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A New Report Finds No Evidence That People Will Work Less Under a Universal Basic Income (theoutline.com)
Economists Djavad Salehi-Isfahani and Mohammad H. Mostafavi-Dehzooeifrom for the Economic Research Forum have released a new report on the results of a basic income scheme launched in Iran in 2011. "In 2011, in response to heavy cuts to oil and gas subsidies, Iran implemented a program that guaranteed citizens cash payments of 29 percent of the nation's median income, which amounts to about $1.50 every day (about $16,000 per year in the U.S.)," reports The Outline. Here are the key findings: The report found no evidence for the idea that people will work less under a universal income, and found that in some cases, like in the service industry, people worked more, expanding their businesses or pursuing more satisfying lines of work. The researchers did find that young people -- specifically people in their twenties -- worked less, but noted that Iran never had a high level of employment among young people, and that they were likely enrolling in school with the added income. The evidence presented in the paper is compelling, but the anecdotal belief that handing people money will make them lazy is hard to shake. "The findings in this paper do not settle this question," the report's authors point out. "What we have accomplished is at the very least to shift the burden of proof on this issue to those who claim cash transfer [sic] make poor people lazy, and to show the need for better data and more research."
The argument against basic income is not about laziness, it's where the money comes from. Gather 5 of your friends and implement basic income. Those who earn less than the BI gets paid by money collected from those who earn more than the BI. Post back the results. Do it among 10, 20, or 30 of friends, all without the need for any government or politicians. Good luck.
I'm still not sold.
Nor should you be. Finding no evidence that X is true is very different (and much easier) than finding evidence that X is false.
Rich are fine and the middle class gets their standard of living dragged far closer to those on UBI. It is a fact that the rich can not pay the bills, they are too large. The middle class will be the ones who pay for this.
Slashdot headline reads "A New Report Finds No Evidence That People Will Work Less Under a Universal Basic Income" yet quoted in the article "The researchers did find that young people - specifically people in their twenties - worked less"
Sooo... yea. I realize Slashdot has become a new social justice platform but c'mon, this is at least the third universal basic income propaganda post of the week and it's certainly stretching the boundaries of legitimate.
I also thought this until I retired. I do more now than I did when I was working. And more of that work actually does something for my community. No, I don't put in the "hours" like a wage slave, but the work is more productive and meaningful and fun for me.
You are welcome on my lawn.
If anything, employers will need to raise salaries, since potential employees will have less incentive to work.
Employers would need to get better in all parts. When the populace no longer fears for their lives upon losing their job, they would be far more apt to quit a shitty job to find something better. Over a generation or two it'd weed out bad businesses, making the country more efficient with higher quality output and faster economic growth.
But I don't know what I'm talking about. Walmart would probably find a way to game the system like do currently.
A world where fewer people are working because more people are capable of retiring sooner sounds like exactly the kind of world we should always be striving toward. The end goal of human progress is for everyone to be born into perpetual retirement.
-Forrest Cameranesi, Geek of all Trades
"I am Sam. Sam I am. I do not like trolls, flames, or spam."
You've got cause and effect backwards. People largely abuse drugs and alcohol to cope with things like their shitty jobs.
This is my signature. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
No, but realize it also goes the other way too. I'm a biomedical researcher, I'll likely make more money quitting cutting edge research at a university and going into pharmecutical work. I'll be doing stuff that will have less risk of failing, but also has very little chance of being a big breakthrough. I'd love to continue doing what I am now, but I can't due to salary reasons. If money weren't an issue, I'd keep doing the high risk/high reward science as I am now.
My job puts food on the table and a roof over my head, sure, but I'm working mainly to accomplish stuff I can take pride in. If the necessities were guaranteed, I think plenty of people would take riskier work in order to feel accomplished.
I think you're thinking of welfare. You still get your full UBI regardless of how much money you make, dramatically increasing the incentives to work.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
Except that one big problem with our current welfare system is that if you work, you lose welfare benefits, and this creates a disincentive against working. A Universal Basic Income would come with no such restrictions.
Any sufficiently unpopular but cohesive argument is indistinguishable from trolling.
I might work less at my current job. That doesn't mean I would sit on my butt and watch Netflix all day.
I've actually had periods where I wasn't employed for a reasonable stretch of time. Sure, I did a bunch of video gaming at first, but pretty soon I got bored and restless, and needed to find something productive to do. So yes, I'd find something useful to occupy my time. I might not be punching a clock at a corporate office, though - I might start doing independent hacking and vulnerability research for instance. I might set out coding new apps, or other such things. I might do something entirely different like learn more about automotive computer networks. But I sure wouldn't be idle.
That right there is the fly in the ointment. Simply working isn't enough. You have to do work producing something other people want, not necessarily what you want. Work has value because it produces something other members of society are demanding. If a UBI allows you to quit a productive job in order to start an unproductive one (e.g. artist), the net result is that the country's productivity decreases, and the standard of living drops. (Which means the UBI has to be increased to keep it at the level of "basic", starting a vicious cycle of continuing productivity declines and UBI increases.)
As an extreme example, nobody wants to collect garbage, repair toilets, clean septic tanks, etc. But because it's needed, society pays a lot for it - enough to entice some individuals to live with the stink and do it for a living. If a UBI causes some of these people to quit and take up more "satisfying" lines of work, the prices of these services will go up, resulting in less income available for people to spend on other things, resulting in the UBI not buying as much as it used to, resulting in the government increasing the UBI to compensate for its decreased purchasing power, resulting in more people switching to more "satisfying" work, resulting in more prices going up, etc.
The economy wants to price things according to how much society values it. Attempting to thwart that with a UBI or minimum wage doesn't make that tendency disappear. The economy just interprets that as damage to the system, and routes around it - by devaluing the currency to lessen the impact of the fixed value of the UBI or minimum wage on prices.
yea becouse I'd believe anything coming out of Iran ... not. /. is really stretching here.
Right. I mean, they probably even disregard the scientific method and still fight over things like whether global warming and evolution are real.
Real lawyers write in C++
Yes, the people trying to make a living with streams and videos will certainly increase. But I doubt that the low paying jobs will go. Rather, they will get cheaper for the employers and you will deal with a LOT higher fluctuation. Which isn't really a problem because, well, how much training time do you need for someone who sweeps your floors or stocks your shelves?
What you'll have is people who want to buy something and need money for it that they don't have with UBI alone, so they'll go and work for a week or two. As an employer, you'll probably have to pay less, too, because now they only want "extra" money from you, not the money they need to sustain themselves.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Saying that the "greater something" is more important than individual rights is leftist now? "You are nothing, your people is everything" and all that?
Wow, and they told me at school that Fascism was a right wing ideology...
Please understand finally that extremism wants to take your liberties. Left or right doesn't really matter here, any extremist ideology puts the ideology over your personal freedoms.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
*Whoosh*
They're not talking about "incentives from employers". They're talking about the personal incentive ("incentive (n): something that incites or tends to incite to action or greater effort, as a reward offered for increased productivity.") to work. Aka, under most welfare systems, there's a "welfare cliff" where if a person works more, their income actually drops as they lose their benefits - and thus there's a disincentive to work past that cliff. Under UBI, there is no such cliff - the more you work, the more you earn.
It's a serious issue. A lot of people who are on benefits for various physical or mental disabilities have "marginal" ability to work. Many want to work, but are afraid that if they take on a job, lose their benefits, and then it ultimately turns out that their condition prevents them from fulfilling the job requirements (a very real risk), that they'll be screwed. It keeps a lot of people who might actually be able to work out of the job marketplace for no good reason.
We gotta go to a crappy town where I'm a hero.
and that they were likely enrolling in school with the added income
That single line torpedoes their entire "study". To rephrase the article summary in more honest words: "we found that people did work less, but we're just going to assume that they're going to school instead".
You can prove anything you want when you're willing to hand-wave away any data you don't like.
UBI doesn't make vast amounts of money for comfortable living appear out of thin air. 29% of the average US household take-home income is under $14k. The poverty line in the US is around $22k.
UBI offers a replacement for welfare, social security, minimum wages, unemployment insurance, and countless other things. Total combined welfare in the US ranged from $16984 (Mississippi) to $49175 (Hawaii) in 2013 (everything from direct payments to assistance for food, housing, energy, etc, both federal and state), according to the conservative Cato Institute. Social Security in the US averages $16k. Minimum wage is $15.1k. Etc. So keep those numbers in perspective. To put $14k a different way, that's $1167 per month - and given that a household is not supposed to spend more than 30% of their income on rent (greater than 30% is defined as "rent burdened"), that would suggest a rent of no more than $350 per month. And we're talking household income here, not individual. And that's income that would be without other added assistance (food, housing, etc), unless your goal is to double up the welfare system rather than replace it.
The big difference with today's welfare patchworks is that UBI is far more efficient (no huge bureaucratic mess, no "hoops" for people to jump through to prove qualifications, etc), doesn't have "cracks" for people to fall through. doesn't have any "cliffs" that disincentivize people to work further, etc. You don't "lose benefits" by working more - any extra work you do is extra income. To move you from poverty wages (UBI) to having the resources to not have to live in a dump, to be able to afford a vehicle, electronics, whatever it is that you enjoy in life. And if you really are the rare sort of person who actually likes living on poverty wages rather than working... well, that probably already describes your situation today.
We gotta go to a crappy town where I'm a hero.
Please understand finally that extremism wants to take your liberties. Left or right doesn't really matter here, any extremist ideology puts the ideology over your personal freedoms.
Thank you. Glad to see someone gets it.
People like to say that the whole R/D thing is just like sports, where you cheer your own team and boo the other one.
But in sports, you're not rooting for the complete, total, and eternal annihilation of the other team. You play the game, you win or lose, no hard feelings (well, not many) and you come back again for a rematch. And again next season. The team is important, but the game is everything.
Ideology is a game for idiots. And far too many people are obsessive players.
Why are you still talking as if the GP was talking about employer-provided incentives when the GP was very clearly talking about personal incentives? It's almost looking as if you were trying to make a point about something else and decided to inject it into the conversation here because someone used a word you felt you could chain off of.
And yes, low-end wages can be expected to go down with UBI - as they should. Minimum wage should disappear, because it's just one of the many pieces of a patchwork currently in use to approximate a UBI. In turn, corporate tax rates can rise (compensating for the windfall to employers for not having to pay as much), in turn helping pay for the UBI.
That said, your notion that people would tend to only try to work up to $1200/mo take-home income (far below the US poverty line) is silly. And contradicted by the study that forms the basis of this Slashdot article.
We gotta go to a crappy town where I'm a hero.