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My own private basic income

opendemocracy.net

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Re: My own private basic income

#201

Post by ZoeZoeBee »

jlg23 wrote: post #182
maerF0x0 wrote: post #6

> I lucked into money. The basic point is that he gets paid more whilst not doing more "work". For those whom "Work" is the only lever they use to convert into money, they see inequitable work:cash ratios as "unfair" (a morality statement). Market economies do not function on work, but on value. He did the same work in a high value scenario. A glass of water provided in the middle of a developed city is worthless and…

> A glass of water provided at the right time in a desert is invaluable and thus expensive. If you travel a real desert, you'll realize that water is always offered for free[1] to people in need. As is bread. And that is the very idea of basic income: Provide essentials for free. [1] Disclaimer: I did about 20k miles by car in Western Sahara and the south of Morocco in the last 4 years.

And what happens if a thousand people show up and there is not enough of that limited resource in the desert for all of them?

We live on a planet of finite resources, without controlling the number of people drawing from said resources you will over load the system, this and human nature are fundamental issues with the idea of Universal Basic Income

Re: My own private basic income

#202

Post by pizza »

weberc2 wrote: post #133
opportune wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Real life isn't just an elaborate Austrian economics simulator. In this case, there are a lot of complex dynamics at play: will workers emigrate elsewhere if trained well (Basically the IIT problem)? Are constituents/subjects ok with reductions in their quality of life so that other people can be provided these resources. To act as if the market will magically fix this is lazy and not realistic. Also yes of course I…

I have a really hard time believing that governments will do better at distributing resources equitably than a market. To act as though governments can magically fix this is lazy and not realistic.

Giant companies are incentivized to kill the competition and then jack up prices while also lobbying for their interests with lawmakers. Said markets will also only give you the choice between products that you don't want, when you really want something that only a government would take on. Another thing that is distorted is that if a transnational corporation has a factory in one country, sends it to one of their factories in another country, and then sends it back again because it's cheaper, that gets counted as international trade. It's hardly an export, it's a way to protect investors from having to pay market rates.. Corporations get massive protections from government, I wouldn't really call it optimal resource distribution if government interference

Re: My own private basic income

#203

Post by dollar »

tunesmith wrote: post #73

What I got out of this was the suggestion to fund Basic Income by taxing unearned income. I'd like to read more on how the numbers would actually work out. If that were the only funding source of BI, then how much impact would that be on the rich, and how much benefit would that be for the people that could use BI?

There is no such thing as "unearned income". Assets are risky.

Re: My own private basic income

#204

Post by wturner »

mod wrote: post #149
wturner wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My point was that each garbage collector is more valuable to the person paying for them than Oprah Winfrey is, but Oprah makes hundreds of millions of dollars and the garbage collector makes a typical wage. I understand the reasoning that Oprah provides a little value that is distributed to a lot of people and that the garbage industry in its totality is more valuable than Oprah. With all that, I still think it's a b…

I think it's painfully obvious that Oprah provides more value than one garbage man, so I don't see the disconnect. Also your above comment even says that "to the person paying them." I pay Oprah and the garbage man, respectively, what they're worth to me. I guess it hurts your feelings that Oprah has more value than your local garbage man, but it's just a fact. You can probably come up with the reasons yourself: pers…

I never said Oprah Doesn't provide more value than one garbage man. I am saying that I don't understand how a task that is literally needed for society to function is less valuable than one that is negligible for society to function and I don't understand why the person who does the more needed task is paid less than the person who does the negligible task. It's really a philosophical question about values but I think entertaining it is more elaborate than a simple catch phrase. Also hierarchy of needs vs wants etc all come into play.

And you are guessing wrong. From what I've read she is probably one of the better people I would like to see in the role if "Billionaire"

Re: My own private basic income

#205

Post by dollar »

the_cat_kittles wrote: post #3

for the articles description: "how [the economy] rewards people who own stuff rather than people who do stuff" i cant believe i never summarized my own feelings that succinctly. of course the reality is it does both, but i think its way out of balance towards ownership rather that doing.

Capitalism rewards value. "Doing stuff" is not inherently valuable.

Re: My own private basic income

#206

Post by [deleted] »

drabiega wrote: post #50
OJFord wrote: post #26

> [in the US] people who don’t need their income are taxed less than people who do I'm not American; I don't know the tax structure. But I can't even imagine that this could possibly be true, or what is true that is meant. Without looking it up, I would assume that the USA subscribes to progressive taxation, under which the richer pay more tax in both absolute and relative terms. Even if it has a flat rate of tax, (a…

In the US income tax is progressive but only a portion of the tax structure. The biggest factor is that capital gains are taxed at a much lower rate than earned income. (income from selling labor) There are also a number of flat amount / percent taxes, many of which vary by state. Finally, the tax structure is sufficiently complicated that those who can afford skilled accountants can further lower their paid taxes co…

[deleted]

Re: My own private basic income

#207

Post by rrggrr »

rayiner wrote: post #119
rrggrr wrote: post #82

Gosh. OP made me sad with his thesis. "1. For owners, work is optional." ... As an owner I wish this were true. For me and most owners I know work is mandatory, and its 60 hour weeks and a lot of sleepless nights. There is no safety net. There is no unemployment. I get no workman's compensation. I have no employment law protections. Its, as one HN comment said some time ago, "a suffering contest" a lot of the time. "…

You're conflating two different roles: owner and operator. While many owners, particularly of smaller businesses, wear both hats, your responses to points (1) and (3) arise out of wearing the operator hat, not the owner hat. For the companies that comprise most of the economy (less than half of U.S. GDP is attributable to small businesses), ownership and operatorship are distinct roles. The CEO of GE is not the compa…

US small businesses, collectively, are the largest employer of US citizens, especially at the margins of society where the author's "right to say no" is at its weakest. Its these small businesses, trying to accumulate wealth through property rights and rent-seeking, that would be disproportionately impacted were the author's philosophy to be adopted.

Re: My own private basic income

#208

Post by wturner »

grotsnot wrote: post #172
wturner wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My point was that each garbage collector is more valuable to the person paying for them than Oprah Winfrey is, but Oprah makes hundreds of millions of dollars and the garbage collector makes a typical wage. I understand the reasoning that Oprah provides a little value that is distributed to a lot of people and that the garbage industry in its totality is more valuable than Oprah. With all that, I still think it's a b…

If millions of people each like Oprah enough to give her a dollar, she makes millions. (pardon the napkin math) If you live in a town of, say, 25k people and your town has 10 garbage collectors (napkin math: each pair covers 1000 people's trash every weekday) each earning minimum wage 15k/year (if it takes 1min to pick up trash for an average household of 2, we get just over the standard 2k work-hour year. To me this…

Here's how I see it:

If Oprah dies tomorrow society lives on and for the most part nothing changes.

If all the sewer treatment plant workers die there is a scramble to replace these invaluable workers to abate a national health crisis.

Why does Oprah make more than these individuals?

Is it because she provides "More value" ?

If you believe she does.... then fine.

If society, through implicit acceptance does...then fine.

I don't, and I don't understand the logic. I believe I understand some of the psychology around it...but not the logic.

Re: My own private basic income

#209

Post by maerF0x0 »

dota_fanatic wrote: post #54
maerF0x0 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

for the record I'm speaking of a "Real" multiplier (taking in account inflation / standard of living) . IMO if every generation is 2x-ing their parent's lifestyle, its nearly instantaneous wealth in the scale of humanity. In the developed world today's poor live like kings of old. In 1000 yrs I would imagine that their poor will live better than our wealthy "Playboys" of today. I see nothing wrong with people being i…

Poor people in the developed world do NOT live like kings of old. They have bosses. They struggle to find mates. They live in small, impermanent homes with no land of their own. They tend to be in debt, and don't even understand how permanent that debt will be for them. They're socially at the bottom. This is nothing like a king, who could have a large family, and was well fed, had permanent shelter, didn't pay rent,…

> Poor people in the developed world do NOT live like kings of old.

I admit its hyperbole. But some things are comparatively like magic. Cellphones/computers, vaccinations, Internet, democracy for example.

Re: My own private basic income

#210

Post by tqi »

wturner wrote: post #208
grotsnot wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If millions of people each like Oprah enough to give her a dollar, she makes millions. (pardon the napkin math) If you live in a town of, say, 25k people and your town has 10 garbage collectors (napkin math: each pair covers 1000 people's trash every weekday) each earning minimum wage 15k/year (if it takes 1min to pick up trash for an average household of 2, we get just over the standard 2k work-hour year. To me this…

Here's how I see it: If Oprah dies tomorrow society lives on and for the most part nothing changes. If all the sewer treatment plant workers die there is a scramble to replace these invaluable workers to abate a national health crisis. Why does Oprah make more than these individuals? Is it because she provides "More value" ? If you believe she does.... then fine. If society, through implicit acceptance does...then fi…

http://money.usnews.com/careers/best-jobs/garbage-collector

"...predicts that employment in this industry will increase 7 percent, adding 9,400 new jobs by 2024... Median Salary $33,800"

If we assume median salary ~ average salary, then $33,800* (9,400/.07) = $4.5bn. Oprah net worth is estimated at around $3bn.

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