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Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

businessinsider.com

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Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#391

Post by aaron695 »

sethammons wrote: post #159

I like the idea of freeing people to be able to quit and get a new job any time, where quitting today means a real threat of losing one's home, transportation, or ability to eat (never mind fueling the cycle of debt that keeps so many down). I think it would be a net benefit if people could tell oppressive employers to fuck off without fear. However, a welfare state is a real thing to be worried about. My sister work…

> This has not stirred people to innovation.

Where does this strawperson come from? UBI has nothing to do with innovation.

I also don't think it will stifle innovation.

I don't understand why this word innovation is mixed with people on UBI.

You do talk about the active drug industry that has sprung up around UBI, so there's innovation there. But I'm not understanding what the claim is.

We are not bringing in UBI to help innovation for either people on it, which it obviously won't, or eco systems around it, which seems like would be a sum loss.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#392

Post by Tiktaalik »

kmonsen wrote: post #256
sethammons wrote: post #159

I like the idea of freeing people to be able to quit and get a new job any time, where quitting today means a real threat of losing one's home, transportation, or ability to eat (never mind fueling the cycle of debt that keeps so many down). I think it would be a net benefit if people could tell oppressive employers to fuck off without fear. However, a welfare state is a real thing to be worried about. My sister work…

If we want to free people from tyrannical employers, isn’t free healthcare step one? Perhaps some sort of more available food stamps step two? I would agree with a lot of the criticism of government should not target too closely etc, but those two programs seems pretty well run compared to the free market alternatives. At least when they are allowed to.

Pretty much. Best thing would be or current entrepreneurs can do is vote for Sanders.

Until there exists medicare/pharmacare/dentalcare/etc for all the big and wealthy entrenched corporations have a massive hiring and retention advantage over everyone else.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#393

Post by Tiktaalik »

Red_Leaves_Flyy wrote: post #154
kyledrake wrote: post #50

"Altman, who favors UBI, said in exchange for a floor, he’d like to see no ceiling on earnings, as some, like presidential hopeful Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, have suggested. And like Friedman, Altman suggested tying the amount of the basic income to a fixed percentage of GDP. “Right now, because people are rightly angry that there's no floor, and that most people have no real chance to be super successful, we sort…

how exactly is a ubi not solving rampant poverty? Maybe someone's implementation is flawed but to make an extraordinary claim like UBI can't solve poverty will require extraordinary proof. Likewise, how is ubi regressive? What would a progressive solution to poverty be?

Money can be clawed back by increases to living expenses (eg. rent increases, food cost inflation).

Creating systems which lower the costs of living (eg. public transit, below market public housing) benefit low income persons and aren't as easily erodible.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#394

Post by intuitionist »

hacknat wrote: post #94
intuitionist wrote: post #26

Altman and Yang are a natural fit because they’re both very invested (Altman literally so) in the narrative that automation is coming for huge numbers of jobs. But the economic statistics just don’t back this up. Total factor productivity, a (rough) measure of the technological contribution to economic production, is growing considerably more slowly than it was during the early 2000s, and much more slowly than during…

Labor productivity is a very simple calculation. It’s real GDP divided by total labor hours. Do you see the problem already? Let’s leave aside for a second that even the creator of GDP thought that, as a top level economic metric, it was useless (yes, useless). But, yeah...have the benefits of GDP been spread around evenly in our society? Of course it hasn’t. Our national GDP has probably been, mostly, generated by a…

OK, John Galt.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#395

Post by rad_gruchalski »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #120
kyledrake wrote: post #50

"Altman, who favors UBI, said in exchange for a floor, he’d like to see no ceiling on earnings, as some, like presidential hopeful Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, have suggested. And like Friedman, Altman suggested tying the amount of the basic income to a fixed percentage of GDP. “Right now, because people are rightly angry that there's no floor, and that most people have no real chance to be super successful, we sort…

> UBI just doesn't solve that Doesn't it though? You create a floor, so that anyone with a miserable job can say "screw you" and quit and go start their own business without having to worry about how they're going to make rent before the new business starts making money, and you get a lot more competition. More smaller companies instead of fewer bigger companies. And the big companies would have to pay more to get so…

> You create a floor, so that anyone with a miserable job can say "screw you" and quit and go start their own business without having to worry about how they're going to make rent before the new business starts making money, and you get a lot more competition.

No, what you get is more and more people who will say „srew you, why should I go and do stuff when I get money for doing f* all”. The people here on HN and those millionaires / billionaires are an outlier. An average shop clerk, security warden will not go and start their own business after saying „screw you”.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#396

Post by whb07 »

Tiktaalik wrote: post #392
kmonsen wrote: post #256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If we want to free people from tyrannical employers, isn’t free healthcare step one? Perhaps some sort of more available food stamps step two? I would agree with a lot of the criticism of government should not target too closely etc, but those two programs seems pretty well run compared to the free market alternatives. At least when they are allowed to.

Pretty much. Best thing would be or current entrepreneurs can do is vote for Sanders. Until there exists medicare/pharmacare/dentalcare/etc for all the big and wealthy entrenched corporations have a massive hiring and retention advantage over everyone else.

Lol I cannot for a second imagine the mental leaps you must make to get to what you just said.

You’re essentially saying “Leninist Russia will be the best thing for entrepreneurs”.

Interesting how chances are you’re not a doctor or in the medical field. You and comrade Bernie have no skin in the game but are loud about your complaints.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#397

Post by astronautjones »

whb07 wrote: post #396
Tiktaalik wrote: post #392

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pretty much. Best thing would be or current entrepreneurs can do is vote for Sanders. Until there exists medicare/pharmacare/dentalcare/etc for all the big and wealthy entrenched corporations have a massive hiring and retention advantage over everyone else.

Lol I cannot for a second imagine the mental leaps you must make to get to what you just said. You’re essentially saying “Leninist Russia will be the best thing for entrepreneurs”. Interesting how chances are you’re not a doctor or in the medical field. You and comrade Bernie have no skin in the game but are loud about your complaints.

i'm sure this is against the rules, but this is one of the most unintelligent replies i've ever seen on HN

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#398

Post by astronautjones »

dannypgh wrote: post #304
wufufufu wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"welfare state" is a weak criticism. You're talking about a population that historically faced oppression and displacement. Given the context, doesn't make sense that a monthly check is the cause of alcohol addiction.

Yep, it's an American pastime to blame the poverty experienced by much of the indigenous population on the indigenous population. It makes people feel less guilty to be profiting from the status quo. Criticism of indigenous folks without first acknowledging the real issues of genocide and disposession is problematic at best, racist at worst.

> problematic at best, racist at worst

any and every discussion related to class on HN

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#399

Post by carapace »

nixpulvis wrote: post #353
carapace wrote: post #348

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well if we can't agree that each person gets enough [space for enough] sunlight for free just because of birth and gravity, then what is there to talk about? Keep in mind that, if we can beat gravity just a little bit , there's a lot of space, eh? I mean, nothing but, really. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space-based_solar_power

Um, no I don't think we all agree about how much space birth entitles you to... But there are some fundamental rights. I'd rather address those directly, rather than give everyone $1,000 and hope for the best.

I'm just pointing out that, as Bucky Fuller liked to say, the Universe is set up for our success, including a huge power plant in the sky. In other words, scarcity is a choice at this point in history and we should be choosing abundance instead.

Re: Sam Altman and Andrew Yang talk UBI

#400

Post by kyledrake »

paulddraper wrote: post #364
kyledrake wrote: post #334

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually a lot of them do very bad things with their money that are very harmful to society, whether it's Bill Gates fraternizing with a convicted child sex trafficker, Peter Thiel platforming for racist demagogue Trump, Vinod Khosla spending unlimited amounts of money to carve out private access to beaches, or running for president and sinking a record setting amount of money on his campaign like Michael Bloomberg i…

TIL supporting the 2016 Republican presidential candidate was evil.

No, platforming for a racist demagogue that causes pain and suffering to millions of people so you can maybe win some Palantir contracts isn't evil at all, I'm not sure where you got that impression. It's just really solid moral judgement, I'm glad he has billions of dollars to push towards positive agendas like that, it's so good for our society to have children in cages at the border so you can win a chess game against other government defense contractors. Inspiring stuff.
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