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Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

timjrobinson.com

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Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#241

Post by lovehashbrowns »

jMyles wrote: post #146
alexmingoia wrote: post #82

Why give free money to everyone? Clearly a rich person doesn’t need a monthly check from government... Milton Friedman long ago proposed a negative income tax to replace means-tested welfare programs. Essentially, people below a certain income threshold would receive money which scales to a maximum the closer their income approaches zero. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negative_income_tax I do think people radically…

What is so bad about reduced "work"? Maybe people who are currently working at stupid, unnecessary jobs will make art and poetry and music. Or maybe invent cool things. Or maybe just relax and learn about themselves. I have never understood this obsession with 100% employment.

People have been brainwashed all their lives to think that getting a check every two/four weeks is the only way to contribute to society.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#242

Post by justinzollars »

This is going to explode in our faces.

Why would the rest of the world finance us (the citizens of the United States) to sit around and watch Netflix all day? Put another way, someone has to buy the debt we are issuing. Today our debt is sold to savers in China, and to other hard working individuals across the world. We have no means of paying back the debt we are issuing, so we are monetizing the debt through a mechanism known as QE, otherwise known as a printing press.

If we are debasing the savings of hard working people, why would they want to continue to lend to us? We could raise interest rates, but with the levels of our national debt, servicing the debt would become impossible. So that isn't an option. If trust is lost in the dollar as a reserve currency, we will become very poor very very fast.

It won't matter if we print more money, or if UBI is 1,000 or 1,000,000 per month. The dollar will have less value.

It's better to focus on improving productivity and making stuff. There can't be consumption without production.

There is no free lunch.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#243

Post by danielheath »

w0rdson wrote: post #221

I definitely need to research this topic more, but after reading everyone's arguments for and against UBI, I think maybe the right solution is somewhere right in the middle. Instead of giving everyone $X,000 a month, what if there was some sort of secondary currency or credits that all Americans receive (call them Patriot bucks or whatever) that could be used for necessities like food, public transportation, etc. I d…

Why charge for public transport at all? Issuing everyone credits they can use to buy rides seems like a way to funnel money to big consultancies.

Similarly for housing; offering very basic housing to anyone who wants to live in it solves 80% of homelessness (the last 20% is harder than you would think).

Food is harder, but something akin to a soup kitchen can still help a lot.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#244

Post by margalabargala »

dopylitty wrote: post #49

People don’t need money. People need basics like housing, food, and medical care. No UBI scheme is going to work in an economic system like the one in the U.S. that isn’t capable of providing those things. It’s not like there’s a shortage of food or shelter now and yet we still have homeless people while homes sit empty. We still have hungry people while farmers are destroying their crops. The economic system is the…

But in society as it exists today, money is essentially equivalent to all of those things. UBI can ameliorate all three of those issues while helping to avoid the issues that crop up when trying to provide those necessities to people directly.

The article attempts to argue for UBI from the stance of being pro-capitalist and working within the existing capitalist framework, and I think the author would answer your criticism with something like "By providing money to people, they can allocate those resources wherever is most efficient for them- to buy the food and housing they need if they need it, or other things if not. The person receiving the money is the one with the most information about where money needs to go in their life."

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#245

Post by JumpCrisscross »

ww520 wrote: post #238
alexmingoia wrote: post #82

Why give free money to everyone? Clearly a rich person doesn’t need a monthly check from government... Milton Friedman long ago proposed a negative income tax to replace means-tested welfare programs. Essentially, people below a certain income threshold would receive money which scales to a maximum the closer their income approaches zero. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negative_income_tax I do think people radically…

Because of equality. Giving everyone a cut makes sure everyone is participated in the program.

> Giving everyone a cut makes sure everyone is participated in the program

This also applies to the negative income tax.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#246

Post by swimfar »

tw04 wrote: post #189
alexmingoia wrote: post #82

Why give free money to everyone? Clearly a rich person doesn’t need a monthly check from government... Milton Friedman long ago proposed a negative income tax to replace means-tested welfare programs. Essentially, people below a certain income threshold would receive money which scales to a maximum the closer their income approaches zero. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negative_income_tax I do think people radically…

>I do think people radically underestimate the unforeseen consequences of a free guaranteed income, even if it was low. But for every you, there's a me. I get satisfaction out of working. I had a job in college where I completed all of my work in the first week and did absolutely nothing for the next 6 months and I was MISERABLE. I needed a task to complete, a job to finish, to feel productive. Furthermore I like hav…

"But for every you, there's a me"

Everyone agrees that there will be people who will want to work, and people who won't. The question is what is the ratio, and is it enough. No one can predict this with a high level of certainty. We all just have "a feeling", which coincidentally happens to align perfectly with whether or not we believe in UBI.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#248

Post by krapp »

m0zg wrote: post #229

People need jobs though. Otherwise you get riots.

People need food, clothing, shelter, access to healthcare, education and communication, and jobs only because employment provides the income necessary to purchase those actual necessities. No one riots for jobs simply to have a job to do.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#249

Post by chii »

zzzkkk wrote: post #21

> Even the most hardcore anti-capitalists have to give respect to how the combination of capitalism and technology has worked to lift most of the world out poverty and provided us with the security and comfort only kings enjoyed just a few century’s ago. no, we fucking don't.

The difference between a peasant and a king in the middle ages, and a peasant (e.g., a worker today) and a king (e.g., Bezos, or the Saudi king) is night and day.

A middle ages peasant has access to a tiny sliver of the goods and services available to the king. A modern day peasant has access to pretty much all of the goods and services available to Bezos today. It's not like the food Bezos eats is any better than any body else's. The clothes he wears is not much better than anybody else's. The computer he uses is not much faster than anybody else's.

So the gap in availability and access of goods and services between the rich and poor is lower today than it was in the past.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#250

Post by jay_kyburz »

Jedd wrote: post #198
jay_kyburz wrote: post #79

I understand and agree with how a UBI will benefit those that are currently falling between the cracks and not receiving any assistance. I can also see the benefits of greatly simplifying the social security system. (If it was implemented in a way that was actually simple. i.e. no distinction between sick, unemployed, old, lazy) But I don't understand why people don't believe the UBI will just become the new definiti…

> But I don't understand why people don't believe the UBI will just become the new definition of poverty. People will still be miserable and feel like they have nothing when comparing themselves to those who get UBI and have a job. We don't know that people will 'still be miserable', let alone the ratio of misery in the current versus the proposed economy. My expectation is that fewer people will be in poverty / mise…

I agree with the notion of not waiting for a perfect plan, and for moving forward to improve the current situation. I consider myself "progressive" in that way.

But if I was writing some code and there was a problem in my algorithm where some people had nothing and some people had too much, I would just take some from the top and give it to the bottom. The UBI seems like a re-writing from scratch.

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