Why a Universal Basic Income Will Not Solve Poverty • Hacker News Board

Re: Why a Universal Basic Income Will Not Solve Poverty

#211

Post by ck425 » Wed, Jun 01, 2016, 9:00 AM UTC

gremlinsinc wrote: post #178

dionidium wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

UBI prevents people from having to toil at horrible jobs unless they choose to, rather than being forced to in order to survive. That can only be a good thing. I agree with you. My whole point was that most people do not agree with you. There is enormous support for the idea that you are supposed to work for what you earn. Full stop. End of story. Anything less is charity that should, at best, be accepted as a last r…

the rich claim that the poor and homeless are lazy and by not being lazy they could have all the riches... yet most rich people were born rich, and most rich families have been the richest families for centuries. Furthermore I know many homeless people who work very hard for the little they get, while I know many rich people who sit on their Yachts all day, or take 6 week vacations every year. -- The rich are just as…

6 weeks vacation is considered lazy? I don't disagree with your point btw just shocked that that's considered lazy.

Re: Why a Universal Basic Income Will Not Solve Poverty

#212

Post by ENGNR » Wed, Jun 01, 2016, 11:52 AM UTC

gremlinsinc wrote: post #178

dionidium wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

UBI prevents people from having to toil at horrible jobs unless they choose to, rather than being forced to in order to survive. That can only be a good thing. I agree with you. My whole point was that most people do not agree with you. There is enormous support for the idea that you are supposed to work for what you earn. Full stop. End of story. Anything less is charity that should, at best, be accepted as a last r…

the rich claim that the poor and homeless are lazy and by not being lazy they could have all the riches... yet most rich people were born rich, and most rich families have been the richest families for centuries. Furthermore I know many homeless people who work very hard for the little they get, while I know many rich people who sit on their Yachts all day, or take 6 week vacations every year. -- The rich are just as…

And yet many people knows of at least one family of super lazy people who would happily live on basic income.

The trouble is convincing them that these people will never ever do anything productive anyway so the best we can do is loss minimisation by ensuring they don't turn to crime and fix basic medical issues early. And that they're not worth a single second more worth of attention compared to the other 99% of society

Re: Why a Universal Basic Income Will Not Solve Poverty

#213

Post by aminorex » Wed, Jun 01, 2016, 12:16 PM UTC

Of course it will not solve poverty. That's not the point. The point is that it will solve the self-destruction of social wealth. In particular, it will prevent the expansion of poverty to include the vast majority of currently wealthy persons.

Re: Why a Universal Basic Income Will Not Solve Poverty

#214

Post by geon » Wed, Jun 01, 2016, 1:47 PM UTC

jbob2000 wrote: post #28

Something that is missing from the basic income/poverty debate is the notion of "learned helplessness"; after a long time in poverty, people get used to the lifestyle and have difficulty adjusting to "regular" life. For example, if you've been homeless your entire life, you've never had to lock your apartment door or carry a key around. My partner (a social worker) had a client who's apartment was always getting robb…

With BI, hopefully fewer people end up in hemelessness like that.

BI won't magically solve every problem, like mental illness, which is another large factor for homlessness.

Re: Why a Universal Basic Income Will Not Solve Poverty

#215

Post by thedaemon » Wed, Jun 01, 2016, 1:54 PM UTC

sgnelson wrote: post #184

dionidium wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Basic income removes that harsh penalty" The real challenge of a basic income isn't how to pay for it; it's how to convince regular people who get up every day and go work at jobs a lot shittier than most of us here have that that's a harsh penalty. There is enormous social momentum behind the idea that you should work if you can.

Not to disagree with your point, but shouldn't we examine the reasons behind and for necessitating that all people work? Not to get too existential, but does anyone really believe that's why we're here, or what we should be doing with our lives?

This is a very good point. We are at a point in society where we have replaced multitudes of workers with automated machinery. (1st world countries)This in turn is supposed to make way for more high thinking jobs, but in my understanding does not. To me it seems we have reached a point where we should find a way to fund people who want to do creative work, or experimental. To me, yes, we are meant to work. But that work is not just for a company. Perhaps teaching yourself how to garden, painting, etc. Doing something, that's work.

To validate the point of work being why we are here I will roughly quote Marcus Aurelius: When you wake up in the morning get up and get going. Why are you wanting to sleep and be lazy? Does the honey bee say forget this and sleep all day? Does the ant forgo his work and sleep and eat all day? No, all creatures go to work. What makes you any different?

This is of course out of context, as this is just reasoning for himself to get up in the morning, not a blanket statement about society.

Re: Why a Universal Basic Income Will Not Solve Poverty

#216

Post by dionidium » Wed, Jun 01, 2016, 2:05 PM UTC

gozur88 wrote: post #207

damptowel wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But government spending within the national economy is not income constrained, so raising taxes is not a requirement.

Then why do we have taxes at all?

It's a good question, but it's clearly not merely to raise money. They print money.

Re: Why a Universal Basic Income Will Not Solve Poverty

#217

Post by pitaj » Wed, Jun 01, 2016, 2:15 PM UTC

snicker7 wrote: post #24

It doesn't make to tax citizens only to give the money back to them. Another way to implement a mincome is to have a flat tax rate and give every citizen a large standard deductible. If one's taxable income is negative, then one would receive money from the government, which is interpreted as a negative tax payment. Furthermore, the purpose of a mincome is not to alleviate poverty, but instead to to replace current s…

> replace current systems of welfare

Yes. The broken, trapping, inefficient, bloated, bureaucratic messes that cost way to much and don't help people nearly enough.

Re: Why a Universal Basic Income Will Not Solve Poverty

#218

Post by geon » Wed, Jun 01, 2016, 2:23 PM UTC

cmurf wrote: post #100

maxxxxx wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When I was in my teens I worked summer jobs in a German social welfare agency (Sozialamt). There were many families that had been on welfare for generations and it was noticeable that their kids had no idea how to make progress in school or how to hold a job. They simply didn't know and had nobody who could tell them. They also had no role models. I think with basic income there is a risk that a lot of people will fo…

Right. The income value I keep seeing floated is in the realm of US$8000 per year. This is not basic income, it's basically a large tax credit. I don't know why it's called basic income, there's nothing really basic about it when it can't completely pay for one basic thing like say rent or mortgage.

I'm pretty sure there are places in your country where $8000/year would be plenty enough to live on. Not in any luxury, obviously.

Living in central SF, or Manhattan would be unfeasible. Is that s bad thing? BI could prevent urbanization, and make small businesses blossom in smaller countryside towns.

And outside of a city you would have better opportunities to grow some food on your own, making your BI last a bit longer.

Re: Why a Universal Basic Income Will Not Solve Poverty

#219

Post by geon » Wed, Jun 01, 2016, 2:27 PM UTC

ascagnel_ wrote: post #193

technofire wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If a bunch of people move to the middle of nowhere, they will need goods and services, and thus jobs will be created as enterprising people move to provide them.

But those customers don't have money to spend -- why would anything but the most predatory business (rent-to-own/layaway firms, payday loans, etc) move to service them?

The people themselves can provide the services. They have no other jobs anyway, remember?

Re: Why a Universal Basic Income Will Not Solve Poverty

#220

Post by geon » Wed, Jun 01, 2016, 2:27 PM UTC

ascagnel_ wrote: post #193

technofire wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If a bunch of people move to the middle of nowhere, they will need goods and services, and thus jobs will be created as enterprising people move to provide them.

But those customers don't have money to spend -- why would anything but the most predatory business (rent-to-own/layaway firms, payday loans, etc) move to service them?

The people themselves can provide the services. They have no other jobs anyway, remember?