Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI • Hacker News Board

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#231

Post by paulddraper » Wed, Jan 01, 2020, 5:05 PM UTC

ianai wrote: post #207

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…

You can’t draw wide ranging conclusions from that sort of UBI. They’re part of a nation that exists within another nation. They’re facing all sorts of pressures and incentives that would not be present for a US wide UBI. The need and requirement for a UBI is real. Private sector is simply never going to find a job for everyone who needs to survive. We offer no other way for people to survive. This isn’t a balance she…

> Private sector is simply never going to find a job for everyone who needs to survive.

You're technically correct that unemployment will never be 0%.

But it's been < 4% for almost all of 2019.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#232

Post by mensetmanusman » Wed, Jan 01, 2020, 5:06 PM UTC

If instead of the federal government paying the Egyptian military millions of dollars, or building billion dollar buildings in Iraq, they were were giving out micro payments to citizens, I don’t see how that could be worse than our current model of spending.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#233

Post by AnthonyMouse » Wed, Jan 01, 2020, 5:06 PM UTC

gonational wrote: post #219

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #174

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. You can get a one bedroom in Austin for less than $800/month, to say nothing of arrangements that involve roommates or shared facilities or couples who would then have a second UBI. > I would imagine an UBI will be mostly used by people to exclude themselves from active wo…

> You can get a one bedroom in Austin for less than $800/month ... because there is currently no program in Austin whereby residents each get $1,000 of free money month.

True, if only people in Austin got a $1000 UBI then many people would want to move there for the UBI and rents there would go up by supply and demand.

But if everybody in the country gets the same UBI then people are going to move from where to where exactly?

If the answer is from places with higher housing costs to places with lower housing costs, I think you're going to find that there's more than enough empty space in the middle of nowhere to satisfy all of that demand without significant rent increases.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#234

Post by enraged_camel » Wed, Jan 01, 2020, 5:07 PM UTC

gonational wrote: post #219

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #174

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. You can get a one bedroom in Austin for less than $800/month, to say nothing of arrangements that involve roommates or shared facilities or couples who would then have a second UBI. > I would imagine an UBI will be mostly used by people to exclude themselves from active wo…

> You can get a one bedroom in Austin for less than $800/month ... because there is currently no program in Austin whereby residents each get $1,000 of free money month.

You're making the mistake of assuming that rents are dependent purely on renters' ability to pay them. Whereas the fact of the matter is that the market is driven largely by housing supply and demand, as it always has been. A $1,000 monthly check is unlikely to move the numbers much.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#235

Post by atq2119 » Wed, Jan 01, 2020, 5:07 PM UTC

moralsupply wrote: post #170

atq2119 wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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…

> 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.

It's really, really not the same. Just because you can't measure something properly, that doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

Just how absurd that thought is becomes obvious when you translate it to a different topic: Magnetic fields did not spontaneously begin to exist when humans started to be able to measure them accurately, for example.

What it does mean is that we don't have as good an understanding of the concept of value as we have of electro-magnetism. That's not surprising, of course, since the inherent complexity of the notion of value is much greater.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#236

Post by ahdeanz » Wed, Jan 01, 2020, 5:10 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…

The term for what you’re talking about is typically referred to as an “income effect”. You could(and people do) make the same argument against the existing social safety net. You can already do no work and simply survive off this net. The threat of death probably wasn’t the big motivator for most people. I could imagine UBI feeling qualitatively the same way once implemented. You still have all the positive motivations for working in place, getting monetary compensation, social status, etc. We don’t really know because it’s never been tried but there’s legitimate reason to believe the positives could outweigh these effects.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#237

Post by StreamBright » Wed, Jan 01, 2020, 5:10 PM UTC

3131s wrote: post #114

barrkel wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Taxing transactions other than capital purchases isn't going to make much of a dent in inequality. The reason we have such inequality is from capital income and appreciation. Taxing ordinary income or outgoings won't help much.

Ok, fortunately Yang also wants to increase capital gains taxes to the same rate as income taxes. https://www.yang2020.com/policies/capital-gain-carried-inter...

It would make more people move to tax havens.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#238

Post by ThrowawayR2 » Wed, Jan 01, 2020, 5:12 PM UTC

Aloha wrote: post #215

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…

I look at UBI as a replacement for a part time minimum wage job, not for working. Meaning it ought to give you about 250 dollars a week. I also view it as a replacement for having minimum wage too - but no one will work for 2.00 and hour either. UBI will free throws labor force, and make it easier for labor to be more mobile and move to where the jobs are - the other key about UBI is everyone gets it, no matter if we…

> "...the other key about UBI is everyone gets it, no matter if wealthy or poor"

Of course if you have anything above poverty level income, it gets snatched right back plus whole lot more though taxes to cover the other UBI recipients who don't. The "everybody gets UBI" rhetoric doesn't really fool anybody; money doesn't come out of thin air.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#239

Post by paulddraper » Wed, Jan 01, 2020, 5:14 PM UTC

nixpulvis wrote: post #223

There's no such thing as a free lunch. Welfare is a tax, and a much needed one since the alternative costs even more. I don't really see how a universal basic income (UBI) solves much of anything that other welfare programs couldn't solve more effectively. If the argument is that it's easier to just give everyone $1,000, then I think you're a lazy policymaker.

Welfare programs are horribly inefficient and full of perverse incentives.

But I doubt UBI is any better overall.

In the U.S. native tribes have effectively had UBI for years and years, whether from government settlements, or casino windfalls (granted, sometimes with limitations on mobility...but hopefully this system would work without just giving it to urban landlords).

The economies of many native tribes are notorious troubled.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#240

Post by ianai » Wed, Jan 01, 2020, 5:15 PM UTC

OnlineGladiator wrote: post #230

ianai wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please don’t tie UBI to the failed war on drugs. Alcohol prohibition was ceased for the exact same reason the war on drugs should be ceased. Further, there are even outlawed substances which have anti-addiction affects that are part of the prohibition. It’s the definition of a bad idea insulating itself from better ideas. People need UBI because the purely survival backed capitalistic system harms society too greatly…

He didn't say anything about the war on drugs, he said it would cause drug epidemics. Getting addicted to drugs has nothing to do with the US' moronic drug policy.

“Most people need to be doing something to feel satisfied and a potential UBI system addresses this need just as inadequately as disability checks do now. Cue drug epidemics.”

That’s an emotional trigger with unsubstantiated link to the supposition. The emotional content is from the war on drugs. People turn to drugs because they’re in a tight spot without a seeming way out. Like how a cornered animal is most dangerous. Or physiology.

People with a UBI will have the ability to engage in more activities that they find worthwhile but without direct, immediate financial consequences-such as artists and mathematicians.