861–870 of 1001 posts
Why on earth should be reversing the trend ? Why not just accept zero-growth and organize the society accordingly ?
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…
Sadly, this will be important for selling UBI to moderates and conservatives. We have to be prepared for UBI to set us back in a big way when it comes to behaving compassionately towards people who can't solve their own problems. I still see it as a positive idea overall, though. Two steps forward, one step back.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The question I can't answer is "what stops a nation voting itself more income?" If every unscrupulous politician can promise to raise the base UBI rate to get elected, what stops that? Obviously, inflation will fix it in the relatively short term, but that's not a good result. And there's an unscrupulous politician in power.
What stops a nation voting itself lower taxes? If every unscrupulous politician can promise to lower taxes to get elected, what stops that?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
My biggest UBI fear is this. UBI becomes the single biggest election issue. Politicians promising increases to get elected, and all the bad policy that stems from such motivations. This is then followed by an inevitable pullback at some point in the future, causing immense harm to everyone relying on every cent of their UBI (most people).
Yup. This kind of gets at why us socialists are generally against UBI. It doesn't actually put any power in the hands of ordinary people, and the ruling class can just as easily take it away again as they gave it. Much better to have basic services (food, housing, healthcare) provided directly, with the workers in control, as that both makes it harder to take away (when healthcare workers go on strike, even the rich…
I have a very hard time conceiving of long-term solutions to such large problems that don't basically boil down to 'if the government is in charge of it, it will end poorly'
I am not sure even OECD nations have sufficient production capacity for everyone and carrying capacity can solely rely on automation in the near future.
I think a short “draft” (2-3 years) of people into various community and defense activities should be mandatory for all healthy young adults before they are eligible for UBI.
I like the idea of efficient consumption.
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…
So could you with your salary (assuming that’s how you get money). It stands to reason your employer shouldn’t be trusting you with that money they give you.
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…
Rather than UBI, why not add supplemental salary to important industries? Instead of handing out a ton of money for free, we could ask citizens to work in the industries with the best long-term pay-off for the economy, things like education, research, maintenance, infrastructure, healthcare, environmental restoration, energy improvements, etc. If these jobs were more highly paid, our brightest minds might be pulled t…