Why Facebook should pay us a basic income | Hacker News Reader

Why Facebook should pay us a basic income

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17 pointschampagnepapi13 comments

I certainly refuse to log back in to Facebook unless they pay me.

It's not clear to me how universal basic income is any different than communism.

Its not equal distribution of all capital, its a guaranteed minimum to live which still allows for capitalism to operate and for people to get rich. In theory at least.

Sure. They’ll just raise your rent and you’ll be back to square one.

Basic income doesn’t fix demand and supply. It just increases demand which increases prices.

Australia has a great welfare program. However you see a large brain drain to US because smart people don’t want to be taxed just so it ends up in someone else’s pocket.

There are many holes in Basic income logic.

Prices already rise so it's not like that's some extra problem UBI adds. There needs to be some mechanism that ties UBI to inflation and cost of living, it's definitely not a fire and forget solution. However we already produce enough of the basics like food, water, and shelter for everyone in the US so why are people going without?

Well, this particular proposal is very socialistic, in that it's saying "I want these people to receive this benefit, and I want those people over there to pay for it." But that's any system of taxation, really. The difference is he's talking about confiscating revenue from a private company in particular (and outside the normal channels)

The author uses the Alaskan oil field payout as an example of a BI system - which it is. But a quick trip to a supermarket in Anchorage will show that even a $2000 payment doesn't go very far with their high cost of living.

Doing some envelope math will show that UBI can't be funded in the US at a meaningful level. Not to mention the potential resistance to stopping all current benefit payments in favor of UBI payments (no more Social Security, disability, WIC program, etc. -- the AARP will scream like banshees)

The difference is that value added taxation changes prices and reduces economic output. Lump sum (fixed) negative taxes (basic income) has no effect on prices making it economically more efficient.

Technically sales taxes in companies reduce marginal revenues so companies choose lower production levels.

Strictly speaking I was under the impression communism always meant controlling of the means of production, more loosely everyone works and is paid according to their abilities and needs.

Universal basic income sounds like ideally it sets the minimum bar at poverty, instead of nothing.

Communism dismisses markets as an economic resource allocation mechanism. Capitalism is based on markets.

Markets provide for economic efficiency. But this can be separated from equity. This is called the first economic welfare theorem or something like that.

Lump sum basic income is more efficient than income taxes in that it does not affect marginal decisions on income.

Milton Friedman (an ardent defendant of capitalism) defended this. I'm surprised he was not mentioned in the article.

I basically just moves the bottom rung above poverty, so these people can now spend and help the money velocity increase. Plus, they are no longer in poverty (hooray!)

Yes. It works as a fiscal policy instrument. But the important thing is that it doesn't affect prices. Messing with prices typically causes dead weight. Value added tax can redistribute wealth but has a clear overall economic cost. Lump sum income policies (negative income tax!) has no dead weight.

(1) It's partial. Communism would redistribute 100% of the GDP. Basic income would redistribute less than that. (Few proponents actually volunteer numbers though.)

(2) With complete wealth redistribution, the government must take over economic planning, and development, even to the point of mandatory career directives. UBI would hopefully leave enough that the existing incentives system would work without centralized planning.

It depends on how it's funded.

If it's funded by taxing personal or company income, then yes, it's pretty close to communism (or socialism really).

If it's funded by land and resources taxes - i.e. taxes on unearned rents - then it isn't communism, it's justice.

See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgism

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