It is so unfortunate so many young people (I assume majority of this site’s visitors) are either rooting for or in support of UBI. You all should read one book - Road to Serfdom.
Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0
991–1000 of 1001 posts
Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0
#992Earlier 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…
>> People will receive UBI, but then other things, like rent, food, etc. will all just magically get more expensive.
Of course they will, but that's missing the point. The point is that the newly printed money will no longer enter the economy through corporations (corporate debt) but through people and this will change the fundamental dynamics of the entire system. It's about changing the flow of newly printed money and how it enters our economy. So instead of corporations trying to extract money from the government and banks and using their control over people as a bargaining chip as they do today, they will have to focus on actually delivering value to people and keeping them satisfied.
Employees will not be disposable bargaining chips for corporations to get something from the government or from banks, people will be the focus of all economic activities because that's where the money is going to be coming from.
Consider that in 20 years, there will be x times more money in circulation in the economy that there is today. Right now, all that money has to pass through the hands of banks and corporations first this makes people dependent on banks and corporations; this is an unhealthy and unjust dynamic because it's people who are creating economic value, not banks or corporations. Why is the government assuming that banks and corporations are the most efficient way to distribute new fiat money into the economy? Aren't people inherently better at figuring out what they need?
Look where corporations got us, people are effectively being told what they need through targeted advertising.
Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0
#993I 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…
They could absolutely spend it all / get an addiction etc. The beauty of a UBI though is that next month they get it again and can start over. There is always the ability to start again, every month is a renewal. These setbacks that currently force people into the streets and doom them for a lifetime would now have the potential to only be setbacks. Of course there will still be homeless people and addicts, but at le…
For those who won't ever be homeless, another thing to consider about UBI going to homeless addicts, is that the destitute no longer have to break into cars, steal from stores, or beg for change on the side of the street, just to survive.
It sucks when an addict steals the catalytic converter off your car. They cost a pretty penny to replace! (~$3000) Meanwhile the addict is getting $50, maybe a couple hundred dollars for it? UBI means surviving until the next UBI check (be it monthly or weekly or hourly) allows you to spend it on whatever they need. Be it drugs or alcohol or food.
Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0
#994I 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 do…
The solution to that is to produce more goods. There is no physical law that says that there is a fixed supply of housing. Currently, it is difficult to get approval to build in many urban areas, but if we eliminate that barrier, there is no reason somebody else can't jump in and undercut an extortionate landlord by offering housing at X + $999, etc. until the price is pushed back down.
UBI doesn't directly create more wealth, but it would spur demand for creation of more actual goods. After all, poorer people tend to spend much more of their income than wealthier people. And once that is done, society will in fact be wealthier in a concrete sense.
Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0
#995Why 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…
Oh, you sound too sure... Have you considered that maybe once not obliged to work anymore you could instead adopt a more entrepreneurial attitude? Perhaps exploring your genuine interests?
Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0
#996The most humanitarian solution to the collapse seems to be a combination of both:
Global Universal Basic Income and Global Carbon Tax.
Global GDP [1] = $142000bn
Human population [2] = 7.8bn
GUBI = $100 * 12 months * 7.8bn = $9360bn
$9360bn / $142000bn = 6.59% of global GDP
6.59% is below the common tax rate. If it could end all wars forever, wouldn't it be worth it?
Can you survive on $100 per month? Barely anywhere so people would still work but it would be a big step towards rebuilding trust among humanity.
We can only avoid violent dystopia if we solve communication and resource distribution problems.
Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0
#997There 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…
So someone else should pay for you to sit around doing new hobbies? Glad you are having a good time, but how can you not view what you do as lazy from the eyes of society? There is no free lunch; the money is coming from somewhere.
Call it lazy, or call it leisure. I’m privileged to take so much time off and still feed my kids. To have this much leisure is truly a blessing.
Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0
#998I don't get UBI. If everyone in my town gets 100€/month on top of their regular income, how will that not drive all rents/mortgages 100€/month up? I think there are more options for Capitalism 2.0 that can be explored: - Make healthcare fully free for everyone (e.g. including dental, eyes, etc.) - Make university education and evening courses free for everyone - Disclose compensation company-wide: This would likely a…
> If everyone in my town gets 100€/month on top of their regular income, how will that not drive all rents/mortgages 100€/month up?
it depends on how UBI is implemented. If it's done via printing money out of thin-air, then yes, it will drive up inflation on goods that cannot be substituted (like rent).
If UBI is paid for by taxing the rich, then it won't drive inflation, because the demand for some goods/services from the rich would drop correspondingly, and so it's inflation neutral.
Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0
#999I don't get UBI. If everyone in my town gets 100€/month on top of their regular income, how will that not drive all rents/mortgages 100€/month up? I think there are more options for Capitalism 2.0 that can be explored: - Make healthcare fully free for everyone (e.g. including dental, eyes, etc.) - Make university education and evening courses free for everyone - Disclose compensation company-wide: This would likely a…
> If everyone in my town gets 100€/month on top of their regular income, how will that not drive all rents/mortgages 100€/month up?
Because the issuer of UBI is going to pay for it somehow, and pretty much every plausible mechanism makes it, in net, a downward redistribution of wealth, not a flat increase. If you could guarantee everyone will rent only and exactly the same unit they rent before the policy, so that competitive forces weren't a factor, it would simply compress rents and, sure, even though it would be a flat increass, the opportunity for monopoly rents you just assumed would allow landlords to capture it all.
But realistically you don't have that kind of lock in, and local competition does play a role in pricing, so not only won't any induced increase be a flat across the board amount, it also won't capture the full amount of the increases (or decreases, depending on where you look) due to UBI, leaving the net income change still resulting in net change in what people can afford in the same direction (though not the same magnitude at pre-policy price levels) that the change in net income would suggest.
Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0
#1000There is not going to be a Capitalism 2.0. Capitalism was progressive for a time, but it has gradually created the conditions for its replacement by democratic socialism. Those conditions are highly socialized production processes (not individual crafts) plus a gigantic class of wage laborers with an interest in a collective approach. A democratically planned economy is entirely possible and would outpace the massive…
> democratically planned economy Sounds like an absolute nightmare on anything but the most local scale. Think about the number of economic decisions made daily by individuals in a free-market economy. That’s many orders of magnitude more than the number of decisions that could be made by a democratically elected group of representatives at the federal level, even if assisted by computer systems. And that’s not even…
That video is so funny, no one is on their phone! Did they not have smartphones in 1989?
While command economies have numerous documented failures, including actual fucking famine during eg the Great Leap Forwards, crowd-sourcing is a very real phenomenon, enabled by the Internet, even under capitalism. Right now, however, we're witnessing the failure of a free-market economy to provide for their poorest citizens. At least the people that starved under Stalin didn't have a Safeway on their block that was filled with food.
Markets are so efficient that even socialist food banks[0] use a "market" on the backend. That doesn't mean that an infinitely free market is infinitely efficient.
[0] https://www.chicagobooth.edu/magazine/food-bank-economics