Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0 • Hacker News Board

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#741

Post by diffeomorphism » Thu, Jul 30, 2020, 11:38 AM UTC

bmitc wrote: post #652

onion2k wrote: post #544

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Power Divide - society will be easily divided into two groups: those who depend on the UBI to live and those who don't. The former will be absolutely at the mercy of the latter. One aspect of UBI is that poor people would be less at the mercy of the rich. If you're a poor person now you absolutely have to try to keep your horrible job else you'll lost the ability to pay rent and buy food. You have to take all the cra…

> One aspect of UBI is that poor people would be less at the mercy of the rich. That is a very strong statement that I don't think can be claimed at this point. In my opinion, I feel things will simply shift under UBI. People will receive UBI, but then other things, like rent, food, etc. will all just magically get more expensive. I cannot see any implementation of UBI working any better than things now unless the pr…

> People will receive UBI, but then other things, like rent, food, etc. will all just magically get more expensive.

In the same way that you declined a promotion because everything would magically got more expensive.

If things simply shift, then there is no reason to expect any of these to change and we might as well implement UBI right now, because it doesn't hurt, right? If you are middle class now, then for you nothing changes except that your salary might include a line -$1000 salary decrease +$1000 UBI (no, if basic income were enough to retire, you would have retired already). Things change for low wage jobs, where your employer now represents a share of your income, not all of it, and you can negotiate without fearing of being hungry on the street.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#742

Post by yters » Thu, Jul 30, 2020, 11:43 AM UTC

Most of my work is motivated by the desire to become financially independent. If someone just hands me financial independence, why should I work? If most people are as lazy as I, where does the money for UBI come from?

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#743

Post by kampsduac » Thu, Jul 30, 2020, 11:50 AM UTC

What would happen if UBI was instead Guaranteed Work and Wage?

I'm thinking if tax dollars were shared in the form of education, training and entry level exposure to trade skills, and jobs that may not typically pay above a minimum threshold for poverty but are subsidized to make them comfortable.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#744

Post by DebtDeflation » Thu, Jul 30, 2020, 11:52 AM UTC

>I worry about three things with UBI though and they're more social than economic.

I worry about one specific economic factor - where is this $12K/year for every American adult and $6K/year for every American child going to come from? If you take per capita GDP ($65K), subtract out the government expenditures that aren't going away like the military, Social Security, Medicare/Medicaid, interest on the debt, running the government, etc. (~$13K), subtract out non-residential fixed investment which is basically business capex to keep their operations running ($9K), that leaves $43K remaining per capita. Now assume 210M adults and 120M children and you need to take ~$10K of that $43K to fund it. So an ADDITIONAL tax of ~23% across the board. Note: I'm not criticizing the theory of UBI, which I think is sound, I'm asking how we fund the specific amounts that often get thrown around.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#745

Post by fab13n » Thu, Jul 30, 2020, 11:53 AM UTC

It needs to be called for what it is in a capitalist framework: a _dividend_, not merely an income.

It is a share of the nation's wealth, which you receive as a legitimate co-owner of that nation. The only difference with a company stock is that you cannot sell it, citizenship is unalterable. This safeguard prevents a lot of extortion schemes.

And when discussing the amount of dividend to grant (a political discussion which must be repeated regularly), the tradeoffs are the same as for a company: you want as much dividend as possible, as long as it's not detrimental to the nation's future wealth.

Many opponents to such schemes wrongly perceive it as communist, it's important to present it in a way that debunks that misconception.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#746

Post by diffeomorphism » Thu, Jul 30, 2020, 11:54 AM UTC

zimbatm wrote: post #740

Where does that money come from? The US population has 199M adults[1]. Let's say a decent basic income is $40k. That's 8 Trillion that the government has to find every year. The US federal tax revenue was of 3.86 Trillion last year[2]. Half of which comes from individual income, and another third from payroll taxes. This is before the effects that UBI will have on the economy. Maybe my 10 minute research is wrong? It…

Where does the money currently come from? Take $1000 of each monthly salary and put a "UBI" sticker on it. Everybody currently employed now gets $1000 UBI for the total price of nothing.

For a person earning $3000+ per month nothing changes, except that their salary now reads $2000+ (same money to spend etc.). For a person currently earning $1500, negotiations with their employer will be different because the salary reads only $500 and losing out on just 1/3 of your income while looking for a new job is doable (if still painful).

But what about a person currently working a job but earning less than $1000? This person doesn't exist because of the "B". But what about a person earning $1100, won't they simply stop working? No, again "B" and never happened in any of the trials done thus far.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#747

Post by bsenftner » Thu, Jul 30, 2020, 11:55 AM UTC

Universal Basic Income does not address ANY of the underlying reasons for wealth inequality - it is license for the economic abusers (exploitative capitalists) to continue business as usual, but with every mark they play now having more disposable income for them to fraudulently take.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#748

Post by rbg246 » Thu, Jul 30, 2020, 11:58 AM UTC

zarathustreal wrote: post #733

rbg246 wrote: post #732

It's utterly disappointing to see the top voted story on hacker news is am economics story (which is great!) on such an interesting topic written by a developer who from reading from his introduction has an undergraduate level of knowledge of economics, surely we can do better for sources and expertise in subject matter. And this is not personal against the author a brilliant blog post (but note it's a blog).

Try not to rely on appeals to authority, it’s not about where information comes from, it’s about the logical validity of that information. If you’re taking everything you read at face value that’s okay! Keep in mind that many people here are taking it into deep consideration and evaluating what is said based on its logical merit, who the author is does not play a role in that consideration. Regardless of whether the…

I understand what you are saying however... logical analysis only gets you so far.

What was logical to a medieval mind is not logical today with no difference in intelligence in the thinker the only difference being a far superior knowledge base.

And my main point is we have the internet we have access, we have access to economists who have the baseline of information to provide a considered argument I can trust.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#749

Post by BenElgar » Thu, Jul 30, 2020, 11:59 AM UTC

diffeomorphism wrote: post #746

zimbatm wrote: post #740

Where does that money come from? The US population has 199M adults[1]. Let's say a decent basic income is $40k. That's 8 Trillion that the government has to find every year. The US federal tax revenue was of 3.86 Trillion last year[2]. Half of which comes from individual income, and another third from payroll taxes. This is before the effects that UBI will have on the economy. Maybe my 10 minute research is wrong? It…

Where does the money currently come from? Take $1000 of each monthly salary and put a "UBI" sticker on it. Everybody currently employed now gets $1000 UBI for the total price of nothing. For a person earning $3000+ per month nothing changes, except that their salary now reads $2000+ (same money to spend etc.). For a person currently earning $1500, negotiations with their employer will be different because the salary…

That's not UBI though, that's a negative income tax.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#750

Post by BenElgar » Thu, Jul 30, 2020, 12:03 PM UTC

DebtDeflation wrote: post #744

>I worry about three things with UBI though and they're more social than economic. I worry about one specific economic factor - where is this $12K/year for every American adult and $6K/year for every American child going to come from? If you take per capita GDP ($65K), subtract out the government expenditures that aren't going away like the military, Social Security, Medicare/Medicaid, interest on the debt, running t…

Why do you include Social Security in the list of things that won't be eliminated? I'm not American but in my understanding UBI would almost completely eliminate Social Security, along with putting a big dent in the need for Medicare and Medicaid.