Slashdot Mirror
Slashdot Asks: Do We Need To Plan For a Future Without Jobs And Should We Resort To Universal Basic Income? (vox.com)
Andy Stern (former president of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), which today represents close to 2 million workers in the United States and Canada) has spent his career organizing workers. He has a warning for all of us: our jobs are really, really doomed. Stern adds that one of the only way outs of this is a universal basic income. Stern has been arguing about the need for a universal basic income (UBI) for more than a year now. Stern pointed out that people with college degrees are not making anywhere near the kind of progress that their parents made, and that it's not their fault. He adds: The possibility that you can end up with job security and retirement attached to it is statistically diminishing over time. The American dream doesn't have to be dead, but it is dying. All the resources and assets are available to make it real. It's just that we have a huge distribution problem. Unions and the government used to play an important part at the top of the market, but this is less true today. The market completely distributes toward those at the top. Unions simply aren't as effective in terms of their impact on the economy, and government has been somewhat on the sidelines in recent years.Making a case for the need of universal basic income, he adds:A universal basic income is essentially giving every single working-age American a check every month, much like we do with social security for elderly people. It's an unconditional stipend, as it were. The reason it's necessary is we're now learning through lots of reputable research that technological change is accelerating, and that this process will continue to displace workers and terminate careers. A significant number of tasks now performed by humans will be performed by machines and artificial intelligence. He warned that we could very well see five million jobs eliminated by the end of the decade because of technology. He elaborates: It looks like the Hunger Games. It's more of what we're beginning to see now: an enclave of extremely successful people at the center and then everyone else on the margins. There will be fewer opportunities in a hollowed out and increasingly zero-sum economy. If capital trumps labor, the people who own will keep getting wealthier and the people who supply labor will become less necessary. And this is exactly what AI and robotics and software are now doing: substituting capital for labor.What's your thoughts on this? Do you think in the next two-three decades to come we will have significantly fewer jobs than we do now?
It is well known that the majority voice - both in staff and readers - at slashdot has leaned conservative for over a decade now. ....
What color is the sky on your planet?
This place was a huge hotbed of "Gore won!" and "BOOOSH is teh EVUL!"
This is demonstrably false; developed nations have much lower reproduction rates than the undeveloped nation. Once the risk of childhood mortality is eliminated, our species preferred reproductive strategy appears to be to use additional resources to improve the quality of our offspring rather than the quantity.
Bureau of Labor Statistics. http://www.bls.gov/bdm/entrepr...
It's been the largest year over year increase because the recession produced the lowest nadir in entrepreneurship since the Great Depression. We're only just now getting back to 2005 levels, and per-capita we're still not anywhere close to normal historical levels. On top of that, small business employment among these smaller firms is low because business expansion is inherently risky; many of these businesses are simply self-employed persons, which is why the employment numbers for small firms is extremely low vis a vis historical trend.
What a load of bullshit.
The top 1 percent pay for almost everything we have... The bottom 47 percent do not pay for jack shit, including their own burden on society.
The Adult Population of the USA is something like 194.5 Million people.
Let's say that you can get by on $25,000 per year, tax free.
Providing UBI for this many people will cost the economy 4.8 Trillion Dollars. Where is this going to come from?
OK, let's scale this back a bit. We will give every adult in the USA $200 per week - $10,400 per year. We're still talking about $2.02 Trillion - this is 11% of the entire GDP of the USA.
To put this in perspective, the USA spends $810 Billion on public education per year, $1.3 Trillion on pensions and almost $600 Billion on defence.
Specialist Mac support for creative pros, Melbourne
Well Paying Tech Jobs you say?
Lets see 120K a year should be well paying right?
Thats 10K a month
Thats 9K after Social Security and Medicare
Thats 8K after Federal Taxes
Thats 7.5 K after California Taxes and SDi
Thats 7 K after Health Insurance
Thats 6.5 K after 5% in 401K to get the free match (You may say dont save bu then your taxes will be higher)
Thats 3.5 K after paying for a 2 BR apartment in the South Bay (Cannot afford San francisco on a 120K salary if you have kids)
Thats 3 K after 2 car payments for cheap sedans
Thats 1 K after buying food , non food Groceries and clothes at Costco
Thats 500 Dollars after paying for Electricity,Phone,Internet,Water&Garbage.
That leaves you a grand total of 500 dollars a month to spend on Gas, transport, entertainment , eating out or buying art supplies for your kids
Note you are not saving for a home downpayment or for kids college or an emergency fund in case you get sick and have to pay your 20% coinsurance.
Tech Jobs are not well paying for the cost of living in the Bay area.
You may say that one should have 2 salaries in the family but unless you are married to another techie the other salary will be in the range of 60K a year.
If you are making 60K a year and filing married jointly thats 30K after taxes or 5K a month.
Thats 2K amonth after paying for daycare for 2 kids
Thats 1K a month after paying for additional gas, eating out (you will eat out more if both are working) and other work expenses.
So now you may have a grand total of 1.5K with both parents rushing during the whole week.
**Life is too short to be serious**