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Why the Tech World Thinks the American Dream Is Dying

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Re: Why the Tech World Thinks the American Dream Is Dying

#21

Post by xhkkffbf »

croes wrote: post #8
youngtaff wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where’s the money for UBI going to come from when billionaires are hoarders and don’t like paying tax?

UBI and capitalism don’t match. Quite the opposite, capitalism even enforces useless work because it’s the main source of income. That’s why all these AI bros dreams of AI benefits are BS unless they think they could get rid of capitalism

Nothing gets rid of capitalism. In the socialist world, various forms of status just replace basic currency. When goods are limited, there has to be some way to ration them. In the former Soviet Union, it was just high party officials who were rich in limited goods. Maybe they didn't have "money" or US-style "capital", but they had other things that took that role.

Re: Why the Tech World Thinks the American Dream Is Dying

#22

Post by aleph_minus_one »

croes wrote: post #8
youngtaff wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where’s the money for UBI going to come from when billionaires are hoarders and don’t like paying tax?

UBI and capitalism don’t match. Quite the opposite, capitalism even enforces useless work because it’s the main source of income. That’s why all these AI bros dreams of AI benefits are BS unless they think they could get rid of capitalism

> Quite the opposite, capitalism even enforces useless work because it’s the main source of income.

If the work was really so useless, companies would love to become leaner (i.e. fire the employees who do useless work). It's rather the government who by its control freakery introduces lots of red tape for companies.

Re: Why the Tech World Thinks the American Dream Is Dying

#23

Post by jmyeet »

The tech world as a whole thinks the American Dream dying is a good thing and they're actively making that happen. And the answer is quite simple: further wealth concentration and the resulting inequality.

China is investing in infrastructure and making sure its citizens have enough to eat and a roof over their heads. The US is starving school children, unleashing its own Gestapo on its citizens, letting its citizens die, doing untold damage to every other country on Earth and letting our infrastructure rot so Jeff Bezos can buy a 4th megayacht.

Automation and AI could be a good thing for society. We could all enjoy the benefits by having to work less and having to less menial and/or dangerous work. But it won't work that here. It'll be used to displace workers, increase the wealth of th etop 0.01% and suppress the wages of reamining workers.

I'm unconvinced the trillions invested in AI will ever see a return. But even if it produces value in some way, will it even matter if nobody has any money to buy anything?

Re: Why the Tech World Thinks the American Dream Is Dying

#25

Post by steveBK123 »

luckylion wrote: post #19
steveBK123 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't most of them have prepper level bunkers on large parcels of property, a private jet flight away in case things go truly south?

Possibly, but those are irrelevant sums compared to their total wealth.

Bezos has a $500M yacht thats longer than a football field

Re: Why the Tech World Thinks the American Dream Is Dying

#26

Post by beeflet »

Mountain_Skies wrote: post #7
youngtaff wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where’s the money for UBI going to come from when billionaires are hoarders and don’t like paying tax?

If the means of production are taken from the billionaires and given to the government, how long would their wealth last? Not sure handing the means of production to a government would be a viable solution as politicians and bureaucrats are humans and often very terrible humans at that, but I don't see how billionaires could continue to last very long once they no longer have control over anything other than a declin…

how are the means of production going to be taken? They have direct control of all of the robots.

Re: Why the Tech World Thinks the American Dream Is Dying

#27

Post by therobots927 »

bryanlarsen wrote: post #17
steveBK123 wrote: post #13

My favorite Tech Bro "AI is gonna make money worthless" cognitive dissonance is how Musk keeps saying exactly this. He has been quoted that people won't need to save anymore due to abundance, while also extracting a potential $1T pay package for himself... https://fortune.com/2026/01/12/elon-musk-retirement-savings-...

Money at that level is about power. Unlike what must of us use our money for, power is relative, it's a zero sum game

What point are you trying to make?

Re: Why the Tech World Thinks the American Dream Is Dying

#28

Post by steveBK123 »

jmyeet wrote: post #23

The tech world as a whole thinks the American Dream dying is a good thing and they're actively making that happen. And the answer is quite simple: further wealth concentration and the resulting inequality. China is investing in infrastructure and making sure its citizens have enough to eat and a roof over their heads. The US is starving school children, unleashing its own Gestapo on its citizens, letting its citizens…

Right, look at what US (and the west in general) did over our long experience of ZIRP. Did we borrow at near-zero to build housing, transit, infrastructure, etc? No... but we got a boatload of SaaS.

Re: Why the Tech World Thinks the American Dream Is Dying

#30

Post by therobots927 »

jmyeet wrote: post #23

The tech world as a whole thinks the American Dream dying is a good thing and they're actively making that happen. And the answer is quite simple: further wealth concentration and the resulting inequality. China is investing in infrastructure and making sure its citizens have enough to eat and a roof over their heads. The US is starving school children, unleashing its own Gestapo on its citizens, letting its citizens…

The datacenters will be used for wide-scale facial recognition and real world surveillance. The tech demons got tired of being limited to spying on people’s online activities.
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