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Lifers, Dayjobbers, and the Independently Wealthy: A Letter to a Former Student

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Re: Lifers, Dayjobbers, and the Independently Wealthy: A Letter to a Former Student

#91

Post by inameritocracy »

zerodensity wrote: post #82
eastbound wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

UBI is a bane because it kills meritocracy. The reason most people are successful is because they risk a lot if they weren’t. Surprise: Stress is a factor of excellence. You say it yourself: If UBI is introduced, then none of the hard jobs gets done.

I don't really care for this argument. We are currently not living in a meritocracy. In a true meritocracy everyone must have the same starting point and rise up within the ranks based on their merits from there. In our society we do not all start at the same place. There are people born into wealth and people born into poverty. So some people have to struggle harder to get to the same place as others where born into…

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Re: Lifers, Dayjobbers, and the Independently Wealthy: A Letter to a Former Student

#92

Post by xen2xen1 »

gonehome wrote: post #17
ipsi wrote: post #11

Reminds me of a couple of married friends of mine. The wife played a classical musical instrument (e.g., not an electric guitar) and had her sights set on being a professional. While working towards that she did a lot of teaching/practising/etc, and her students would often say something along the lines of "I'm so envious of all this time you have to practice music! How are you able to do it?!" and her reply was alwa…

Also pretty common with authors iirc - a spouse with an income that provides stability. That said, also easy for people to use this as an excuse.

The plot of Breaking Bad?

Re: Lifers, Dayjobbers, and the Independently Wealthy: A Letter to a Former Student

#93

Post by lotsofpulp »

nradov wrote: post #81
JSavageOne wrote: post #39

Great, practical advice. I do think however that by 2030, UBI will be the norm in many wealthy countries, and thus more people will be able to pursue their passions rather than having to sell their soul as dayjobbers to make money for corporations and rich people.

There's no way UBI will become the norm. I'm certainly not willing to pay higher taxes so that other people can pursue their passions. They can get a job like the rest of us.

The point of UBI is that it is universal, so you also would be getting the basic income, so presumably, you can also pursue your "passions".

Re: Lifers, Dayjobbers, and the Independently Wealthy: A Letter to a Former Student

#94

Post by e_i_pi_2 »

tomcam wrote: post #60
dragonwriter wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> UBI is a bane because it kills meritocracy. UBI enables meritocracy, it doesn’t kill it.

What if most people paying taxes now opt for UBI instead?

The "U" part means everyone would get it, so you don't have to opt for it, and everyone would still pay taxes

Another way to think of it is as a negative income tax - as a simple example the equation could be ((income * 0.2) - 20000), so if you make no money you get 20k, if you make 100k you pay no taxes and get nothing, if you make 200k you owe 20. This is using a flat tax rate for simplicity but then everyone get taxes 20% and everyone gets 20k. It's similar to public school - everyone pays for it and everyone gets it, but the purpose is to ensure it's there for people that wouldn't be able to afford it privately.

Re: Lifers, Dayjobbers, and the Independently Wealthy: A Letter to a Former Student

#95

Post by npteljes »

saagarjha wrote: post #58
bruce511 wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Music is a commodity. There's already more music available to let my playlist run for years without repeats. Plus it's never been easier for folk to create, and publish, new music. With endless supply comes diminishing unit value. So, not to be brutal, but playing music is not an especially valuable thing, and so people really don't need to pay much for it. Ditto for writing books, making ceramics, pretty much anythi…

What about this does not apply to software, or any other highly paid profession?

Software is very quickly outdated, and the software world is also expanding. So you need a lot of people writing new software. I don't know how much security there is in the field, in our lifetime, probably a lot. But I can also imagine a world where the CPU doesn't get much faster anymore, and the churn of paradigms and frameworks slow down, and in that world, software lives longer and so you'll not need as many, or as many highly paid, software people.

Re: Lifers, Dayjobbers, and the Independently Wealthy: A Letter to a Former Student

#96

Post by lotsofpulp »

tomcam wrote: post #60
dragonwriter wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> UBI is a bane because it kills meritocracy. UBI enables meritocracy, it doesn’t kill it.

What if most people paying taxes now opt for UBI instead?

Then prices increase for services that are currently being done because someone was too poor to have access to a better path in life.

Re: Lifers, Dayjobbers, and the Independently Wealthy: A Letter to a Former Student

#97

Post by stinkytaco »

eastbound wrote: post #52
JSavageOne wrote: post #39

Great, practical advice. I do think however that by 2030, UBI will be the norm in many wealthy countries, and thus more people will be able to pursue their passions rather than having to sell their soul as dayjobbers to make money for corporations and rich people.

UBI is a bane because it kills meritocracy. The reason most people are successful is because they risk a lot if they weren’t. Surprise: Stress is a factor of excellence. You say it yourself: If UBI is introduced, then none of the hard jobs gets done.

> Stress is a factor of excellence.

So is having a rich family. The article provides a long list of examples of great artists who's success is largely enabled by already being wealthy, not necessarily being the best. Even just being lucky enough to already be established puts you far ahead of people trying to break in. I can walk out the door and likely find a job in my industry because I have lots of experience to point to and references who will vouch for me. I think I'm good at my job, but I was also in the right place at the right time to get it and now I'm a safe bet for someone who needs my skills, even if I'm not the best bet. Someone who's trying to break in that's ten times more talented than me might never catch that break. I know for a fact that I've hired lesser candidates because I needed someone who was a known quantity more than I needed someone who was possibly great.

Meritocracy is pretty far down the list as a factor of success in my experience.

Re: Lifers, Dayjobbers, and the Independently Wealthy: A Letter to a Former Student

#98

Post by whatprivilege6 »

itake wrote: post #33
golergka wrote: post #20

Yes, that's the point of making money: so that your loved ones (probably kids) could do art or whatever else. What's the point of it all if you can't invest in your loved ones? Are you a bad person for loving your kids more then some other random kid that they would be competing against? I fail to see anything bad about this.

From an ethical society stand point, yes. In the US, we agreed that we need to support everyone’s children and so we pay taxes so other people’s children can attend school. If you refuse to help other people’s children get an education, you’re evading taxes and that is unethical.

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Re: Lifers, Dayjobbers, and the Independently Wealthy: A Letter to a Former Student

#99

Post by HeyLaughingBoy »

digging wrote: post #85
ericmay wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> semi-regular panic attacks, persistent existential dread Ha - I’ve known a number of friends who have had this same problem working a “useless 9-5” job and missing out over what they’re passionate about. It’s all about trade-offs.

> It’s all about trade-offs. It's true that in our limited lifespans we will always have to choose trade-offs, but the current choice between crushing poverty vs crushing workload is not a natural one; it's contrived. most of us should be working fewer hours in the modern economy and have more leisure/creativity time. personally, I've made it my goal as a SWE to get a 4-day work week and/or shorter work days. even if…

> crushing poverty vs crushing workload is not a natural one; it's contrived

I wish more people realized this. But then again, my goal 20 years ago was to have a lifestyle that could be enabled by a job in a coffee shop. Now I look back and wonder what happened :-)

Re: Lifers, Dayjobbers, and the Independently Wealthy: A Letter to a Former Student

#100

Post by npteljes »

wude935 wrote: post #2

I wonder if there is any artistic benefit by marrying the arts with a deeply capitalist system. Obviously as this article mentions its not great for the artists themselves, but perhaps the cutthroat nature of the industry makes it so that only the best of the best rise to the top, even if it means it comes from an independently wealthy musician.

>perhaps the cutthroat nature of the industry makes it so that only the best of the best rise to the top

I think that's proven false, by the existence of Marketing as a field. Deep pockets achieve that it's not the "best X" that reaches places, but whatever they are pushing is reaching places. Not 100% the case, but still, music production is so an industry, and it's arguable whether this is good for the artists - or the public, for that matter.

TL;DR the deeper the capitalism, the more exclusively the capital prevails

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