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Billionaire-Fueled Lobbying Group Behind the State Bills to Ban UBI Experiments

scottsantens.com

131–140 of 192 posts

Re: Billionaire-Fueled Lobbying Group Behind the State Bills to Ban UBI Experiments

#131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, they want you alive. They want you to procreate. And they want you to be desperate enough to accept jobs on unfavourable terms, to make sure society continues to provide them with the luxuries they've become accustomed to. The only alternatives for those jobs will have to be "living on the streets" and "joining the military".

And when you join the military you're used as a tool to cement corporate power across the sea for... you guessed it!

Yes. And ever since overturning Roe v. Wade they aren't even subtle about it.

Re: Billionaire-Fueled Lobbying Group Behind the State Bills to Ban UBI Experiments

#132
post #99
post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> money, gerrymandering Let’s take these two separately. As to money: the evidence shows money isn’t buying results. Wall Street and Silicon Valley strongly supported Clinton in 2016. She outspent Donald Trump by 70%: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/dec/09/trump-and-cl... ($340m to $581m). But Clinton lost. Within the Republican Party, billionaires billionaires wanted someone other than Trump: https://fortun…

> As to gerrymandering, what makes you think it has any real effect? Without gerrymandering the Republican party would have last controlled the House in 2007.

False. Republicans won the popular vote in 2022, 54M to 51M.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022_United_States_House_of_Re...

Re: Billionaire-Fueled Lobbying Group Behind the State Bills to Ban UBI Experiments

#133
post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Aaaaand there it is.

Is your proposal that the USA needs to import more people we don't have work for so we can put them on UBI?

The more likely scenario if the US implements UBI, is they'll probably need to import a lot more people on various work visas (and who won't get UBI) to do all the jobs people on UBI won't do any more.

Re: Billionaire-Fueled Lobbying Group Behind the State Bills to Ban UBI Experiments

#134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you consider "utopian" an ad hominem, but not "danger to democracy?"

It depends. Let's test this. Presume 80% of the country wants to increase taxes for the rich and corporations, tax churches, have Universal Healthcare and a Universal Basic Income, reform your educational system, legalise abortion, make sexual education mandatory, legalise dreamers, have easier immigration and they all vote for a party who has detailed plans on how to finance and realise those ideals. How do you reac…

That's a big hypothetical, but first I'd be pretty devastated because I've been told my whole life we have checks and balances to protect the minority from the raw will of the majority, but I would probably try to sue for violation of my rights as laid out in the constitution. Barring that I would try to leave for another country.

Re: Billionaire-Fueled Lobbying Group Behind the State Bills to Ban UBI Experiments

#135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It depends. Let's test this. Presume 80% of the country wants to increase taxes for the rich and corporations, tax churches, have Universal Healthcare and a Universal Basic Income, reform your educational system, legalise abortion, make sexual education mandatory, legalise dreamers, have easier immigration and they all vote for a party who has detailed plans on how to finance and realise those ideals. How do you reac…

That's a big hypothetical, but first I'd be pretty devastated because I've been told my whole life we have checks and balances to protect the minority from the raw will of the majority, but I would probably try to sue for violation of my rights as laid out in the constitution. Barring that I would try to leave for another country.

That doesn't violate any of your rights. The fact that you really think so is already undemocratic. Hence my remarks.

Re: Billionaire-Fueled Lobbying Group Behind the State Bills to Ban UBI Experiments

#136
post #45

UBI's critics expected these programs to have terrible outcomes, where recipients would spend their money on trivialities (or worse: drugs). Instead, what we find is that UBI recipients either spend it on essentials, stuff for their kids children or paying down debt.

> UBI's critics expected these programs to have terrible outcomes, where recipients would spend their money on trivialities (or worse: drugs). The worst possible outcome is the intended one: where UBI recipients spend it on essentials, and society adapts over time such that a large swath of the population becomes dependent on state-issued subsidies for basic sustenance. This would create an entrenched concentration o…

> an unprecedented level of top-down control over society

wouldn't the people that the article is accusing of being against UBI, want this outcome?

sounds like if they want more control, they should be for UBI

Re: Billionaire-Fueled Lobbying Group Behind the State Bills to Ban UBI Experiments

#137
post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> UBI's critics expected these programs to have terrible outcomes, where recipients would spend their money on trivialities (or worse: drugs). The worst possible outcome is the intended one: where UBI recipients spend it on essentials, and society adapts over time such that a large swath of the population becomes dependent on state-issued subsidies for basic sustenance. This would create an entrenched concentration o…

The problem is, we already have that.

One of many reasons that FDR was the worst president in US history.

Re: Billionaire-Fueled Lobbying Group Behind the State Bills to Ban UBI Experiments

#138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a big hypothetical, but first I'd be pretty devastated because I've been told my whole life we have checks and balances to protect the minority from the raw will of the majority, but I would probably try to sue for violation of my rights as laid out in the constitution. Barring that I would try to leave for another country.

That doesn't violate any of your rights. The fact that you really think so is already undemocratic. Hence my remarks.

Mandatory sexual education violates my freedom of religion, as my believes around sex are a deeply held religious conviction.

Edit: The rest I would just try to leave. I think they're the wrong direction for any country and I wouldn't want to be part of a country that voted that way, but you can't fight with that kind of majority.

Re: Billionaire-Fueled Lobbying Group Behind the State Bills to Ban UBI Experiments

#139
post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> UBI's critics expected these programs to have terrible outcomes, where recipients would spend their money on trivialities (or worse: drugs). The worst possible outcome is the intended one: where UBI recipients spend it on essentials, and society adapts over time such that a large swath of the population becomes dependent on state-issued subsidies for basic sustenance. This would create an entrenched concentration o…

> an unprecedented level of top-down control over society wouldn't the people that the article is accusing of being against UBI, want this outcome? sounds like if they want more control, they should be for UBI

Would UBI lead to more control for them, or for government? I have to imagine the latter.

Re: Billionaire-Fueled Lobbying Group Behind the State Bills to Ban UBI Experiments

#140
post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My point is the line 'no one stays clean in the beltway' is and very much greater than thou attitude. We all like to rip on k-street and politicos however I don't think tech is on some great white horse that we can speak down on everyone else.

I say "no one stays clean" from 20 years working with lobbyists I believed in and still sincerely think we did some good work. The corrupting influence of DC can't be avoided. You swim in the cesspool with the gators, you come out covered in crap.

Fair but who do you think funds k-street?
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