Swiss to vote on 2,500 franc basic income for every adult • Hacker News Board

Re: Swiss to vote on 2,500 franc basic income for every adult

#291

Post by CHsurfer » Sat, Oct 05, 2013, 2:46 PM UTC

crntaylor wrote: post #270

marvin wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As always, you are welcome to take up a very big CHF loan and put your money where your mouth is ;) I expect you have a 50% chance of making money. The actual explanation is a lot simpler; McDonalds employees are more expensive in Switzerland than in the US. You can see the same effect where I live, in Norway.

Your first point isn't too far off the mark. If goods are really 60% more expensive in Switzerland than in the US, then you'd expect people/corporations/institutions in Switzerland to use their CHF to buy dollars, buy goods in the US at a large discount and have them shipped to Switzerland, or for Swiss companies to hire US employees and pay them in USD, thus driving the USD/CHF exchange rate towards purchasing power…

There are some on-line electronics stores that run quite efficiently. In these places, the price is much closer to the USD equivalent in similar stores in the US. I think this supports the argument above related to Higher labor costs driving up prices.

Re: Swiss to vote on 2,500 franc basic income for every adult

#292

Post by epo » Sat, Oct 05, 2013, 2:51 PM UTC

_random_ wrote: post #242

rayiner wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lots and lots of poor, uneducated, unacculturated citizens, and Switzerland quickly turns into Bangladesh. Brilliant idea!

LOL, you just described UK. Multiculturalism doesn't work - it has been tested here.

There are those who reject persons of other races(1) among both the native-born and non-native-born but ignoring them, multiculturalism works very well.

(1) Racist is a good shorthand term for these people, idiot is another.

Re: Swiss to vote on 2,500 franc basic income for every adult

#293

Post by known » Sat, Oct 05, 2013, 2:55 PM UTC

Very much desirable to prevent wage slavery in globalization

Re: Swiss to vote on 2,500 franc basic income for every adult

#294

Post by marknutter » Sat, Oct 05, 2013, 3:00 PM UTC

Suncho wrote: post #265

eatitraw wrote: post #176

There are so many people excited about all these "equality" bills, and nobody criticizes it. So I'll just leave it there: http://paulgraham.com/inequality.html

Paul Graham misses the mark here. I agree with him that it doesn't make sense to try to get rid of income inequality and that income inequality can actually be a positive driving force in the economy. However, it's possible to take money from the rich and give it to the poor, thereby making the poor richer, without preventing income inequality from continuing to increase. Just do it at a low enough rate. And it's not…

But PG didn't write that essay in response to a basic income argument, he wrote specifically about the argument for eliminating income inequality. So yes, he missed the mark, but only because he wasn't trying to hit it in the first place.

> The jobs of tomorrow are becoming less and less definable in terms of the jobs and skills of today.

The jobs of tomorrow are no less definable than they were 50 or 100 years ago. It's always been anybody's guess what people will be doing for a living in the future.

> We should be giving people incentive to stay out of the labor force and to spend their time how they want. Some people will stay home and play Xbox. Some will come up with awesome new jobs. Some will do amazing work that benefits humanity and which nobody would have ever thought to pay them for.

This is very idealistic, but probably not realistic. Most people will stay home and consume entertainment.

> But it's important to remember that keeping the lazy people out of the labor force decreases the level of incompetence in the labor force. Those Xbox people are staying out of the way of folks who actually want to get things done. Sometimes the best way to contribute to the economy is to stay out of it.

Competence isn't always the main requirement for jobs. In fact, for most jobs, it ranks lower than punctuality, politeness, and consistency. If you effectively remove all the people who are not that competent but able to do jobs that don't require that much competence (manufacturing, food services, etc.) you decrease the available labor pool required to provide the goods and services people like spending their basic income on.

Re: Swiss to vote on 2,500 franc basic income for every adult

#295

Post by arjunnarayan » Sat, Oct 05, 2013, 3:03 PM UTC

eli wrote: post #276

swissass wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Live near the border with France. Buy everything there in EUR. Border is nonexistent for all practical purposes so this is very doable.

Don't you still have to go through customs and maybe pay duties since Switzerland is non-EU?

No, it's Schengen area, so no border checks. You drive across just as you would from Massachusetts to Vermont.

Re: Swiss to vote on 2,500 franc basic income for every adult

#296

Post by X4 » Sat, Oct 05, 2013, 3:03 PM UTC

thenomad wrote: post #231

X4 wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For those who don't know what the idea behind the unconditional income is: I'll briefly explain it. Imagine you work hard and only get enough to live on the edge. Now imagine you're not even the average joe, but feel that you could really change things on the world. You haven't to be a genius in order to do that, but you need to be creative, innovative and willing to work without the command to work. Now let's get an…

There's some evidence for this. Initial basic income test programs show that people tend to reinvest their basic income in starting businesses, in particular. http://www.globalincome.org/English/BI-worldwide.html covers the tests - not unbiased but has useful facts and data on where to get more info.

In September 1848 Joseph Charlier published in Brussels "Solution du Problème Social" (Solution of the Social Problem), a remarkable book [1]

The permanent income hypothesis was formulated by the Nobel Prize winning economist Milton Friedman in 1957 and can be read in his Book [2].

Just as an understatement, you can see which country has the highest backing of entrepreneurial activity [3].

–––––––––––

[1] http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/888/1/WRAP_Cunliffe_basic.pdf

[2] http://papers.nber.org/books/frie57-1

[3] http://thumbnails.visually.netdna-cdn.com/which-country-back... and http://www.internationalentrepreneurship.com/total-entrepren...

Re: Swiss to vote on 2,500 franc basic income for every adult

#297

Post by robomartin » Sat, Oct 05, 2013, 3:05 PM UTC

ewoodrich wrote: post #150

robomartin wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, maybe i am wrong on it being purely a welfare effect. There are many other inputs in that system. Search youtube on how to make money for having babies as an example. Food stamps are another input. For quite some time Russian immigrants coming into Los Angeles had a reputation for piling into homes/appartments and milking every ounce of available government assistance, even to the extreme of keeping quiet when…

I really do want to understand your viewpoint. But in my state (Oregon) which typically ranks near the top of anti-poverty programs, the average one could receive from food stamps and welfare in a family of four is about 950 dollars per month. Assuming you were accepted (post AFDC, there's no guarantee of benefits: it's luck of the draw). In Mississippi it's about 850 for a family of four with absolutely no income or…

> And I don't mean this to be offensive, but, are your cop friends sure that these "welfare" abusers that they witness aren't actually just using that as a front for an illegal pursuit (i.e. drug dealing, undeclared gifts/gambling/taxable proceeds?)

No offense taken. The picture that was painted for me was one where a segment of welfare recipients seem to be engaged in gaming the system any way they can by tapping into every available program out there. For example, single mothers having multiple kids by different fathers because each kid represents a monthly paycheck. On top of that there's work for cash and, yes, potential criminal activity.

Does this apply to all welfare recipients? Of course not. The vast majority of them probably wish they could get out of the nightmare they fell into through whatever circumstance.

Perhaps my greater point is that simply giving money away with no goals or conditions isn't good at all. It changes the way people think and behave. The most extreme examples of this are lottery winners who's life's are ruined even after winning millions of dollars.

When it comes to welfare I am a proponent of actually investing MORE money on the poor. How? Provide them with a reasonable living wage. The condition would be that they'd have to go to school (for free). The idea is the proverbial "teach a man to fish" concept rather than giving them fish. A one to two year trade education would be a solid stepping stone from which these people could pull out of their circumstances. Of course, there are cases where this would not work. I firmly believe we have a moral and ethical responsibility to take care of people who fall upon hard times and simply can't take care of themselves. We also have a moral and ethical responsibility to make sure that our help does not produce adverse effects (crime, abuse, dependency, devolution, societal decay). To be sure, the topic is wide and complex.

Re: Swiss to vote on 2,500 franc basic income for every adult

#298

Post by CalRobert » Sat, Oct 05, 2013, 3:06 PM UTC

eli wrote: post #276

swissass wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Live near the border with France. Buy everything there in EUR. Border is nonexistent for all practical purposes so this is very doable.

Don't you still have to go through customs and maybe pay duties since Switzerland is non-EU?

Completely open border; still part of the Schengen area.

Re: Swiss to vote on 2,500 franc basic income for every adult

#299

Post by marknutter » Sat, Oct 05, 2013, 3:06 PM UTC

TelmoMenezes wrote: post #290

tikhonj wrote: post #2

A Swiss franc is currently worth a little bit more than a dollar, so this works out to $2800/month or $33600/year. By US standards, this actually seems to be a good salary: significantly better than working full time at minimum wage. It would cover all my current expenses handily. Of course, I'm young and single but by no means frugal. (I find that the little costs involved in worrying about my expenses easily outwei…

> One of the main questions about something like this is about who would do boring, low-paid work with this sort of basic income. I believe this would not be a problem in the long run for the following reasons: - A lot of boring low-pay work is unnecessary (dealing with the endless paper trail of over-complicated bureaucracies, lots of things that companies do, like telemarketing, just because it's so cheap, etc. etc…

I see it differently. If people are receiving a basic income their performance at a job becomes much less important. Why care if you do a good job if losing it doesn't really impact you that negatively?

Re: Swiss to vote on 2,500 franc basic income for every adult

#300

Post by ZenoArrow » Sat, Oct 05, 2013, 3:07 PM UTC

gaius wrote: post #202

ZenoArrow wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Political experimentation usually leading to starvation... Have you got a high number of examples to back that up? I can only think of a handful.

Sure, Cambodia is one, North Korea, China in the 50s, Zimbabwe... Millions dead.

In what way were Pol Pot era Cambodia and Mugabe era Zimbabwe political experiments? They were/are dictators! There's nothing remotely radical about dictatorships.