941–950 of 1001 posts
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The problem is how "basic needs" are defined.
Easy: anything someone needs to avoid imminent or near imminent avoidable physical pain or death. Food, Shelter, Clothing, Healthcare.
Touch? As shown with old studies on babies who died without physical contact, humans have a need for physical contact.
> What can startups do to increase prosperity for everyone? I think it might be best to create a different thread since this is a separate and important question than the "Basic Income" debate that is also interesting and happening in the same comments. Either way, here are my thoughts: You can take that question a few of different ways. What can all startups do within their current processes/products? What is a star…
>I'm also taking the view that raising the prosperity for the lowest individuals will in turn increase the prosperity for everyone else. This is an aside, and I don't particularly want to evaluate it as good or bad, but this statement is striking compared to the neoliberal idea of 'a rising tide lifts all boats' - i.e. increasing general prosperty raises prosperity for the lowest individuals.
I'm sure you already knew this but I figured I'd share it anyways: After thinking about it last night I decided I believed in a "trickle up effect" and then went to google it, thinking it a nice take on the "trickle down effect," only to find that "trickle up effect" was the original and "trickle down" was apparently the clever take down... Sigh. Guess I should have paid more attention in Economics.
Anyways, like most economic theories I'm sure there are a myriad of reasons why it might not work or be the most effective (which you graciously decided to not go into.)
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It's fascinating that you seem to find the "largely middle class white" part racist but not the "largely African American" part racist. Also, saying the Ferguson protests were about "not paying bills" is like saying Occupy Wall Street was about "skipping work". It smacks of either absolute ignorance or some sort of deliberate agenda.
So my comment gets downvoted for pointing out racism in a y-combinator thread. The original post from the person to whom I've replied seems to have been rewritten and now my own previous answer is out of context. Great. Maybe some people around here assume racism as characteristic of a single group, not as a human characteristic that we all share alike. Perhaps helps to quote what "racist" is described on a dictionar…
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Another thing that would be helpful to most people is fixing the affordable housing issue. The problem is that lots of people are deeply invested in making housing increasingly less affordable (alternatively phrasing as "improving home values"). Housing is the single biggest expense for many people, especially those in economically productive high wage cities, and cutting that would dramatically reduce the remaining…
It's a matter of supply and demand. If the zoning laws enable the building of affordable housing then the supply would rise and overall prices would decline. What you'll find in places with high housing cost is that zoning laws or geography prevent massive expansion of housing supply.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guy_Standing_%28economist%29
"The Precariat" has some great ideas on how the relationship between the state and individual are changing. He also covers the current dynamics in welfare assistance for citizens of a state and demonstrates how basic income would be easier to administer and lessen the burden if proof needed to gain assistance. I also like how he examine s the current status of citizen vs non citizen and proposes the notion of a "denizen."
If you are an a contract programmer I recommend reading "The Precariat." All the extra work you do for work should count for something but it is sometimes not given any recognition.
Watch the youtube video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9OraivQ45ME
Standing, Guy; Jhabvala, Renana; Unni, Jeemol; Rani, Uma (2010). Social income and insecurity: a study in Gujarat. London New York: Routledge. ISBN 9780415585743. Standing, Guy (2011). The Precariat. London: Bloomsbury Academic. ISBN 9781849664554. Standing, Guy (2014). A Precariat Charter: from denizens to citizens. London New York: Bloomsbury Academic. ISBN 9781472510396.
Make it more efficient to buy food from the local farmer / farmers market than having it shipped around the world to the nearest walmart.
Make it easier to do local and smaller scale manufacturing (think 3d printing).
When your economy is local, it's efficient, green (remove the high cost of transportation out of the equation) and it feeds on itself with jobs and money.
I'm building something right now that I hope will be a step towards reaching some of those goals.
Teaching people to control their costs, ala "mr money mustache" makes sense. I personally believe that you can control your costs and raise a family on $30k/yr if you are educated on the bad choices not to make...several cars on loans, larger houses than needed, etc...
I genuinely don't know how a couple could raise one child on $30k/yr - is rent cheap where you live ? If you had have asked me what a couple needs to raise a kid in the US, I would have guessed 80k.. maybe 60k if they are very careful with money management, as you suggest. I'm actually being sincere.. but where I live rent is very high, so perhaps that explains the vast difference ?
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I was thinking about that, and about the story of Ferguson Missouri, where some huge portion of the (largely African American) population had arrest warrants over petty fines that had blossomed through late fees and default judgements into financial catastrophes levied by the (largely middle class white) municipal government, with the last few suggestions.
Instead of Universal Basic Income, how about Universal Basic Food Stamps? It feels like, rather than a basic income, we need two orthogonal currencies: one for necessities (food, rent, utilities) and one for niceities. Everyone would just have two numbers in their bank account, for each of the country's two official currencies. Basic income would be paid in one, while all income from trade in the economy would be in…
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Instead of Universal Basic Income, how about Universal Basic Food Stamps? It feels like, rather than a basic income, we need two orthogonal currencies: one for necessities (food, rent, utilities) and one for niceities. Everyone would just have two numbers in their bank account, for each of the country's two official currencies. Basic income would be paid in one, while all income from trade in the economy would be in…
You can't really economically disincentivize addicts from seeking a fix; that's basically definitional. Not sure I agree. Seems like we cut down smoking drastically in the USA through heavy taxation? Not an expert in that area, however.
Things that would help everyone, regardless of income, without depending on a radical restructuring of entitlement spending, that seem like things startups could actually do: * Equally credible alternatives to university education for professions that don't involve students shouldering $100k-$200k in debt based on decisions they have to make when they're 18 years old. * Empirical, blinded, skills-assessment based tur…
Financial desperation squeezes the cognitive juice right out of you. In 2013, Harvard researchers did a study of how financial stress affects decision making. Denise Cummins, Ph.D. explains their findings in Psychology Today: "When the cost of [a car] repair was increased to $3,000, a very different picture emerged: The cognitive performance of those at the upper end of the income distribution was unaffected by the i…
This issue happens because one has to constantly juggle many priorities in the mind all at one time. This can come down very heavily on a person. To have to make decisions to chose one over the other, a.k.a making sacrifices can be soul depleting if done for a very long time.
There are often conflicting priorities many demanding attention at the same time. In case of trade off you often stand to lose something for the other.