Request For Research: Basic Income • Hacker News Board

Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#401

Post by tptacek » Wed, Jan 27, 2016, 9:08 PM UTC

Retric wrote: post #350

xixi77 wrote: post #298

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's an interesting list... To me, improving provision of medical service and education definitely seems possible, as a lot of current problems are due to the fairly artificial constraints in the system. Removing them, or going around them, can really do a lot. Things like child care and finance are not as obvious to me though: these are already competitive industries, with very price-sensitive clients too, and (IMO)…

Childcare is dying for some automation. 1 person can care for ~3 very young children( Worse, these are all minimum numbers. You need extra staff to cover someone being sick, or turn people away.

This is obvious, right? A K-12 teacher handles ~30 kids at a time, starting at age 5-6. Their job is more rigorous than the one a child-care professional does. Meanwhile, most parents are happier about the time their kids spend in school than they are about the time they spend in childcare.

Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#402

Post by vbean781 » Wed, Jan 27, 2016, 9:09 PM UTC

Someone pointed me to a good book on this topic called "Scarcity" written jointly by an economist and a psychologist. It looks at what happens to our minds when we're in a "scarcity mindset" -- basically, we have tunnel vision, lose attention span, self-control, and the ability to plan long-term. Your mind is compromised, and that's a cause of perpetual poverty (i.e., if any of us suddenly became poor, we'd start behaving predictably like those who are low income do).

Along those lines, they suggest a few types of things startups (or anyone) could do to reduce mental stress for people. For example, adult continuing education classes where it's ok to slip up or learn on your own schedule (thanks to technology). Or savings products for young people that start before they are desperate and living in a world of scarcity (and prevent them from going to a payday lender one day). Or a service that gets patients to take their meds without having to think (I think at least one startup is already attacking this).

For things that require behavioral change (like making on-time mortgage payments, or saving money), maybe social pressure can be used in productive ways....like it is in microfinance groups in the developing world (small groups borrow collectively and group members encourage one another to repay). Anyway, just a few ideas...this is a great topic.

Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#403

Post by mikeyouse » Wed, Jan 27, 2016, 9:09 PM UTC

stcredzero wrote: post #347

tptacek wrote: post #170

Things that would help everyone, regardless of income, without depending on a radical restructuring of entitlement spending, that seem like things startups could actually do: * Equally credible alternatives to university education for professions that don't involve students shouldering $100k-$200k in debt based on decisions they have to make when they're 18 years old. * Empirical, blinded, skills-assessment based tur…

Equally credible alternatives to university education for professions that don't involve students shouldering $100k-$200k in debt based on decisions they have to make when they're 18 years old. Why not just free university education for people who have the prerequisite academic qualifications?

Yes.

Everyone bemoans the increasing in tuition and increase in admin staff.. these things are intimately tied. The cost of education on a per-student basis hasn't increased very much in the US. Most of the cost burden has just shifted from taxpayers to students (for better or worse). Much of the admin staff is necessary to handle all of the financial aid, grant applications, etc.

Simply providing tuition-free education would eliminate much of the bureaucratic overhead.

Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#404

Post by staunch » Wed, Jan 27, 2016, 9:09 PM UTC

kasey_junk wrote: post #367

stcredzero wrote: post #347

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Equally credible alternatives to university education for professions that don't involve students shouldering $100k-$200k in debt based on decisions they have to make when they're 18 years old. Why not just free university education for people who have the prerequisite academic qualifications?

I think for me one of the open questions is are "prerequisite academic qualifications" as they currently stand, the right precursors to the kinds of educations we might dream up in the future.

Einstein famously (and actually) had poor grades in subjects he had no interest in, and did great in subjects he enjoyed. It seems to have delayed his progress that no one recognized his skill and passion early on.

Bad filters look for weaknesses and good filters look for strengths. Anyone who excels in at least one area has potential to do great things.

Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#405

Post by Patrick_Devine » Wed, Jan 27, 2016, 9:09 PM UTC

bishnu wrote: post #3

It's worth reading about the Canadian experiments with basic income in the 1970s: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mincome http://news.nationalpost.com/full-comment/colby-cosh-what-th... The experiment allowed households to opt out, and after a while most did. However this result is convoluted by the fact that the income was not inflation indexed, and inflation rates in Canada in the 1970s got quite high. The main concl…

Here's another link: http://motherboard.vice.com/read/the-mincome-experiment-daup...

Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#406

Post by arasmussen » Wed, Jan 27, 2016, 9:10 PM UTC

I just published a Medium post about this exact subject: Tech Innovation & Economic Inequality. https://medium.com/@a13n/tech-innovation-economic-inequality...

Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#407

Post by newjersey » Wed, Jan 27, 2016, 9:10 PM UTC

notahacker wrote: post #319

newjersey wrote: post #272

I think that there ought to be a maximum wage that is linked to the minimum wage (we can switch over the baseline to the basic income if we ever get basic income implemented). The idea is anyone earning over the maximum income[calculation] will pay almost all of the amount over the maximum wage as income tax. Calculation: I propose that the maximum income be a hundred times the current federal minimum wage times two…

(not the downvoter FWIW) I think you lost most people when you suggested the status quo "mega rich" should get to keep all their assets whilst the tax system is redesigned to stop anyone catching up with them through entrepreneurial zeal and hard work...

We already have an estate tax that maxes out at 40%. As long as we don't allow any more exemptions or windows, it shouldn't be a problem. We may quarrel over whether or not free lunch at work qualifies as income (I'd say it is not worth it to make a fuss) but use of corporate funds for personal expenses would count as income for the person if we are worried about these things. As long as the mega rich do not receive and spend over (for example) three million dollars a year per person, why should we worry about them? If they take over three million dollars and pay 90% off the top, they are more than welcome to do so in my eyes. The main thing is that there should be no exemptions for any reason. Exemptions, exclusions, deductions, tax discounts, and such are inherently examples of central planning. I can't believe that we would allow such communist ideas in our country.

My goal is not to facilitate people to become ultra rich through "entrepreneurial zeal and hard work". It is just the same ignorance as shown by pg in his recent essay where he says that a startup entrepreneur who becomes a billionaire is somehow better or more desirable than a billionaire who inherited his money. What I want is to get a solid foundation so people are not worried about their next meal or a clean dry place to spend the night.

If someone creates a new business process or a new gizmo that does the work that formerly took one thousand workers, well I am thankful to the person. However, we will still cap his payday at a hundred times the minimum living wage. I think it is a fair deal. People who do things should do things because they want to do things not because they want a big payday and become "mega rich".

Edit: There was an article that I read the other day that said something along the lines of forget the mega rich the upper middle class is the cause of the decline of America.

Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#408

Post by Mz » Wed, Jan 27, 2016, 9:11 PM UTC

thenipper wrote: post #317

tptacek wrote: post #259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was hard for me and Erin to do 7 years ago (our kids are teenagers now), and we're economically very fortunate. I can't imagine how hard it must be for people trying to provide for families on $15/hr to manage child care.

I've had friends who are reasonably well off compared to the rest of the country and in doing the math realized it was just easier for one parent to stay home for X years raising the children. Of course then they are out of the workforce and 'unhirable' when they try to re-enter it.

I did the homemaker thing for two decades.

Pro tip: Have the full time parent take classes part time and do volunteer work. These days, blogging and online freelance work can also play a part.

Those things help preserve your employability. They give you something to put on a resume. The one and only thing that has the ability to increase your earning power while you take time off work is education. I read that somewhere and I have experienced it firsthand.

I got my first full time paid job at age 41. It paid better than minimum wage and I worked for the largest company in town. Any time I made small talk while buying myself lunch or getting a haircut, telling people where I worked got oohs and aahs. They didn't even know my job title or that I was stuck in an entry level job and never managed to get promoted. Just having a job there at all was statusy and a ticket to a real career.

I wasn't making the kind of money my ex made, but I wasn't doomed either. I ultimately left (for health reasons). I now do freelance work and, with my health issues resolving, my income is going up. At some point, I expect to live comfortably.

Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#409

Post by notahacker » Wed, Jan 27, 2016, 9:11 PM UTC

matthewowen wrote: post #123

marcell wrote: post #44

I'm very skeptical of basic income as commonly understood. The typical basic income program I've seen goes something like this: give every person in the country $10k to live on, no strings attached. [a] 1) As defined above, this is horribly inefficient and expensive. I, a software engineer in Silicon Valley, would receive this $10k. How does this benefit society? I already make over $100k; I don't need additional inc…

"As noted elsewhere in this thread, the US has 300M residents; naively the cost of this program would be $3T!" So you raise taxes. For the people who don't need the extra $10k... well, that's OK, because their taxes will go up by some amount. Possibly more than $10k, possibly less. It depends on how much they earn. You do still have the problem of determining what the progressive tax looks like, but this is a simpler…

Naively, a $3T program would increase the US budget by around 50% even if you eliminated all existing social security and unemployment benefits.

I can't see determining a politically acceptable and GDP-neutral progressive tax that finds an average of 50% extra per person as a simple problem, and that's even before you start dealing with the backlash from equally unhappy people whose existing welfare or social security program entitlements add up to more than $10k per annum...

Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#410

Post by tptacek » Wed, Jan 27, 2016, 9:11 PM UTC

Retric wrote: post #380

vijayr wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

just ban education based discrimination I am not sure I understand this. If you are going to a doctor, you would want to make sure she is qualified, isn't it? And the only way (currently at least) to make sure is that degree that proves she knows what she is doing. Of course this doesn't apply to all professions.

There is still a path to become a practicing lawyer without going to law school. You need to pass a test and become certified, but going to school is only necessary for the pedigree. Arguably the simplest solution is to remove undergrad degree requirements from med / law school. In terms of education there are two options. Ban mentioning degrees only credentials, or ban mentioning school names which deflates the ivy…

In reality, there's no good path to a career in the law that doesn't go through a small subset of the big law schools, because there's a huge glut of lawyers. A starting point for looking into this is the Google search "third tier toilet".

The thing that unlocks legal professions from the grip of $200k law schools is going to be something that reimagines the role of a lawyer, creating a new kind of legal professional that makes radically less money than a BigLaw lawyer.