Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0 • Hacker News Board

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#811

Post by pickledcods » Thu, Jul 30, 2020, 1:34 PM UTC

attilakun wrote: post #795

pickledcods wrote: post #644

I am busy in the field of fractal arithmetic and quantum logic. Thanks to an incompetent advisor I was dis-advised to follow an academic schooling and missed the boat. With UBI I would have finished the basics of these two fields long ago and published them for the good of science releasing a trove of new techniques, insights, algorithms and hardware designs. Now I have to scavenge for work and waste my time.

I'm curious: what kind of quantum logic are you working on? Can you elaborate on what grounds did your advisor disadvise you to follow academic schooling?

Breaking arithmetic down to a single operator represented as movement and a single value represented as null/zero. Because there is no variation in operator or value you can remove them from the equation so only the structure remains. You can use that structure to create fractals storing information, manipulate and navigate through them. Working on the final prototype now and got rough designs to implement in hardware but its getting severely delayed because of absence of UBI.

There are two types of higher education here, academic and applied. School adviser had no clue and advised to walk the applied path because it would get me into computer science one year faster. Yeah, applied CS, but I needed academic. Tried to get back onto the train, did hardware and software for a total of 9 years but in the end the gap was too large to get recognised and make the jump. One advantage though, it allowed me to think outside the academic box.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#812

Post by rapind » Thu, Jul 30, 2020, 1:39 PM UTC

habosa wrote: 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 think UBI only works as a replacement and simplification of existing programs. As a way to replace progressive tax with a flat tax and eliminating other food and welfare programs, but essentially ending up in the same place without all the corruption and loopholes.

If UBI is pasted in without cleaning out the existing cruft then it'll just be another mess on the pile.

However if done correctly, and not as a form of welfare, then it will be a vast improvement (in terms of fairness) with no effect on inflation.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#813

Post by manuelabeledo » Thu, Jul 30, 2020, 1:39 PM UTC

slightwinder wrote: post #799

bakuninsbart wrote: post #646

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 3. Charity - let's say we actually give every person enough money for food, housing, and utilities. Some people will mess up. They could spend it all on an addiction or just make a bad investment. Even with UBI they could still end up hungry or homeless. Will we help them? Or will we say "you had your UBI, the rest is on you". This changes the morals of how we treat people in the worst times. I think it should be p…

> Instead of relying on the charity of wealthy people, good public mental healthcare, public addiction centres and social workers engaged with the homeless community are the ways forward. Those probably don't exist with UBI, because one point of UBI is to take all the money going into those support and give it directly to the people and let them take care of themself. In german there is a significant number of people…

UBI is not a replacement for universal healthcare, in the same way that unemployment benefits are not a replacement for public education: they both may be related somehow, but they do not overlap completely.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#814

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Jul 30, 2020, 1:41 PM UTC

[deleted]

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#815

Post by wonderwonder » Thu, Jul 30, 2020, 1:46 PM UTC

bmitc wrote: post #652

onion2k wrote: post #544

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 cra…

> One aspect of UBI is that poor people would be less at the mercy of the rich. That is a very strong statement that I don't think can be claimed at this point. In my opinion, I feel things will simply shift under UBI. People will receive UBI, but then other things, like rent, food, etc. will all just magically get more expensive. I cannot see any implementation of UBI working any better than things now unless the pr…

If someone is giving you money every month, for free, you are less at their mercy. Currently if people dont take whatever work is given to them, including being forced to go to work in a pandemic, they starve. If they have at least a basic set amount coming in every month they have the ability to actually pause and figure some things out. A married couple just through UBI may have enough to scrape by with no work. The work force suddenly has negotiating power because they don't have to take any job that comes along.

I could see society changing as well. If 20 people got together and formed a commune, that commune is essentially self maintaining as they get an income, can grow their own food etc.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#816

Post by holidayacct » Thu, Jul 30, 2020, 1:48 PM UTC

Universal Basic Income is never going to work, we all live in a universe where everyone wants to build or create something. The average person isn't going to build or create a damn thing, they aren't going to do anything productive for society they are going to tear the whole country down or sit on their asses watching Netflix all day long. Every time I see someone mentioning universal basic income I start to wonder how much contact they've had with the outside world.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#817

Post by zimbatm » Thu, Jul 30, 2020, 1:48 PM UTC

diffeomorphism wrote: post #746

zimbatm wrote: post #740

Where does that money come from? The US population has 199M adults[1]. Let's say a decent basic income is $40k. That's 8 Trillion that the government has to find every year. The US federal tax revenue was of 3.86 Trillion last year[2]. Half of which comes from individual income, and another third from payroll taxes. This is before the effects that UBI will have on the economy. Maybe my 10 minute research is wrong? It…

Where does the money currently come from? Take $1000 of each monthly salary and put a "UBI" sticker on it. Everybody currently employed now gets $1000 UBI for the total price of nothing. For a person earning $3000+ per month nothing changes, except that their salary now reads $2000+ (same money to spend etc.). For a person currently earning $1500, negotiations with their employer will be different because the salary…

Would the initial 1000$ UBI be paid by the state or by the employer? Assuming that the employee is above threshold.

What about the person currently working part-time for $500? It seems like it wouldn't make any material change for them as it would be swallowed by UBI.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#818

Post by ambyra » Thu, Jul 30, 2020, 1:49 PM UTC

Austria already has unlimited unemployment insurance, and is rated as one of the happiest countries. Why is UBI any better?

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#819

Post by achenatx » Thu, Jul 30, 2020, 1:49 PM UTC

onion2k wrote: post #544

habosa wrote: 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 cra…

nah what would happen is payday lending style companies would give a one time cash payout in return for permanent collection of the UBI income stream.

the real problem is that 50% of the population has a below average IQ. No matter what you do 15% will end up in financial trouble

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#820

Post by markus_zhang » Thu, Jul 30, 2020, 1:49 PM UTC

Free basic food + government housing + free schooling should be better.

And more importantly how do you promote equal opportunity to the kids? Still have to make sure that somehow kids from poor cities/districts get proper education.