Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

businessinsider.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

61–70 of 444 posts

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#61

Post by tells »

kyledrake wrote: post #60
tells wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this is very inflammatory and false. The VAT is not highly regressive. Money is power but poverty stricken people literally have zero money. How are gov't "programs" going to help? democrats love "programs" because it just gives them something to show off. it hardly solves any real problems. I doubt you've lived through any sort of poverty or have felt like the walls were closing in on your life, but people live that…

It is not inflammatory or false. VAT taxes are regressive consumption-based taxes, and poorer people disproportionately bear the costs compared to the wealthy. It's very well established among economists https://www.quora.com/Why-is-value-added-tax-regressive > I doubt you've lived through any sort of poverty or have felt like the walls were closing in on your life, but people live that everyday. For those that have…

on the presupposition that the VAT is flat across all goods. look at Yang's plan. this is not the case. https://www.yang2020.com/what-is-freedom-dividend-faq/

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#62

Post by goatinaboat »

tempsy wrote: post #36
intuitionist wrote: post #26

Altman and Yang are a natural fit because they’re both very invested (Altman literally so) in the narrative that automation is coming for huge numbers of jobs. But the economic statistics just don’t back this up. Total factor productivity, a (rough) measure of the technological contribution to economic production, is growing considerably more slowly than it was during the early 2000s, and much more slowly than during…

Whether it’s automation or something else doesn’t really matter. I think it’s hard to argue that there’s a ton of shitty jobs out there, and those shitty jobs are most vulnerable to outsourcing, automation, made obsolete, etc. People in those jobs are the ones that could be most helped by UBI. Of course you need to think about how to replace shitty jobs with better ones over time, but UBI smooths out societal issues…

those shitty jobs are most vulnerable to outsourcing, automation, made obsolete, etc

Most of those jobs will be the hardest to automate because Moravec’s Paradox. Automation will wipe out lawyers and accountants long before it reaches sewer maintenance and refuse collection.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#63

Post by kyledrake »

3131s wrote: post #57
kyledrake wrote: post #50

"Altman, who favors UBI, said in exchange for a floor, he’d like to see no ceiling on earnings, as some, like presidential hopeful Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, have suggested. And like Friedman, Altman suggested tying the amount of the basic income to a fixed percentage of GDP. “Right now, because people are rightly angry that there's no floor, and that most people have no real chance to be super successful, we sort…

> The problem with having a handful of people be billionaires and trillionaires is that money is power, and with that amount of money you have nearly unlimited power and influence over everyone and everything. Sure, and that's why we need a mechanism to redistribute that wealth... like a UBI. > a highly regressive VAT tax that none of these ultra wealthy people will ever pay. Yang proposes to exempt basic goods from…

If you're using a regressive VAT tax to pay for UBI you are not redistributing wealth, you are disproportionately taxing the poor to distribute to themselves (https://www.quora.com/Why-is-value-added-tax-regressive) much of which will be lost as the prices of goods increases to match equilibrium. Amazon won't "pay the tax" it will pass the tax along in the form of higher consumer prices.

If the primary concern is tax evasion, there are many ways to improve this while still maintaining progressive taxation.

And I'm sorry, but even if this would work, I'm still not going to be sold on the idea that the world should be lorded over by a few trillionaires from California.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#64

Post by keiferski »

save_ferris wrote: post #24
keiferski wrote: post #19

I haven’t read all of the literature on basic income, but my (admittedly semi-educated) impression is that one potential downside is that it fosters dependence on the state and is thus not anti-fragile. I’m just thinking out loud here, but: what if instead of a flat cash payment, the basic income program provided free technologies that covered basic needs. For example, a small greenhouse device that can grow enough f…

I’d argue that giving out this free technology still creates the dependency you’re trying to avoid. Realistically, a lot of people aren’t going to know how to use this technology up front, so what are they gonna do? What if the technology breaks and needs to be fixed? Do people rely on the state for maintenance? You’re still paying for it either way. In your first example, it sounds like the ultimate goal is grow eno…

I don’t think fixing broken technology requires the ongoing involvement of the state. If (gasoline) car manufacturers all disappeared tomorrow, mechanics would still be able to maintain them. The goal is to reduce dependency and increase independence. The way to do that is by creating a distributed, public knowledge and skills base.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#65

Post by j8014 »

solveit wrote: post #51
j8014 wrote: post #47

I find the concept of UBI and redistribution of wealth terrible to a free society. If wealth redistribution is what the rich and common both "want", why allow the wealthy to set the rules? It seems easier to string them all up by the neck and take it all so we have fair redistribution of wealth, why half ass it?

> It seems easier Setting aside ethical issues as you clearly don't care, it really isn't at all easy. It's not like people haven't tried.

Ethics? If you agree with UBI, then ethics do not matter. Why negotiate a minority position, take it all.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#66

Post by 3131s »

kyledrake wrote: post #63
3131s wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The problem with having a handful of people be billionaires and trillionaires is that money is power, and with that amount of money you have nearly unlimited power and influence over everyone and everything. Sure, and that's why we need a mechanism to redistribute that wealth... like a UBI. > a highly regressive VAT tax that none of these ultra wealthy people will ever pay. Yang proposes to exempt basic goods from…

If you're using a regressive VAT tax to pay for UBI you are not redistributing wealth, you are disproportionately taxing the poor to distribute to themselves ( https://www.quora.com/Why-is-value-added-tax-regressive ) much of which will be lost as the prices of goods increases to match equilibrium. Amazon won't "pay the tax" it will pass the tax along in the form of higher consumer prices. If the primary concern is t…

> If you're using a regressive VAT tax to pay for UBI you are not redistributing wealth, you are disproportionately taxing the poor to distribute to themselves (https://www.quora.com/Why-is-value-added-tax-regressive) much of which will be lost as the prices of goods increases to match equilibrium. Amazon won't "pay the tax" it will pass the tax along in the form of higher consumer prices.

A flat value added tax is regressive, but a VAT itself is not inherently regressive. Imagine if we have a VAT on yachts and nothing else, does that disproportionately affect the rich or the poor?

That's why Yang is proposing to exempt basic goods and raise the rate on some luxury items.

Even under a flat 10% VAT paired with the UBI, you would only be worse off if you spend $120,000 yearly on items with a 100% pass through (the IMF's estimates on the average pass through under a VAT are much lower than this).

> If the primary concern is tax evasion, there are many ways to improve this while still maintaining progressive taxation.

You are going to need to specify a better alternative then. Again, a VAT has inherent properties that make it highly auditable and therefore easier to administer. A wealth tax, in comparison, is much more subject to misreporting because it relies on asset valuation.

> And I'm sorry, but even if this would work, I'm still not going to be sold on the idea that the world should be lorded over by a few trillionaires from California.

Do you want wealth redistribution or not?

Yang wants to give individuals legal ownership of their own data and control over how it is used, so I'm not so sure that most of those California billionaires are all that fond of him anyway.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#67

Post by djrobstep »

tells wrote: post #55
djrobstep wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every redistributive program that gives the poor more money increases demand for goods that poor people want - that's the whole point! It's no problem because supply can adjust to compensate - the exception to this is land, which is why a UBI ought to be funded with a land value tax. This is why Yang's UBI isn't very good, because it is sales tax funded (he's too much of a centrist to tackle land and capital, touchin…

I think it's smarter to go after automation and consumption than land value tax as of this moment. It's a lot harder to measure the true value of land compared to consumption. Also, the VAT can also be adjusted for non essential goods. Consumption is quite strong in this country. It's wise to target that.

Spoken like a person who wants to perpetuate inequality. To fix inequality we need to directly redistribute land and capital - the things that rich people use maintain the class system

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#68

Post by randomdata »

pdonis wrote: post #23
keiferski wrote: post #19

I haven’t read all of the literature on basic income, but my (admittedly semi-educated) impression is that one potential downside is that it fosters dependence on the state and is thus not anti-fragile. I’m just thinking out loud here, but: what if instead of a flat cash payment, the basic income program provided free technologies that covered basic needs. For example, a small greenhouse device that can grow enough f…

> what if instead of a flat cash payment, the basic income program provided free technologies that covered basic needs What if, instead of yammering about UBI, Andrew Yang, an entrepreneur, went out and started a company to make such technologies? The way to innovate is to innovate, not to try to milk money out of the government. The whole discussion about UBI misses this basic point: to make it easier for people to…

> For example, the government subsidizes large agribusinesses instead of letting innovators and entrepreneurs find cheaper ways of providing people with food.

The primary subsidy afforded to farmers is effectively assistance in paying insurance premiums. Insurance that exists to keep farms afloat during bad years in an environment that is highly volatile. The intent is not to make food cheaper (although that may happen as a side effect), but rather to ensure there are still farmers around next year to grow the next crop.

I am not sure that really limits the desire of innovators and entrepreneurs to seek out ways to provide cheaper food. I would argue that there is still great incentive to do exactly that. Someone who can successfully do so is in a great position to become the next large agribusiness. Those who have large agribusinesses today do so because they were the innovators and entrepreneurs of the past who figured out how to sharpen their pencil to a finer point than their neighbours.

The insurance system probably limits innovation in finding ways to survive bad years independent of government support, but I'm not sure how much that relates to the particular topic at hand.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#69

Post by doyceplunk »

chr1 wrote: post #39
echelon wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How does UBI even work? Won't it just lead to rampant inflation where the basic income is spread thin, eaten up almost entirely by the rising cost of goods? It seems like this in turn will require an even higher basic income, which exacerbates the problem. Isn't an analogous situation that of private loans for tuition? Tuitions have risen across the board to eat up all the new "free" money in the system. Won't UBI ma…

It depends on how government would get the money for UBI. If it goes ahead and just prints more money then there will be rampant inflation, but if it redirects money from other programs, the prices of some goods may change, but there won't be inflation.

The money will come from a 10% Value Added Tax (VAT). No new money will be printed to pay for the Freedom Dividend so there will be no inflation.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#70

Post by unrealhoang »

j8014 wrote: post #47

I find the concept of UBI and redistribution of wealth terrible to a free society. If wealth redistribution is what the rich and common both "want", why allow the wealthy to set the rules? It seems easier to string them all up by the neck and take it all so we have fair redistribution of wealth, why half ass it?

If UBI still doesn’t exist when 2M drivers will be jobless because of technology then yes, what you described will
Post reply on HN