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Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

timjrobinson.com

541–550 of 1001 posts

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#541

Intergenerational wealth transfer is the root of all evil. She absolutely shouldn't be able to do that.

I agree but preventing parents from providing security for their children is a form of harm. One could then argue that if all wealth were recycled, the state would be so strong that parents would feel even safer for their children in such a system - but then you're back to state vs. individual, socialism vs. freedom, etc., etc.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#542

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of the people objecting also think someday they're going to be a baron of industry who needs income incentives to keep workers toiling away for them.

No, that's just a straw man. A lot of people are paying giant amounts of taxes and they'd rather not see them go up much further.

If your tax burden is overwhelming to your finances you are going to get more out of UBI than you get taxed into it lest its failed in its primary goal of wealth redistribution.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#543
post #526

I like the simple argument made here about UBI enabling efficient consumption. I worry about three things with UBI though and they're more social than economic. 1. Power Divide - society will be easily divided into two groups: those who depend on the UBI to live and those who don't. The former will be absolutely at the mercy of the latter. We can see this a little bit with the coronavirus relief packages. 2. Predator…

> some governments give poor people vouchers for rent ... targeted by slumlords who find a way to give you as little as possible for them This seems to be a problem because the vouchers are only redeemable by government-granted monopolies, and thus neither tenant nor landlord are participating an open market. If the tenant could go anywhere else with their money a la UBI nobody would choose those terrible living quar…

You dont need UBI for this though (not throwing my support for either side, I am sitting on the fence).

My govt doesnt restrict people to only rent from certain approved places.

If you have a rental agreement, and abiding by the rental agreement policies, then u can rent from anyone under govt assistance.

I had rented my basement out to a family under rental assistance.

The govt wrote the checks with my name on it that the renter would provide to me.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#544
post #526

I like the simple argument made here about UBI enabling efficient consumption. I worry about three things with UBI though and they're more social than economic. 1. Power Divide - society will be easily divided into two groups: those who depend on the UBI to live and those who don't. The former will be absolutely at the mercy of the latter. We can see this a little bit with the coronavirus relief packages. 2. Predator…

Power Divide - society will be easily divided into two groups: those who depend on the UBI to live and those who don't. The former will be absolutely at the mercy of the latter.

One aspect of UBI is that poor people would be less at the mercy of the rich. If you're a poor person now you absolutely have to try to keep your horrible job else you'll lost the ability to pay rent and buy food. You have to take all the crap your employer gives you. With UBI, assuming it's enough to live on, you could walk away from that job and still survive. That shifts a lot of power from employers to employees. It's one of the most appealing aspects.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#545

There are a lot of people here dissenting on the idea of UBI on the premise that they find meaning in work, and to take the incentive to work away will lead others (themselves included) not to have meaning in life. I’ve taken a year off of work to start a business that failed and spent the past few months hanging out with my kids. At first, my stress levels were high because daycares were shut down and I was panickin…

I really curious how many of the jobs no one wants to do would still get done. I get that the B in UBI is "basic" but still, so many necessary jobs are jobs no one really wants to do but they do because they need money. If they didn't need money would those jobs still get done. Trash collection? Construction work? Hotel cleaners? Janitors? Farmers, Grocery Store stockers, truckers, nurses, sales clerks, .... Sure the…

[deleted]

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#546

Intergenerational wealth transfer is the root of all evil. She absolutely shouldn't be able to do that.

Wait--the root of all evil is me trying to work hard to leave something for my kids so they can have a better life than I do and, with any luck, pass on the genes that I've given them?

When your policy proposals require extinguishing desires built into our minds and bodies by millions of years of evolution, you should go back to the drawing board.

The root of all evil is unqualified, absolute, extreme statements, and the people who fervently believe in them.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#547

The elephants in the room are the extremely cheap labor that already undermines the legit goods and services: - extremely cheap prison labor - undocumented laborers who have (almost) no legal rights and who take difficult jobs - ex-cons who have to pay a portion of their wages to employers who are willing to hire them - jobs where wages must be subsidized by government programs (eg. WalMart encourages their lowest pa…

This is a good point. I actually consider shoring up these loopholes as part of (or needing to be passed alongside) UBI.

Yeah, I would prefer we fix them then deal with either UBI or fixing welfare programs, but with the current state of Congress, I have little hope that this is a probability.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#548
post #526

I like the simple argument made here about UBI enabling efficient consumption. I worry about three things with UBI though and they're more social than economic. 1. Power Divide - society will be easily divided into two groups: those who depend on the UBI to live and those who don't. The former will be absolutely at the mercy of the latter. We can see this a little bit with the coronavirus relief packages. 2. Predator…

Something no one ever talks about with UBI is how the effects will be eliminated in a few years. The very things poorer people would buy from it would get more expensive by the UBI proportion, it will just be inflated away.

When everyone has an extra $1000 do you really think landlords won’t increase rent? The price of food and clothing won’t increase? When literally an entire country is richer by this amount?

UBI does not create more wealth. It does not mean all the people receiving it will put more value into the economy. It just means everyone gets X+$1000 more tokens for the same wealth/goods. Poor people will still be in just as difficult a situation as they will be competing for the same goods against the same people as before.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#549
post #526

I like the simple argument made here about UBI enabling efficient consumption. I worry about three things with UBI though and they're more social than economic. 1. Power Divide - society will be easily divided into two groups: those who depend on the UBI to live and those who don't. The former will be absolutely at the mercy of the latter. We can see this a little bit with the coronavirus relief packages. 2. Predator…

I especially buy into your third concern. Where I live, if the introduction of a UBI was followed by a drastic reduction (or complete elimination) of the means-tested system we know today, hunger would potentially become a problem for people blowing their money early in the month (or getting robbed?). This tells me the utopian ideas of replacing the entire complex system with a simple UBI isn't feasible. You'll end u…

Where I live, if the introduction of a UBI was followed by a drastic reduction (or complete elimination) of the means-tested system we know today, hunger would potentially become a problem for people blowing their money early in the month (or getting robbed?).

If that happened regularly the charities would be started up again, except next time far more people would have a little extra money to give so they could be much better funded.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#550

There are a lot of people here dissenting on the idea of UBI on the premise that they find meaning in work, and to take the incentive to work away will lead others (themselves included) not to have meaning in life. I’ve taken a year off of work to start a business that failed and spent the past few months hanging out with my kids. At first, my stress levels were high because daycares were shut down and I was panickin…

I really curious how many of the jobs no one wants to do would still get done. I get that the B in UBI is "basic" but still, so many necessary jobs are jobs no one really wants to do but they do because they need money. If they didn't need money would those jobs still get done. Trash collection? Construction work? Hotel cleaners? Janitors? Farmers, Grocery Store stockers, truckers, nurses, sales clerks, .... Sure the…

So the solution is to continue using suffering and historic injustice to force people into doing stuff they don’t want to do - “or else”? I don’t think so. In India, even middle class families can afford a part time house maid because the latter’s salaries are insanely low thanks to cruel supply/demand dynamics and poverty; the same family, after moving to a developed country, would just do the chores themselves. It leads to a more equitable society.
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