Worse: the guy is probably going to face some flak from his superiors over this. His bosses and coworkers probably didn't think much about his shirt, if they even noticed it: it looks more like tattoo art than "pin up girls" and calling it "mysogenic" as one newspaper did is a bit silly. But now that the press is all over it, they can't let it slide. I don't know what is worse: people looking at everything with a magnifying glass so they can find something to feel offended by, or the people who take the "perennially offended" seriously.
Belief is not the same as religion,and certainly not any religion in particular. I don't know if belief is indeed a defect, or genetic, or a mental condition beyond one's control, but it's plausible. But there's no mental condition that makes you a Muslim or Christian or Hindu. Those are determined by your environment, and in those cases you do have a choice. A hard choice for sure: if you grow up in a deeply religious family, you'll have a hard time switching to a different one. But by the same token, someone being brought up in a deeply racist family will have a hard time accepting the notion of the equality of races. I do not judge someone for being religious, but I do judge them by the values they embrace and the actions resulting from those values.
It is the author of this silly article who cannot tell the difference between (threats of) rape and offensive statements:
Gendered bigotry against women is widely considered to be “in bounds” by Internet commenters (whether they openly acknowledge it or not), and subsequently a demographic that comprises half of the total human population has to worry about receiving rape threats, death threats, and the harassment of angry mobs simply for expressing their opinions.
The language is a bit convoluted, but the author implies that these threats are the result of online misogyny ("gendered bigotry", really?), or at least that ending online misogyny would put an end to death threads as well. This sounds like one of those cases where harassment automatically is blamed on bigotry, instead of accepting the fact that people often simply dislike you for your actions and opinions and not for your gender or ethnicity. It's easy to make that mistake (especially as an outside observer) because once those threats and insults materialize, they often do contain sexual or racial slurs.
Before asserting that death and rape threats are the result of online bigotry, at the very least one should examine who exactly is getting these threats. Hint: it's not just women and minorities; it happens to plenty of white males. The language in those threats might be less racial or sexual, but they are threats just the same.
Expense claims should be a matter of public record since it is our money they are spending, but again only the relevant data should be exposed: how much and on what, but not where. Interestingly, while the gun owner info was freely given, the government agencies fight requests for expense reports tooth and nail. Personally I would like to know why a 10 person junket from my city's government to NYC ended up costing over €300k. Now I don't expect high ranking officials to travel coach, but I do expect them to be somewhat careful with public funds. When they aren't, we have a need and a right to know.
Same idiocy happened here in the Netherlands when a journalist, someone with extreme leftist connections and a known ETA (terrorist organization) sympathizer, requested the names and addresses of firearms license holders under open government laws. In the end, the guy did not get the requested info i.e. name and address, photo, and serial numbers of the weapons, but he did get a list of date of birth and city of residence of each license holder as well as the manual for Verona, the software that tracks firearm licenses. As a gun owner, the idea of government freely handing this info to people closely tied to ETA terrorists somehow does not give me a warm cozy feeling about sensitive data being in safe governmental hands.
It's very simple: "open government" means that the government should disclose information on the details of their own operation, but never information that can be tied to individuals, except where it concerns information on holders of public office that is relevant to the right of the public to monitor them. Only aggregated data on citizens should be disclosed. And for civil servants or elected officials, relevant data means stuff like expense claims, not stuff like their address, records of previous employment or registered religion.
I would definitely recommend to go with a reputable external consultant when it comes to getting started with queries and reports. They will be able to come up with good questions to get from your data, but more importantly they can help avoid bad answers. For instance, given the initials, height, eye color, age and other such data of presidential candidates, I can probably come up with a filter that will correctly indicate whether or not the candidate won the elections, based on the data. But how useful is that filter for predicting the outcome of the next election? That is the pitfall of big data.
I can see some advantages, especially if it'll be easy for 3rd parties to develop modules for this thing. Currently, if your phone doesn't support NFC payments, doesn't have good fingerprint scanner, or is missing some other feature, you're stuck. Other phones will have these features but will be missing others. In this design you can customize and add what you want; addition, you might want some features only some of the time. Don't need a camera today? Swap it for a battery. There might be a market for niche applications as well: a credit card scanner for handheld POS applications, a custom NFC module for ID or building access, a Zwave/Zigbee module for home automation, a glucose reader for diabetics, a Braille module, etc.
The real question is: will these advantages outweigh the disadvantages that you mentioned? I think it will, but only for a small group of people. I never said this couldn't be done but I have my doubts about this being commercially viable, and Google getting in on the game hasn't convinced me otherwise.
They are the Apple of office chairs: overhyped, overpriced, and the yardstick by which competing products are measured, but they fulfil the needs of some people so well that the higher price tag is justified. I had an Aeron at the office for a while, and liked it a lot; I subsequently got one for my home office as well.
Then a man feeling uncomfortable can be a sign he's being discriminated against.
I never said or implied otherwise.
Take my bullshit feelings seriously and I'll take your bullshit feelings seriously.
Better to not complain about feelings at all if they are "bullshit", but in any case, what goes for the man goes for the woman, as I stated in my previous post.
As to sexist jokes etc... simply saying "there is a lot of dick here" is not evidence of discrimination or sexist jokes. Sometimes you go to an all male work place and there are no jokes of any kind what so ever. Just work.
Sometimes, yes. And in other cases the jokes are there. The less diverse the workplace, the likelier this is.
Trying to play on pathetic stereotypes and project them on every situation where you're not happy for some reason is not acceptable.
Neither is dismissing claims of discrimination or other inappropriate behaviour out of hand in every situation. Be careful not to fall into the same trap yourself.
If you have an issue, show evidence please. The burden of proof is on you.
What you have is lots of cock in some places. An issue answered with the statistical graduation rates of women with skills required for those professions. So that was the only bit of evidence and it is countered.
I never supported the notion that the cause for the shortage of women in technical professions is caused by inappropriate behaviour in predominantly male environments. My point was that the counter-arguments do not prove that such inappropriate behaviour doesn't occur in the workplace. The fact that it occurs more frequently in less diverse environments is well-documented. No links, you can do your own homework. And by the tone of your posts I'd say you are living proof of this.
No. A women feeling uncomfortable in a predominantly male group can bea sign that someone is discriminating against her or showing her disrespect. It can also mean that she is incapable of adapting to a more or less normal environment. The fact that some women claim to be discriminated against at every setback does not disprove the fact that sexist jokes or more serious discrimination tends to happen more often in less diverse groups. Whether or not her "personal response to a given situation" is appropriate depends to a large degree on the situation, wouldn't you say?
In a normal workplace, men try not to make sexist jokes, women try not to dress overly sexy, and people in general only complain about stuff that actually matters, try to solve minor things in an amicable fashion, and don't flip out over every little thing that bugs them. You are responsible for her feeling uncomfortable if you make sexist jokes, just as she is responsible for your discomfort if she dresses like a slut. Now I fully agree that there is hypocrisy, that in our society the burden of both being accommodating to others and being mindful of others' sensitivities typically falls squarely on the shoulders of the White Male and on no one else's, and that some people take full advantage of that fact. But that doesn't mean that there is no real discrimination going on. That was my point.
That doesn't mean that the the lack of diversity hasn't resulted in discrimination. I can well believe that some women feel more uncomfortable in an all-male environment... and that some men in an all-woman workplace (daycare, education) feel uncomfortable too. Some individuals adapt better than others who feel they have to deny their own "cultural identity", demand their every whim is fulfilled, or blame every setback and failure to connect to others on the group's lack of inclusiveness. And some groups are easier on outsiders than others: not making sexist jokes helps. The burden is on the group as well as the woman.
No, but firing antitank missiles at a building under construction is a bit more extreme than, say, cutting hoses at gas stations, climbing the fence of a nuclear plant and leaving a protest banner, throwing paint bombs at politicians' houses or sending them death threats, or vandalising GM farms and animal testing labs. You know, the usual shenanigans our green politicians' were up to in their younger years.
Yes, but certainly not just the insurance companies. I see the same issues in my own country with its weird system (insurance is private but it's mandatory to have it). In our case at least I suspect that there is some collusion between insurers going on; competition is failing. And if there is no real competition or no way for one insurer to get much better prices than others, do you think insurers will prefer a $100 bill for setting a bone, or a bill for $2.000? They'll just up the premiums.
Terrorist-turned-politician, that seems to happen relatively often in such circles, though few are as extreme as this case. And I for one am not all that happy to see these guys in parliament. Our laws (in NL) allow for disenfranchisement from passive voting rights, but in practise it never happens. Even the killers of Fortuyn (a prominent politician) and van Gogh (film director and columnist with strong opinions against islam) can still run for public office, even though they are perpetrators of political murder and terrorism.
Where in that post was any racism implied? Or are you suggesting that his post is racist because coloured folks tend to be poor more often than white folks? That makes you the racist, not him.
"You can have your monopoly if I get my cut, in the form of handouts to the needy that make me look like a good and caring politician." And you're right: other subscribers will pay for this.
Here in the Netherlands we have many, many examples of deals (sometimes forced, sometimes voluntary) between government and companies, where the latter receive some perks in return for doing something charitable for the community. It sounds good, but the devil isn't in the handouts but in the perks, and the motivations of those arranging the deals always have some selfish ulterior motive. And the results are almost always crap. I'm a big believer in a clear delineation between public and private activities. If the community wants broadband for the poor, the community should vote for it and pay for it from public funds, not ask or force a corporation to provide this in return for favours agreed upon in back room deals.
Exactly. And not just for a multi user situation, but also to provide lag-free looking around for a single person; a motorised setup + network will always have a noticeable and annoying delay. We suggested just this to the manufacturer when we looked into remote-presence robots.
There's a big difference between "we want to send up stuff, work with us to design and develop a vehicle" and "we'd like to send some stuff up using that nice rocket you have there". To use a car analogy, it's the difference between outlining the design for a car and asking Toyota to work out the details and build you one, and flagging down a cab (or buying a cab and have the driver set fire to it once you reach the destination, since these aren't reusable rockets). That's a bit more than shifting the risk around a little. That's my take on what "commercial space flight" means: private companies instead of public organisations leading and funding the design and development of (new) space craft, assuming *all* risk for the project and for market economics. It's not new (OS have been around for a while already) but it does appear to be taking off (ha ha) lately.
Besides program management, didn't NASA also provide the funding for research, design and testing that went into the development of their rockets? If so, that's a significant difference. Orbital Sciences and SpaceX weren't paid to develop a rocket, they did so on their own dime (even if Orbital uses surplus parts for theirs), then offered rides to interested parties. Commercial launches may not be exactly new, but privately funded development of spacecraft is. It's a bit too early to say if that will lead to better and cheaper space flight though, but at least SpaceX is coming up with some promising developments.
In principle that sounds like a good idea; the nice thing is that it accounts for robotic labour as well since that adds to the GDP. But before you can distribute part of the GDP as a basic stipend, you have to collect it as taxes first. Then how to account for a largely robotic factory that contributes greatly to the GDP but generates only very little tax revenue from income taxes and corporate tax? Raise the corporate tax too far, and that factory will take its business elsewhere. Your tax model would need to reflect that.
I can see a few other economic issues as well. In an economic downturn, basic income would drop along with the GDP, slamming the brakes on consumption, thus pushing the economy further into a recession.
Before we begin to stop thinking that, we'll have to consider a few hard questions. In the Netherlands, there is a growing group of people who have no intention to ever apply for a paying job; they are happy to get by on state benefits, some odd jobs on the side, and a more simple lifestyle. For some this is a life choice, but for others it's a matter of financial incentives: these people could perhaps find work, but would you get up early 5 days a week to work for a tiny increase in your income? In fact, the net family income may in some cases actually be lower compared to being on the dole, as workers lose municipal benefits and tax exemptions that the unemployed enjoy. Our labor participation rate stands at around 65%; at some point this system simply becomes unsustainable. If we would provide a basic income to everyone, I suspect that a great many people would still want to work, but they'd work a great deal less, and productivity would drop. Then you'd end up having to raise taxes for the remaining workers, reducing the incentive to work even further.
So:
- How would we make the economics of this work? Do we tax differently? And how do we then ensure that we remain competitive as a nation? Or would we move to a socialist model in which the state runs a couple of (highly automated) businesses, and using the proceeds to provide for its citizens? I'm no socialist, but Marx' question about the ownership of the means of production will become an important one in an extremely automated society.
- How big a slice of the pie would non-workers get, what do we consider to be basic necessities? A home, 3 squares a day, and education and health care, sure. But dish washers, cars, holidays, day care?
- Which leads to another important question: what perks and privileges do tax paying workers get? For one, I would say the right to vote; at least voting on budgetary matters should be reserved to those footing the bill, and perhaps the right to vote in general as well.
It's not the laws or the bureaucracy; it starts with the politicians. Now, I can see how in a world of bloated laws, this law and this practice creeps in, but when any decent politician hears about what is going on, there is only one right response from them. Not "We'll investigate" or "We must weigh individual rights against our duty to protect the people against criminals" or "A change in policy needs careful consideration", but only "This ends now". They are all aware this is going on after several newspapers and others (John Oliver etc) have brought attention to it. So why are you not hearing politicians demand that this ends, from your congressmen, secretaries of state, or your president? The fact that you're not hearing any of them tells you something about the kind of men and women that get elected to public office these days.
By the way, here in Europe, every now and then an issue similar in gravity to this one comes up, and the political reaction is the same indifference. So you're not alone.
I love self-checkout. I've tried it in a few places: Ikea, AH (a Dutch supermarket chain), and Leclerc (a French supermarket). Ikea and Leclerc basically have an unmanned checkout lane: you scan all your items there, pay, and leave with/without a random spot check. The French one was confusing (and it didn't like my credit card), but the Ikea one works well; I never see many people struggling with it.
And the AH system is one where you pick up a handheld scanner as you enter the store, scan your purchases as you go along, and deposit the scanner in a rack at the end after which you pay and leave. It's a popular system, I've never seen anyone struggle with it other than an elderly person asking a store clerk how to remove an item from the list. And it saves time: no need to pack everything from a cart or basket onto a conveyor belt and into a bag; I scan and bag as I go along, pay and leave. My local AH has no scanners and I've stopped going there, I now frequent one a bit further away just for the convenience.
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Worse: the guy is probably going to face some flak from his superiors over this. His bosses and coworkers probably didn't think much about his shirt, if they even noticed it: it looks more like tattoo art than "pin up girls" and calling it "mysogenic" as one newspaper did is a bit silly. But now that the press is all over it, they can't let it slide. I don't know what is worse: people looking at everything with a magnifying glass so they can find something to feel offended by, or the people who take the "perennially offended" seriously.
Belief is not the same as religion,and certainly not any religion in particular. I don't know if belief is indeed a defect, or genetic, or a mental condition beyond one's control, but it's plausible. But there's no mental condition that makes you a Muslim or Christian or Hindu. Those are determined by your environment, and in those cases you do have a choice. A hard choice for sure: if you grow up in a deeply religious family, you'll have a hard time switching to a different one. But by the same token, someone being brought up in a deeply racist family will have a hard time accepting the notion of the equality of races. I do not judge someone for being religious, but I do judge them by the values they embrace and the actions resulting from those values.
Gendered bigotry against women is widely considered to be “in bounds” by Internet commenters (whether they openly acknowledge it or not), and subsequently a demographic that comprises half of the total human population has to worry about receiving rape threats, death threats, and the harassment of angry mobs simply for expressing their opinions.
The language is a bit convoluted, but the author implies that these threats are the result of online misogyny ("gendered bigotry", really?), or at least that ending online misogyny would put an end to death threads as well. This sounds like one of those cases where harassment automatically is blamed on bigotry, instead of accepting the fact that people often simply dislike you for your actions and opinions and not for your gender or ethnicity. It's easy to make that mistake (especially as an outside observer) because once those threats and insults materialize, they often do contain sexual or racial slurs.
Before asserting that death and rape threats are the result of online bigotry, at the very least one should examine who exactly is getting these threats. Hint: it's not just women and minorities; it happens to plenty of white males. The language in those threats might be less racial or sexual, but they are threats just the same.
Expense claims should be a matter of public record since it is our money they are spending, but again only the relevant data should be exposed: how much and on what, but not where. Interestingly, while the gun owner info was freely given, the government agencies fight requests for expense reports tooth and nail. Personally I would like to know why a 10 person junket from my city's government to NYC ended up costing over €300k. Now I don't expect high ranking officials to travel coach, but I do expect them to be somewhat careful with public funds. When they aren't, we have a need and a right to know.
Same idiocy happened here in the Netherlands when a journalist, someone with extreme leftist connections and a known ETA (terrorist organization) sympathizer, requested the names and addresses of firearms license holders under open government laws. In the end, the guy did not get the requested info i.e. name and address, photo, and serial numbers of the weapons, but he did get a list of date of birth and city of residence of each license holder as well as the manual for Verona, the software that tracks firearm licenses. As a gun owner, the idea of government freely handing this info to people closely tied to ETA terrorists somehow does not give me a warm cozy feeling about sensitive data being in safe governmental hands.
It's very simple: "open government" means that the government should disclose information on the details of their own operation, but never information that can be tied to individuals, except where it concerns information on holders of public office that is relevant to the right of the public to monitor them. Only aggregated data on citizens should be disclosed. And for civil servants or elected officials, relevant data means stuff like expense claims, not stuff like their address, records of previous employment or registered religion.
How the fuck is that "harmful"?
Because every time you believe in a general purpose processor, a kitten dies
I would definitely recommend to go with a reputable external consultant when it comes to getting started with queries and reports. They will be able to come up with good questions to get from your data, but more importantly they can help avoid bad answers. For instance, given the initials, height, eye color, age and other such data of presidential candidates, I can probably come up with a filter that will correctly indicate whether or not the candidate won the elections, based on the data. But how useful is that filter for predicting the outcome of the next election? That is the pitfall of big data.
I can see some advantages, especially if it'll be easy for 3rd parties to develop modules for this thing. Currently, if your phone doesn't support NFC payments, doesn't have good fingerprint scanner, or is missing some other feature, you're stuck. Other phones will have these features but will be missing others. In this design you can customize and add what you want; addition, you might want some features only some of the time. Don't need a camera today? Swap it for a battery. There might be a market for niche applications as well: a credit card scanner for handheld POS applications, a custom NFC module for ID or building access, a Zwave/Zigbee module for home automation, a glucose reader for diabetics, a Braille module, etc.
The real question is: will these advantages outweigh the disadvantages that you mentioned? I think it will, but only for a small group of people. I never said this couldn't be done but I have my doubts about this being commercially viable, and Google getting in on the game hasn't convinced me otherwise.
They are the Apple of office chairs: overhyped, overpriced, and the yardstick by which competing products are measured, but they fulfil the needs of some people so well that the higher price tag is justified. I had an Aeron at the office for a while, and liked it a lot; I subsequently got one for my home office as well.
Then a man feeling uncomfortable can be a sign he's being discriminated against.
I never said or implied otherwise.
Take my bullshit feelings seriously and I'll take your bullshit feelings seriously.
Better to not complain about feelings at all if they are "bullshit", but in any case, what goes for the man goes for the woman, as I stated in my previous post.
As to sexist jokes etc... simply saying "there is a lot of dick here" is not evidence of discrimination or sexist jokes. Sometimes you go to an all male work place and there are no jokes of any kind what so ever. Just work.
Sometimes, yes. And in other cases the jokes are there. The less diverse the workplace, the likelier this is.
Trying to play on pathetic stereotypes and project them on every situation where you're not happy for some reason is not acceptable.
Neither is dismissing claims of discrimination or other inappropriate behaviour out of hand in every situation. Be careful not to fall into the same trap yourself.
If you have an issue, show evidence please. The burden of proof is on you. What you have is lots of cock in some places. An issue answered with the statistical graduation rates of women with skills required for those professions. So that was the only bit of evidence and it is countered.
I never supported the notion that the cause for the shortage of women in technical professions is caused by inappropriate behaviour in predominantly male environments. My point was that the counter-arguments do not prove that such inappropriate behaviour doesn't occur in the workplace. The fact that it occurs more frequently in less diverse environments is well-documented. No links, you can do your own homework. And by the tone of your posts I'd say you are living proof of this.
No. A women feeling uncomfortable in a predominantly male group can be a sign that someone is discriminating against her or showing her disrespect. It can also mean that she is incapable of adapting to a more or less normal environment. The fact that some women claim to be discriminated against at every setback does not disprove the fact that sexist jokes or more serious discrimination tends to happen more often in less diverse groups. Whether or not her "personal response to a given situation" is appropriate depends to a large degree on the situation, wouldn't you say?
In a normal workplace, men try not to make sexist jokes, women try not to dress overly sexy, and people in general only complain about stuff that actually matters, try to solve minor things in an amicable fashion, and don't flip out over every little thing that bugs them. You are responsible for her feeling uncomfortable if you make sexist jokes, just as she is responsible for your discomfort if she dresses like a slut. Now I fully agree that there is hypocrisy, that in our society the burden of both being accommodating to others and being mindful of others' sensitivities typically falls squarely on the shoulders of the White Male and on no one else's, and that some people take full advantage of that fact. But that doesn't mean that there is no real discrimination going on. That was my point.
That doesn't mean that the the lack of diversity hasn't resulted in discrimination. I can well believe that some women feel more uncomfortable in an all-male environment... and that some men in an all-woman workplace (daycare, education) feel uncomfortable too. Some individuals adapt better than others who feel they have to deny their own "cultural identity", demand their every whim is fulfilled, or blame every setback and failure to connect to others on the group's lack of inclusiveness. And some groups are easier on outsiders than others: not making sexist jokes helps. The burden is on the group as well as the woman.
No, but firing antitank missiles at a building under construction is a bit more extreme than, say, cutting hoses at gas stations, climbing the fence of a nuclear plant and leaving a protest banner, throwing paint bombs at politicians' houses or sending them death threats, or vandalising GM farms and animal testing labs. You know, the usual shenanigans our green politicians' were up to in their younger years.
Yes, but certainly not just the insurance companies. I see the same issues in my own country with its weird system (insurance is private but it's mandatory to have it). In our case at least I suspect that there is some collusion between insurers going on; competition is failing. And if there is no real competition or no way for one insurer to get much better prices than others, do you think insurers will prefer a $100 bill for setting a bone, or a bill for $2.000? They'll just up the premiums.
Terrorist-turned-politician, that seems to happen relatively often in such circles, though few are as extreme as this case. And I for one am not all that happy to see these guys in parliament. Our laws (in NL) allow for disenfranchisement from passive voting rights, but in practise it never happens. Even the killers of Fortuyn (a prominent politician) and van Gogh (film director and columnist with strong opinions against islam) can still run for public office, even though they are perpetrators of political murder and terrorism.
Where in that post was any racism implied? Or are you suggesting that his post is racist because coloured folks tend to be poor more often than white folks? That makes you the racist, not him.
"You can have your monopoly if I get my cut, in the form of handouts to the needy that make me look like a good and caring politician." And you're right: other subscribers will pay for this.
Here in the Netherlands we have many, many examples of deals (sometimes forced, sometimes voluntary) between government and companies, where the latter receive some perks in return for doing something charitable for the community. It sounds good, but the devil isn't in the handouts but in the perks, and the motivations of those arranging the deals always have some selfish ulterior motive. And the results are almost always crap. I'm a big believer in a clear delineation between public and private activities. If the community wants broadband for the poor, the community should vote for it and pay for it from public funds, not ask or force a corporation to provide this in return for favours agreed upon in back room deals.
Exactly. And not just for a multi user situation, but also to provide lag-free looking around for a single person; a motorised setup + network will always have a noticeable and annoying delay. We suggested just this to the manufacturer when we looked into remote-presence robots.
There's a big difference between "we want to send up stuff, work with us to design and develop a vehicle" and "we'd like to send some stuff up using that nice rocket you have there". To use a car analogy, it's the difference between outlining the design for a car and asking Toyota to work out the details and build you one, and flagging down a cab (or buying a cab and have the driver set fire to it once you reach the destination, since these aren't reusable rockets). That's a bit more than shifting the risk around a little. That's my take on what "commercial space flight" means: private companies instead of public organisations leading and funding the design and development of (new) space craft, assuming *all* risk for the project and for market economics. It's not new (OS have been around for a while already) but it does appear to be taking off (ha ha) lately.
Besides program management, didn't NASA also provide the funding for research, design and testing that went into the development of their rockets? If so, that's a significant difference. Orbital Sciences and SpaceX weren't paid to develop a rocket, they did so on their own dime (even if Orbital uses surplus parts for theirs), then offered rides to interested parties. Commercial launches may not be exactly new, but privately funded development of spacecraft is. It's a bit too early to say if that will lead to better and cheaper space flight though, but at least SpaceX is coming up with some promising developments.
In principle that sounds like a good idea; the nice thing is that it accounts for robotic labour as well since that adds to the GDP. But before you can distribute part of the GDP as a basic stipend, you have to collect it as taxes first. Then how to account for a largely robotic factory that contributes greatly to the GDP but generates only very little tax revenue from income taxes and corporate tax? Raise the corporate tax too far, and that factory will take its business elsewhere. Your tax model would need to reflect that.
I can see a few other economic issues as well. In an economic downturn, basic income would drop along with the GDP, slamming the brakes on consumption, thus pushing the economy further into a recession.
Before we begin to stop thinking that, we'll have to consider a few hard questions. In the Netherlands, there is a growing group of people who have no intention to ever apply for a paying job; they are happy to get by on state benefits, some odd jobs on the side, and a more simple lifestyle. For some this is a life choice, but for others it's a matter of financial incentives: these people could perhaps find work, but would you get up early 5 days a week to work for a tiny increase in your income? In fact, the net family income may in some cases actually be lower compared to being on the dole, as workers lose municipal benefits and tax exemptions that the unemployed enjoy. Our labor participation rate stands at around 65%; at some point this system simply becomes unsustainable. If we would provide a basic income to everyone, I suspect that a great many people would still want to work, but they'd work a great deal less, and productivity would drop. Then you'd end up having to raise taxes for the remaining workers, reducing the incentive to work even further.
So:
- How would we make the economics of this work? Do we tax differently? And how do we then ensure that we remain competitive as a nation? Or would we move to a socialist model in which the state runs a couple of (highly automated) businesses, and using the proceeds to provide for its citizens? I'm no socialist, but Marx' question about the ownership of the means of production will become an important one in an extremely automated society.
- How big a slice of the pie would non-workers get, what do we consider to be basic necessities? A home, 3 squares a day, and education and health care, sure. But dish washers, cars, holidays, day care?
- Which leads to another important question: what perks and privileges do tax paying workers get? For one, I would say the right to vote; at least voting on budgetary matters should be reserved to those footing the bill, and perhaps the right to vote in general as well.
It's not the laws or the bureaucracy; it starts with the politicians. Now, I can see how in a world of bloated laws, this law and this practice creeps in, but when any decent politician hears about what is going on, there is only one right response from them. Not "We'll investigate" or "We must weigh individual rights against our duty to protect the people against criminals" or "A change in policy needs careful consideration", but only "This ends now". They are all aware this is going on after several newspapers and others (John Oliver etc) have brought attention to it. So why are you not hearing politicians demand that this ends, from your congressmen, secretaries of state, or your president? The fact that you're not hearing any of them tells you something about the kind of men and women that get elected to public office these days.
By the way, here in Europe, every now and then an issue similar in gravity to this one comes up, and the political reaction is the same indifference. So you're not alone.
If you kill the shortest third of all humans, the average height goes up immediately within the current generation.
I love self-checkout. I've tried it in a few places: Ikea, AH (a Dutch supermarket chain), and Leclerc (a French supermarket). Ikea and Leclerc basically have an unmanned checkout lane: you scan all your items there, pay, and leave with/without a random spot check. The French one was confusing (and it didn't like my credit card), but the Ikea one works well; I never see many people struggling with it.
And the AH system is one where you pick up a handheld scanner as you enter the store, scan your purchases as you go along, and deposit the scanner in a rack at the end after which you pay and leave. It's a popular system, I've never seen anyone struggle with it other than an elderly person asking a store clerk how to remove an item from the list. And it saves time: no need to pack everything from a cart or basket onto a conveyor belt and into a bag; I scan and bag as I go along, pay and leave. My local AH has no scanners and I've stopped going there, I now frequent one a bit further away just for the convenience.