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Comment by lukifer | Hacker News Reader

A few counter-points to your framing:

- As more work becomes automated, it is more likely the owners of productive capital who would bear the brunt of the tax burden, not the minority of full-time laborers.

- Many valid forms of productive work do not necessarily pay a salary (raising children being the most obvious example, but also community service, open source projects, or rolling the dice on a startup). These still create value for society in ways that our current economy measures poorly.

- In a basic income environment, there is no reason for a minimum wage to exist. This would open the doors to many jobs that would otherwise be cost-prohibitive, whether people do it for the extra income, or for the other intangibles of employment.

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Why would I want to work, if I am just paid to do nothing? Minimum wage exists now and is raised every couple of years. You don't think the same thing will happen with basic income?

If it ever happens, I can see people eventually fighting for more, because it can't support a family of 4.

On top of this, it just creates a culture of dependence, which politicians love..because why would you vote against your own free handouts?

> Why would I want to work, if I am just paid to do nothing?

Try not working. Boredom is unbearable. Most people would do some kind of work even if they have enough money to spend the rest of their lives doing nothing.

I think you underestimate the number of consumers and how little many people need mental stimulation. In today's world, it's easy to stay occupied with nothing more than the content on a typical cable subscription.

I'm not one such person, even though I'm much more of a consumer than a producer (I read 4-5 books a month, watch probably 15-20 hours of TV a month and 2-3 movies a month), but I know people that watch 4-5 hours a night! It doesn't even have to be good content. Instead of going "I've seen this movie/show, or it's not very good," turning it off and doing something productive, they watch the lest boring thing on, even if it's a movie they've seen 3 times, and it's halfway over. It boggles my mind.

A couple of things.

1. Many people have an innate desire to do something productive. I might get paid to sit at home and do nothing, but in all that spare time I have been tinkering with electronics and now I've just invented a new robotic vacuum cleaner. Now I have a business and I'm making big money.

2. How much money and time and resources do we spend forcing people to work when they don't want to? There are people whose entire job revolves around forcing people to work, ensuring they're doing adequate work, and distributing government money to them anyway because their income from their forced job doesn't cover the bills. Why bother?

3. There are many things that would motivate a person to find a job, or find a better job. Not being able to support their family is one of them. Give them enough money to get by and if they want more they have to work. There's your motivation.

4. We already have a culture of dependence. What's wrong with that? Everyone depends on everyone else in a well-functioning society.

Why do freeloaders bother people so much? You can get paid to not work right now. I've done it, I've been on unemployment and food stamps when I legitimately needed the help. That's why I have no problem supporting the next person who needs help too. It's not a culture of dependence, it's a culture of support. And for the few who just don't want to work... who cares?

Why (if an alternative is feasible, as the basic income proponents would argue) _should_ people be forced by threat of destitution to "work" for a living? Why does it upset you that people might seek some increased freedom over how to spend their limited time? [There is, after all, a reason the term "wage slavery" came to be, extreme though the analogy it draws may be]

Wanting more is a fundamental human trait. Capitalism is built upon companies wanting more and competing against each other to get more profit. Doesn't that motivation hold true for people too?

Basic income proposals offer a very minimal income. Most people will want more. Do they want to visit far away places, or drive a nicer than minimal car, or live in a larger home. There are many motivations to continue to work even if one has access to a basic income.

> Basic income proposals offer a very minimal income.

And can only really (barring better production technology) only support that. If it targetted much more than minimal income now it would drive runaway inflation until the level at which the BI was set would represent only minimal income. The sustainable level of BI, in terms of the actual standard of living supported, is a function of productivity.

> Why would I want to work, if I am just paid to do nothing?

Because -- as research has shown is generally true of humans -- your satisfaction function is driven significantly by relative affluence, not solely by absolute affluence.

> Minimum wage exists now and is raised every couple of years. You don't think the same thing will happen with basic income?

I'd expect it to generally rise with productivity, and consider that to be a generally desirable result.

> If it ever happens, I can see people eventually fighting for more, because it can't support a family of 4.

And why shouldn't they argue for more? At the same time, people would argue against it because of the taxes it would take, and the people whose narrow short-term economic self interest was driving the latter advocacy would have a lot more resources to use to promote their argument.

> why would you vote against your own free handouts?

For one thing, because someone convincingly makes the case that short-term increases will be unsustainable over an extended period and result in collapse.

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