Earlier quoted context omitted.
> They ain't desirable. But who wants to pay them do nothing? I do. Because these sentences are in opposition, not support. If they are undesirable in the workforce (reduce productivity or whatever) then why would you want them working? If they drain x dollars from the system, UBI costs y dollars, and if y Here's how I see it: if the measure of a man is how he treats someone who can give him nothing, then the measure…
Humans are not rational economic units. There's much more at play. My issue with UBI (and too lax welfare in general) is cultural issues. Once you get multiple generations of people who never worked.. It's not good. Personally I think USSR was somewhat close to UBI. Working was mandatory and pay was crap. But everybody looked the other way when somebody slacked or was drunk at work all the time. It was next to imposs…
Once we reach that point, as a society we have to answer the question of what happens to those people who find themselvesbout ofbwork. And those left with dull and dangerous jobs, usually the underpaid ones as well.
As long as you are a proponent of unlimited capitalism and still have a job, not varing is one answer. Caring about more than oneself, or taking a more long term view, aiming for some kind of social net, and UBI is an option, is only prudent. Too much social unrest is recipe for disaster, and ultimately revolution (history has examples for that as recent as the Arab Spring). Smart ruling classes want to avoid that, e.g. Bismarck who invented the Prussian / German to combat a raise of socialist ideologies.
Not smart elites, and wannabe elites, optimize for their own short term benefit. As did French nobility once.