The Indian government is set to endorse Universal Basic Income

I see UBI as this:

   * Wealth redistrobution
   * Basic standard of living
   * Safety net

That's pretty communist in my mind. I know the purists out there will wave their hands and say "this is just an attempt of the bourgeois class in an attempt to lul the proletariat into a false sense of safety while what they are really getting is life-long survitude to their masters" because that's what my communist friends think. I think that with a rational look at this you can see it as an attempt to level a playing field in a communist fashion. Everyone starts off at a level playing field where they cant go hungry and have a basic standard of living.

From the US that seems like voo-doo communist magic.

Also, I find it funny that the communist, who argues for the rights of the lower classes, is asking... I'm not going to say it. You put it best.

"You're a lot more likely to riot if your kids are starving."

Or in other terms:

"You're a lot more likely to if your kids are starving."

It's funny how that works out.

Price inflation and deflation occur when there is a temporary mismatch between the apparent relative economic influence of the consumer and the availability of goods and services, or actual economic influence.

If you give every member of the lower class a cash income that is effectively a transfer payment from the upper class, you are redistributing apparent relative economic influence.

We can look at this as though the entire economy were just two people. Let's call them Peter and Paul. Peter is a rich landowner, who owns the everything factory. Paul is Peter's employee and tenant.

Let us also say that the status quo is for Paul to do all the work in the economy. He keeps all the machines in the everything factory cleaned, oiled, and programmed. But Peter owns the factory and the machines. He sets Paul's wages, and the prices of the goods and services produced by the machines. So being a good businessman, Peter sets the prices of food, housing, medical care, and everything else, such that if Paul were to purchase everything he needs and everything he wants, it would require 120% of his wages. Peter, you see, wants to keep Paul motivated to do additional good work for Peter's sole benefit. Paul has to prioritize the things that he wants, and never has quite enough to be content. And Peter gets to keep everything that Paul makes with the machines in excess of what Peter decides he can have.

Now Paul programs the machines to make a pistol, and he eats beans and rice for two months to be able to buy it. He then points the gun at Peter and says, "Brother, we need to talk."

Paul is not quite as smart as Peter. Instead of demanding ownership of the factory, like a dirty communist, or a change in the goods-production algorithm, like some kind of genius technocrat, he asks for more of the fake units of accounting that Peter manipulates to keep Paul from getting everything he wants, like a complete idiot. Peter huffs and puffs and pretends this is a grievous loss for him, and finally agrees. Paul holsters his gun and goes back to work. Peter goes to his management terminal and sets up a monthly payment in addition to normal wages. Then his automatic price-management daemon slowly ups the prices of everything Paul routinely buys from the factory until it is once again costing Paul 120% of his cashflow to get everything he desires.

In this instance, there was no change in the availability of goods and services. Peter still ultimately makes all the economic decisions. So any change in relative economic influence causes price inflation or deflation, until the influence matches the market again. The money is the lubricant for the economic engine, not the fuel. You don't ask for gear grease when you want #2 diesel.

Paul should have demanded that he be given a certain percentage of everything the factory produces, independently of Peter's fake accounting units. For instance, he might have demanded that he get a guaranteed 5000 kcal/day of the robot-produced food, without having to pay for it, and 2 L/day of the potable drinking water, and 4 hours/month with the AI physician, and 9 hours/day in the factory's capsule hotel. That would necessarily shift the production of the factory towards the things that Paul wants, without affecting the prices of the things Paul does not specify in the deal. Peter will still try to adjust the prices of those other things so that Paul must work full-time in the factory to get some of the things he wants. Peter doesn't want to get his hands dirty, after all.

> I call it morbid because "not enough people died hence its a success" is a bad argument. What is your cutoff for the number of people to have died for it to have become a failure? How do you arrive at that cutoff?

The cutoff was not given by me. It was given by the nay-sayers including the Supreme Court of India. Who speculated "financial emergency" and "large-scale riots"? Was it people who supported demonetization or those who opposed?

> Yes a relatively smaller percentage than demonetization (but not small by any means). Furthermore, less people were affected by partition but the impact to those affected was much higher. In demonetization, more people were affected but the average impact to those affected was much lower. They might even be the same area under the curve in terms of suffering. But how do we quantify that? Simply saying that "less people were affected yet more people died during partition in contrast to demonetization where more people are affected but less people died" is an incomplete argument. More people are affected by the poor air quality of New Delhi but less people die because of it than the partition, does that mean that the air quality measures that the government has taken (banning unleaded fuel etc.) is a success?

But you are again trying to tie an economic move like demonetization with something inherently negative: pollution. How does pollution compare to the Partition or Demonetization? How does that analogy even make any sense? We are talking about "implementation" of "intent". I gave comparison of Partition because the Partition of India was an "intent" in the same way that the demonetization was an "intent". The "implementation" of the "intent" failed with Partition but not with demonetization. How do I quantify that? See the demonetization exercises carried out by 6 countries before India. It was bloody and ended in either coups d'état or large-scale riots. Both did not happen in India.

> Survivorship bias. You only hear of the ones that got caught. There are so many that got away scot-free.

You are in the realm of speculation here. It is for you to prove that "so many go away scot-free".

> Also, do you always believe or agree with what the Supreme court says or recommends? How do you feel about the mandatory standing for the national anthem before any movie? Should that be something that the state should enforce? Hitler made it mandatory for civilians to perform the Nazi salute towards him.

I agree with mandatory standing for National Anthem irrespective of whether it is before any movie or in any public place. Now you taking it to the other extreme of comparing standing for National Anthem to that of Nazi salute is completely uncalled for. Are you actually comparing Nazi ideology with upholding the Constitution of India? The Supreme Court only upheld the Articles of the Constitution. Read the order of the Court. This is not some Nazi diktat. Please widen your perspective.

The money comes from sacrificing existing entitlement programs, which might actually cost more.

Think about it like this in the US: Imagine giving everybody a basic income and eliminating minimum wage, social security, medicare, welfare, and so forth...

Naturally some people would become wealthier (paying down existing debts) and some people would become poorer (spending money more rapidly and increasing their debt burden), but these are personal decisions.

> Jan Dhan Yojana

I hate to break this to you, but most people don't actually have bank accounts, and if they do, they don't know how to use them. Most of those bank accounts that were opened in the Jan Dhan Yojana scheme have ₹1 ($0.015) or less in them [1].

These laborers mentioned in the article I linked did not have accounts which they could use. That's why they threatened to strike if they weren't paid in cash. You live in a bubble if you think lower income groups are rapidly adopting digital payments. Sure, the help at your place did, but I've met many people living in the heart of Bangalore who can't afford a smartphone. These same people also don't have a bank account. Or who knows, maybe they have a 0 balance account in their name somewhere.

Its quite easy to talk of "short-term impact" and "long-term gain" when you're not facing any of the short-term impact yourself. I doubt you or your family went to bed hungry on any day during November and December. Millions of Indian families did, while they didn't have to. This could have been executed better.

Lastly, you're citing an article from December 2nd to prove that a lot of money that was outstanding on Nov 8th hasn't been collected. I linked one from January 4th. Which do you think has more up-to-date data?

[1] - http://www.economist.com/news/finance-and-economics/21707234...