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European Citizen's Initiative for UBI

eci-ubi.eu

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Re: European Citizen's Initiative for UBI

#91

Post by colechristensen »

austincheney wrote: post #69

I would really like to see a real world UBI experiment. For example, implement UBI on two small communities. To counter act the impacts of potential inflation the experiment would need to occur for about 5 years because inflation follows changes to cash flow with a tail of about 9 to 12 months. You would need two communities to test whether isolation has an effect such that one community is geographically isolated fr…

A lot of small rural towns around the country already virtually are with very significant portions of the population receiving direct welfare and disability payments.

The study to do is why existing programs don’t work better.

Re: European Citizen's Initiative for UBI

#92

Post by slg »

wyager wrote: post #84
slg wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When would you say this cultural identity developed? Because there are millions of people in this country that can remember a time when the top marginal tax rate was above 90%.

It dates at least back to the earliest Scots-Irish immigrants to the US. The wartime stuff was an aberration and not sustainable.

What is considered "wartime stuff"? Because the US has been preparing for, engaging in, or recovering from war for basically the entire history of the country including today as we are currently engaged in the longest war in US history.

Re: European Citizen's Initiative for UBI

#93

Post by colechristensen »

knorker wrote: post #68

Where do I sign against this? This is just FIRE without the money. Did you read the actual proposal? They explicitly want to give a middle class life to everyone, with zero obligation from the individual. This is complete insanity. Kids will make zero plans to use school to make themselves useful. Kids are idiots (past me included), and if they knew they had the option to do nothing productive, then that's what a ver…

You end up with people doing things because they want to.

Lots of people do lots of things for reasons other than money and we’re heading towards an economy where living a middle class life doesn’t require everyone to work.

People will run factories and do science and make art without just needing to do it to eat.

Humans before civilization didn’t work anywhere near so hard to survive as people today.

Go look at github and tell me about how money is necessary to get everything done.

We’re not in a post scarcity economy but it’s nearby.

Re: European Citizen's Initiative for UBI

#94

Post by rsj_hn »

knorker wrote: post #68

Where do I sign against this? This is just FIRE without the money. Did you read the actual proposal? They explicitly want to give a middle class life to everyone, with zero obligation from the individual. This is complete insanity. Kids will make zero plans to use school to make themselves useful. Kids are idiots (past me included), and if they knew they had the option to do nothing productive, then that's what a ver…

Relax, it's a petition. Anyone can sign a petition. The very idea that people think a petition is how to achieve UBI means that it will not be achieved. This is a way of feeding illusions to people who want to live in illusion, of catering to people who think complaining and wishing and imagineering unicorns and money raining down from the sky will bring said unicorns and money to them. And so the petition provides a valuable service of helping people live in their minds. It comforts them. They can pretend UBI is already here, or just over the horizon. It shouldn't upset you at all.

Re: European Citizen's Initiative for UBI

#95

Post by theptip »

slg wrote: post #21
wyager wrote: post #16

Most extant forms of welfare exist because at the time of their creation they allowed some group of politicans to buy the votes of some subset of the population. In order to reliably capture those votes, the welfare system has to represent a substantive transfer of wealth from whoever is getting screwed to whoever is selling their vote. From this angle, the problem with UBI is it doesn't really represent a clear win…

I have no idea if you are right or not, but it is a pretty wild political science theory that a policy can benefit too large of a majority of the population and therefore would be unpopular.

You can analyze this from the perspective of Public Choice theory. I think the claim would not quite be that the policy would be unpopular _with the population_ - just that it wouldn’t be in the individual interest of any politician, and therefore, as rational actors, they wouldn’t take the action to enact the policy.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_choice#Special_interest...

Re: European Citizen's Initiative for UBI

#96

Post by ksec »

Svip wrote: post #53
wyager wrote: post #16

Most extant forms of welfare exist because at the time of their creation they allowed some group of politicans to buy the votes of some subset of the population. In order to reliably capture those votes, the welfare system has to represent a substantive transfer of wealth from whoever is getting screwed to whoever is selling their vote. From this angle, the problem with UBI is it doesn't really represent a clear win…

The largest problem for UBI - from a state and political standpoint - is that you are actually taking away power from the civil service and politicians, because they would no longer have the power over people's benefits. UBI reduces the amount of benefits you could afterwards give to specific political groups you favour.

Actually do what the electors want instead of leaving us to do it our way while they do the fame and glory bit.

Reforming the Civil Service would remove his life-support system.

It would kick away the ladder that's put him where he is.

While he's still standing on it.

The only way to reform the Civil Service system is to reform the political system.

No government's going to reform the system that put it into power.

- Sir Arnold Robinson

Re: European Citizen's Initiative for UBI

#97

Post by systemvoltage »

js8 wrote: post #77
systemvoltage wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am worried about how cost of living would explode to untenable levels. Low skilled labor prices would get out of control I am guessing since it is a basic supply/demand issue - when you put a floor with UBI, minimum wage to take up manual labor jobs would rise dramatically. It is actually incredible how much of our society depands on manual labor. Most people on HN are out of touch with this reality. The world runs…

> UBI I can see can diminishing the ability for the same laborers to obtain affordable food, housing, and transportation. I don't understand how this follows. I was with you until then, but IMHO UBI might negatively affect middle/upper class who relies most on lower class paid labor (things like cleaning, delivery, cooking, repairs). But people who provide these services already can and have to do them themselves, I…

Building new housing requires low skilled labor.

Re: European Citizen's Initiative for UBI

#98

Post by systemvoltage »

zozbot234 wrote: post #87
systemvoltage wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am worried about how cost of living would explode to untenable levels. Low skilled labor prices would get out of control I am guessing since it is a basic supply/demand issue - when you put a floor with UBI, minimum wage to take up manual labor jobs would rise dramatically. It is actually incredible how much of our society depands on manual labor. Most people on HN are out of touch with this reality. The world runs…

When you make physical labor more expensive, it gets automated out of existence. And the part that can't be automated away gets reassessed to improve work conditions and make it more convenient to pursue that line of work. This is precisely what you want to happen.

It doesn't and won't. Automation is useful in certain areas but impossible in many. There is a reason why Tesla factories still have manual steps in assembling a car - it can't be automated away with reasonable costs.

Look at Switzerland (it is not UBI, but they have some of the highest labor costs): https://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/in/Zurich . A meal at an inexpensive restaurant which relies on low skilled labor (not just cooks and waiters, but the entire food supply chain) costs $27 USD. I am all for improving labor conditions though.

Re: European Citizen's Initiative for UBI

#99

Post by axiosgunnar »

isbvhodnvemrwvn wrote: post #18
ericmay wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How would that work in practice? Wouldn't people just move to the higher UBI areas?

Freedom of movement in the EU is conditional on you contributing to the economy; if you move just for the benefits, you will be kicked out (in theory)

What about asylum seekers and war refugees?

Re: European Citizen's Initiative for UBI

#100

Post by nradov »

slg wrote: post #92
wyager wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It dates at least back to the earliest Scots-Irish immigrants to the US. The wartime stuff was an aberration and not sustainable.

What is considered "wartime stuff"? Because the US has been preparing for, engaging in, or recovering from war for basically the entire history of the country including today as we are currently engaged in the longest war in US history.

Obviously that's referring to WW2, when the peak marginal income tax rate was temporarily raised to 94%. That was unsustainable because, absent a worldwide violent conflict, the highest income people will just emigrate to lower tax countries.

All of our wars since WW2 have been wars of choice. The survival of our nation hasn't been at stake.

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