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Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

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Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#881

Post by ankurpatel »

habosa wrote: post #526

I like the simple argument made here about UBI enabling efficient consumption. I worry about three things with UBI though and they're more social than economic. 1. 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. We can see this a little bit with the coronavirus relief packages. 2. Predator…

I agree with your third point. People will take the money and make bad decisions and then ask for more. In US we have food stamp program to grant free food to people who cant afford it then why do people still beg for money. I have heard of people using food stamps program and sell them to store for cash and these types of fraud exist because people easily do them without getting caught. I guess we can apply technology to reduce this fraud as much as possible.

Another thing happening in US is the unemployment program and the Coronavirus relief program which pays unemployed extra $600/week on top of unemployment. This way they make more money than they used to when they were working. In this case their incentive is to just stay home and not work which is also not right as without essential workers in the service industry we cannot get work done and if we start paying them higher than they get with the extra $600 we won't be able to afford them to be hired full time or temporary basis. For example someone even earning the lowest minimum wage can make $800/week and that is about $42,000 annually so we sort of do have UBI currently happening and worth learning from that.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#882

Post by Legogris »

habosa wrote: post #526

I like the simple argument made here about UBI enabling efficient consumption. I worry about three things with UBI though and they're more social than economic. 1. 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. We can see this a little bit with the coronavirus relief packages. 2. Predator…

I’ve been a hardcore pro-UBI for years from the perspective of moving (part of) the distribution of newly minted money from private banks to spread out over individuals. Gradually I have recently been feeling doubt for another reason: it makes everyone dependent on the government in the sense that if the government completely controls the demand side of the consumer economy (in the frame of the article). A majority of the population will (either due to unemployment or committed spending over non-UBI income) be unable to make ends meet without UBI.

It actually puts a lot of power in the hands of government and central banks.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#883

Post by SamPatt »

mdavis6890 wrote: post #880
habosa wrote: post #526

I like the simple argument made here about UBI enabling efficient consumption. I worry about three things with UBI though and they're more social than economic. 1. 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. We can see this a little bit with the coronavirus relief packages. 2. Predator…

If you want to do UBI, the correct implementation is: - Give the same amount to everybody* , with no means testing to avoid it become a political football. Bill Gates gets it too. This also removes any dis-incentive to work while also collecting UBI. Otherwise congress with write up a 9000 page law about who gets how much and when, which they then hold everybody hostage to. - Pay for it with a flat tax on all income…

A 9000 page law from Congress is inevitable.

They literally survive by using their power to placate whoever they need to, voters in their district broadly or special interests specifically.

They will never not choose to carve out as much benefit for their supporters as possible. Look at every piece of legislation in the past generation. Why would this be any different? Given the vast amount of resources UBI would be directing it is absolutely inevitable.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#884

Post by sobellian »

laingc wrote: post #419
alex_young wrote: post #114

A UBI paid for with a carbon tax would both save us from the worst consequences of global warming and stimulate the economy. It's hard to find a rational excuse for not doing it. Planet Money did a great episode on this idea over 7 years ago: https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2013/07/12/201502003/epis... They did a followup 5 years later: https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2018/07/18/630267782/epis... It seems like…

One of my best friends is an academic economist working in this space, so while I won’t pretend to be an expert, I have spent a goodly amount of time discussing this with one. With no disrespect intended to you personally, this policy you propose makes no sense. Without putting words in your mouth, it looks to me like “two things I as a progressive like the idea of”, rather than a coherent economic policy. Carbon tax…

> Carbon taxes unquestionably fall hardest on the poor, as do consumption taxes generally. Everything from the products purchased by the poor to their modes of transport are more carbon-intensive than the rich.

That's exactly why we would want to link it with a transfer like UBI. If UBI requires too much cashflow for your taste, we could always use an expansion of EITC instead. If tax incidence on unemployed is too worrisome, then we can start shifting the EITC more towards a regular NIT.

And with due respect for your best friend, the consensus is overwhelming among prominent economists that a carbon tax is fundamentally a good idea:

- http://www.igmchicago.org/surveys/carbon-tax/

- http://www.igmchicago.org/surveys/carbon-taxes-ii/

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#885

Post by jtr1 »

newacct583 wrote: post #830
jtr1 wrote: post #826

As many here have noted, UBI still leaves in place a power structure, or material relation of dependency. I just think there are a lot more nuanced and interesting approaches to this problem. For instance, what would it take to devolve ownership of essential infrastructure for social reproduction (practically: hospitals, farms, housing, schools, etc) at the local level? How could we blend small forms of cooperative o…

> devolve ownership of essential infrastructure for social reproduction I think you might want to pull the vocabulary back to conventional terms if you really want to discuss this productively. With almost all of those, there are existing practical examples in the real world: the UK NHS covers hospitals, lots of US municipalities have experimented with public housing projects, public schooling is The Way It Is Done t…

Thanks, I appreciate that feedback. That was definitely a jargony phrase. Mostly I'm wishing for a term to discuss these policies at the level of abstraction where UBI is situated, and I don't see one in conventional discourse at the moment.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#886

Post by dang »

All: don't miss that there are multiple pages of comments in this thread. That's what the "More" link at the bottom of the page points to. Or click these:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23993259&p=2

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23993259&p=3

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23993259&p=4

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23993259&p=5

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23993259&p=6

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#887

Post by mdavis6890 »

SamPatt wrote: post #883
mdavis6890 wrote: post #880

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you want to do UBI, the correct implementation is: - Give the same amount to everybody* , with no means testing to avoid it become a political football. Bill Gates gets it too. This also removes any dis-incentive to work while also collecting UBI. Otherwise congress with write up a 9000 page law about who gets how much and when, which they then hold everybody hostage to. - Pay for it with a flat tax on all income…

A 9000 page law from Congress is inevitable. They literally survive by using their power to placate whoever they need to, voters in their district broadly or special interests specifically. They will never not choose to carve out as much benefit for their supporters as possible. Look at every piece of legislation in the past generation. Why would this be any different? Given the vast amount of resources UBI would be…

I don't think I disagree with you (is that the same as agreeing?). I wasn't describing what I think would realistically happen, I was describing what I think would be best.

I just wish we could find a way to give people money with no judgement of any kind, political or otherwise. That's probably asking too much....

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#888

Post by f00zz »

uoylj wrote: post #444
gzu wrote: post #383

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The lack of real world experience on a HackerNews UBI discussion is infuriating. Western society's white collar elite are completely unaware of truly how many "sucky" jobs there are in the world that all enable our (currently) superior standard of living. Your entire existence relies on a globalist system of slave level labor producing products from all corners of the world. Automation of every industry is impossible…

Most of that stems from the fact that the US dollar is the main global reserve currency - so people around the world are willing to accept them in exchange for real goods and services. This won't be the case forever. Once it flips, the magically cheap overseas goods become the expensive imported goods only rich people can afford.

Yeah, just a century ago the reserve currency was the pound sterling, a century before that the franc, a century before that the Dutch guilder. I guess people in those times also expected the status quo to last forever.

Re: Universal Basic Income is Capitalism 2.0

#889

Post by umvi »

habosa wrote: post #526

I like the simple argument made here about UBI enabling efficient consumption. I worry about three things with UBI though and they're more social than economic. 1. 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. We can see this a little bit with the coronavirus relief packages. 2. Predator…

I fundamentally don't like UBI because, like other forms of welfare, it makes the poor ever more reliant on the government without incentive to become self-reliant.

I'm a strong believer in self-reliance. I think solutions that tackle poverty should have a path to self-reliance in there. Current welfare programs reward continued reliance and punish self-reliance (i.e. government benefits yanked if you try to supplement income too much with self-reliant sources, etc.). The ideal program helps people work their way to a state where they are no longer reliant on the government to survive. UBI locks the poorest into government reliance permanently.

You might say "yeah, UBI will help people be more self-reliant because now it's unconditional and you can supplement however you want". And maybe that's partially true. But I still think without an incentive, indeed a culture shift that values self-reliance, the poorest UBI recipients will still be stuck in rut, because they don't just lack money, but fundamental financial education that middle/upper class receive as intellectual inheritance from their parents. Just like today, it doesn't matter how many government subsidies you get, the poor's standard of living will scale to their income until every penny is gone. Someone needs to teach the poorest how to live below means so you can save, invest, avoid expensive addictions and health problems, etc. and an unconditional check in the mail won't automatically bestow that knowledge.

I predict if UBI becomes a thing it will actually increase the divide between lower and middle classes, because the middle class will use it more effectively (i.e. saving, investments, etc.) while the poor will use it less effectively (as a consequence of lacking financial education).

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