Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI • Hacker News Board

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#161

Post by jandrewrogers » Wed, Jan 01, 2020, 3:57 PM UTC

GarrisonPrime wrote: post #89

chr1 wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Then there’s the behavioral factor to consider. Will UBI truly relieve pressure and give people a hand up? Or will it result in a large swathe of the population dropping out of the labor force and accepting a life of poverty and marginalization? Could some UBI pushers actually see the latter as the true goal? Ask any Native American how empowering a UBI-esque system worked out for them. Not that I’m rejecting the ide…

Tribal UBI has had mixed outcomes. Payments that are below practical livability seem to help as an augmentation to income and for reducing poverty. In tribes where work is not necessary or limited to a couple months per year to live comfortably (the latter case common for tribes with a large resource extraction business) you see much more evidence of rampant social pathology rather than mere poverty.

Anecdotally, having grown up in and around various tribal communities, people will consistently replace work as a source of purpose with some other purpose of their own devising. Unfortunately, most of the time people will choose a purpose that is socially destructive in the absence of a default purpose that is socially beneficial. A consideration for designing a constructive UBI system is institutionalizing new sources of socially beneficial purpose that can be easily adopted by people that lose work as a purpose. Insufficient thought is put into this latter problem, I have seen little evidence that this will happen organically.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#162

Post by pascoej » Wed, Jan 01, 2020, 3:58 PM UTC

Yang does have an interesting idea for campaign finance reform too. 100$ a year for any citizen to spend on political campaigns. In some ways I think this is bigger than the UBI. If everybody spent this voucher it would be ~23B, almost 4x what was spent on federal races in 2016.

I think it will be more likely that our elected officials make better policy for normal people if their campaign funding also comes from them. In federal budget terms, 23B is cheap to increase political participation / trust.

While it’s entirely possible that corporations / billionaires increase their expenditures to match, having “enough” money is more important than having more money in political campaigns (or so I was taught in school.)

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#163

Post by datashow » Wed, Jan 01, 2020, 3:58 PM UTC

dwiel wrote: post #139

datashow wrote: post #110

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. A system that will concentrate that much power will be inherently evil, it will and does serve the needs of that few over the needs of the many. It is kind of right but essentially wrong. In any society with th…

Wouldnt that same argument apply to people fighting for democracy in the age of monarchy? Why try to get rid of the king when he will just be replaced by a president? Dont even bother. Obviously power structures and concentration of power always exist in some form, but that doesn't mean we should never try to rein it in on occassion.

No. They are not the same. How is it worthless to replace the king with a president? I don't understand your logic.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#164

Post by e40 » Wed, Jan 01, 2020, 3:59 PM UTC

sethammons wrote: post #159

I like the idea of freeing people to be able to quit and get a new job any time, where quitting today means a real threat of losing one's home, transportation, or ability to eat (never mind fueling the cycle of debt that keeps so many down). I think it would be a net benefit if people could tell oppressive employers to fuck off without fear. However, a welfare state is a real thing to be worried about. My sister work…

Any time such a huge change is introduced into a complex system, it is extremely hard to see all the unintended consequences.

I like the idea of UBI, too. Taking that leap worries me, though, we might be in for a worse time because of it.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#165

Post by Unsimplified » Wed, Jan 01, 2020, 4:00 PM UTC

Red_Leaves_Flyy wrote: post #147

Unsimplified wrote: post #133

My problem with UBI is 1. It's not fair work-sharing, if people can live on it. 2. There's no economic mechanism that guarantees we'll have enough money to fund it every month. I propose another solution. Accessible, high paying jobs. If someone is unskilled, train them. Once they are skilled, guide them to useful work.

This forces the bag holders to pay more. What happens when companies expenses increase? They increase their costs, cut jobs, cut benefits, and in very rare cases take short term losses to implement one of the former methods. There are not enough high paying jobs. Period. Hard stop. There won't ever be. Now, we need gas station attendants, room cleaners, baggers, bus drivers. These jobs will be replaced by much less e…

I'm doubtful of any tax-based plan as a longterm solution. Here's why. Money needs to flow in a circle for a sustainability. But we can't force people to spend all their money monthly and even then tax is not 100% so net negative monthly shortage risk. Maybe we need a spend it or lose it basic-credit system.

About high paying jobs, suppose we pay 100$/hr for people to monitor the machines, up to a cap of 1K$/mth.

Here's one of the semi startrek-esque longterm solution that works reliably but not yet possible. Suppose basic goods productivity improves 10000X. Then a small number of people can produce the basics for everyone without any money issues involved.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#166

Post by charlesu » Wed, Jan 01, 2020, 4:01 PM UTC

moralsupply wrote: post #142

swiley wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You tax coorperations, not rich individuals. Although if you sit down and work it out I’m not sure it makes sense quite yet. UBS though probably could.

When you tax corporations, they don't simply make less profits, they embed the tax losses in their prices and pay less to workers. You, as a consumer or employee, end up paying that tax.

I think you're oversimplifying how companies determine prices and wages. Yes, corporate taxes are one consideration. There's also competition, regulations, distribution costs, and commodity prices. Passing along your costs directly to consumers is a great way to give up market share to a more efficient or creative competitor.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#167

Post by shrubble » Wed, Jan 01, 2020, 4:02 PM UTC

rpedela wrote: post #153

anovikov wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seriously there is NO WAY in the world an UBI will cover the rent - even the rent alone - in any place where it makes sense starting a business. I would imagine an UBI will be mostly used by people to exclude themselves from active workforce to "retire" in low-cost destinations. Because that will be the only thing it will really allow doing. Say you impose a super huge 30% income tax (anything above that will cause a…

There are plenty of places in the US with rents in the $100s and you could start a business whether that business is a hotdog stand or a software business.

Could you name them, please? Rents in boring Ohio cities for example, are still $650 for a 1 bedroom unit.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#168

Post by snidane » Wed, Jan 01, 2020, 4:05 PM UTC

anovikov wrote: post #148

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> UBI just doesn't solve that Doesn't it though? You create a floor, so that anyone with a miserable job can say "screw you" and quit and go start their own business without having to worry about how they're going to make rent before the new business starts making money, and you get a lot more competition. More smaller companies instead of fewer bigger companies. And the big companies would have to pay more to get so…

Seriously there is NO WAY in the world an UBI will cover the rent - even the rent alone - in any place where it makes sense starting a business. I would imagine an UBI will be mostly used by people to exclude themselves from active workforce to "retire" in low-cost destinations. Because that will be the only thing it will really allow doing. Say you impose a super huge 30% income tax (anything above that will cause a…

> Seriously there is NO WAY in the world an UBI will cover the rent - even the rent alone - in any place where it makes sense starting a business.

Wrong. UBI financed by monopoly taxes makes rents go rock bottom. High uncompeted markup prices - Rents - are by definition caused by some kind of monopoly situation, because they are not competed away. You need to tax monopolies and not call it tax but a 'privilege fee' and reinvest the money into infrastructure or resistribute as dividends - which is UBI basically.

There is NO WAY anything like UBI would ever work without curbing monopoly pricing because any money raised by income tax, VAT or any other means freely given to people will end up rising up rents and monopoly prices even higher.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#169

Post by ghostwriter » Wed, Jan 01, 2020, 4:05 PM UTC

dwiel wrote: post #139

datashow wrote: post #110

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. A system that will concentrate that much power will be inherently evil, it will and does serve the needs of that few over the needs of the many. It is kind of right but essentially wrong. In any society with th…

Wouldnt that same argument apply to people fighting for democracy in the age of monarchy? Why try to get rid of the king when he will just be replaced by a president? Dont even bother. Obviously power structures and concentration of power always exist in some form, but that doesn't mean we should never try to rein it in on occassion.

You cannot achieve that by replacing an almighty king with an almighty government dictating who gets what (which is a prerequisite of UBI).

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#170

Post by moralsupply » Wed, Jan 01, 2020, 4:06 PM UTC

atq2119 wrote: post #146

moralsupply wrote: post #115

The government would need to get money somewhere for the UBI program. It can only do so either through taxation, or by printing money, as the government is not a value-generation enterprise. If UBI gets its funding by taxation, UBI can't work economically (not to say it wouldn't be "UBI"). Even if you tax all the rich people, it won't provide enough money for the program. Besides, you can't really tax the rich, the m…

> the government is not a value-generation enterprise This is incorrect. The value generated by providing a stable framework in which people can go about their daily lives is incredible. It's hard to measure this value, of course, but our modern way of life is impossible without this framework.

Without prices it's not possible to measure the "value" of goods or services. Which is the same thing as saying that without prices there's no "value" generated.

The government makes its own money (generating inflation, which is taxation on savings), and takes money from people through taxation in various ways. It then spends that money in any way it wants, without a price system to signal where that money should be spent. Therefore, it ends up generating "malinvestments", where money is poured in the government functions, social programs, war, "economic incentive" programs, etc. according to the current political agenda, which is generally of low time preference (as politicians have to keep promising on things they can deliver within their mandates).

The modern state (which dates from the 1700's) might have had its historical justification on the basis of making management costs smaller (as in: property records, basic infrastructure, etc.). But as time goes by and technology improves, making both management and transaction costs diminish, the need for a centralized state becomes less important. The problem, however, is that governments want to persist (as they have a large amount of politicians and public workers), and instead of lowering taxes and being less invasive over time, they are progressively doing the opposite.