Hacker News Reader

Comment by chunsj | Hacker News Reader

Basic income is not free money, it's redistribution so that every people can live humane life.

Money comes from value and value comes from somewhere. If you receive a redistribution, you've not created value but you've received it. That's "free money".

And remember friends, TANSTAAFL.

There are plenty of free lunches, they're called externalities, free rider problems, etc., etc.

For a maxim held by so many who flirt with economics, it's strange that so much of the field is explicitly about determining where the free lunches are.

The point of TANSTAAFL isn't that you'll never eat for free. It's that someone pays for your lunch. In an externality, someone pays for your lunch involuntarily.

And I don't think that makes it any more relevant as a maxim here. Social safety nets, welfare, and UBI are all giving lunches to people. Sometimes they produce net benefits, sometimes not.

Throwing in TANSTAAFL doesn't add anything to the discussion.

UBI represents a massive increase in the level of redistribution proposed, so it's important to remember that it is redistribution and the money will have to come from somewhere.

I think you're being willfully ignorant.

The point is that every lunch is non-free to some people, even if it is free to others.

You might thing it trite or a truism, but very many people forget that the billions/trillions for UBI is going to be very expensive for a lot of people.

Rent is also value that one didn't create. A way to fund basic income that particularly appeals to me is a land value tax, because resources that no one created (land, oil, etc.) don't rightfully belong to anyone and the benefits from those resources should be shared.

There is definateky value provided in exchange for rent. Rent is paying to stay in someone elses building or what not, not just the land. you are essentially paying the landlord instead of building your own home.

If you think there is no value to living inside, well, that's just delusional.

Sure, there is a component of rent that comes from the structure. But that isn't the component that causes the price difference between an apartment in San Francisco or Manhattan and the same size apartment in West Texas or Detroit.

That would be a limited supply of units in a high demand area causing the price difference, which is a fundamentally different argument

And what limits that supply? Some combination of a limited supply of land and limited planning permission, neither of which are created by the landlord and both of which could very reasonably be taxed.

A land value tax is a tax on the unimproved value of the land itself. If you improve it (build a house for example) you've created value, and that isn't included. The value added by the landowner is a small portion of the amount of rent you pay in San Francisco.

> There is definateky value provided in exchange for rent. Rent is paying to stay in someone elses building or what not, not just the land. you are essentially paying the landlord instead of building your own home.

True, renting isn't merely usage of the house; renting involves more than that. A landlord is required to maintain upkeep on the housing and ensure the property remains functioning. If you buy a house you need to pay for that yourself and the costs can be situationally high. (Disclaimer: I don't know if this is true in US, but its true in NL at least.)

> don't rightfully belong to anyone

Where did you get this idea?

I grant you that oil is found in and around the earth we all share. However, value comes in when you extract it into a usable form for others. I think you have to consider this value add when discussing resources. If you do, it tracks my original comment.

If you want to ignore the part where that money was taken from someone else, then sure it's free money.

Redistribution covers both sides of the transaction rather succinctly.

In the U.S., the top 0.001% already have UBI by virtue of the corrupting taint of lobbyists / super PACs influence greatly expanded corporate (capitalist) welfare using legitimized legal trickery (ie tax code, commercial&civil law), while the rest of the people subsidize trickle-down deception, massive tax-breaks, offshoring and so on (likely because they lack the political connections and grassroots organization+leadership to mount an effective opposition). The American Dream has withered for many whom feel diffusely angry for sliding into desperate, meaningless, retail, part-time jobs or idleness... drugs, alcohol, crime and Trumpistan are just the unfortunate symptoms of oversupply of labor and the need for many more businesses to find sustainable, good-paying jobs that add value so people can choose to have some purpose and self-confidence.

What has worked:

- Stronger (ie sans "right-to-work")/more-effective/less-corrupt unions

- Much higher, graduated corporate tax rates

- Simplified, progressive personal & corporate income taxes (ie Norway's personal tax system by SMS is often quite user-friendly)