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Request For Research: Basic Income

blog.ycombinator.com

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Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#671

Post by ctdonath »

phaus wrote: post #666

I'm intrigued by the idea of a basic income, but usually when people begin to talk about it, I see a certain argument presented. A simplified version of the argument is as follows: "In a free market, if a certain subset of people start making significantly more money than they used to, the demand for things that this subset of people couldn't afford before is going to increase substantially. This increase in demand w…

Supply is limited. Always. Increase demand enough, and there MUST be an increase in "friction" somehow to limit demand to match supply; otherwise, supply runs out fast favoring "first come first served" and suffering waste while "real need" goes unfulfilled. Raising prices is the most natural and appropriate (if arguably imperfect) way to apply such friction, generally equalizing the cost value to the buyer with the reward value to the seller.

Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#672

Post by IanCal »

kasey_junk wrote: post #565
toomanybeersies wrote: post #541

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems to be a very American thing to not have banking as a basic right (or at least assumed right). Here in New Zealand, there's pretty much no restriction on getting bank accounts. It's almost unheard of to not have a bank account. Transaction fees aren't really a thing either. Most people only have to pay to withdraw money from other banks ATMs. There's no fees for bank transfers (regardless of whether it's to t…

Please note I'm not trying to belittle your answer, but New Zealand is a very small place. In the US there are Credit Unions (the smaller, less popular non-profit bank alternatives in the US) that have more members than the entire population of NZ. If you were to only bank amongst one Credit Union here in the states you'd see similar levels of service to what you mention (other than chip & pin which is only recently…

For another side, UK here.

Pretty much the same but:

1. Loads of free ATMs, the ones that charge are privately owned/run typically and in shops. While banks may run them and slap their logo all over it, it's effectively just advertising, it doesn't matter which one I go to. The idea that it would matter seems really weird.

2. No fees for bank transfers, most will complete within the hour I think and are generally immediate.

3. Chip & pin has been required for quite a while now, contactless cards are extremely common.

4. Pretty much everyone has some kind of bank account, I'm not sure how it works if you're homeless or have absolutely no proof of identity/address, but there might still be things that can be done there.

Most accounts are also free, though sometimes with usage requirements (deposit at least £X + have two direct debits is common), and many will pay you ~£100 to switch to them.

Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#673

Post by rokhayakebe »

samstave wrote: post #220
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…

Awesome. A couple points: Alternatives to patient-present doctor-mediated health care to cover the 80% case in which doctors are expensive overkill; some combination of telemedicine and nurse-practitioners. We have police departments and we have fire departments. We should have "nurse departments" that are clinics but much more structured as are fire and PD services for each given area. (I know there is a grey versio…

Re:ChildCare

Solution: Childcare Visa. Many women in other parts of the world would LOVE to come to America. We need a special visa for them, and perhaps they can take care of your children from 8 to 6PM M-F in exchange for room and board and weekends, or some type of arrangement.

Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#674

Post by notahacker »

newjersey wrote: post #407
notahacker wrote: post #319

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(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…

So the only tax break you're permitting is for inheritance?

One doesn't need to believe that a startup entrepreneur who becomes a billionaire is somehow better than a billionaire who inherited his money to find line of argument that implies the only exemption in the tax system should be for inherited fortunes unfathomable.

Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#675

Post by rokhayakebe »

rewqfdsa wrote: post #235
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 You're talking about trade schools? Good. That's a step in the right direction. It doesn't go far enough though. One unfortunate reality of our existence is that people differ markedly in cognitive skill. These differences are innate and immutable. Not everyone can benefit from an education. If we pitch education as the way to address to inequali…

One unfortunate reality of our existence is that people differ markedly in cognitive skill. These differences are innate and immutable.

Leaving the defeatist mentality aside, instead of saying they do not fit our current model, why not work on personalizing education. People go to school and meet a few professors with this attitude and they leave convinced they cannot be made good for anything. Not good.

Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#677

Post by flubert »

fsloth wrote: post #187
RankingMember wrote: post #118

I'm curious to see how Finland's basic income system turns out. I think doing so would drop the omnipresent fear of being destitute and homeless, which would do a lot to improve mental health.

Finland already has a quite thorough social welfare system - no-one is homeless unless they have a bag of other problems than a lack of income. Mental health - not so good. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_suicide... You will notice Finland has way more suicides than US.

Rates of homelessness:

US: 633782 / 314000000 => 202 homeless per 100,000

Finland: 7877 / 5363000 => 147 homeless per 100,000

Based off of numbers from (YMMV):

http://www.housingfirst.fi/en/housing_first/homelessness_in_...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homelessness_in_the_United_Sta...

https://www.google.com/?gws_rd=ssl#q=population+of+usa+in+20...

https://www.google.com/?gws_rd=ssl#q=population+of+finland+i...

Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#678

Post by astrange »

throwawaytime wrote: post #632
mijustin wrote: post #583

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Financial desperation squeezes the cognitive juice right out of you. In 2013, Harvard researchers did a study of how financial stress affects decision making. Denise Cummins, Ph.D. explains their findings in Psychology Today: "When the cost of [a car] repair was increased to $3,000, a very different picture emerged: The cognitive performance of those at the upper end of the income distribution was unaffected by the i…

"When the cost of [a car] repair was increased to $3,000, the cognitive performance of those at the upper end of the income distribution was unaffected by the increase. But those at the lower end suffered a 40% decline! The authors interpreted this to mean that scarcity impaired people’s ability to think clearly. The threat—even an imagined threat—of a large bill made it difficult for poor people to focus on the cogn…

Was your employer covered by the ADA? If they have more than 15 employees, you have a great EEOC case to get un-fired.

Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#679

Post by flubert »

cousin_it wrote: post #227

My short-term worry about basic income is that it'll end up bidding up the prices for goods that poor people buy, especially the rent. I won't be surprised if most of the basic income eventually goes to the landlords. IMO the right solution is to get the government involved in distributing certain goods, not just handing out money to buy them. The state could guarantee free housing, food, healthcare, education and pe…

>IMO the right solution is to get the government involved in distributing certain goods, not just handing out money to buy them. The state could guarantee free housing,

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_housing_in_the_United_S...

Re: Request For Research: Basic Income

#680

Post by phaus »

ctdonath wrote: post #671
phaus wrote: post #666

I'm intrigued by the idea of a basic income, but usually when people begin to talk about it, I see a certain argument presented. A simplified version of the argument is as follows: "In a free market, if a certain subset of people start making significantly more money than they used to, the demand for things that this subset of people couldn't afford before is going to increase substantially. This increase in demand w…

Supply is limited. Always. Increase demand enough, and there MUST be an increase in "friction" somehow to limit demand to match supply; otherwise, supply runs out fast favoring "first come first served" and suffering waste while "real need" goes unfulfilled. Raising prices is the most natural and appropriate (if arguably imperfect) way to apply such friction, generally equalizing the cost value to the buyer with the…

I understand the argument. What I'm asking about, is whether or not it would negate the positive effects of a basic income. The people who argue against the idea of a basic income often use this argument as evidence that it can't possibly work.
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