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A universal income is not such a silly idea

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Re: A universal income is not such a silly idea

#251

Post by ilkan »

Universal income is a fantastic idea. Imagine being able to work on your own coding project for 2 years with a guarantee of basic ramen and safe shelter. I don't think it'd work well in Western society yet. It would be feasible in, say, a dense and autocratic city-state like Singapore. IMHO it will come. As a world, we are starting to automate and displace work faster than our brains can learn new skills en masse. IE one person can create a skill and codify it (years), faster than 300K people can go to training and expand the industry organically (lifetime). This applies to both manufacturing and service jobs.

Structural lifetime unemployment is going to be the cause of future civil instability, and governments will use UI as a way to calm and control social order.

Re: A universal income is not such a silly idea

#252

Post by lingoberry »

vasilipupkin wrote: post #194
tinco wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, I just took the opportunity to naïvely hate on the U.S. a little. I think their lack of social security is appalling. How can such a well faring nation have such a low income tax, and so many poor people. I guess I just don't understand their definition of liberty.

There is quite a bit of welfare benefits in the U.S. the complete lack of social security in the U.S. is a strawman. Now, it's probably true that the benefits are not as generous as elsewhere, but they are fairly extensive, and depending on the state you live in, are quite generous

You would only say that if you were born in the US. Your definition of "generous" is pretty laughable in most other developed countries.

Re: A universal income is not such a silly idea

#253

Post by graylights »

LogicalBorg wrote: post #52
graylights wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But that's exactly the point of universal income. You don't pay them for idleness, you pay them regardless. You just don't pay them enough for their desires, just their needs. All those things you want cost money to verify and adds massive administration costs. Another point of universal income is it's cheap to administrate. If you want to "pay" people for taking college, just subsidize it.

I don't think cost of administration is a big deal. The outcome of the system in people's lives is more important. Otherwise you'll end up creating a system where people sit around in idleness and drink themselves to death on booze. Paying for their needs is a good idea, but what about using the payment to motivate them to make their own life better in other ways?

I think the costs of administration would exceed the payments. We're fine with bureaucratic jobs now because we need employment numbers, but those jobs aren't producing anything real. Look at the VA, it employs half as many people as the Army, just to manage benefits. What your proposing would, like the VA, require filings, delays, rejections, appeals and a whole lot of heartache. Simplifying things is the key selling point. You reduce pointless jobs that produce nothing and get rid of red tape in the process.

I just don't think adding bureaucracy is the solution. If I want someone to go to school I don't manage it on the individual, you'll spend half your money on administration. I spend it by subsidizing tuition.

Some people will drink themselves to death, but they already do that in our current system. How does that matter? The only difference I see is they'll have a lot more free time. Maybe they'll waste it, maybe they'll improve themselves.

Re: A universal income is not such a silly idea

#254

Post by abraxasz »

yetanotherphd wrote: post #166
brazzy wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're making a lot of completely unsupported predictions there...

so did the parent, and everyone else in this thread.

... and this is why, selfishly, I would like to see the system implemented somewhere, albeit not necessarily where I live. People keep throwing peremptory statements here and there (on both sides of the argument), even though we really have no way to know what's going to happen. So let the Swiss implement it, and let the whole world see how it's gonna play out. If it works (which I sincerely hope, from the bottom of my heart), then that can give ideas to the rest of us. If it fails, we can draw the adequate conclusions too.

Re: A universal income is not such a silly idea

#255

Post by dllthomas »

lgieron wrote: post #228
ck2 wrote: post #12

It's not a silly idea at all but I like to think of myself as progressive and I think it is a very bad idea in reality vs on paper. Just look at how college costs magically rise to the availability of loans and grants. What do you think is going to happen to food and rent prices once those supply chains figure out there is much more profit to be made? The Walton family alone has more wealth then the lower 42% rest of…

College is different than food. Everyone cares about going to most prestigious school they can afford (that will accept them), which creates a bidding war. This is actualy very similar to housing markets in desirable neighourhoods - everyone wants to live there while there's room for maybe one person in ten, so the market forces set the price at a level beyond the means of the bottom 90%. Food, on the other hand, is…

For college in particular, where it is quite specifically the fact that you are (better skilled and/or better connected and/or more able to pay) than everyone else that commands a premium this is very much the case - we can't just build more prestigious schools.

For housing, for most people, the bulk of what makes a neighborhood desirable is location relative to their work and social group and activities, cleanliness, and safety. Prestige is less of a component outside the very high end, where we don't care to subsidize anyway. The market (and the rest of society) can absolutely provide more "desirable neighborhoods" for the desires of the people who will be turning a net positive from BI.

Re: A universal income is not such a silly idea

#256

Post by corysama »

drivingmissm wrote: post #211
PaulJoslin wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Capitalism is powered by money and greed. At it's heart, the point is to maximise profit and efficiency. This drives innovation and growth across the world... this is no bad thing. However, as a side of effect of this, it also means businesses want to become more efficient, reduce costs and maximise profitability - your share holders are expecting good returns and that's just the way the world works! However, accordi…

The growth in the divide is caused by changes in CEO compensation that reward CEOs of public companies with large stock option rewards. In theory this is a reform-- only CEOs with rising stocks should get paid. Also just looking at the top public companies isn't really representative of the economy as a whole. The median CEO really makes around $360,000, which is a respectable 9-1 ratio. http://chiefexecutive.net/how…

Further, being paid $9.6mil/year as a CEO is exceptionally rare. $10.2mil of total compensation would have placed you in the top 100 out of the 100Ks (millions?) of CEOs world wide in 2012. $20mil would have placed you in the top 20.

http://www.equilar.com/ceo-compensation/new-york-times-top-1...

Re: A universal income is not such a silly idea

#257

Post by chongli »

weddpros wrote: post #97
Mikeb85 wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you would like more than this, you can go and get a job and hopefully earn more (have a better lifestyle) than staying at home not working. Except this isn't the case, since benefits are usually cut when you starting working. This means that you start work in an insecure job with no necessary increase in quality of life. With a guaranteed income, if you were to get a job, you'd have a guaranteed increase in your…

I often hear this argument, but it sounds wrong to me. Benefits are cut when you start working, and resumed when you stop again. Did you consider the fact that salaries WILL be lowered to compensate for BI ? If BI is 1000, that 1200 paying job will become a 200 paying job... I just can't see where's the incentive to work. Who wants a 200 paying job when you get paid 1000 for just breathing ?

If BI is 1000, that 1200 paying job will become a 200 paying job... I just can't see where's the incentive to work. Who wants a 200 paying job when you get paid 1000 for just breathing ?

You've got it backwards. The incentive is not to work, the incentive is for employers to offer market value for their wages. When people have the power to choose not to work, the market will have to adapt. If nobody wants a 200 paying job, the pay will have to go up.

The current system we have forces people to work unfair wages just to support themselves. Basic income will make it a competitive, voluntary labour market.

Re: A universal income is not such a silly idea

#258

Post by gpvos »

lmm wrote: post #51
PaulJoslin wrote: post #25

The thing I genuinely don't understand regarding the basic income for all argument is that surely it just moves the goal posts rather than solves the problem at hand? In the current system, you can go stay at home and get income support, which should provide you with the basics i.e. a home, food, electricity etc. If you would like more than this, you can go and get a job and hopefully earn more (have a better lifesty…

> This therefore means there is an incentive to go work. Yes and no. It's not an incentive to get a 10hr/week part-time job, for example, because you'd lose your benefits and so get paid less overall. Even making the transition can be difficult - most jobs won't pay you until the end of the month, but your benefits will be cut off at the start. How long does it take to save up a month's expenditures while on benefits…

> lose your benefits

An unconditional basic income should include enough money to pay health insurance yourself.

Re: A universal income is not such a silly idea

#259

Post by SomeCallMeTim »

btilly wrote: post #177
belorn wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I understand the confusion, but its mostly there thanks to misconception about how things works now, > If you would like more than this, you can go and get a job and hopefully earn more (have a better lifestyle) than staying at home not working. Staying home and not working today is not actually an option in most places in the world. The reason is why this new model is called unconditional basic income. The current s…

Your reasoning is severely flawed. Nobody today wants to accept an income below what you need to survive because..you need to survive. Liberals don't want to see other people accepting an income below what is needed for them to survive in a way that we can accept, so pass rules about a minimum wage. With this proposal, there is wage that it too low. As long as you make enough to afford something nice that you want th…

>The classic example being a single mom who, while working, and paying child care, makes less than on welfare.

It can be worse that this.

At least in some states, every dollar you earn is deducted (at least in part) from your welfare checks. This was at least the case a while ago; I couldn't vouch for its truth today after welfare has been "reformed" several times. It was definitely true at one time, though.

When this was true, at the very least, it was a severe disincentive to working, since until you were able to make more than your welfare check, you would be at best be making pennies on the dollar by taking a job.

Re: A universal income is not such a silly idea

#260

Post by Evgeny »

ptype wrote: post #224
gnaritas wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This pretty much happens already in progressive taxation countries(e.g. belgium) where you can actually make less money by having a higher salary because your tax-rate increases. You don't understand how progressive taxes actually work. This simply doesn't happen. You can't make less money by making more money.

Agree, but there is one interesting example of where this went wrong: http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pomperipossa_in_Monismania

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