3 ms·
> the market has decided that a large and growing number of people's work is worth $0 Or rather is worth less than the legal minimum wage, which is not the sam
by bzbarsky 11y ago
> the market has decided that a large and growing number of people's work is worth $0
Or rather is worth less than the legal minimum wage, which is not the same thing.
> Why should someone be incentivized to work when their work has no value?
Very few people's work has no value, especially if they're allowed to do what they like to do. Typically the problems arise when the value is lower than the costs involved (salary, ovehead of managing them, etc).
Reducing such costs should be a pretty important part of a basic income setup.
> coerced labor (yes, starvation and homelessness due to unemployment are coercion) is no longer necessary
The interesting question is what the end game is here. If we get to a situation where 100% effort from 100% of people is no longer necessary, but 100% effort from _some_ people is still necessary, how do you ensure that the people who still need to work keep doing so? And how will those people feel about it and what will the try to do as a result? A worst-case-ish scenario that seems all too likely is bans on emigration of "productive citizens" (defined as the ones whose 100%, or even 80%, effort is in fact still needed) who would otherwise decamp for other countries with lower taxes.