are benefitted by BI, but my question is more wondering what happens to the percentage of people that end up still n…

I question how a "BI" can be paid for long-term. Presumably BI is taxed like any other income, but of course that means the amount of tax revenue collected will not balance the amount of money paid to citizens... unless we really raise the rates on "wealthy" people (who's definition may shift if everyone is provided a free "comfortable" standard of living). In which case this "BI" becomes a Robbin Hood tax on the nat…

I think in order for it to be sustainable, it can't be tied to taxation on production, but rather taxes on rent.

For if production goes down, it becomes impossible to fund this entitlement. But if the entitlement is strictly tied to land rent (analogous to the citizen's dividend that Alaskans get for the extraction of natural resources), this can't completely disappear.

Re: Finland’s basic income plan could change everything

#158

Post by sanderjd »

Alupis wrote: post #147
beat wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are those people you mention actually productive now? Most of the people I know who would do nothing are already doing nothing.

> Are those people you mention actually productive now? Well, kind of, but only enough to pay rent and eat. But that's my point, individuals like this, who only work the bare minimum to just keep existing and have no drive or motivation to achieve more, are very likely to just not work anymore at all since their basic needs are now provided. At the moment, they at least work somewhat. This helps keep local businesses…

You are linking human labor to production, which is not necessarily wrong, but not necessarily right either. Many of us who are cautiously supportive of BI think it sounds like an awful idea that is nonetheless one of the few that has a somewhat credible vision of a plausible future where production is almost completely independent of human labor.

Re: Finland’s basic income plan could change everything

#159

Post by vijayr »

vinceguidry wrote: post #12

I'm cautiously enthusiastic about basic income. I want to believe that it really can change everything, until that nagging doubt of "but human nature just doesn't work that way!" inevitably kills the buzz. The idea behind basic income is to remove day-to-day struggle from people's lives. If only they didn't have to worry where their next rent check is coming from, then potentially a huge groundswell of human capital…

It all depends on what we as a society value most. At this point, we (most of us) are forced to work/do things that we aren't passionate about (or even interested in) just to earn a very very basic lifestyle. Imagine a huge part of the population doesn't have to worry about it anymore, as opposed to a small percentage of the population on welfare now. People would start valuing other things more like artistic abilities etc. How many artists have gone into fields that they have no interest in, just to earn a living? They might go back to creating art, writing books and so on.

At least, that is my dream :P

Whether this experiment succeeds or not, it is well worth trying. Finland is a very good bet to start this experiment because of it's small size, homogeneous population etc. It would be very difficult to do such an experiment in big, diverse countries like the U.S

Re: Finland’s basic income plan could change everything

#160

Post by existencebox »

CountSessine wrote: post #141
istjohn wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Un-monetized self-motivation is not required, here. They would be have the opportunity to earn above and beyond the basic income. It's not Marxist or communal at all. We are not talking about abolishing work for pay. We are simply talking about an un-earned payment in addition to whatever they earn in conventional jobs.

The previous poster made the point, On the other hand, those 5 million additional people probably aren't going to sit around doing nothing. That's not how human nature works, either - most people are happier doing something rather than nothing! Self actualization and all that. I don't think that it's completely relevant to the BI debate, but what if everyone actually did just decide to sit around doing nothing?

I think the general response is, in a real world it's never an all or nothing proposition, and even if it were, the fewer people contributing, the greater the opportunities for those who do. (greater uncontested target market share, less competition, more demand, less supply.) The economics 101 supply demand curve hopefully helps incentivize ENOUGH people at sufficient levels to do what productive work needs/is desired to be done.

And if then everyone STILL decides to do nothing, I think we have bigger problems than a matter of economic policy :)

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