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Mark Zuckerberg Doubles Down On Universal Basic Income, Calls It a 'Bipartisan Issue' (cnbc.com)
Mark Zuckerberg praised the Alaska Permanent Fund and used it as another platform to lobby for universal basic income, as he did during his commencement address to Harvard in May. The Alaska Permanent Fund was established in 1976 as the Alaska pipeline construction neared completion. According to CNBC, the "goal was to share the oil riches with future generations." From the report: Zuckerberg says the state's cash handout program "provides some good lessons for the rest of the country." The dividend averages $1000 (or more) per person. "That can be especially meaningful if your family has five or six people," says Zuckerberg in a post he wrote about the payment. "This is a novel approach to basic income in a few ways. First, it's funded by natural resources rather than raising taxes. Second, it comes from conservative principles of smaller government, rather than progressive principles of a larger safety net," says Zuckerberg. "This shows basic income is a bipartisan idea." Fundamentally, Zuckerberg says people think and work differently when they have their basic needs met. "Seeing how Alaska put this dividend in place reminded me of a lesson I learned early at Facebook: organizations think profoundly differently when they're profitable than when they're in debt. When you're losing money, your mentality is largely about survival," says Zuckerberg. "But when you're profitable, you're confident about your future and you look for opportunities to invest and grow further. Alaska's economy has historically created this winning mentality, which has led to this basic income. That may be a lesson for the rest of the country as well."
Err....have you actually seen the massive number of high wealth people that are with the "progressive" democrat party these days...?
I'd dare say that the split between the parties is pretty equal, maybe even tipping towards the democrats somewhat.
A lot of BIG money was behind Hillary..she had a lot of the Big money and a lot of the no money....the lower middle to middle class is what seemed to propel the republicans into the white house.
I don't think the old class/wealth to party connection holds these days....in fact, it may have switched.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
If your only criteria for being bipartisan is that the plan conforms to both conservative and liberal ideals, then this wouldn't a problem. But when Obama basically copied previous conservative proposals in order to reach a bipartisan deal, he met with resistance just because it was proposed by a Democrat.
As long as liberals think Universal Basic Income is a good idea, they are going to need strong super majorities to get it through the legislative process because the other side will block literally anything that even smells liberal in origin.
-- All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. -- Edmund Burke
No, there's fundamental differences in philosophy behind those who want their lives dependent on the government and those that don't.
That's a simplistic, Ayn Randian view of the world that a 13 year old would have. Life ain't that simple, kiddo.
I don't respond to AC's.
Don't have three or more kids, especially if you don't have the means to support them. It's hard enough to make concepts like minimum wage and UBI work for individuals alone. It seems that a lot of these efforts are being viewed through the lens of normalizing and accepting situations caused by, in part, irresponsible breeding, rather than affecting the root causes.
The rich can avoid taxes, the poor and middle class not so much. All taxes are regressive.
Agent K: A *person* is smart. People are dumb, stupid, panicky animals, and you know it.
And you think the CEOs of internet-related companies really deserve their multi-million dollar pay checks? There's dozens of companies with a supposed value calculated in million of dollars but don't have a single product apart from pushing ads on their users.
If you think UBI is bad, I wonder what you must think of these companies.
#DeleteFacebook
The janitor can be easily replaced by thousands of other people who have the skills to do his job. Despite what you think of CEOs, their responsibility puts dinner on the plates of every employee at the company. If they screw up, or quit, or get fired, a lot more is at stake than in the case of a janitor. Also, CEO's can be dragged into court for the failings of anyone in their employ, and since Sarbanes-Oxley they can even be held personally liable for malfeasance of their other employees. So, while a janitor expends much more physical effort doing his job than a CEO does, it doesn't matter to as many people. And by matter, I mean, literally put hundreds or thousands of people into successful homes or out of a job. There is a smaller talent pool for CEOs and if they want to keep the ones that handle that pressure the best, then they have to compete against other companies looking in the same pool.
What does one thing have to do with the other? You saying you'll never support anything Zuckerberg says until his earnings are same as mean salary in US? By that measure we have very few people who's ideas are even worth listening to.
That's insane. The John Birch Society was thoroughly discredited and run out of the Republican Party over 40 years ago. Seriously, you need to read something from this century.
The US already has a very successful UBI. It's called Social Security. Right now, it only applies to older people and those with disabilities.
Social Security has done a remarkable job of eliminating poverty among the elderly. It gives them enough money to afford basic necessities of food and shelter. Everyone gets a basic income with no requirement to work and no "means test".
Don't know why the same system wouldn't work for everyone. Just increase the SS tax and give everyone a basic income.
I don't read your sig. Why are you reading mine?
I might do minimum work for maximum pay, but I'm not taking an 80% paycut to sit around the house.
Your reductio ad absurdum argument is not even funny.
As we automate more and more people out of work, as ownership of those automated facilities concentrates more and more, we MUST switch to UBI or admit we're making almost the entire population redundant. This isn't weavers destroying Jacquard looms - computers and robots are on the threshold of obliterating general labor as a way to make even a subsistence living.
And if we decide the general population is redundant, how long until someone who is in the 'have' group decides the 'have nots' need to starve to death or be killed off before they storm the gates looking for their share?
The problem is that while much of the rest of the world is at least slightly socialist already, the USA is still paranoid about communism and resists social programs even if they're dying as a result - the Republican support for repealing socialized healthcare being a textbook example.
So UBI may not fly in the USA until past the time when its needed, and then we will get to see if the masses die off before they revolt.
What about:
Denmark
Finland
Netherlands
Canada
Sweden
Norway
Ireland
New Zealand
All of which are socialist, all of which are quite successful, even with relatively high tax rates.
whois gawk date unzip strip find touch finger mount join nice man top fsck grep eject more yes exit umount sleep dump
Birchers are nuts. But the KGB archive has been opened, they weren't wrong about everything.
That's not what UBI is. And most humans will NOT want to stay at what qualifies for UBI housing. Either it's a single room with shared toilet, living space and kitchen, or it's a barracks style bunk beds with a foot locker for your personal stuff. That's what UBI provides. Sure, if you're lazy, you might be happy with shared living quarters, but most people want at least their own personal bathroom, which requires more money. Where's that money come from? Working, of course.
But instead of having to be forced to work as a janitor just to live, as you do today, perhaps you can work as a craftsman - whittling wood or something, who makes enough money to not only afford a better location, but doing what they love. And of course, paying taxes.
And people may be lazy, but they also are not lazy. Think of it this way - why do people do things for recreation instead of staying in bed all day on the weekend? They run, they do exercise, they do hobbies, etc. When instead they could be sitting on the couch watching TV with a beer in their hands?
Hell, even with UBI, most people like where they live, so they'll continue to work at their present jobs. Those who are unhappy will likely quit and find more satisfying jobs, not being stuck in a job just to make the mortgage payment and otherwise live. Others may take a pay cut to work less hours because they're not forced to work long hours just to survive, and use the spare time for things they may enjoy more, including raising kids.
No, UBI is not a utopia, but it's far from a disaster. There's a reason why people want to house the homeless and give them healthcare - it's cheaper to do so than for them to live on the streets and incur increased policing costs and healthcare costs. Hell, jailing someone costs over $100K a year. And those without healthcare use ER, the most expensive form of medical treatment available. It's far cheaper for them to be able to access a regular doctor and do proactive treatment than reactive treatment in an ER.
And if there's some idiot homeless person who spent all their UBI money on drugs, well, you can't really feel sorry for them anymore. Lock 'em up, I guess if they can't take care of themselves properly.
Unfortunately the JBS techniques of distracting people with senseless conspiracy theories, while turning them against their own government and interests are more popular and widely used now than ever before in our history
Just look at the rise of fox news under the guidance of Roger Ailes and it is easy to prove that your theory is crap
Coming from Texas where there's not a whole lot of federal government representation (outside of the federal court system) it always stuns me to hear this great hatred of the federal government and I've not understood why a "power grab" that is represented as better health care for everyone. Is this a states' rights issue or who exactly are they stealing power from, and why are you so opposed to it?
moox. for a new generation.
Despite what you think of CEOs, their responsibility puts dinner on the plates of every employee at the company.
No he doesn't. Market demand does, which the employees fulfull, and could do so equally for any other individual with the skills of a McDonald's manager. The manager then siphons off the value created by them at an absurdly disproportionate level.
Look at, say, the management of Google or Microsoft, ostensibly with the very best executives around. How many completely off-the-mark products and services have they advanced, to be discontinued as a business failure later?
I challenge you to name anything a CEO does fundamentally more insightfully than a McDonald's crew manager, or taking ideas gleanable from reading Slashdot or any other technically competent publication, putting the ideas on a dartboard, and throwing darts. Don't let me give the impression that I'm saying the CEO's ideas are of equal number or quality to random Slashdot readers, though. The CEO is inferior on both counts.
Inequality of opportunity (having money is an automatic win in any business competition regarding anything over those who don't), and old boys' networks is why they're there. That's mostly it. Don't get the impression I'm some leftist decrying capitalism, though. It works better than the alternatives. But to elevate it to a idealized meritocracy is just leaving the realm of reality entirely for a self-serving fiction.
If by that you mean they want to expand the number of people with disposable income, well sure, of course they do. Isn't that the whole fucking point of Capitalism? If wealth becomes concentrated in just a few demographics, then you have a serious economic problem, and history teaches that extreme wealth concentrations are a very bad thing for social cohesion and the economy. Even the Romans knew it, which is why they distributed bread to the populace of the city of Rome, because when they didn't, they had food riots that cost the wealthy a helluva lot more money then just "panem et circenses".
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Exactly. UBI would provide only the very basics; a humble abode and a few necessities. I for one would have no intention of living in a Tokyo-sized apartment eating just Soylent Green. It really is a fallacious claim.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
It's not going to be free, it's just that how it gets paid will change. I don't think a tax on robots is the best way to do it, but there will be changes in how governments draw revenue, but those revenues will still be drawn.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
That's a silly ad hominem attack. Ayn Rand's views are rational and nuanced, she understood and described the collectivist ideology to such a fine degree that it makes it impossible for them to attack her ideas, they can only attack her personally.
You can't handle the truth.
One has to define what one means by "socialism". The countries you list are "social democratic", in that they have adopted some socialist elements like unemployment benefits, public health care and a social safety net, but their economies are still largely capitalist and free enterprise.
Venezuela, on the other hand, was basically taken over by a pack of kleptocrats masquerading as a socialists, who quoted Marx and Guevara even as they have spent the better part of two decades looting the country. Sure, there was lots of money to go around while oil prices were sky high, but their base criminality has been exposed by the collapse in oil prices. I doubt the likes of Chavez and Maduro were ever really socialists at all. Chavez, in particular, was pretty much a populist nationalist, one might even say an imperialist as he siphoned off billions to try to build some sort of Bolivarian Empire. Whatever gains the poor made in Venezuela were simply funded by what amounts to the world's most profitable lottery; plentiful long-chain hydrocarbons.
The countries you list are by and large technocratic in nature, in that elected governments of any ideological stripe still rely on a professional civil service which creates a sort base continuity in state organs regardless of the party in power. While there is doubtless corruption to be found, sadly that is a part of human nature, by and large they are governed by responsible people who are bound and limited by democratic norms.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Oh fuck off. There's nothing overtly socialistic about UBI, at least not more so than social security, unemployment benefits, welfare, Medicaid or dozens of other federal and state programs. The fact is that, other than health care, the US is largely as a "social democrat" as any other industrialized nation, and I'd say that single payer healthcare is probably going to be coming in the next decade or so as everyone finally declares defeat on trying to keep the ridiculous and expensive system going with the series of bizarre tweaks that both the ACA and the current Republican solutions represent.
In some ways UBI will be an improvement, because you can get rid of all these various programs, and get rid of a lot of the enforcement and investigation branches of these agencies. As everyone would get a base income, there would be no means testing, and "welfare fraud" would become a lot rarer.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
A basic income should allow a worker to tell his or her employer where to get off if they mistreat their workers, and take their labour elsewhere. Surely the libertarian dream?
A basic income means that employers need only pay small wages in order to attract workers, in fact, no minimum wage would be necessary.
Small businesses could start up and workers take a risk by joining the business for stock instead of pay and still afford to live.
Many more people could try that business they always thought about but couldn't risk their family's future on.
Of course the massive wealth inequality we have today would have to go, because the money necessary for a basic income is in the hands of the billionaires and the hands of the big corps.
We know there is enough money in total, because we are always being told that if everyone works hard enough they can all have nice houses, pensions etc. implying that there is sufficient money for said.
Unfortunately a basic income is also a big boon to rapacious capitalist types:) because now they can ramp up the prices of things since poor people who previously didn't have money, now do, and also the cost of housing will shoot up. Inflation then reduces the basic income to less than what is needed to live. Price control is necessary for basic needs and utilities. Not so libertarian! :)
Experiments in basic income prove little unless they are on the scale of an actual nation state and there is tight control of immigration, for example no EU state could try this while the unemployed of every other EU state can just pop over and claim it! The EU as a whole could though if it managed to get a grip on all that tax avoidance.
I'm a lefty, I love the idea of a basic income, I believe that if it worked it would markedly increase the freedom of all those current 'wage slaves' who know they are never going to be a CEO because, well, how many CEOs can there be? But the necessary changes in the behaviour of people and businesses, and the alterations to tax codes and housing policy might very well be too big a change to institute at once; and like an unstable equilibrium, I fear that a basic income would fail rapidly if there aren't some strict controls in place, and those with the 'active consent' of the vast majority of the population.
snake
People in poverty:
1. have more illnesses which cost more money
2. have more need of social service, which costs more money
3. are more likely to be involved in the justice system (crimes, etc) which costs more money
4. keeping people in prison cost 5-6 times the cost of any benefit each year.
5. People in poverty are more likely to have children who will also be in poverty
The economics just don't stack up.
There is no greater fallacy today than the belief the government must tax what it spends. All money is created by a ruling sovereignty. There is a reason the Secret Service is one of the oldest institutions around - counterfeiting is a direct attack on sovereignty.
Taxes are about inducing demand for state currency, and in modern economies, controlling for the inflation that comes from a government regulated banking system. You'll know the income tax was legalized within months of passing the Federal Reserve Act. Now you know why.
What a load of hogwash.
Except for recent actions like "quantitative easing" and other pump/dump strategies, way less than half of the "money" is created by sovereignty. It is created by the banks (and other financial institutions). Part of it is regulated by fraction reserve lending, the other part is the wild west (e.g., credit default swaps). The government tries to monopolize this by creating some demand by "taxation", but that only affects a portion of the "money" that gets exchanged (because many transactions are shielded from taxation).
For example, just the other day, Apple created $7B out of thin air by issuing bonds backed by money in Ireland out of the reach or purview of the Fed. The global Credit Default Swap market is estimated at around $500 trillion. Compared to the federal reserve about about $1.6 trillion actual deposits times the reserve ratio of 10% would only be a fraction of only the CDS market, not even including the corporate bond market and other financial derivative markets.
The cart is now driving the horse for better or worse...
In modern times, if the govt were to simply try print money to increase its budget, it probably couldn't print it fast enough to outpace inflation (as many countries that have tried have found out the hard way).
No, you are dependent for your own safety in every situation you mention except foreign terrorist states (unless you willingly go to one).
Why are 'foreign terrorist states' deemed out of my control but companies doing things I can't see, using processes I can't find out about; not out of my control?
I control companies and other potential bad actors, by living in a country that regulates business, monitors the environment, punishes harmful behaviour and does all this with a government. Because I am not equal in power to a big company but a government bloody should be!
snake
The point of capitalism is to create a bigger middle class, not a bigger sponge class. Someone has to pay the bills.The fat cats have armies of lobbyists and lawyers to avoid taxes. That effectively leaves the rest of us.
If you are fixated on the minimum wage, your economic policy is a failure.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Assuming that an UBI will be paid for by taxes, it is equivalent to a negative income tax. Paying the UBI as a tax credit would make it explicitly a negative income tax. Nothing really changes but the name, the effect is exactly the same.
That is how I advocate an UBI should be done:
First, in preparation, make tax refunds paid out in monthly installments instead of in one lump sum (and to be fair and symmetrical, allow tax payments still due after filing to be paid in monthly installments too). Most people, who already get at least some small tax refund, will thus get a small payment from the government every month right away with just this change.
Then, give everyone the same tax credit of some (initially small) fraction of the mean income, and fund that by an additional flat tax of that same fraction of their own income. (So e.g. if you start with a 1% mean income tax credit, it's funded with a 1% flat tax). That is automatically completely revenue-neutral (because that's how averages work), but reduces the tax burden / increases the tax refund of low-income people, shifting it to high-income people, with people near the mean income seeing almost no change. (Because 1% of the mean income minus 1% of your income is greater than zero the further below the mean your income is, exactly zero when your income is the mean, and less than zero the further above the mean your income is).
Then, slowly increase that percent until the tax credit being given is at least equal to a poverty-line income. Et voila, you now have a tax-funded basic income. Make the tax credit received from this program count as "income" for the purpose of means-tested welfare programs, and watch people gradually fall off the rolls of those means-tested programs as the percent is increased, until most of them can be shuttered entirely, reducing everyone's taxes in the process.
-Forrest Cameranesi, Geek of all Trades
"I am Sam. Sam I am. I do not like trolls, flames, or spam."
The Victorian notions of charity had debtors prison and child labor. Relying on the good will of wealthy benefactors does not produce a reliable system of taking care of the poor.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
The permanent fund is managed by a state-controlled corporation. A certain amount of the income from oil production is paid into the fund each year, and the corporation is required to invest the fund. The fund pays out a dividend each year that's based on a rolling five year average of the profits that the fund has earned. The principal of the fund is constitutionally protected, and barring mismanagement or a massive change in political views around the fund, will always exist. Last year the permanent fund earned about $1.37 billion on a fund of about $55 billion.
Then i'm sure you won't be taking your social security check to the bank, but returning it to the government. You can stop drinking water that someone else paid to have cleaned, air that other people paid to have cleaned, roads that other people paid to have laid down, and maybe you shouldn't be calling the police next time you feel yourself in danger, or the fire department if your house catches fire, or go to the hospital unless you have the money to pay for everything they charge.
Society itself is a form of socialism, it's just some stupider than fuck people are too fucking stupid to understand that.
Fascism: An authoritarian and nationalistic right-wing system of government and social organization. See also: NAZI's
Yeah, and those little fuckers should have voted with their wallets and not been born, or at least chosen better parents. Anyway they should certainly suffer to serve as an example.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
Abbreviated for the stupid: US Constitution, Article 1, Section 8:
The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States....
....To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof.
Fascism: An authoritarian and nationalistic right-wing system of government and social organization. See also: NAZI's
> Don't care.
The don't argue against UBI on economic grounds.
And history is full of people who "don't care" and who were removed from their position of privilege by the poor using force.
we celebrate disruptive technologies , e.g. MP3 player vs tape/CD. Well we are about to enter a disruptive economic period whey the old economics and wealth and privilege values are about to get removed too. The people making old tech fought against their replacement, but they still lost.
When the welfare system in the USA was signed into law, during the FDR days, it was MAINLY for poor families with dependent children. In the 60's LBJ and government really expanded it with the advent of medicare/medicade. People, when they are "given" anything, will work LESS. People can be lazy if they don't have to get up off their butts and work for a LIVING. Who really wants to work? Some do. It gives them purpose in life. "GIVING" people anything, at times, most don't appreciate it but will end up thinking they are "entitled" to something.
I realize it's easy to get lost in the MSM rhetoric where both sides are progressives, but that is _STILL_ the issue.
We don't even have a single mainstream progressive party in this country. We have a far right and a moderate party. Even Bernie Sanders is considered far left in the USA. Travel a bit outside this country, or read a non-partisan book every once in a while, and you will see how drastically conservative American politics are.
-- All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. -- Edmund Burke
I wasn't ignoring everything else. Nothing about UBI can be said to apply to "common Defence" or to "general Welfare". Before you tell me that UBI falls under "general Welfare", please note that this is the definition of the word ":welfare" from Webster's 1828:
WELFARE, noun [well and fare, a good faring; G.]
1. Exemption from misfortune, sickness, calamity or evil; the enjoyment of health and the common blessings of life; prosperity; happiness; applied to persons.
2. Exemption from any unusual evil or calamity; the enjoyment of peace and prosperity, or the ordinary blessings of society and civil government; applied to states.
It is clear that the intended meaning was that "welfare" was adjunct to "defence". That is, protection from attack, and perhaps arguably assistance when natural disasters of outbreaks of disease strike. However, a system where the government pays every citizen an income is considerably outside of that scope.
Only if you decide to set up a dichotomy between people who want to take that benefit away and give the money to the rich, and those who don't. It's entirely possible to have a right-wing party that also supports the status quo programs because they're popular, while not wanting to socialize the whole damn economy. Just look at Margaret Thatcher's Britain. She privatized all sorts of formerly government run corporations and interests, but she left the NHS alone - why? Because it worked and people liked it.
It's not like there's some sort of slippery slope to absolute statist control, and only total unmitigated freedom is a possible alternative. People/countries/societies can and do function with some measure of social programs, and as has been proven repeatedly in advanced countries, it works out just fine. The only thing that's proved to be a problem is corruption - in countries where that is widespread/endemic, and there's no or weak rule of law, it ends badly, but that's true of corrupt countries without lots of social programs, too.
Exactly. That's why each year we have to increase the ubi payments. We can't have citizens living like that!
A car on every garage, a chicken in every pot, an iPhone in every hand, a 70" tv on every stand!
Vote for me! The other guy won't give you as much free stuff!
That's not what UBI is. And most humans will NOT want to stay at what qualifies for UBI housing.
Universal Basic Income isn't forcing people into tenements or housing camps, universal basic income is a system where every citizen, regardless of employment status revives a basic income. If you want more than the basic income, you can go out and work for it. UBI isn't providing basic services, it's providing a basic income. Trying to provide the same system piecemeal is wasteful and inefficient. The amount the US wastes trying to maintain dehumanising programs for welfare is astounding, and all of this so some constipated angry old conservative can feel better.
No, UBI is not a utopia, but it's far from a disaster.
. This, UBI is what we envision will be required when most of the basic jobs are automated. Not just manufacturing and services but soft AI is starting to threaten jobs that are based on understanding rules and patterns like accounting and legal services. The problem wont be that people aren't unwilling to work, it will be a lack of opportunities.
And if there's some idiot homeless person who spent all their UBI money on drugs, well, you can't really feel sorry for them anymore. Lock 'em up
I'm sorry, but that is a very stupid suggestion.
The minimum wage in the UK is less than £15,000, to keep one prisoner locked up for a year is £65,0000. We'd end up spending more money trying to keep them incarcerated instead of trying to help them get clean. If you take that £45,000 per year and put it into a rehabilitation program there is a chance that next year, you wont have to pay that extra amount. Incarceration for minor crimes increases recidivism.
The answer to petty crime is never harsher sentencing, the answer is removing the motivation to commit it. This goes double for drug abuse, if you penalise someone for a bad habit they wont stop, they'll just become sneakier about it. If you send them to prison for it, they'll just learn even more bad habits.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
The point of universal income is to still be able to have a consumer class when robots/AI have taken 99% of our jobs. This is NOT altruism, this is very forward-thinking greed.
"Prediction: within 10 years, Windows will be a Linux distribution." Me, 7-6-2016
this is, and was, a massive government power grab which is unconstitutional.
Point to the screed that you read that convinced you of that, because it is bullshit.
It's about removing control from those who pay into the system as a method of wealth distribution.
Control of the system should not be in the hands of those who can afford to pay into it, because they will only abuse their control to continue to keep the money out of everyone else's hands. It should be in the hands of The People, with one person having one vote. That would be democracy.
If all you hear is the same old crap, try finding some different sources for the debate.
You're still here :(
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Most humans are NOT lazy.
Most humans will get bored relatively quickly. Sure SOME will spend their time playing computer games or watching porn but most others will want to do something that has meaning. Some may even commit suicide because of that boredom.
Look at all the people who volunteer, the people who still work in retirement (when they dont have to).
A UBI will mean one parent will be able to afford to stay home with the kids, help with school trips, etc which will be good for the kids.
A UBI means humanity can get back to its roots of community, helping one another. I see the UBI strengthening community bonds, reducing crime.
If this wasn't the case, you'd have a disproportionately large number of people moving to Alaska with their families, hoping to collect that $5,000 - $6,000 per month of zero effort income.
Per Year.
I'm not good at making signatures...
You really don't understand freedom.
Try the Declaration of Independence... it's a good definition of freedom.
"We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, That they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these Rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the Consent of the Governed, that whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these Ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or abolish it, and to institute a new Government, laying its Foundations on such Principles and organizing its Powers in such Form, as to Them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
I don't read your sig. Why are you reading mine?
> People in poverty:
Don't care.
They don't want to change or they don't think they can. Liberals will happily enable them and tell them they can't.
UBI is not going to solve the urban crime problem. Those people already represent some degree of ambition and consumerist hunger. They want more than their mere pittance and they are willing to do whatever it takes to get it.
Hey look, someone else who thinks poor people are poor because they just don't want to work! As if there are all these unfilled, good paying jobs, but so many people would rather live in squalor. But hey, at least you can feel superior and absolve yourself of any sympathy by judging them and assuming you know fuck all about their lives.
I also love how you confuse desperate choices borne from a lack of legitimate options with "ambition and consumerist hunger". You seem to understand on some level that these people are turning to a life of crime, which is dangerous and will probably end with them dead or in jail, because they have no other options between that and a mere pittance. Yet you can still think that poor people are poor because they're lazy and make bad choices. It's the definition of doublethink.
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
What you're overlooking is that there is less and less work to be had as automation takes over. Stop looking backwards and start looking forwards. For most lower level work, odds are high that 50+% of it will be automated within 20 years. Even burger flipping will be gone.
The cesspool just got a check and balance.
The minimum wage in the UK is less than £15,000, to keep one prisoner locked up for a year is £65,0000. We'd end up spending more money trying to keep them incarcerated instead of trying to help them get clean. If you take that £45,000 per year and put it into a rehabilitation program there is a chance that next year, you wont have to pay that extra amount. Incarceration for minor crimes increases recidivism.
Sure but we get to feel superior by judging people and then punishing them. Can you really put a price on that?
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
You are engaging in a bait-and-switch. You demonize billionaires, but taxing billionaires can't feed the welfare state, there simply isn't enough money there. The people progressives and the left are actually are proposing to "tax out of existence" are professionals: entrepreneurs, small business owners, doctors, lawyers, engineers, accountants, people who have worked hard for a lifetime to accumulate the skills necessary to make a few times median wage.
Your goals and policies are again inconsistent. If you are concerned about too much consumption and too much pollution, the last thing you want to do is to transfer money from high earners to low earners via taxes or a UBI, because that is a classic way of increasing consumption; that's the whole point of such Keynesian policies.
Give everyone $20k. Living now costs $18k more. Everyone currently with a job will feel a lot poorer as they're paying more in taxes than they get from the government and on top of that inflation is going up.
I'm not sure I buy this. In an isolated scenario, you'd be correct. However, even today, we have a large swath of the population covered under some kind of safety net program that would be replaced by UBI. And those programs have not caused living costs to rise as much as the safety net funding.
The problem as I see it is that programs in the US are always half-assed. We don't ideologically want UBI, so instead we institute 50 different anti-poverty programs that end up doing 70% of what UBI would do and costing 100% more for administration and "means testing".
Even the military-industrial complex is basically one giant welfare program. Tons of money goes in, very little actual tech comes out. Most of that money is appropriated because said defense contractor "creates jobs" in areas where congress-critters need votes. Are those jobs actually adding value? Or are they jobs for the sake of giving someone a job? And what's the difference between that and just cutting a citizen a check directly? Wouldn't it be more efficient?
So while in principle your analysis of increased income would lead to increased prices, a cursory look at current data doesn't seem to suggest that.
I would theorize that the increased productivity from having basic needs met outweighs the inflationary forces that increased universal income would cause.
If you ask kids what they want to do when they grow up, none of them say they want to do the least work possible.
You might get that answer if you ask someone who has been forced into working shitty jobs for years.
This tells me what type of person we're talking to.
Cheap storage VM.
Unfortunately most individuals of child-bearing age can't really afford to have a kid. If you wait until you can afford a kid you get a situation like Japan is in where your population is shrinking and consequently the economy stagnates.
#BiologySucks
I never called capitalism perfect... I'm only claiming that historically it's the only system that works consistently that we've come up with.
Also, you assume that people who are rich must have somehow broken some moral, legal or ethical rules to get where they are. While *some* may have, I'm positive that the majority of the super rich folks didn't cheat to get what they have. For those who did lie, cheat or steal their way to riches, that's why we have laws about fraud, unfair business deals and theft for the government to enforce. If the government fails to enforce those laws, why do we take it out on all rich people?
Personally, I know a couple of *really* rich folks who I've known for decades who where not that well to do when I met them. I know how hard they worked, how many hours they put in growing their business to what it is today. I don't begrudge them their wealth or envy their ability to buy expensive things, take expensive trips or live in expensive houses. They have been passing all this on to their kids, who won't have to work a day in their lives if they didn't want to. They didn't lie, cheat or steal what they have, why should we assume that the rich generally have?
What it boils down to here is plain old class warfare... "Tax the Rich" because they don't pay their fair share!
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
Not necessarily.
My own framework suggests giving naturalized American citizens a social security rendered as an end-of-the-year non-refundable tax credit. If it's supposed to pay out $8,000 and you owe $5,000 in taxes, you get $5,000. The other side of this is that you are now an aid-dependent member of the household: if the household income falls below the aid threshold, you get welfare services (childcare welfare stays around because you don't want to give people cash for children).
I've been looking harder at social security, though. There's a transition path out.
Currently, OASDI allows the accrual of "credits" for income earned. These credits determine your retirement benefit under OASDI. Under my system, OASDI only funds the difference between its benefit and the Universal benefit, so the credit system still stays around.
It would make sense to pay out to naturalized Americans based on their Social Security credits.
Let's say that the (average) $1,300 OASDI is replaced by a $729 universal benefit that pays when you hit age 18, and those in retirement age receive an additional (on average) $571 from OASDI. An American with freshly-granted citizen obviously has no credit, and gets none of this; instead, he receives that $8,750 as a non-refundable tax credit each year, and is eligible for welfare.
Now consider: five years later, this citizen has earned enough credits to be eligible for $250/month. Today, OASDI just says you're not eligible for retirement benefits. Under a universal Social Security, this new citizen receives $250/month, plus the remainder of the benefit as a non-refundable credit.
This inherits from OASDI the problem of not providing benefits to late-life immigrants; that's fine essentially because it's fine now. At the same time, an immigrant who comes to this country, gets citizenship, and then doesn't work is in exactly the same position as today. We've now controlled for the immigrant risk in a graceful manner.
While our own citizens are born here and learn to want for the luxuries of their working-class parents, immigrants come here from whatever lives they lived in whatever countries from which they come. They must learn to desire that higher standard-of-living that comes from gainful employment so as to become equivalent to the young adults just entering our workforce. We can care for them, and even afford them the benefit we grant to citizens; and we can do so without simply assuming all responsibility when we let them into this country. They will first learn what it is to be a working-class American, and then can decide if they'd rather to live on the scraps which we throw away--and I believe nobody wants to take that large step down.
So no, we don't need tighter immigration controls at all. We only need people who can figure out how to write legislation which controls for risks.
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You mean like in Cuba, Venezuela, Russia? Ferret
No, I'm thinking more like Mosaddegh in Iran and a host of Central and South American countries that had their democratically elected governments overthrown because they weren't playing nice with big western companies. Can't have local people making their own decisions, no siree! They might start thinking crazy things like their natural resources are there to benefit the population rather than be exploited by multinational corporations.
When Capitalism doesn't get its way, Capitalism sends in the CIA. Ask John Perkins about it sometime.
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)