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I think the point being missed here is that those with high incomes or wealth essentially have their lifestyles subsidised by those who are forced to take the b

I think the point being missed here is that those with high incomes or wealth essentially have their lifestyles subsidised by those who are forced to take the basic jobs in order to live. Their labour is cheaper than it would be if they were truly free. Essentially, they have little negotiating power. I'm advocating for flipping that position and seeing where it leads us. I don't think that people would suddenly stop working entirely. I think there would be a redistribution from rich to poor. I think that's reasonable. If you feel that the world would fall apart and people would stop doing anything useful if they weren't coerced, then I would ask the question - why do the wealthy work? They already have a basic income. What proportion of people who could retire permanently at say, age 40, actually do? I think the picture being painted of a bunch of feckless, consuming meatballs, is wildly off base.

baddox 11y ago
Isn't that a bit like saying that professional athletes or entertainers have their lifestyles subsidized by those who are forced to take basic jobs because they lack the athleticism or artistic skill of the professionals? Or would you say that athletes and entertainers are okay because their success is based more on their own merit?
- quadrangle 11y ago
  Athletes and entertainers are mostly struggling people. There's tons of talented people who don't get rich at all. The smaller number who get rich are winners in a largely winner-take-all media system controlled by big corporations. Even most NFL players aren't rich, only the stars, the others just make a decent living but then have to quit at a young age and live with concussions. The best collegiate wrestlers are athletes of the highest order and have no living from it. And so on and so on. Regardless, these spectacles are barely productive or valuable really. They are mostly escapist distractions. The circus part of "bread and circuses". The idea that you can look at this completely unjust system and say "oh, the Gladiators deserve their fortunes though" is absurdly out of touch. > because they lack the athleticism or artistic skill of the professionals Your comment implies that we could have a functioning society if everyone were rock stars and athletes. That's absurd. The role of rock-star and athlete is a zero-sum game. We don't need a billion rock stars. If everyone were virtuoso musicians, then a few of them would still win the lottery as being the ones that make it over others, and nothing would be that different. We'd still be having the same discussions about economics etc.
  - baddox 11y ago
    I said "professional" athletes and entertainers. I'm not just talking about the ultra wealthy stars. I just mean people who make a living doing that full time. > Your comment implies that we could have a functioning society if everyone were rock stars and athletes. That's absurd I'm arguing the opposite, by highlighting this absurdity.
    - quadrangle 11y ago
      Sorry if I misread your comment. You seemed to be implying that people who make a living as artists and athletes "deserve" their living and that other people are not-so-talented. Maybe you were playing the character of someone with that sort of dumb bias.
- stegosaurus 11y ago
  I think you're attributing some sort of negative towards the wealthy that I don't hold. I have no issue with the rich. I have a problem with the lack of negotiating power that the poor have. The subsidy comment is intended to illustrate that it's not as simple as 'take money from the rich and give to the poor'. At the moment we have the reverse - the rich are able to give less because the market is not free - the poor are coerced into providing their services for a lower amount because they own nothing.
  - fsloth 11y ago
    "I have no issue with the rich. I have a problem with the lack of negotiating power that the poor have." This! It's not about jealousy but augmenting the winner take all dynamics of uncontrolled economic system into something that feels humanely more fair without disincentivizing or creating pathological scenarios.
  - baddox 11y ago
    I absolutely agree that the distribution of wealth from poor to rich is both real and crappy. And it's not just the "coercion" of having to trade labor for basic needs. The government (often at the behest of the very wealthy) has blatant poorer-to-richer income distribution policies. Virtually all subsidies of special interests are examples of this. Tariffs and other trade restrictions are examples of this. Social Security is an example of this (perhaps not by design). Inflation can be an example of this.
gwright 11y ago
I'm having a hard time understanding why you describe working for a living as being coerced. The resources required to continue living (food, shelter, etc) don't magically appear. So if you aren't making an effort in some way to get them (barter, labor, personal relationships) then you are just living the life of a dependent, something that we usual reserve for children and the infirm. There is also a huge difference between providing assistance to ease the efforts required and simply removing the need for effort entirely by providing 100% assistance (i.e. dependency). Taking a 'basic job' in order to live seems like a reasonable trade-off and a starting point for something better. To assume that people should be able 'to live' in the absence of a basic job (i.e. to live as a dependent) just because they don't want to work is problematic. For the purposes of this discussion, I'm assuming that 'basic job' is not something inherently hazardous, although I also think that individuals should have the freedom to make an informed decision about taking on personal risks. So even hazardous jobs should be available as long as the hazards are disclosed.
- stegosaurus 11y ago
  The reason I call it coercion is that the resources individuals require to make a life for themselves are held by others. If I own 1000 acres of land and you own zero, I can coerce you into working for me. If I own 1000 and you own 10, we'll negotiate. Does that make sense? It's not really about providing people amazing lives - it's more that free trade doesn't really work properly when one party is playing a completely different game. Example - as a software developer I could choose a 30k PA job or a 90k PA job. I feel a pressure to take the latter, but it doesn't feel like coercion, I can actually make the choice. If you're unskilled - and bear in mind that unskilled is a moving target which essentially means 'not required by society at the present time' - then it doesn't work that way. You take whatever you can get. That's the problem with inequality. It's not about toys, size of house. it's about the extreme outcomes - the bottom level becoming interchangeable cogs and no longer human beings with free will.
  - gwright 11y ago
    It is difficult to have a discussion without agreement on terms. "Coercion" means forcing someone to do something via threats or actual force. It doesn't mean "not giving me what I want (or need)". Perhaps you should be given what you need, but failing to do that isn't coercive. There is an unsettling attitude on HN that there is something inherently wrong with unskilled labor or more generally work that doesn't require some sort of advanced study. Perhaps there is a future world where everyone is engaged in highly skilled labor that satisfies their every desire but until that time there are going to be many people who will be occupied in other types of work and there is nothing inherently wrong with that. Honest work of any kind that enables someone to be self-sufficient should be applauded, not disdained. What is wrong with an unskilled worker taking the best available job and building from there? Isn't that generally how people acquire skills? If the argument is that a person can't sustain themselves that way, then I would suggest that developing programs to assist people who are already working is much easier than developing programs to assist people who aren't working at all. Regarding 'inequality', I just don't find that very compelling mainly because the discussion seems to be all about how to take things away from rich people in order to give it to poor people, that is, redistribution schemes based on the mistaken notion that this is a zero-sum game. In many cases, the wealth is acquired by distortions in the market created by government intervention. Eliminating the market distortions would be a good first step towards a more vibrant economy that would benefit every one.

baddox 11y ago

Isn't that a bit like saying that professional athletes or entertainers have their lifestyles subsidized by those who are forced to take basic jobs because they lack the athleticism or artistic skill of the professionals? Or would you say that athletes and entertainers are okay because their success is based more on their own merit?

quadrangle 11y ago
Athletes and entertainers are mostly struggling people. There's tons of talented people who don't get rich at all. The smaller number who get rich are winners in a largely winner-take-all media system controlled by big corporations. Even most NFL players aren't rich, only the stars, the others just make a decent living but then have to quit at a young age and live with concussions. The best collegiate wrestlers are athletes of the highest order and have no living from it. And so on and so on. Regardless, these spectacles are barely productive or valuable really. They are mostly escapist distractions. The circus part of "bread and circuses". The idea that you can look at this completely unjust system and say "oh, the Gladiators deserve their fortunes though" is absurdly out of touch. > because they lack the athleticism or artistic skill of the professionals Your comment implies that we could have a functioning society if everyone were rock stars and athletes. That's absurd. The role of rock-star and athlete is a zero-sum game. We don't need a billion rock stars. If everyone were virtuoso musicians, then a few of them would still win the lottery as being the ones that make it over others, and nothing would be that different. We'd still be having the same discussions about economics etc.
- baddox 11y ago
  I said "professional" athletes and entertainers. I'm not just talking about the ultra wealthy stars. I just mean people who make a living doing that full time. > Your comment implies that we could have a functioning society if everyone were rock stars and athletes. That's absurd I'm arguing the opposite, by highlighting this absurdity.
  - quadrangle 11y ago
    Sorry if I misread your comment. You seemed to be implying that people who make a living as artists and athletes "deserve" their living and that other people are not-so-talented. Maybe you were playing the character of someone with that sort of dumb bias.
stegosaurus 11y ago
I think you're attributing some sort of negative towards the wealthy that I don't hold. I have no issue with the rich. I have a problem with the lack of negotiating power that the poor have. The subsidy comment is intended to illustrate that it's not as simple as 'take money from the rich and give to the poor'. At the moment we have the reverse - the rich are able to give less because the market is not free - the poor are coerced into providing their services for a lower amount because they own nothing.
- fsloth 11y ago
  "I have no issue with the rich. I have a problem with the lack of negotiating power that the poor have." This! It's not about jealousy but augmenting the winner take all dynamics of uncontrolled economic system into something that feels humanely more fair without disincentivizing or creating pathological scenarios.
- baddox 11y ago
  I absolutely agree that the distribution of wealth from poor to rich is both real and crappy. And it's not just the "coercion" of having to trade labor for basic needs. The government (often at the behest of the very wealthy) has blatant poorer-to-richer income distribution policies. Virtually all subsidies of special interests are examples of this. Tariffs and other trade restrictions are examples of this. Social Security is an example of this (perhaps not by design). Inflation can be an example of this.

gwright 11y ago

I'm having a hard time understanding why you describe working for a living as being coerced. The resources required to continue living (food, shelter, etc) don't magically appear. So if you aren't making an effort in some way to get them (barter, labor, personal relationships) then you are just living the life of a dependent, something that we usual reserve for children and the infirm. There is also a huge difference between providing assistance to ease the efforts required and simply removing the need for effort entirely by providing 100% assistance (i.e. dependency). Taking a 'basic job' in order to live seems like a reasonable trade-off and a starting point for something better. To assume that people should be able 'to live' in the absence of a basic job (i.e. to live as a dependent) just because they don't want to work is problematic. For the purposes of this discussion, I'm assuming that 'basic job' is not something inherently hazardous, although I also think that individuals should have the freedom to make an informed decision about taking on personal risks. So even hazardous jobs should be available as long as the hazards are disclosed.

stegosaurus 11y ago
The reason I call it coercion is that the resources individuals require to make a life for themselves are held by others. If I own 1000 acres of land and you own zero, I can coerce you into working for me. If I own 1000 and you own 10, we'll negotiate. Does that make sense? It's not really about providing people amazing lives - it's more that free trade doesn't really work properly when one party is playing a completely different game. Example - as a software developer I could choose a 30k PA job or a 90k PA job. I feel a pressure to take the latter, but it doesn't feel like coercion, I can actually make the choice. If you're unskilled - and bear in mind that unskilled is a moving target which essentially means 'not required by society at the present time' - then it doesn't work that way. You take whatever you can get. That's the problem with inequality. It's not about toys, size of house. it's about the extreme outcomes - the bottom level becoming interchangeable cogs and no longer human beings with free will.
- gwright 11y ago
  It is difficult to have a discussion without agreement on terms. "Coercion" means forcing someone to do something via threats or actual force. It doesn't mean "not giving me what I want (or need)". Perhaps you should be given what you need, but failing to do that isn't coercive. There is an unsettling attitude on HN that there is something inherently wrong with unskilled labor or more generally work that doesn't require some sort of advanced study. Perhaps there is a future world where everyone is engaged in highly skilled labor that satisfies their every desire but until that time there are going to be many people who will be occupied in other types of work and there is nothing inherently wrong with that. Honest work of any kind that enables someone to be self-sufficient should be applauded, not disdained. What is wrong with an unskilled worker taking the best available job and building from there? Isn't that generally how people acquire skills? If the argument is that a person can't sustain themselves that way, then I would suggest that developing programs to assist people who are already working is much easier than developing programs to assist people who aren't working at all. Regarding 'inequality', I just don't find that very compelling mainly because the discussion seems to be all about how to take things away from rich people in order to give it to poor people, that is, redistribution schemes based on the mistaken notion that this is a zero-sum game. In many cases, the wealth is acquired by distortions in the market created by government intervention. Eliminating the market distortions would be a good first step towards a more vibrant economy that would benefit every one.