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Comment by anonporridge | Hacker News Reader

Make work, bullshit jobs is basically a crude mechanism for a kind of UBI for many people.

Our governments are deeply disincentivized to cleanup these inefficiencies because it means higher unemployment.

This is one of the reasons I'm a strong supporting of an actual UBI + universal healthcare. If people's lives aren't destroyed and driven to death by poverty if they don't have a job, then there won't be as much moral and political hazard to eliminating bullshit jobs in favor a system that works better for all of us.

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Replacing bullshit jobs with UBI takes away many ways that important emotional needs are met. Feeling useful, important, part of something bigger, respected, etc. These are very important for quality of life.

I would argue that it's worse to slowly come to the sickening realization that you're not actually useful. That the people around you just put up with you and give you something to occupy your time with out of pity.

If we make sure everyone's basic economic needs are met, then maybe they'll surprise you and find a job or social niche where they legitimately are useful and valued. But if you're economically imprisoned to your current job, then you won't have the time or freedom to explore.

Also, unemployment insurance and welfare as they are now are fundamentally different from UBI. The nature of these programs is "stay unemployed or economically useless, or else you lose the benefit" and it actively disincentivizes people from trying to contribute to society.

I take it you've not spent much time talking with people in bullshit jobs? Most would be thrilled to be paid to watch/teach their kids, or work on an artistic side-hustle or hobby. Work is just the stupid, pointless bullshit someone makes them do to have money, while taking time from them they could be using for things that are actually valuable. It's not meeting an emotional need or making them feel important. God, certainly not respected.

>Feeling useful, important, part of something bigger, respected, etc. These are very important for quality of life.

And it's pathologically toxic that we as a society believe the only valid way to meet those emotional needs is by providing value to a company in exchange for the means to survive.

I would side with the opposite: To make it easy to fire government employees (mostly leaders and managers) like we do in private industry. Deeply unpopular but I believe it’s the correct strategy. UBI is not fixing the underlying problem. Strong top down direction like Apple or Space X.

> UBI is not fixing the underlying problem.

I disagree entirely. The practical and moral reason why it's difficult to fire workers is because it generally results in the worker losing his income and healthcare, leading to personal and familial hardship. If healthcare were de-coupled from employment, then the hardship experienced by a fired worker is reduced. If some amount of income is de-coupled from employment, then the hardship experienced by a fired worker is further reduced (unemployment insurance works fine enough as a temporary band-aid, but it's not the real deal).

If we can get enough social infrastructure in place so that fired workers experience minimal hardship, then it becomes morally acceptable to make our government and companies more efficient, by laying off inefficient or unnecessary workers. Society then gets to equitably reap the rewards of this increased efficiency.

Relatedly, in theory it also makes it much easier for a worker in a "local maxima" of doing a job they dislike inefficiently so long as checks get cleared more of an incentive to quit on their own decision and find a better personal "efficiency" for their labor if they feel much more comfortable that they have a safety net if they decide to seek new options.

Along similar lines, it also reduces the risk of quitting to follow some entrepreneurial venture, potentially boosting innovation in addition to adding a force pushing the market towards decentralization, which is probably a good thing.

Along the same lines, it also (in theory) helps non bread winners in abusive domestic relationships leave the relationship, since they have a static income stream tied to themselves rather than being 100% dependent on their partner.

I like my job well enough and it pays well, but I eye climate.careers and my own side project meant to help address climate breakdown every day.

Yet I also have bills to pay and kids to feed, so they languish. This would help.

Of course, give them a chance to improve. Shift them to another position if they show curiosity or initiative. Obviously, if you think all people in the workforce are benevolent actors who deserve nothing but praise - you're deluded. There are people that weigh in on the rest of the team, ruin the culture and talk behind others' back. They're the troublemakers and should be fired.

The gov optimization function is to maximize production not employment. This is an ongoing fallacy in the political narrative but the unseen consequences of making up jobs is overall lower purchasing power.

There's also an element of keeping people busy so they don't have time to organize or challenge the status quo of power.

But how would you force people to vaccinate if they are on UBI and dont have to jump when their employer says so? Or do you crack the U of UBI then, attaching strings to the basic income to make people comply to what you want them to comply with?

Strings are always attached. Government does not work without regulations.

So the acronym should be changed to BI then. And if it is not U, I dont care supporting it politically...

Isn’t this a convoluted way of saying we have too many people?

Depends. Do you think the only reason people should exist is to serve the machine?

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