Why does this and general basic income generate so much anger?
If society makes progress and does move to a model where machines are doing most of the work, and there is more free time for people and most people don't need to do any work for their living or will not be able to find work for their living, we will definitely need to look at this model or any other alternate model that may come about as a result of natural experiences with such progress.
Sure, but it's being read as a pilot study for such things "at home", where it would most certainly have to be funded by taxes. Or at least this reading is GP's explanation for why people get angry.
When people are only discussing how best to spend 3rd world development aid, then nobody gets all that angry.
UBI is actually the only form of social net that tries its best to limit this.
(And it's not an easy problem to solve - a redistribution arrangement like UBI inherently involves some sort of "means testing" and must be phased out as one reaches the breakeven point where one starts "paying into" the system.
People who tell you that this isn't a thing and that UBI "gives money to everyone, or to the rich" are totally clueless. They fail to understand the basics about balancing a budget, never mind actual, non-trivial economics.)
I think that is the wrong focus. If we instead start with deciding “just” financing options, an make a public dividend it would be a good start.
One study concluded that an unconditional payout as low as $50/month can help some people tremendously (IIRC this was in Sweden)
“Just” financing to me is to recognize that some resources are truly part of the commons, and any expropriation should generate rent for everyone. Land being the typical example, but also things like fishing rights, carbon emission rights, or why not ipv4 networks and dns-domians.
If everyone gets $50 UBI bucks in the mail every month, and candidate A runs on the platform of raising it to $100 per month, they will guarantee themselves the support of some significant self-interested portion of society for whom this would be a net benefit. Other candidates would be pressured to make similar offers to compete. We already see this kind of thing (farm subsidies, student loan forgiveness, etc), UBI would be more explicit/immediate, and expand the affected block to include every eligible voter. Just how hesitant politicians are to make the needed reforms to social security, even though we all know that it needs to happen in some form. UBI would be worse.
There are so many homeless Americans because our government has failed to manage the resources of our country to provide even a basic poverty level standard of living for everyone. There are countless reasons and studies about how or why this occurred but I think the reality is rather simple. People in power exploit those they control to get more wealth and power. Whether it's the manager at mcdonalds or bezos himself, if they can abuse their power they will. The reason there is so much anger against handouts to the destitute is because this reduces the power these oligarchs hold. Unless you're topping Forbes richest list then you're a peon in their game and they're not going to capitulate to the life of a pleb without a fight that'd make Hitler look like Rosa parks.
We're at a point where machines are very clearly doing far less than a quarter of the work. I think it's more likely under 10%.
If you were right, right now we'd have true mass unemployment as we're nowhere near prepared for that level of automation in the global economy. The next tier of jobs are not here yet to absorb the labor. Scan from country to country, you'll find global unemployment has never been lower.
Further, if we were at that level of machine labor share, we would have likely seen a large increase in productivity or profitability in manufacturing. Manufacturers are not replacing humans en masse unless it makes a lot of business sense (in output, cost, or a combination; and we're not seeing anything even remotely close to those types of seismic-shift figures showing up in manufacturing numbers anywhere).
The vast majority of all manufacturing in China is still done by hand, with minimal machine contribution. They've barely begun to scratch the surface of machines taking over their manufacturing (and naturally they're freaking out about the future unemployment prospects of that, just as people in the US and elsewhere are). And Chinese manufacturing is further down the machine-adoption curve than other countries like Mexico or Vietnam.
We have hardly even automated a consequential share of the labor in your typical fast food chain. Globally we're just getting around to electronic ordering kiosks as the norm.
More generally, the only sensible answer is probably to divide labor productivity today with that of pre-industrial labor. Which amounts to approximately the ratio of GDPs. Which means about 500/50_000 (USD, very roughly). Which again leads to the conclusion that machines & automation are doing about 99% of the work, right now.
We don't have mass unemployment because all the people no longer working with their muscles have found other jobs, providing things other than food, which their ancestors simply didn't have. Like hospitals, HVAC, websites, and food stamp programs.
BTW both China and fast food are massively automated/mechanized. The price difference between McDonalds and having a personal chef cook you a similar burger is the degree to which machines have been used instead of human hands. The fact that none of them look like C-3PO is irrelevant.
True, if we include bureaucrats. Otherwise that's a just-so story leftists tell to cement their grip on power.
Despite the US Federal government controlling over 36% of all money spent in the economy, it's not enough cause oligarchs. Meanwhile our nomenklatura are pure of heart, selfless with only the interests of the people at heart.
To stop it, we need to make sure the government is telling everyone what to do and how to do it! It’s the only way!
Americans enjoy a higher general standard of living than most others in the developed world precisely because our government has a relatively hands off approach to "managing resources".
Homelessness is the result of addiction and mental illness. The government could pour huge sums of money (even more than it already does) into initiatives focused on addressing these issues and the broken people that comprise the homeless population will still not get better.
How can one come to this conclusion?
Does it account for the boost the US got for not being destroyed in WW2? For having tons of natural resources per capita? For having land borders with only 2 countries, neither of which can threaten it, and oceans on other sides?
I can easily see how there are more factors to the quality of life in America than the government being relatively “hands off” managing resources. Although, even that is tough to define as the US government is very hands on in many businesses.
I'd question that. Rich americans maybe. But the average american has to deal with long working hours, poor access to high quality food, extortionate costs for healthcare, cities where you can't walk anywhere, etc.
Homelessness is indeed a difficult issue. But what about the people working 2 or 3 minimum wage jobs. They'd benefit big time from mote government support.
I'd question that. Poor Americans maybe. But the average american has relatively average work hours[1], shops at large grocery stores or supercenters[2], and has among the highest median income in the world(adjusted for PPP)[3]
1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Working_time#OECD_ranking
2. https://www.ers.usda.gov/amber-waves/2015/august/most-us-hou...
3. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_income#Gross_median_hou...
On average, a full-time employee in United Stats works 1,768 hours per year, or 38.6 hours per week. By comparison, Europeans work up to 19 percent fewer hours annually compared to those working in the US.. Even more extreme On average, a full-time employee in Germany works 1,363 hours per year, or 34.3 hours per week That’s the equivalent of 26 days more per year full time Americans are working.
Median income PPP is not that great of a means for comparing standards of living. The US bottom 25th percentile earn less than 1/2 the 50th percentile. I would argue for disposable income PPP after taxes, food, shelter, and medical care at the bottom is more representative as a minimum standard of living.
>The US bottom 25th percentile earn less than 1/2 the 50th percentile.
Again, only considering the average American here. I would agree that it's worse to be poor in the US compared to a lot of other countries due to fewer social safety nets.
https://www.oecd.org/about/document/list-oecd-member-countri...
Citation needed.
You're wrong, but spout long since debunked victim blaming rhetoric as fact. Apt username.
This premise is false on its face, given how aggressively western countries are trying to encourage working age immigration. The entire developed world is facing shortages of construction workers, nurses, daycare workers, doctors, engineers, etc.
Jobs aren’t being automated away for you look at the labor force participation rate: https://www.bls.gov/emp/tables/civilian-labor-force-particip...
From 1998 to 2028, there will have been a sharp drop in the 16-24 age group. But there will have been only a few points drop among 24-55, and sharp increases among 55+ (which mostly happened from 1998 to 2008).
You just don't see now many thousands of billions of hours of hard, boring labor is done by machines every day, and mostly perfectly. It's truly marvelous. The fact that people are still homeless is a crime against humanity that rests squarely on the world leaders who allowed so a tragedy to occur. In a truly civilized society these leaders would imprisoned.
Want to really know how dann good you have it? Spend 10 years in the northern reaches of canada. I doubt You could survive the summer months. You can only bring the clothes on your back. No tools, supplies, books, or resources. If you want to take my bet drop me an email. I'm sure we can come to a fair wager.
Is it? Anyone with a reasonable understanding of the process of life knows how fragile a given (personal) status quo really is. Factor in the indirect costs to everyone for any single "failure" and only naivete can explain your assumption.
Note: I'm not saying your naive. I speaking of those who would fall under your the umbrella of your observation.
As a society, I think people are already conditioned to help out their "family" by their labors, but the education I was talking about should be geared towards thinking of every one has part of an extended "family" where some parts of the family need to be subsidized and that it is natural to do so :-).
The myth of the individual is a "modern" invention that has little if any historic support. To normalize that myth (read: false assumption) with the word natural is silly at best. Of course, those most susceptible to that ruse are typically the least likely to realize and/or admit they've been duped. Of course they want to believe everyone else was duped as well.
I hope this helps.
I think that statement is worth considering a bit more. For instance, Alaska and Saudi Arabia fit that description, setting aside whatever "on the land" means.
I don't know if people "get pissed" about it, but it has been noticed that such a situation oftentimes doesn't seem to result in a healthy economy/society.
And..just because Alaska isn't that bad doesn't mean it couldn't support the hypothesis. It's not California. Of course, California has a lot of resources too, so one could also say it's not New Jersey, or New York.
I suppose that Alaska does make a case that giving away a "citizens dividend" can be done without attracting the world to move there and making it unmanageable.
Of course a rich entity giving money to a limited number of poor people for a limited time will generate great results. Sure, a study is good but I would have guessed the correct outcome anyway. Now, compare this to a money transfer not from some rich external entity but from fellow citizens, countrywide, for generations. That's what basic income is. And it has very little to do with the study.
See Geolibertarianism for good start to learn about the argument https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geolibertarianism
The argument is that the value of the land itself is collectively created, so it is morally justifiable to capture this value for public benefit. On the other hand, improvements on a particular piece of land represent an individual's investment.
The fact that land rent correlates so well with locally-created value also makes it quite convenient as a source of funds for local government.
From a position of Rawls veil of ignorance, I don’t see how you could justify land title being granted on first come first served basis. Leased to the highest bidder (with a public dividend) seems much more agreeable.
Chances are, if I've got a high enough income to be net taxed for UBI based on income tax, I've also got a high enough land interest to be net taxed based on UBI based on land rent/property tax.
Personally, a system based on income tax works better for me, as I'd like to have some high income time, then retire and lower my tax burden. If land/property is a significant source of government revenue, I need to have a much larger reserve before I retire; it may be easier to accumulate, but it's a psychological barrier. If you're changing the rules after I've already retired though, I'm going to get out the torches and pitchforks.
On the contrary, many people retire to low-cost areas where land rents are incredibly low. You can also move to a smaller house or apartment and lower your land "footprint" that you would be paying rent on. (This is of course the gains you would realize by selling the larger property, in the absence of taxation on land rent. Since land rent tax does not substantially alter incentives.) And you need to pay tax on your retirement savings anyway, either at saving or withdrawal. It amounts to the same thing.
A large majority of citizens don’t own property, most have debt. And I would argue, mostly due to legislative capture from the few people who do own property. So when I think of the word “fellow citizens” attribute the word to how people in the first group relate to each other. The latter group would be fellow plutocrats.
For me land rent isn’t a tax, and it does not belong to the state in any shape or form. It’s about the commons and fundamental inalienable rights. Things I expect to see in the UNs declarations of human rights rather than in the tax-policy of the local government
1. Where do we get the money from?
2. What will be the long term effects of UBI and does it constitute progress compared to the current system.
I have no idea whether the math with Geolib checks out but even if it does, it only answers the first question. I just find it very amusing that UBI is aimed at fixing the inequality, yet its proponents are somehow oblivious to the obvious - UBI by design is increasing the inequality. UBI means the top 10% by income/wealth will receive exactly the same distributions as the bottom 10%. Jeff Bezos will be getting the same UBI as the bum on the street. How is that progress?
Whatever your ideology is, I don't think Jeff Bezos should have any fundamental inalienable right to land rent/tax.
I do think capitalists can perform a useful service by calculating risks an moving resources around to productive use. I do not think, however, that such work automatically should reward people with the right to extract rent from those resources for private gain. So I’ll happily grant Bezos an UBI as long as any rent extract from resources under his control is payed back to the commons.
Edit: Btw it’s not just about fixing inequality. For me it’s also the realization that markets are exceptionally bad at allocating resources to intrinsically motivated labor, biasing the whole economy toward optimizing for greed. An UBI could alleviate this problem somewhat by allowing more amateur work to flourish.
While there are people who hold extreme positions on redistribution, most people in general actually seem supportive of ameliorating the plight of the poor, and I would say broadly do believe that doing good for many at some expense of the few is justified. Many people even will go to great lengths and do charitable work among other things.
However, cash redistribution which is arguably a very effective way to accomplish the same thing still faces huge opposition. Suddenly otherwise charitable people will start talking about 'welfare' in disparaging tone and so on.
Paradoxically you were more likely to find support among people like Milton Friedman ("the thing poor people need the most is money") who was not exactly known for his left-wing views.
there is something different going on with cash redistribution that is separate from general notions of fairness. My guess is that there is still way too much cultural emphasis placed on the notion of work. People would rather have poor people receive a salary for meaningless menial work rather than just flat out receiving cash assistance.
Of course UBI and helicopter money ruffle feathers. They directly contradict the basic assumptions our political systems are thought to work on.
There is no reconciling these positions. Society is a struggle between them, with one side or the other gaining the upper hand at different times.
It seems you’re suggesting that certain current societal victories (like say Civil Rights) aren’t actually achievements of justice and fairness but merely “one side” and their arbitrary views having the “upper hand” today.
Many philosophers are going to say that’s completely wrong and that we can determine what justice actually is.
What are you talking about? I'm sorry but you don't understand basic Philosophy. Plenty of philosophers give answers. You're saying John Rawls dedicated his life to thinking about justice and came up with no 'answers'? Ridiculous.
John Rawls had some very nice ideas about justice but by no means did he settle the debate. For one thing, he was a utopian, opposed to property rights. That is unrealistic, unless you’re talking about some hypothetical post-human society.
To create any workable theory of justice, I think you should start with the basic assumption that you’re dealing with human beings who naturally incline towards competition and status-seeking. Envisioning a society without some of the traits of human nature is the epitome of Utopianism. You might be able to engineer these traits out of human beings but then you’re dealing with a post-human world.
and many proponents are really only trying to solve for "i don't want to experience poor people" rather than "i don't want people to be poor (especially if caused by automation i created)". you see this position a lot in comments here about homelessness in SF, for example.
UBI tries to solve a complicated problem (inequity) with a simple solution (the simplicitiy of which is irresistably attractive to makers of all sorts). inequity needs to be solved by healing the thousand cuts we've endured over the last 50 years, not with the tiny little band-aid that is UBI.
we need to fix the ways that plutocrats have tilted the economy in their favor. just around taxation: income tax rates, employment taxes, capital gains tax, depreciation, corporate loss-shifting, interest deduction, nearly every deductions actually, etc. moreso, lending (student loans, mortgages), insurance (healthcare), and real estate (literal rents) have become de facto ways of extracting rents out of the many for the few.
However, potentially UBI does more than you imagine. There are measurable differences in both behavior and development when meeting basic needs is a struggle. Rutger Bregman did a great job touching on some of the basics in this TED talk: https://www.ted.com/talks/rutger_bregman_poverty_isn_t_a_lac...
By giving low income people extra cushion (even a small one) you can improve their cognition and decision making, giving them a platform from which to improve their lives, pursue education, even innovate. All without complicated, difficult to implement and expensive social programs designed to achieve the same goals. Poverty squanders potential.
And then, of course, there is the oft talked about, and in my opinion self evidently valid, concern about an increasing number of white collar jobs being replaced by automation. At some point we'll have no choice but to come up with a solution for a shrinking pool of unskilled or semi-skilled jobs.
Conveniently the same process that will remove those jobs, will also make the production of the goods and services they relate to dramatically cheaper. UBI gives some of that surplus to the lower and middle classes, which is important given the danger that it would otherwise be absorbed by the rich.
having seen this in practice, i generally buy-in to this idea but disagree that UBI is the solution (i might buy that it could be a small, targeted part of a larger solution). fix systemic inequity. give disadvantaged folks dignity and fairness. they'll do the rest.
poverty may not even be the principal problem. don't try to step in to solve their "problem" for them, especially if you have no experience. let them do it. allow opportunities, listen, but don't just give solutions.
> "...in my opinion self evidently valid, concern about an increasing number of white collar jobs being replaced by automation."
entirely not self-evident and an overblown concern, given history. humans are infinitely creative. we'll do other stuff, or even change the system, in the pursuit of esteem.
In short, the benefits to the already employed should not be left out.
It's no doubt overly idealistic but I envision it as a new renaissance.
One thing is certain: as technology continues to make providing basic needs cheaper and cheaper, we need to come up with some way to give a significant part of that surplus to the masses.
The current system will allocate it to the 1% and we can look to science fiction for what happens after that.
What I find frustrating personally, living in the US, is the irrationally vehement opposition to the idea. Like universal healthcare, accessible higher education, affordable child care, sane vacation time, reasonable parental leave and etc.. the US will no doubt be decades behind the rest of the world here too.
inventing and making and doing is what should unlock profits, not simply just owning property (rents).
Politics has always generated anger, but I think there'd be less visceral hostility if people stopped reading Twitter and didn't watch MSNBC day in and day out.
I mean, I think there are plenty of other reasons as well, such as the effectiveness of such a program or trust that the people receiving the money won't use it on things the people giving the money deem immoral. But I think the big one is just that I believe most of us humans receive money by renting ourselves out for money and doing things we don't like, and instead of finding ways to receive money by renting out other things we own or by finding a thing we enjoy doing, we harp on those who do. (I think why Andre Yang is trying to frame a UBI as a dividend is that it reframes it into we as citizens own stock in the economy and should receive profit sharing...but that's a convo for another day)
I’m not opposed to basic housing and/or food instead - those are much simpler, as there is finite demand (in contrast to money), which can be planned for and satisfied.
So in general it’s the opposite, taking money out of bubble sinks and giving to people who will spend it on services will cause more circulation, not less.
If you raise the floor you are by definition making everyone else less wealthy by comparison, and therefore threatening the status of middle class persons as being significantly better than those on the bottom of society.
At least with means-tested welfare you can trap those people in a cycle of dependence and tell them what they can and cannot do in order to receive that help.
And often, these people wouldn't say the same about taxation that goes into funding the justice system - which is another means for society to improve stability and foster prosperity. But the justice they reach for is punitive, rather than rehabilitative, because again, it's their crab mentality that guides their policies.
All in all, I don't attribute the crab mentality as malice but insecurity.
Whether malice or insecurity or something else at the root, animus is the result at the surface.
I used to drive rideshare, and I heard perspectives on handouts to from my passengers that would peel paint.
This just is not a forum where such resentments can be acknowledged.