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What Would Happen If We Just Gave People Money?

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Re: What Would Happen If We Just Gave People Money?

#21

Post by jjn2009 »

lawpoop wrote: post #20
jjn2009 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These people are the exception not the rule, for every person like this there are many times more of those who would take the dole and do nothing with themselves. Basic income might increase the allure of risky proposition, I think in most cases these groups of people estimated some risk/reward function of their endeavours, considering the reward more so than the risk, but there is a healthy combination of the carrot…

I personally doubt it, but that remains to be seen. I'm open to being convinced otherwise. I think more people would take a "staycation" for a while, then get bored, and go into new endeavors, like starting a new business, writing a novel, becoming seriously involved in volunteering, continue working in their degree field, etc. If people were only motivated by the stick, no one would seek a raise or change jobs for a…

There is a healthy balance of stick and carrot, they both have their place. But the main motivation behind work is largely stick. Once you achieve a certain level of income it becomes normalized over time and work is done to maintain this lifestyle and the pain from losing what you have.

You have an extremely rosy view of the average person if you think thats how the vast majority of people are going to spend their time on UBI. I imagine people on UBI will act like any other person who I've met whose parents do not kick them out of their home and provide them with basic needs.

In my experience these people are not doing anything worthwhile or ground breaking, and its intuitive to any individual why this is the case. Nobody glorifies or looks up to this subset of the population yet you put on a pedestal the man or woman who has no worry of basic needs by way of the government payout.

Re: What Would Happen If We Just Gave People Money?

#22

Post by jmh42 »

I've spent some time thinking about basic income. At times arguing for it, other times arguing against it.

Unfortunately we cannot resolve the scarcity problem, particularly when it comes to real estate, i.e. the location one chooses to reside. There is a simple physical constraint: only one thing can occupy a specific space at a time. Cities in general are popular places to live because of their proximity to "things", the Arts and that interesting stuff happens where more people can collaborate in the real world. (Consider the demand to be close to your child's school or near a dog park.)

Given this (assumption if you will), let's consider a few rounds of economic cause/effect. Round 1: if everyone were given a basic income, many more people will be able to afford to live in a city. Round 2: not all people, but some, will seek housing (rent or buy) in this city. Round 3: owners will need to choose between [1] renting/selling at current price for which there is suddenly higher demand or [2] increasing their price until there is less demand. Round 4: most owners choose option [2] and excess income begins to be sucked up by higher and higher prices.

The issue is basic income increases the demand (perhaps good for today's global economic ailments) while supply of goods/housing will take time to adjust. Of course, given the opportunity to sell apartments in a city at higher margins will cause developers to build new supply, but this takes years.

One way to deal with the supply/demand issue is having a basic income that starts low ($100 a month?) and increases to a basic living wage over the course of 5 years. This way, investments can be planned ahead of time so supply increases with demand.

Re: What Would Happen If We Just Gave People Money?

#23

Post by caseywoolley »

jmh42 wrote: post #22

I've spent some time thinking about basic income. At times arguing for it, other times arguing against it. Unfortunately we cannot resolve the scarcity problem, particularly when it comes to real estate, i.e. the location one chooses to reside. There is a simple physical constraint: only one thing can occupy a specific space at a time. Cities in general are popular places to live because of their proximity to "things…

This is the basic flaw that everyone seems to be missing. Cost of living will just rise to meet the increase in demand resulting in no one except private landowners being any better off. Henry George identified the solution over 100 years ago. Basic income requires something like the Henry George land-value tax to be successful. At the same time, a land-value tax would also be the best way to raise funds for a universal basic income.

Re: What Would Happen If We Just Gave People Money?

#24

Post by caseywoolley »

notduncansmith wrote: post #17
flashman wrote: post #16

I'm less worried about the economic aspects (western countries can afford this) than the social ones, namely the new forms of resentment this will encourage when taxpayers see all the things 'their' money is buying people.

The key is to culturally shift from a scarcity-rooted value system to an abundance-roots one. Call it "The New American Dream".

As long as there are greedy people and a limited supply of earth and its resources there will always need to be an accounting system for it. But that's not to say the system can't be improved. A full land-value tax would give the inherent value of land and natural resources back to the public and compensate those who use less of our limited resources from those who use too much.

Re: What Would Happen If We Just Gave People Money?

#25

Post by lawpoop »

jjn2009 wrote: post #21
lawpoop wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I personally doubt it, but that remains to be seen. I'm open to being convinced otherwise. I think more people would take a "staycation" for a while, then get bored, and go into new endeavors, like starting a new business, writing a novel, becoming seriously involved in volunteering, continue working in their degree field, etc. If people were only motivated by the stick, no one would seek a raise or change jobs for a…

There is a healthy balance of stick and carrot, they both have their place. But the main motivation behind work is largely stick. Once you achieve a certain level of income it becomes normalized over time and work is done to maintain this lifestyle and the pain from losing what you have. You have an extremely rosy view of the average person if you think thats how the vast majority of people are going to spend their t…

But the people "on UBI" will be everyone. It seems like you're thinking of "the people on UBI" as only those who don't have a steady job, live at their parent's house, etc.

I think of the average person I know, who works, has hobbies, who might have a side business, play a sport, participate in local theater, volunteer at a religious institution or charity, belong to a club, etc. Those people will also be "on UBI".

I think, if they didn't have to work full time (or more), they would still be 'productive' members of society, engaging /even more/ in all those things they are already doing when they aren't working. They might continue working full-time, or part time, or on weekends, or take contracting gigs. They might be more apt to quit, or at least speak up, when a workplace is mis-managed, because the downside isn't as painful as just hanging in there. In that case, a truly bad workplace will see that fact more accurately reflected in turnover.

I don't have a problem with people who aren't working on UBI. They probably already get some government benefits; UBI doesn't change that or enable them any more than what we have now.

What UBI offers in addition, is that those productive, self-motivating people would have the freedom for self-direction, instead of stuff they have to do to pay the rent. I would rather subsidize them and get the people who could use their physics or mathematics PhD instead of slinging frappucinos.

As a programmer, I know a number of people who would probably devote a major chunk of time to their startup or open source project rather than nudge layouts on corporate pages, if they didn't have to. They would be doing it already if they didn't put their income and health insurance in jeopardy.

If the cost of that is to allow a few people to sit on the couch more comfortably, so be it.

Re: What Would Happen If We Just Gave People Money?

#26

Post by jjn2009 »

lawpoop wrote: post #25
jjn2009 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a healthy balance of stick and carrot, they both have their place. But the main motivation behind work is largely stick. Once you achieve a certain level of income it becomes normalized over time and work is done to maintain this lifestyle and the pain from losing what you have. You have an extremely rosy view of the average person if you think thats how the vast majority of people are going to spend their t…

But the people "on UBI" will be everyone. It seems like you're thinking of "the people on UBI" as only those who don't have a steady job, live at their parent's house, etc. I think of the average person I know, who works, has hobbies, who might have a side business, play a sport, participate in local theater, volunteer at a religious institution or charity, belong to a club, etc. Those people will also be "on UBI". I…

>But the people "on UBI" will be everyone.

This is exactly what I'm trying to point out is the issue, if everyone had parents who gave them handouts we should expect the trend to be towards our stereotypical view of a deadbeat who lives at their parents house. All these people who you are talking about had the privilege of having a healthy combination of both the carrot and the stick, and while you are completely right they could provide value if they had UBI now if they instead lived in UBI for generations their priorities could have been completely different. If we imbalance this important piece of society too much we will be running a modern day behavioral sink experiment on the population.

Re: What Would Happen If We Just Gave People Money?

#27

Post by jmh42 »

caseywoolley wrote: post #23
jmh42 wrote: post #22

I've spent some time thinking about basic income. At times arguing for it, other times arguing against it. Unfortunately we cannot resolve the scarcity problem, particularly when it comes to real estate, i.e. the location one chooses to reside. There is a simple physical constraint: only one thing can occupy a specific space at a time. Cities in general are popular places to live because of their proximity to "things…

This is the basic flaw that everyone seems to be missing. Cost of living will just rise to meet the increase in demand resulting in no one except private landowners being any better off. Henry George identified the solution over 100 years ago. Basic income requires something like the Henry George land-value tax to be successful. At the same time, a land-value tax would also be the best way to raise funds for a univer…

I had not heard of Henry James and his book "Progress & Poverty" (1879). More info for anyone interested [0]

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progress_and_Poverty

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