The goal of BI is not to give everyone a high paying job. The goal is to allow everyone to live with dignity and then strive for more if they so desire. So many people today are working shit jobs for shit pay and still can't afford the basics of living. We apply band-aid solutions with qualifications that require significant costs to administer.
BI replaces all that with a simple, cost-effective way to provide the basics of living to everyone. Knowing that whatever happens in life—laid off, lose a leg, cancer, job gets automated—you have the security of the BI to give you time to recover and adjust would relieve a lot of stress. That same setup gives you the freedom to take risks like going for more education, training for a different job or starting a business.
I suspect some of the resistance comes from people who feel that humanity does well only under hardship, that people need to be forged in the fire of adversity. Nonsense! I've become an excellent software developer not because my coworkers occasionally turn off my computer while I'm working or delete some of my recent files but because I've been in an environment that supports my growth. I only work one job so I have time at night to learn more about my craft. I have good pay so I can take time off when necessary and actually do something with it, and I can afford to buy the tools necesary for my work.
The goal of BI is to provide something similar for everyone so we can all be the best person we want to be, even if that's sitting on the couch taking bong rips while watching cartoons. If that's all that motivates you, better to free up the job you would be sucking at for someone who wants to use it to advance their life and be productive.
Another aspect that motivates me for BI is that more and more jobs are being automated, and that's not going to stop. At some point it's going to be extremely difficult to find a job paying enough for everyone without good skills. We're going to have to support those people somehow through welfare, homeless shelters, SNAP, WIC, Medicare, Medicaid, ACA . . . All the administrative work those programs require is complete waste, friction in the engine of society. Let's find a more efficient way to provide a more dignified system.
That doesn't make any sense. If I pay you $100 and take back $99, how much am I really giving you?
That was my first thought as well, that it would be more efficient to skip taxing people who didn't work extra. However, it's probably more efficient to simply collect a flat tax for everyone. It's about eliminating the waste of needs-assessment and different scales. I'm no expert of course, and this is something that will be tested out in different countries to find an optimum. Obviously the BI and tax would have to be chosen so the after-tax BI actually covered the basics as intended.
So does that mean you get more money if you have kids? I can think of a few ways that this would get abused. In fact I already know how a similar system is already abused in the US.
The proposal I read about most provided a smaller BI for each child and elderly adult in the household. Yes, this will be abused by some, but it's blown way out of proportion today anyway. And being able to cover the basics and work to increase that without losing those basics will hopefully alleviate much of the impetus to cheat the system. I suspect most people who would be tempted to do that would prefer to play video games than raise more kids.
Most people on a minimum wage don't have that option. "Boss, I demand twice the minimum wage!" "Great, you're fired. Good luck finding that wage with your skill set."
But with a BI taking care of the minimum part of the wage, they can now choose to work extra for luxuries or not and go without them. And now that there's no minimum wage, companies can lower their wages and let the market force them up.
Sure, that same person above with no additional skills will have the same few jobs to choose from, but at least now they can flip the bird to an employer who won't pay more without worrying about covering food and rent for the month. They can take time off to learn a new skill and improve their wage. If the employer has to pay too much, they can invest in technology to automate the job.
This neatly addresses one of the things I've always thought was interesting about the restaurant industry. At least on TV (yes, yes, I know) the mantra is one-third on food, one-third on rent/utilities, and one-third on labor. But while the costs of the first two continue to drop due to technology and scale, the last one remains fixed. How, then, can a restaurant maintain that balance without constantly raising prices? Paying low wages.
The BI would break that cycle and allow the wages to fall to the point where people wouldn't be willing to work for it—and could choose to do so without starving or living on the street. Food prices would come down as a result which means more money for other expenses. The wage would have to equalize at a point where people wanted to work for it or the industry automated those jobs away, and the workers would go do something else.
I agree it sounds all too neat and simple, but sometimes the best solutions are exactly that. IIRC, the Netherlands and Finland are already—or soon will be—running fairly extensive BI experiments. I'm excited to see the results!
Yes, it is immoral to keep people from starving in the streets.
I simply can't fathom how ensuring everyone has equal access to a dignified life with basic food, clothing and shelter could possibly be immoral. You'll either have to try to explain how that is or accept that your morals differ wildly from many people here.
In the USSR people didn't pay taxes. . . . People simply made their pay levels across the country.
Under a BI system,
everyone pays taxes—even people who don't work,
you can work for extra income, and
your salary from working is set by market forces and can differ across jobs and geographies.
It meant that it doesn't matter, you could be a director, a teacher, a doctor, a factory worker, a construction worker. You had a set salary and you didn't know any other way.
This is not how a BI system works. Everyone gets the same monthly BI stipend simply for being alive. Beyond that, each person is free to work—or not—as many jobs for whatever salary they can negotiate with their employer. Doctors will still make more than janitors, but the latter will be much more free to pick up and move, start a new career, or even start a business than they are now.
What was that sound? Did I just hear a massive, simultaneous erection from the libertarians out there?:)
Obviously the reality is that while everybody's productivity was comparatively tiny, everybody's salaries had nothing to do with their productivity. That WAS 'basic income'.
That's not basic income at all. It runs totally counter to BI as I explained above.
Yes, it is immoral to enslave even one person to keep thousands alive.
It's not slavery as anyone is free to pack up and move to a new society if they choose. Or just collect your damn check and smoke pot all day. We already pay taxes for societal goods, and much of that is wasted administering all these disparate needs-based programs. Not paying for the programs; paying administrators to perform assessments to approve or deny claims. All that waste would be freed up for the public good, and people wouldn't have to submit to such degrading invasions of their privacy.
"You can't really measure the surface temperature from a satellite."
"Go ahead and show me a surface temperature record made from a satellite."
link to satellite surface temperature data
"Those are the . . . temperature of the surface itself."
Seriously?
If you can't correctly formulate your own question, don't balk when someone answers the one you actually asked. Next time try, "My bad, I meant to say surface air temperature but was in a rush. Is it possible to get that via satellites?" Instead, you went with being an ass and acting like it was the other person's fault for not reading your mind. Good call!
Let me sit back and see you try to come up with proof that CO2 traps energy.
How has the world raised such horribly lazy people? The second video result provides a very simple demonstration of the greenhouse effect, but if you genuinely want to understand it, there are many papers and books you can read about it. Prove to us that you truly seek knowledge by searching for—and reading—any one of them.
Did you take a chemistry, physics or biology class in high school or university? If so, congratulations! You were practicing science by using the scientific method to test predictions through experimentation. At that moment, you were a scientist.
I think pteddy knows they're an asshole. They were just surprised to find out they are a "type A" asshole. Many people don't realize just how many asshole types there are in this crazy world.:p
Even better, embed the typos and grammatical errors in the test itself so they don't suspect it's part of the test. Then use eye-tracking software while they're taking the test so you can spot when they notice the errors.
No, we shouldn't roll our own bigmath libraries, or nosql implementations. But what lazy-assed devs would import an external dependency for something as trivial as padding a string?
So you're okay with risking the sudden loss of a multi-thousand line library, but God forbid someone risk having to rewrite eleven lines?
Obviously, the solution is to make a copy of all dependencies. Problem solved.
The FBI is making it difficult for law-abiding citizens to rely on encryption for security yet doing absolutely nothing to stop criminals and "the terrorists" from doing so because, as you said, they can't. So why bother? Why endanger everyone else for zero gain?
In areas where it is a certainty (earthquakes in California, Floods in other parts of the country), the insurance companies step back and don't insure.
Hmm, someone should really tell these guys they're doing it wrong.
I'm all for easier colonoscopies every four* years, but I'm really curious how light this will make glasses and improve contact lenses (which are already essentially weightless). Science does indeed kick ass!
Slashdot Mirror
I think you mean flower, the seed-bearing part of the plant.
back door business deals
Are those Greek government deals? ;) There's a definite trend developing in this thread.
The phrase I think you're looking for is "back room".
What? A guy can't enjoy the feel of satin panties?
I'm running a stock Galaxy S7 and opened my phone just now to remove the app, but my lockscreen looks the same.
"News for nerds. Stuff that's sometimes true."
If everyone is an individual, then we are all the same!
The government wouldn't print money to pay the basic income any more than it prints money to pay out welfare and other benefits today.
Wouldn't it be nice to replace all that nonsense with a simple needs-based test?
"Here, hold this mirror under your nose. Congratulations, I see you're breathing. Here's your check. Next!"
Why, then, is that ancient felony (for a victimless crime, no less) keeping me from being able to earn money honestly by working?
You should call up your elected representatives and have them change . . . Oh right, felons can't vote in most states either.
The goal of BI is not to give everyone a high paying job. The goal is to allow everyone to live with dignity and then strive for more if they so desire. So many people today are working shit jobs for shit pay and still can't afford the basics of living. We apply band-aid solutions with qualifications that require significant costs to administer.
BI replaces all that with a simple, cost-effective way to provide the basics of living to everyone. Knowing that whatever happens in life—laid off, lose a leg, cancer, job gets automated—you have the security of the BI to give you time to recover and adjust would relieve a lot of stress. That same setup gives you the freedom to take risks like going for more education, training for a different job or starting a business.
I suspect some of the resistance comes from people who feel that humanity does well only under hardship, that people need to be forged in the fire of adversity. Nonsense! I've become an excellent software developer not because my coworkers occasionally turn off my computer while I'm working or delete some of my recent files but because I've been in an environment that supports my growth. I only work one job so I have time at night to learn more about my craft. I have good pay so I can take time off when necessary and actually do something with it, and I can afford to buy the tools necesary for my work.
The goal of BI is to provide something similar for everyone so we can all be the best person we want to be, even if that's sitting on the couch taking bong rips while watching cartoons. If that's all that motivates you, better to free up the job you would be sucking at for someone who wants to use it to advance their life and be productive.
Another aspect that motivates me for BI is that more and more jobs are being automated, and that's not going to stop. At some point it's going to be extremely difficult to find a job paying enough for everyone without good skills. We're going to have to support those people somehow through welfare, homeless shelters, SNAP, WIC, Medicare, Medicaid, ACA . . . All the administrative work those programs require is complete waste, friction in the engine of society. Let's find a more efficient way to provide a more dignified system.
That doesn't make any sense. If I pay you $100 and take back $99, how much am I really giving you?
That was my first thought as well, that it would be more efficient to skip taxing people who didn't work extra. However, it's probably more efficient to simply collect a flat tax for everyone. It's about eliminating the waste of needs-assessment and different scales. I'm no expert of course, and this is something that will be tested out in different countries to find an optimum. Obviously the BI and tax would have to be chosen so the after-tax BI actually covered the basics as intended.
So does that mean you get more money if you have kids? I can think of a few ways that this would get abused. In fact I already know how a similar system is already abused in the US.
The proposal I read about most provided a smaller BI for each child and elderly adult in the household. Yes, this will be abused by some, but it's blown way out of proportion today anyway. And being able to cover the basics and work to increase that without losing those basics will hopefully alleviate much of the impetus to cheat the system. I suspect most people who would be tempted to do that would prefer to play video games than raise more kids.
Most people on a minimum wage don't have that option. "Boss, I demand twice the minimum wage!" "Great, you're fired. Good luck finding that wage with your skill set."
But with a BI taking care of the minimum part of the wage, they can now choose to work extra for luxuries or not and go without them. And now that there's no minimum wage, companies can lower their wages and let the market force them up.
Sure, that same person above with no additional skills will have the same few jobs to choose from, but at least now they can flip the bird to an employer who won't pay more without worrying about covering food and rent for the month. They can take time off to learn a new skill and improve their wage. If the employer has to pay too much, they can invest in technology to automate the job.
This neatly addresses one of the things I've always thought was interesting about the restaurant industry. At least on TV (yes, yes, I know) the mantra is one-third on food, one-third on rent/utilities, and one-third on labor. But while the costs of the first two continue to drop due to technology and scale, the last one remains fixed. How, then, can a restaurant maintain that balance without constantly raising prices? Paying low wages.
The BI would break that cycle and allow the wages to fall to the point where people wouldn't be willing to work for it—and could choose to do so without starving or living on the street. Food prices would come down as a result which means more money for other expenses. The wage would have to equalize at a point where people wanted to work for it or the industry automated those jobs away, and the workers would go do something else.
I agree it sounds all too neat and simple, but sometimes the best solutions are exactly that. IIRC, the Netherlands and Finland are already—or soon will be—running fairly extensive BI experiments. I'm excited to see the results!
Yes, it is immoral to keep people from starving in the streets.
I simply can't fathom how ensuring everyone has equal access to a dignified life with basic food, clothing and shelter could possibly be immoral. You'll either have to try to explain how that is or accept that your morals differ wildly from many people here.
In the USSR people didn't pay taxes. . . . People simply made their pay levels across the country.
Under a BI system,
It meant that it doesn't matter, you could be a director, a teacher, a doctor, a factory worker, a construction worker. You had a set salary and you didn't know any other way.
This is not how a BI system works. Everyone gets the same monthly BI stipend simply for being alive. Beyond that, each person is free to work—or not—as many jobs for whatever salary they can negotiate with their employer. Doctors will still make more than janitors, but the latter will be much more free to pick up and move, start a new career, or even start a business than they are now.
What was that sound? Did I just hear a massive, simultaneous erection from the libertarians out there? :)
Obviously the reality is that while everybody's productivity was comparatively tiny, everybody's salaries had nothing to do with their productivity. That WAS 'basic income'.
That's not basic income at all. It runs totally counter to BI as I explained above.
Yes, it is immoral to enslave even one person to keep thousands alive.
It's not slavery as anyone is free to pack up and move to a new society if they choose. Or just collect your damn check and smoke pot all day. We already pay taxes for societal goods, and much of that is wasted administering all these disparate needs-based programs. Not paying for the programs; paying administrators to perform assessments to approve or deny claims. All that waste would be freed up for the public good, and people wouldn't have to submit to such degrading invasions of their privacy.
No, you're supposed to pee into one if you take medications.
"You can't really measure the surface temperature from a satellite."
"Go ahead and show me a surface temperature record made from a satellite."
link to satellite surface temperature data
"Those are the . . . temperature of the surface itself."
Seriously?
If you can't correctly formulate your own question, don't balk when someone answers the one you actually asked. Next time try, "My bad, I meant to say surface air temperature but was in a rush. Is it possible to get that via satellites?" Instead, you went with being an ass and acting like it was the other person's fault for not reading your mind. Good call!
Let me sit back and see you try to come up with proof that CO2 traps energy.
How has the world raised such horribly lazy people? The second video result provides a very simple demonstration of the greenhouse effect, but if you genuinely want to understand it, there are many papers and books you can read about it. Prove to us that you truly seek knowledge by searching for—and reading—any one of them.
Did you take a chemistry, physics or biology class in high school or university? If so, congratulations! You were practicing science by using the scientific method to test predictions through experimentation. At that moment, you were a scientist.
I think pteddy knows they're an asshole. They were just surprised to find out they are a "type A" asshole. Many people don't realize just how many asshole types there are in this crazy world. :p
Even better, embed the typos and grammatical errors in the test itself so they don't suspect it's part of the test. Then use eye-tracking software while they're taking the test so you can spot when they notice the errors.
No, we shouldn't roll our own bigmath libraries, or nosql implementations. But what lazy-assed devs would import an external dependency for something as trivial as padding a string?
So you're okay with risking the sudden loss of a multi-thousand line library, but God forbid someone risk having to rewrite eleven lines?
Obviously, the solution is to make a copy of all dependencies. Problem solved.
The FBI is making it difficult for law-abiding citizens to rely on encryption for security yet doing absolutely nothing to stop criminals and "the terrorists" from doing so because, as you said, they can't. So why bother? Why endanger everyone else for zero gain?
In areas where it is a certainty (earthquakes in California, Floods in other parts of the country), the insurance companies step back and don't insure.
Hmm, someone should really tell these guys they're doing it wrong.
Allow the use of Markdown for comments. I rarely even hand-write HTML in my day job.
I'm all for easier colonoscopies every four* years, but I'm really curious how light this will make glasses and improve contact lenses (which are already essentially weightless). Science does indeed kick ass!
Sweet! I'm pretty sure inhaling graphene microdust will prove to have no long term health effects.
The OP obviously meant real football, y'know, the one where you carry and throw around an oblong "ball" with your "armfeet".