As a Canadian entrepreneur I worry that mincome/basic income will serve to knock the wind out of the sails of many innovators and entrepreneurs who, like me, are currently DRIVEN to work hard, research, push the industry along and crank up competition. I would much, much rather work hard, earn more money, and feed my neighbour - than have no hope of digging myself out of my situation no matter hos hard I worked, bein…
Basic income doesn't emphasize divisions between poor and working people
51–60 of 259 posts
Re: Basic income doesn't emphasize divisions between poor and working people
#52"If we’re interested in social policies that are resilient I think the dignity problem, or the moral aspects of these policies are worth considering more closely." I certainly agree the moral aspects are worth considering. No matter how you arrange your basic income scheme (and the tax system to support it), it's going to split the population into two groups: those who are net recipients of government money, and thos…
It would be possible to hack the system by getting rid of all the stealth and corruption and just issuing each of us a check for the gas tax and lotto tax. Then just issue simple, cheap, straightforward normal un-obfuscated prop tax bills and un-obfuscated state income tax forms.
As a side dish WRT "The government's money" all of this money came from voluntary participation in various tax schemed monopolies and centrally controlled economic planning.
A state level "mincome" funded entirely by lotto players and gas tax and so forth is interesting. It should be sustainable and cheaper overall than the current system of byzantine complexity.
Frankly we have a large number of "bribes" paid to the government by non-humans. It would be interesting rather than slush funding them and obfuscating them to mincome all incoming bribe money. All state corporate income tax, all our weird little excises and fees and utility cable tv franchise fees, all of it goes to mincome and the government itself can only accept personal human being state income tax for general revenue. Its an interesting mental model and if implemented would likely save a lot of money... obfuscation is expensive after all. I'm pretty well paid and spend pretty freely, I'd likely remain a net tax payer, but I could imagine many poor people continuing to pay very little tax and getting the same state mincome check.
Re: Basic income doesn't emphasize divisions between poor and working people
#53As a Canadian entrepreneur I worry that mincome/basic income will serve to knock the wind out of the sails of many innovators and entrepreneurs who, like me, are currently DRIVEN to work hard, research, push the industry along and crank up competition. I would much, much rather work hard, earn more money, and feed my neighbour - than have no hope of digging myself out of my situation no matter hos hard I worked, bein…
As an economist however, I may be in agreement. I have some concerns about the inflationary effects of a minimum income. I have a strong suspicion that goods strongly associated with low income will tend to get more expensive, negating much of the benefit of a minimum income. And I'm also concerned about the positive feedback in the political system where the majority continue to vote for increases to their stipends uncontrollably.
All in all I'm not sure which is going to have the bigger effect long term on the economy.
Re: Basic income doesn't emphasize divisions between poor and working people
#54Earlier quoted context omitted.
What this seems to say is that people shouldn't starve, but to get food people should demonstrate that they are starving. I am unsure why demonstration is essential, because either way others are still obligated to provide food so that people aren't starving.
If my brother tells me he's hungry and broke I might make him dinner and let him crash on my couch. If I just saw him spend $500 on weed I'll probably tell him he's on his own. The demonstration is essential because if we don't require it, some people will exploit our kind nature to rob us. This is already a massive problem in programs where we do require demonstrations of need. See NPR's expose on rampant disability…
If you consider giving basic income to people who spend $500 on weed "robbing", well you are entitled to your opinion, but that's not exploit of system, because system is working as intended.
Re: Basic income doesn't emphasize divisions between poor and working people
#55"If we’re interested in social policies that are resilient I think the dignity problem, or the moral aspects of these policies are worth considering more closely." I certainly agree the moral aspects are worth considering. No matter how you arrange your basic income scheme (and the tax system to support it), it's going to split the population into two groups: those who are net recipients of government money, and thos…
I think some kind of UBI could be of benefit, but there could be some undesired effects that need to be understood before we can consider it a better replacement for the current system.
Re: Basic income doesn't emphasize divisions between poor and working people
#56It's extremely counterproductive to, as the article puts it, "take the question of the moral quality of the poor off the table." The fact is that a large amount of poverty is directly correlated with "moral quality". Most poor people in the US (maybe Canada is different?) have low "moral quality", which I define as engaging in behaviors that are likely to keep a person poor. These behaviors include not seeking work […
So it is your sincere belief that most poor people are 'broken' in the sense that they can't even make rational decisions where 'rational' means 'likely to improve one's life'?
In the past I argued that the poor are completely rational and simply choose to exploit the safety net. It's a hypothesis I can't rule out.
https://www.chrisstucchio.com/blog/2011/why_the_poor_dont_wo...
But that doesn't explain many of their other bad behaviors, e.g. wife beating.
Re: Basic income doesn't emphasize divisions between poor and working people
#57"If we’re interested in social policies that are resilient I think the dignity problem, or the moral aspects of these policies are worth considering more closely." I certainly agree the moral aspects are worth considering. No matter how you arrange your basic income scheme (and the tax system to support it), it's going to split the population into two groups: those who are net recipients of government money, and thos…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgism
>Once you establish that people have a permanent, inalienable right to an income, you imply that others are obligated to provide them with that income.
No, you don't.
Wealth is created in one of two ways - by nature or by people.
The fairest and most equitable way to distribute wealth is to share the natural wealth equally as possible and try and make sure that people are compensated as closely as possible for the wealth which they create (e.g. Walmart billionaires).
Our economic set up ensures that natural wealth is kept among the ultra wealthy (e.g. oil barons) and the ultra wealthy can parasitically extract wealth created by others.
Re: Basic income doesn't emphasize divisions between poor and working people
#58Earlier quoted context omitted.
What this seems to say is that people shouldn't starve, but to get food people should demonstrate that they are starving. I am unsure why demonstration is essential, because either way others are still obligated to provide food so that people aren't starving.
If my brother tells me he's hungry and broke I might make him dinner and let him crash on my couch. If I just saw him spend $500 on weed I'll probably tell him he's on his own. The demonstration is essential because if we don't require it, some people will exploit our kind nature to rob us. This is already a massive problem in programs where we do require demonstrations of need. See NPR's expose on rampant disability…
1) Trust your brother, feed him and let him crash. Costs you $50.
2) Don't trust your brother. Hire an investigator to determine if he bought weed. Most of the time nothing is found so you wind up helping him, which now cost $70. Occaaionally you discover something and choose not to help. Still costs you $20.
Is #2 worth it? That depends on how often the investigator finds a reason not to help.
Re: Basic income doesn't emphasize divisions between poor and working people
#59Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Don't let basic income advocates evade the question of who pays for their utopian scheme. Have you witnessed this?
I have seen it in every discussion. Some of the forms of evasion include: * focusing on the wealth/profit generated by a surge in entrepreneurship from the millions suddenly motivated to start successful businesses * focusing on the unlimited wealth created by robots/asteroids/solar in space which will fund any program we wish * focusing on how we can't afford not to try BI, i.e., the default system is a financial fa…
Re: Basic income doesn't emphasize divisions between poor and working people
#60"If we’re interested in social policies that are resilient I think the dignity problem, or the moral aspects of these policies are worth considering more closely." I certainly agree the moral aspects are worth considering. No matter how you arrange your basic income scheme (and the tax system to support it), it's going to split the population into two groups: those who are net recipients of government money, and thos…
At least some of the budget would come from realizing reductions in bureaucratic overhead from eliminating the welfare apparatus and costs associated with crime (which poverty is the biggest predictor of). We also always seem to have enough money to bomb the ever living shit out of brown people in all the far flung regions of the universe, so I don't understand why cost should ever be an issue. I don't think need is…