/r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification • Hacker News Board

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#291

Post by wonderwonder » Mon, Feb 07, 2022, 5:05 PM UTC

danenania wrote: post #239

gavinray wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Universal basic income I'm going to sound like I'm being snarky here, and I promise I'm not. How exactly is this supposed to work? The government prints money and gives it away for free, nobody has to work? I don't say this from a place of privilege. I grew up lower class trailer trash and have been homeless. Maybe I don't understand the concept fully but it seems a bit absurd and unfeasible

One way to think about it: we already have a basic income in the US. Nobody starves to death in the US. Nobody is denied medical care in the emergency room. In many places (though not everywhere), there are shelters where a person can sleep inside. There are food stamps and a patchwork of welfare programs. However meager they may seem, things like this amount to a form of universal basic income. Does it prevent peopl…

I am not trying to disagree at all, in fact I think we very much need to do more for the poorest among us, especially the kids. Where does that 30k come from though? For 300 million people, that's 9 trillion dollars a year, ~half of GDP. Inflation would be out of control, essentially Venezuela / Zimbabwe levels.

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#292

Post by kaibee » Mon, Feb 07, 2022, 5:05 PM UTC

tomrod wrote: post #230

wing-_-nuts wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You cut most of our bureaucratic social safety net (food stamps, disability, social security, etc) and replace it with a system where everyone gets enough for the bare basics. If you were smart, you'd fund it with a carbon tax. In all honesty I don't see UBI becoming a thing until we start automating ourselves into unemployment. People say this would increase inflation. Maybe. Let's trial it with 1% of the population…

> In all honesty I don't see UBI becoming a thing until we start automating ourselves into unemployment. From a political stability perspective, I expect this would be wise to get in front of.

From a political perspective, it is easier to profit (in terms of political capital or actual capital) from a crisis than it is to prevent it. If you prevent it, then you've spent a lot of capital all for most people to say "well, nothing even happened!". It is a sad state of affairs.

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#293

Post by slingnow » Mon, Feb 07, 2022, 5:06 PM UTC

danenania wrote: post #239

gavinray wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Universal basic income I'm going to sound like I'm being snarky here, and I promise I'm not. How exactly is this supposed to work? The government prints money and gives it away for free, nobody has to work? I don't say this from a place of privilege. I grew up lower class trailer trash and have been homeless. Maybe I don't understand the concept fully but it seems a bit absurd and unfeasible

One way to think about it: we already have a basic income in the US. Nobody starves to death in the US. Nobody is denied medical care in the emergency room. In many places (though not everywhere), there are shelters where a person can sleep inside. There are food stamps and a patchwork of welfare programs. However meager they may seem, things like this amount to a form of universal basic income. Does it prevent peopl…

I think you're being disingenuous if you believe receiving a no-shit check from the government for $30k per year is the same as scraping by through food banks, homeless shelters, and one-time medical care in the emergency room. I would say all of those things absolutely prevent people from not working. No one would willingly want to live their life that way.

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#294

Post by pmorici » Mon, Feb 07, 2022, 5:06 PM UTC

monkeybutton wrote: post #84

pmorici wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I happened upon the r/AntiWork comments section from time to time before that Fox News segment and it always struck me as full of people who were making every excuse not to take responsibility for their own circumstances and who have a fantasy that low skill jobs should some how pay enough to be life long careers instead of viewing them as stepping stones to bigger and better things.

There are a lot of low skilled jobs in a service economy. I imagine that a significant fraction of all jobs are low skilled ones. Not everyone is chasing the hustle or whatever either, so there's a significant amount of people will be working those low skilled jobs their whole lives. What quality of life do they deserve? Does society want a permanent underclass that are treated miserably?

I don’t believe your premise that such a large share of the available jobs are low skill that there is no room for people to move on to something better. If you look at fast food for example I’m seeing there are about 2.5 million workers which is a tiny percentage of the overall workforce. Looking at the age distribution of the US work force you could staff every fast food restaurant with only 16-19 year olds and still only be employing about half of that age groups work force.

https://www.bls.gov/cps/cpsaat11b.htm

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#295

Post by i_dont_know_ » Mon, Feb 07, 2022, 5:06 PM UTC

gavinray wrote: post #182

JSavageOne wrote: post #156

I remember stumbling upon /r/antiwork a few years ago and being so happy I'd stumbled upon a thriving movement that so effectively criticized one of the core principles of society that everyone takes for granted - that everyone must effectively sell their labor to someone else (unless they're rich enough to opt out, or clever enough to create some business or invest their way out). To me anti-work is the recognition…

>Universal basic income I'm going to sound like I'm being snarky here, and I promise I'm not. How exactly is this supposed to work? The government prints money and gives it away for free, nobody has to work? I don't say this from a place of privilege. I grew up lower class trailer trash and have been homeless. Maybe I don't understand the concept fully but it seems a bit absurd and unfeasible

So the "where the money comes from" part is a separate discussion (maybe another thread?), but I'll try to answer "how it (could) work".

So, let's say there's some amount X that is enough for a person to afford housing, food, reasonable transport etc. It's as simple as saying "everyone gets this amount now, rich or poor".

For a rich person, it'll be a drop in the bucket, but for a poor person it could mean the economic freedom to quit a bad job. A few quick points around this:

* inflation. People keep worrying about this. Wages have stagnated since the 70s, and whenever raising minimum wage is mentioned, people say it will cause inflation. My counter-question is, how have we stagnated wages and still have inflation as high as it is now? It kinda feels like inflation isn't a result of growing wages but tied to economic growth in general. If inflation will just happen as part of economic growth, why not cut poor people in on the pie a little bit? (I know why, I'm asking rhetorically)

* welfare. People think we're doing something like this already with welfare, except welfare comes with all kinds of random classist baggage. Should the person get welfare if they, say, try to buy some 'luxury' item that's not strictly needed to live but might give them a small hint of joy in an otherwise tough situation? This version just takes away the restrictions and qualifying conditions by saying everyone just qualifies.

* no one working. Of course people would still work. It's just they wouldn't be forced to do so under pain of homelessness or starvation. Imagine saying "I quit" and still getting your base needs met. What kind of working conditions would people have to give you to keep you wanting to work? What kind of job satisfaction would need to become the norm?

I realize many of these don't apply to many of the people in this forum, but it can make a huge difference in industries like food service, where working conditions and perks are... a bit different from tech.

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#296

Post by frickinLasers » Mon, Feb 07, 2022, 5:06 PM UTC

throwawayboise wrote: post #209

gavinray wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Universal basic income I'm going to sound like I'm being snarky here, and I promise I'm not. How exactly is this supposed to work? The government prints money and gives it away for free, nobody has to work? I don't say this from a place of privilege. I grew up lower class trailer trash and have been homeless. Maybe I don't understand the concept fully but it seems a bit absurd and unfeasible

It is unfeasible. The reason money works is because it is an abstraction for someone's production of value that is way easier than bartering for everything. physical labor, skilled labor, educated thinking, management, knowledge transfer... anything that is valuable to someone else. If you just pay people to sit on their asses, many of them are just going to sit on their asses, creating nothing, simply consuming reso…

People who work bullshit jobs (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullshit_Jobs) are already unintentional leeches. UBI would disincentivize that inefficiency. Then those who want to sit on their asses with their $1200 could do so guilt-free, and, in my rosy vision for the world, the fraction who want to do something more fulfilling than making money for "the host" (e.g., FAMAG, Wall Street, I dunno) would be empowered to focus on things that are important to them, and probably to humanity as well.

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#297

Post by isbvhodnvemrwvn » Mon, Feb 07, 2022, 5:06 PM UTC

wing-_-nuts wrote: post #211

gavinray wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Universal basic income I'm going to sound like I'm being snarky here, and I promise I'm not. How exactly is this supposed to work? The government prints money and gives it away for free, nobody has to work? I don't say this from a place of privilege. I grew up lower class trailer trash and have been homeless. Maybe I don't understand the concept fully but it seems a bit absurd and unfeasible

You cut most of our bureaucratic social safety net (food stamps, disability, social security, etc) and replace it with a system where everyone gets enough for the bare basics. If you were smart, you'd fund it with a carbon tax. In all honesty I don't see UBI becoming a thing until we start automating ourselves into unemployment. People say this would increase inflation. Maybe. Let's trial it with 1% of the population…

That's a tad bit insane - disabled people won't be able to find jobs, whether you want it or not. You are pushing them deeper in poverty by giving them the same amount of money as you give to someone who chooses not to work.

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#298

Post by nebula8804 » Mon, Feb 07, 2022, 5:07 PM UTC

nothis wrote: post #53

Besticle wrote: post #5

It takes one bad experience to ruin a reputation. Guy went on Fox news (against the communities) wishes and made millions of people's first impression of r/AntiWork to be negative. In the modern world optics are EVERYTHING and that cannot be understated. Imho the first thing they need to change (which they have with their move to the new subreddit) is renaming it from r/AntiWork to r/WorkReform. Most of the sub (I'd…

What I'm noticing the past 5 to 10 years is the right outsmarting the left in activism and public imagery. Not with arguments, with wording. It's hard to watch. One way I'm trying to make sense of is the following: The left is used to being the underdog, the ones fighting for reform against powerful, conservative institutions. They are used to not really stand a chance, it's the spirit that counts. In that position,…

Are the right really in defense mode? They managed to instill a majority in the supreme court, they have veto power in the senate and after 2022 will likely hold the majority in the house. They are successfully chipping away at the gains of the FDR era.

At the same time the left is fractured into two major camps. One camp is the leadership that seems to end up controlling major movements like Black Lives Matter and subduing it into nothing. This group chooses to not fight. They are benefiting from the status quo.

The other is the "progressive" left that is aiming for European style systems and policies. All they have as a weapon is Twitter and they are not really achieving their goals. What power do "Twitter People" really have if their efforts only translate into gestures from the higher ups(eg. BLM painted on the street in front of the capitol)?

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#299

Post by asow92 » Mon, Feb 07, 2022, 5:07 PM UTC

optimiz3 wrote: post #280

asow92 wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if we zero out every US billionaire (imagine that for a second; take 100% of their wealth and leave them with exactly $0) it would not even cover 1/5 of the US national debt. We can't see taking their money as a viable long term solution to UBI. Our debt is out of control and our day of reckoning will come eventually. Nothing is free; markets will correct for UBI and people will become just as poor as they were…

The COVID stimulus programs were a sort of UBI program. We're now starting to see mass inflation in part due to lower labor participation and excess liquidity. Obviously only part of the picture as quantitative easing and low rates are also driving excess liquidity, and omicron is also driving lower short-term labor participation.

Emphasis on the sort of part; universal means universal—everyone gets it. It's not Universal Guaranteed Income, it's Universal Basic Income. My wife and I worked the whole time and we made too much to ever get any stimulus. So we worked while we saw many people our age goofing off and seeing just how long they could ride the unemployment wave—yes, they really were proud of this.

Meanwhile another half our peers want their college debt forgiven because they can't cut it in the real world with their liberal arts degree. Mark my words: if they ever do get around to slashing college debt, those who did what they were supposed to will be left there with their bill in hand while everyone else who made every ill-advised decision gets off for free.

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#300

Post by gruez » Mon, Feb 07, 2022, 5:08 PM UTC

JSavageOne wrote: post #105

pmorici wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I happened upon the r/AntiWork comments section from time to time before that Fox News segment and it always struck me as full of people who were making every excuse not to take responsibility for their own circumstances and who have a fantasy that low skill jobs should some how pay enough to be life long careers instead of viewing them as stepping stones to bigger and better things.

For me antiwork is just anti forced wage labour. If we had a universal basic income, then that would be accomplished and people would be free to work on whatever they want. If technology is advanced enough to be able to afford this which I'd argue is already the case, I don't see why this shouldn't be the case.

>For me antiwork is just anti forced wage labour. If we had a universal basic income, then that would be accomplished and people would be free to work on whatever they want

What type of living conditions are we looking to guarantee? If your baseline is "prehistoric living conditions", I'm sure it's quite affordable. If it's "21st century middle class america" it will be ruinously expensive. Incremental improvements in technology can eventually bring us to a point where we can afford to give arbitrary fixed standard of living to everyone, but not if that standard of living is constantly increasing.