A Basic Income Should Be the Next Big Thing
bloombergview.com
A Basic Income Should Be the Next Big Thing
1–10 of 840 posts
Re: A Basic Income Should Be the Next Big Thing
#2That's a little surprising — with all discussions about basic income taking place, I assumed it is more of a left-wing thing. But what is even more surprising are arguments against it: social workers being laid off and other more complicated policies like minimum wage taking a back seat. With this kind of rhetoric, it's easy to believe that the real reason is the "welfare lobby" of government officials who don't want their bloated offices to close, indeed.
Re: A Basic Income Should Be the Next Big Thing
#3I think the reason for huge support behind Basic Income is failure of government in efficient allocation of its resources. The current generation with its experience with public education, spending on unnecessary wars and other poorly run government programs no longer trusts government to effectively deliver services. Thus Basic Income seems like a natural solution. I honestly would prefer a smaller government that reallocates resources, over Bernie Sanders style big government socialism.
Re: A Basic Income Should Be the Next Big Thing
#4> Switzerland will hold a June 5 referendum on whether to give every adult citizen 2,500 Swiss francs (about $2,600) a month.
Yeah and, for sure, it won't pass... considering how conservative we are, plus the legal side of the proposal is not so clear in where the money will come from.
Re: A Basic Income Should Be the Next Big Thing
#5I'm still wondering about one thing: if everybody has a basic income, then who will be doing the dirty jobs like collecting our waste? Will the price for waste collecting go up? And will there then be a kind of economic "inversion", where the intellectual people prefer to work on interesting stuff at the expense of money, while the "non-intellectual" (need a better word here) people will make all the money doing the dirty jobs?
Re: A Basic Income Should Be the Next Big Thing
#6>> "But in the U.S., many liberals see it as naive and a distraction from more practical priorities, such as a $15 minimum wage and paid family leave."
I can't see how they could believe this. First of all a minimum wage becomes unimportant as you should hypothetically have enough money to support the kind of lifestyle a minimum wage job would provide without working. Secondly, as it's no longer financially critical to them, people won't be as inclined to take on minimum wage type jobs - which will force the wage up anyway so that the business can attract employees. So it should take care of itself. As for paid family leave (I presume they mean maternity/paternity leave?) you won't need that as your basic income will ensure you still have money coming in. And if the company wants to retain your services after your leave they will offer it anyway. The key point in these examples is that even if you don't get a higher minimum wage or paid family leave it's no longer going to have a big effect on you as you have your UBI to rely on.
Also, it doesn't seem to me like there is a left/right split on this elsewhere in the world. This leads me to believe that the problem is the highly partisan US political system. The right is obviously going to support UBI as it would significantly reduce government size - the left can't be seen to be agreeing with the right. I think it's a kind of childishly schoolyard thing you see a lot in US politics (he likes that so I don't).
Re: A Basic Income Should Be the Next Big Thing
#7affiliate marketing is a good way for basic income
Re: A Basic Income Should Be the Next Big Thing
#8I'm still wondering about one thing: if everybody has a basic income, then who will be doing the dirty jobs like collecting our waste? Will the price for waste collecting go up? And will there then be a kind of economic "inversion", where the intellectual people prefer to work on interesting stuff at the expense of money, while the "non-intellectual" (need a better word here) people will make all the money doing the…
Dirty jobs already are paid a premium. I would expect the differences to be amplified though, for good reason?
Re: A Basic Income Should Be the Next Big Thing
#9I'm still wondering about one thing: if everybody has a basic income, then who will be doing the dirty jobs like collecting our waste? Will the price for waste collecting go up? And will there then be a kind of economic "inversion", where the intellectual people prefer to work on interesting stuff at the expense of money, while the "non-intellectual" (need a better word here) people will make all the money doing the…
It is already the case - go try and pursue a career in academia and see how much money you make compared to a plumber.
Re: A Basic Income Should Be the Next Big Thing
#10I'm still wondering about one thing: if everybody has a basic income, then who will be doing the dirty jobs like collecting our waste? Will the price for waste collecting go up? And will there then be a kind of economic "inversion", where the intellectual people prefer to work on interesting stuff at the expense of money, while the "non-intellectual" (need a better word here) people will make all the money doing the…
> And will there then be a kind of economic "inversion", where the intellectual people prefer to work on interesting stuff at the expense of money, while the "non-intellectual" (need a better word here) people will make all the money doing the dirty jobs?
In the long run, any menial task is supposed to be automated away completely. In short term, what you described already happened in area like Post-doc and game industry (or humanities degree, if you will ...).