321–330 of 348 posts
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Let's vote for the candidate which will give us the most money... seems like a slippery slope
Isn't that what conservative politics has been doing all along?
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"Isn't this like saying that the invention of agriculture will mean society has to start feeding hunter gatherers for free?" How did you make that connection? If you aren't hunting, you can do farm work. If you aren't doing that, you can produce tools. If you aren't doing that, you can go mine ores, make clothes, etc. Its not like agriculture was invented and suddenly anyone who wasnt farming was philosophizing, ther…
"How did you make that connection? If you aren't hunting, you can do farm work. If you aren't doing that, you can produce tools. If you aren't doing that, you can go mine ores, make clothes, etc." This is exactly my point.
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You are, frankly, just making stuff up. UBI proposals are not necessarily (nor usually) funded by creating new money supply.
Perhaps that was the wrong wording, but giving everyone money would only inflate costs as they rise to meet the new income levels (whether that money is printed or redistributed). What else are you claiming is made up?
"Motivates working, avoids a blanket handout which would just raise the prices of everything in response"
"More fair, less cost, and better purchasing power"
I mean that it's a made up difference between UBI and NIT, they are simply equal in this regard, for better or for worse.
It makes no sense that they would be different, as the net money flow between individual (or household) and the government can be made exactly the same between UBI and NIT scheme, and how much money someone actually has in their hands is what determines motivation, fairness, purchasing power, inflation etc.
Under UBI: NetMonthlyIncome = income + UBI - taxes_ubi(income)
Under NIT (where taxes_nit can yield a negative value): NetMonthlyIncome = income - taxes_nit(income)
You can make taxes_ubi(income) == taxes_nit(income) + UBI and you get the same exact real life result, it's just that the accounting is different.
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What is the problem when you reward people for not contributing anything?
I wouldn't see that as rewarding someone, but rather meeting their basic needs. Like Germany already does with health care and unemployment benefits, but doing away with the bureaucratic hassles and penalties, and increasing the money to an actual liveable amount. For me it's a question about how we want to transform society in the long term, I don't think UBI for all will come next year. I'd give back the following…
"I'd give back the following question: why are we rewarding people currently for doing mind-numbing bullshit jobs?"
What the hell does that mean? Nearly everyone's individual work is useless. A fry cook is useless in isolation, a pencil pusher is useless in isolation, even a programmer is useless in isolation. You do not get paid to do work, you get paid to produce value, hence why people can get fired even if they deliver a lot of low quality work. The work you do is useless in isolation, it is the combination of everyone else's work and the system itself that makes certain work valuable. This is why socialist fantasies like UBIs will only ever work if you have a slave force doing the work that needs to be done. The idea that John Doe's individual ability to slap car parts together somehow makes him valuable is what you get wrong. It's John's ability to exchange his ability to fix people's cars that produces value - in other words, John's ability to start a business and exchange work that he knows how to do for other goods and services. The demand and supply of John's ability and the cars that need fixing, provide John's pool of wealth. If Jane knows how to fix cars too, you don't just suddenly start giving her money for doing nothing, just knowing how to fix cars has no value by itself. I don't see why this is so hard to fathom why this UBI will obviously fail unless Germany has an AI work force it's been hiding under its sleeves this entire time. Someone has to do the productive work, and this will only result in musical chairs where no one wants to be the last one with a job. This system rewards people for not doing work, and unless they have a way of filling that gap, at best this will amount to a bunch of already priveleged individuals being paid to just exist, and at worst, those who are late to the party will be forced to fill that gap.
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Isn't that what conservative politics has been doing all along?
There is a difference between taking less in taxes and giving out cash payments. How that plays out is unknown, though the Covid relief programs are a likely better experiment than this German experiment.
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This, and also the removal of welfare. Since you lose welfare when you get a job often there is an opportunity cost decision, should I really work 40 hours a week to make a little more than welfare. with UBI the salary is always additional.
Aye to take it a step further: there is a professor at UCSD who pushes for UBI Libertarianism, for that reason. Don't add conditions or requirements, just mail everyone a check and ditch all of the bureaucracy, EBT, etc. The problem is that it makes poverty traps smaller, but doesn't make them go away. Like, if Johnny Hobo isn't able to feed his kids and blows his welfare on smokes and 40s, UBI isn't going to magical…
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Real fairness under that definition can't exist as long as there are inheritances. People who are born in wealthier families are not playing under the same rules (just imagine if a person playing Monopoly started with ten times the initial amount of money). I prefer a definition of fairness that is actually achievable[1]: everyone has at least the bare minimum, regardless of fitness and deserving. You can quibble abo…
What's the difference between your local grocery store clerk, and a Hollywood actor? They both likely have cars, homes and an iphone. Sure, your Hollywood actor is probably driving an exotic sports car and their iphone is diamond studded, but fundamentally, what does it matter? > housing, food, education and health. Any society where anyone can't get those things by asking for them is not fair I agree in the general…
One has to keep working to live a comfortable life, the other doesn't (and neither will their kids).
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This version of UBI (granted, without the U), would cost $43B [0]. I'm guessing what would actually be implemented would cost more, but $720B is certainly too high. Your post doesn't mention: - Savings from scrapping other welfare programs - Decreased healthcare and law enforcement costs and other economic benefits of bringing millions of people out of poverty - Massive stimulus leading to increased government revenu…
This is what I often see from UBI supporters though. For example, why is my post too high. I state simply, "here are the number of people over 18" and "here is the amount to pay". You say "Oh, that's too high." What? . Why! Why is it too high. What part of it. It is very, very, very simple math. Instead, you quote an article from Macleans. Yet that article says Ontario's (not Canada's) UBI program suggested at the ti…
In most versions of the plan I've seen, the cost is not as simple as (population over 18) * (monthly amount). If you're looking for a breakdown of the math, check this out:
https://d3n8a8pro7vhmx.cloudfront.net/bicn/pages/57/attachme...
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Let me get this straight, the starting point is taxed like this, assuming the average wage in UK which seems to be 35k for a full-time job ( https://www.findcourses.co.uk/inspiration/articles/average-s... ) 35k makes net 12k (not taxed) + 18.4k (at 20% tax rate) = 30.4k net In the conclusion, everyone gets a "UBI" of 666 per month, which basically doesn't even cover rent ( https://www.statista.com/statistics/752203/a…
£35k is about £27.4k after tax. You have forgotten about national insurance.
https://atlaspragmatica.com/a-united-federal-britain/#commen...
Like you, they calculated the current take-home pay of this hypothetical person as £27,442 and, under the proposed UBI system, a take-home pay of £26,550. That's a one-off decrease of £892 which is about 2.5% of their gross salary.
For an imperfect comparison, Figure 5 here:
https://www.tuc.org.uk/research-analysis/reports/lessons-dec...
shows a similar real terms wage decrease in 2011, supposedly due to the political choice of austerity.
As another comparison, the Department for Work and Pensions estimated that 3.5% of their 2010-2011 budget was spent on administration:
https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/what_percentage_of_th...
Obviously replacing most benefits with a UBI won't remove all government administration costs, but it could lead to multiple society-improving outcomes (like improved health) which could reduce the over all tax level.
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The old billions wouldn’t even be alive but for capitalism. Well if capitalism is responsible for all the good it must be responsible for all the bad, like industrial warfare like WWI and WWII.
Because war didn’t exist before capitalism /s Per-capita violence has been in steady decline for this time period.
“Per captia” violence? That is a hell of a qualifier you need.