61–70 of 89 posts
>James Felton Keith, tells The Sociable that a Universal Basic Income is the best way to distribute an equity stake in productivity — thus creating an “asset holder class.”
US already provides a tremendous amount of value to its residents vs the rest of the world - doesn’t that count as a stake in productivity ?
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I believe that in the context of small communities, programs for the less fortunate can work very well. Mostly because the resources are attached to something/someone they know and they would feel to social pressure not to abuse those resources. For instance, I'm not a religious person but that's one of the true virtues of a religious community. Giving to the less fortunate but you feel the pressure to do good with i…
Which is surely an argument in favour of UBI? No tragedy of the commons, or scope to "abuse" it - you exist, you get the UBI. Should work at any scale, no? No need to claim insurance or welfare if shit happens - that safety net stays. A baseline below which it's not possible to sink. Which was the original intent behind welfare etc. The possibility of having small communities joining in once again, in addition would…
In most UBI proposals (such as A. Yang's) those programs would mostly go away.
> Which is surely an argument in favour of UBI?
In a vacuum sure. But UBI will inevitably lead to inflation of things like food, cars, rent etc. Especially so in the poorer communities that already are heavily subsidized (which would go away under UBI in favor of a single payment).
If your landlord knew that everyone all of a sudden had an extra $1000/mo of disposable income they wouldn't be worried to raise the rent because they know you have it. We will then be in the same position with the option to either raise it to $2k/mo or re-introduce programs like SNAP/WIC/etc to earmark money for food/rent so people don't just go broke paying rent.
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Because I don't think UBI will help in the long term. It will lead to inflation of commodities (rent, food, cars, etc) and will lead to us having a bigger entitlement burden in the long run.
You really didn't answer my question though, and now we're on a different, tired series of questions that always get asked in regards to UBI.
I'm against the agism in the article but the rest of it is sound. Right now we means test shareholders on the basis of whether they have capital to invest in a company, which is discriminatory in a society like ours where wealth inequality is the highest it's been in the history of the world. If half the country has no upward mobility and an impoverished quality of life that takes everything they got just to survive,…
It's people who are invested into the system. Anecdotal: the arguments I get into on this one are with people who don't want to argue any of the human side of the policy. It's not even a thought to them - and they won't even meet you on that battlefield.
Also, people who fight UBI are always people who have some sort of investments, are rent collectors, etc. The first thing they will ALWAYS point to is that there's no proof it will help the economy/markets. They also like to point out how it's not fair for someone to take my money through taxes because "I earned" being a high earner (aside: I did get to being a high earner because of hard work, but also because an incredible network of external support via school + family + _community_ + _country_).
The fear of UBI is the fear of admitting that you had help. It's admitting the status-quo needs challenged. Like - by ALL MEANS tax the hell out of me if it means that we lessen human suffering and raise the bar for my fellow citizens. Selfishly, I think I'll be better off that way.
The point that someone gets the majority of the hotels in Monopoly the game is no longer fun, and it's a race to the bottom... but at this point I think they're just playing a different game than we are.
Nobody can ever answer the question of "What happens when someone blows their UBI and cant afford to eat?" Will we let them starve? You'd almost have to from the government side of things. How about 5 years after when someone introduces another entitlement program to help single mothers/seniors/etc and then criticizes everyone else as heartless for not supporting it? Will we just end up where we are now with even mor…
I've answered it a few times in comment sections such as this one, but I can do it again.
If someone cannot meet their needs in a situation where they have a BI that's substantial compared to the cost of essentials, they clearly need more help, and I don't think they are undeserving of more help, but I think circumstance has demonstrated that the help they need is not simply more cash. Assistance at that point should take other forms and address the underlying issues.
I don’t get what UBI solves vs the existing social safety net programs >James Felton Keith, tells The Sociable that a Universal Basic Income is the best way to distribute an equity stake in productivity — thus creating an “asset holder class.” US already provides a tremendous amount of value to its residents vs the rest of the world - doesn’t that count as a stake in productivity ?
> Value, like energy, can neither be created nor destroyed, but it can change form. This is both false and unproductive. Value is unlocked and created all the time. People are much wealthier and better off than their ancestors, despite our far larger population. Hello technology! They didn't have refrigerators, microwaves, the internet, smart phones, modern medicine and so on. Today we're increasingly concerned with…
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I've asked this elsewhere recently but here it goes again. Im sure Im wrong, but wouldnt it make sense to start with like "all rice, bean, potatoes, and broccoli consumption at the personal level is free" and start with a food stamp / ebt that buys unlimited of something very specific? It wouldnt be a currency thats worth trading to other people, landlords couldnt collect ebt credits in lieu of rent, because everyone…
Because of the massive cost and buerocracy around maintaining a gradation system of handouts like you describe. By some calculations it can even be cheaper for the gov to go all or nothing than it is to run a system of checks with specific tiers based on need.
Cuz I'll be honest, with $1000 a month in cash, I would eat less healthy than $500 cash, and $500 in healthful grocery credits.
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I've asked this elsewhere recently but here it goes again. Im sure Im wrong, but wouldnt it make sense to start with like "all rice, bean, potatoes, and broccoli consumption at the personal level is free" and start with a food stamp / ebt that buys unlimited of something very specific? It wouldnt be a currency thats worth trading to other people, landlords couldnt collect ebt credits in lieu of rent, because everyone…
Destroying the value of rice, beans, potatoes, and broccoli would signal to producers that they should grow something more valuable. The next inclination would naturally be to say "Well, you just force the growing of rice, beans, potatoes, and broccoli." You have now landed on a planned economy, which doesn't work very well. So healthy staples can't actually be "free for all". I do think that providing the food direc…
If anything, the argument against it would be picking and choosing industry winners: pistachio, avocado, cheese, meat markets would find it unfair.
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All Western countries (including the US) do some kind of wealth distribution and it clearly works. Societies without any form of wealth distribution don't work. Or do you have an example? I can't think of any.
It's a pretty horrible argument unless they come back through to actually explain what they mean. > Wealth redistribution doesn't work and never has. Is a HUGE sweeping generalization that has literally zero substance in a discussion - and technically it's false off-the-bat because I'm certain almost anyone can think of at least ONE example where the "redistribution of wealth" has worked to lessen human suffering. Al…