Is the World Ready for a Guaranteed Basic Income? • Hacker News Board

Re: Is the World Ready for a Guaranteed Basic Income?

#91

Post by codeismightier » Thu, Apr 14, 2016, 4:11 PM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #38

VincentEvans wrote: post #23

Why wouldn't all standard of living benefits of basic income get eliminated immediately by all relevant costs rising to soak it up? This happens every single time the poor get any sort of money. In poor neighborhoods the rents cost as much as people are able to pay, no more, no less. Do you know when most rental deposits are collected? Around the tax return season. If suddenly the poor had some money to spare - the r…

The key difference is mobility. Basic income means people don't have to live in Philly near their job. They can move to Iowa and dramatically raise their standard of living.

Can you explain a bit more about how these people can raise their standard of living by moving?

Money is just an abstraction for real goods and services produced by the economy. Presumably we need people to live in Philly since that's where our industry is. If people moved away to some remote place, wouldn't our economy take a hit? Not to mention the transportation costs of servicing a more remote, less dense area.

Re: Is the World Ready for a Guaranteed Basic Income?

#92

Post by codeismightier » Thu, Apr 14, 2016, 4:15 PM UTC

drumdance wrote: post #77

lghh wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I had a decent basic income, I wouldn't be working.

But not everyone would. I really love my work. Fewer people in the marketplace would be good for me because it would drive up my wages, which means I could afford to do things that the average UBI recipient could not. Also, it's not like UBI would solve all social problems. Many people who like to work in nonprofits today would continue to do so. Probably even more people would because they would have more of a safet…

Money is just an abstraction for actual goods and services produced by the economy. If your wages go up, presumably so does the wages of those whose services you consume.

If less people worked, the economy would produce less and we would be worse off.

Re: Is the World Ready for a Guaranteed Basic Income?

#93

Post by WorldMaker » Thu, Apr 14, 2016, 4:17 PM UTC

vaadu wrote: post #25

Where is the incentive to get people off the couch looking for work or going to school?

Why is this a moral problem? [1] Isn't this a market problem that the market can solve? Basic Income would add actual liquidity in the labor market. If workers actually have the option not to work, then the market has to finally figure out how to make the worker want to work.

Maybe that competition would lead to better companies and better work.

[1] Other than the lasting impact of the Puritans on American society, of course...

Re: Is the World Ready for a Guaranteed Basic Income?

#94

Post by maxerickson » Thu, Apr 14, 2016, 4:19 PM UTC

ancap wrote: post #44

In the past century we have countless examples of socialism failing, yet its proponents devise some new scheme, some new brand and try to sell it as if something will be different this time. Socialism will always fail because it is contradictory to human nature.

Planned economies failed. The socialist governments in Western Europe haven't failed yet.

(there are even several countries with 3-4 weeks of vacation for everyone and similar annual per person productivity to the US...)

Re: Is the World Ready for a Guaranteed Basic Income?

#95

Post by ancap » Thu, Apr 14, 2016, 4:21 PM UTC

inflagranti wrote: post #83

ancap wrote: post #44

In the past century we have countless examples of socialism failing, yet its proponents devise some new scheme, some new brand and try to sell it as if something will be different this time. Socialism will always fail because it is contradictory to human nature.

We have countless examples of capitalism failing too. But the argument that socialism is against human nature is obviously wrong, as humans are social animals. However, as any animal, if you corner them and put them in survival mode, things can get ugly. The purpose of modern states is exactly to provide security in multiple ways, one of them being shared financial security, to remove the need of constant struggle fo…

>But the argument that socialism is against human nature is obviously wrong, as humans are social animals.

Socialism is anti-social (or were you confused by it having the word "social" in it?). Socialism says two people do not have the right to come to an agreement on the exchange of property and labor. What is social about that? How is that in harmony with human nature?

>There were enough articles recently for instance about Amazon, as an extreme example of hiper competitive anti-social environment that encourages people to backstab each other and play politics to advance.

And yet people work for Amazon. Willingly. What's wrong with that? Just because the work environment does not meet your standards of what you expect from a job, why would you want to deprive others of their jobs? That's very anti-social.

>Now you can argue that companies are not countries, but I don't see how such learning don't apply.

Not only are they not countries but trying to extrapolate such scenarios which happen between free acting, cooperating, social individuals to a generic edict enforced through threat of violence is foolhardy.

>Sorry in advance for the ad-hominem, but that supposedly intelligent people even here on Hacker News keep reiterating old tropes about socialism and human nature unreflected, while any research in that regard or simple observations as illustrated above are contradictory to it, is baffling.

Again, your examples tell us nothing of socialism and are not even applicable.

Re: Is the World Ready for a Guaranteed Basic Income?

#96

Post by evunveot » Thu, Apr 14, 2016, 4:23 PM UTC

dota_fanatic wrote: post #29

Disclaimer: I don't know anything about anything. Some parents can put 850k in a account for their child when it's born that gets invested, say in the American economy (grows by say 7% over an average, long time period), which compounds until later in life, and when they grow up, they can access it. With good financial responsibility, this child won't have to work a day in their lives and can live off the returns. Wh…

There are about 4 million births in the US ever year, so that program would inject $4 trillion per year into the economy (assuming everyone currently living is left out). It would be impossible to pull in that much through taxation (today) so it would have to be pure money creation. $4 trillion is about 25% of GDP, so if the economy isn't growing by at least that amount every year, the value of the dollar will inevitably fall to compensate, most likely to a level where the return on the $1 million investment isn't anywhere close to a livable income.

Come to think of it, I'm not even considering the money multiplier. When that $4 trillion is spent or invested, eventually it ends up in someone's bank account, and because we have fractional reserve banking, it adds to the banks' deposits, allowing them to loan more money out. The banks' reserve requirement is 10%, so in the worst case (if the banks loan out as much as they possibly can), that $4 trillion becomes $40 trillion. (Each bank loans out 90% of their deposits, the loans becomes deposits at other banks, who loan 90% of that [81% of the original], and so on and so on.) That's 250% of GDP, so you'd probably see inflation severe enough to threaten social order in general.

If we imagine that the program has been running for several generations already and the whole population already has their $1 million trust fund, you can at least destroy about $2.4 trillion per year as people die, but the bigger issue would be that "$1 million" means a very different thing in a world where there's $300 trillion in citizen trust funds compared to today when the total of all physical currency and liquid bank accounts is about $10 trillion.

There's also the problem of who gets to decide how to invest the money, which would be a magnet for corruption.

Re: Is the World Ready for a Guaranteed Basic Income?

#97

Post by bryanlarsen » Thu, Apr 14, 2016, 4:23 PM UTC

VincentEvans wrote: post #23

Why wouldn't all standard of living benefits of basic income get eliminated immediately by all relevant costs rising to soak it up? This happens every single time the poor get any sort of money. In poor neighborhoods the rents cost as much as people are able to pay, no more, no less. Do you know when most rental deposits are collected? Around the tax return season. If suddenly the poor had some money to spare - the r…

Why would rent go up? Some homeless people would rent apartments, sure, but they're a very small percentage of the population, and a good portion of homeless people have other issues that makes that unlikely. In other words, demand would not increase substantially. And supply wouldn't change. If neither supply nor demand changes, why would prices?

There would be some movement. The prices of the worst shit-holes would probably go down because people would gain the ability to move into a nicer place. That might cause a little increase in the price of low end apartments.

And any city that is currently supply-constrained would probably see upward movement on prices. But most cities that aren't San Francisco have vacancy rates around 3%, they aren't supply constrained. If one landlord raises prices, people can and will move to an cheaper apartment elsewhere. And if prices do rise, people will build more apartments, driving prices down. (again, assuming not San Francisco).

Because even though anybody relying on Basic Income may not be starving, they'll still be really poor, and really cost sensitive. If BI is $10,000 a year, a $100/month price increase is a huge chunk of their income, and worth the huge hassle of a move to avoid.

Re: Is the World Ready for a Guaranteed Basic Income?

#98

Post by curiousgeorgio » Thu, Apr 14, 2016, 4:25 PM UTC

codeismightier wrote: post #91

rayiner wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The key difference is mobility. Basic income means people don't have to live in Philly near their job. They can move to Iowa and dramatically raise their standard of living.

Can you explain a bit more about how these people can raise their standard of living by moving? Money is just an abstraction for real goods and services produced by the economy. Presumably we need people to live in Philly since that's where our industry is. If people moved away to some remote place, wouldn't our economy take a hit? Not to mention the transportation costs of servicing a more remote, less dense area.

If Philly is where our industry is, then we only need as many people to live in Philly as the labor market demands. However, if unemployment is high or wages are too low (relative to the cost of living) in an area, then that suggests we have an oversupply of labor there, not a shortage. Basic goods (food, clothing, materials for housing) are grown/produced in many areas (even rural ones), not just in dense cities, so no, transportation costs don't really increase the cost of living in rural areas. To the contrary, in most cases it's far, far cheaper to live outside of dense cities.

Re: Is the World Ready for a Guaranteed Basic Income?

#99

Post by evanpw » Thu, Apr 14, 2016, 4:30 PM UTC

asmithmd1 wrote: post #61

Retric wrote: post #3

I think we should just call it what it is a dividend. We have crossed a point where handing off 10% of everyone's income allows for a reasonable minimum standard of living. But, because progress is always going to cost some people more than others we need to align incentives. Sorry, I know your a world class doctor, but Auto Scan (TM) just does a better job. The important thing to remember is that % for a given stand…

The numbers seem to work for the US. A 10% income tax increase redistributed to all US households would be ~$11,000 per household, which is right about what the poverty line is for 1 person. If your household makes less than $110k you get a tax cut, above $110k you will be paying more to prevent social unrest. All numbers in Billions and for 2014 Total earned income $14,700 Total income tax $1,000 -------------------…

An alternative framing: if we doubled the size of the income tax, we could pay each person $4300 / year.

Re: Is the World Ready for a Guaranteed Basic Income?

#100

Post by maxxxxx » Thu, Apr 14, 2016, 4:33 PM UTC

pluteoid wrote: post #53

maxxxxx wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also don't believe it can't work long term unless attitudes change dramatically. People who work for a low income will complain that there are people who get almost the same without doing any work. The same wealthy people who lobby for more tax cuts will also not want to pay for people who don't do anything. There will be a lot of people who will use the freedom granted by basic income for productive means but ther…

The people working for only slightly more than the UBI will get more than twice the income of someone not working at all. Universal basic income means everyone gets the income.

I doubt that. Low end salaries will probably go down unless there is a minimum wage.