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Wow. That's a huge straw man if ever I've seen one. I will entertain you, however: We aren't talking about anyone's "life purpose", whatever the hell that mea

Wow. That's a huge straw man if ever I've seen one. I will entertain you, however: We aren't talking about anyone's "life purpose", whatever the hell that means. We are talking about having the state (and for a quick reminder, that means citizens producing value, not a magical entity that pulls money with value out of hat) fund people with no desire to create value. Not just people going through a rough time, not people unable to give back, but people who will take, yet willingly not give back. They're free to do live their lives as they see fit within the law, but no one can expect for the rest of society to fund their chosen lifestyle. If you feel like they deserve income, you can gather like-minded people and open a charity that does just that. EDIT: Those chiming in with a downvote, I'd appreciate if you explain where I'm so wrong.

eli_gottlieb 10y ago
Well, I didn't downvote you, but I do feel like your comment ignores the elephant in the room. Your model ("takers rob makers with state") implicitly assumes something like a Labor Theory of Value, in which "value creation" always and only requires that a human being perform painful, undesirable labor. Within that model, the 20th century gave us all sorts of debates regarding job guarantees, job-creation programs by the government for stimulus, privatization, socialization, et cetera. The whole point of proposing UBI, however, is that we now (almost) universally agree that the LTV is just plain false, and much "value creation" actually involves machines doing the work. We believe that if we impose work requirements by force on humans by depriving them of machines of their own, forcing them to compete with machines to survive, there will be immense human suffering for completely arbitrary reasons. UBI is thus the moderate proposal to deal with the issue. The radical proposal is to give everyone whole or partial ownership of enough machines to supply for themselves, perhaps through some collective-ownership arrangement like a cooperative, commons trust, or the state.

eli_gottlieb 10y ago

Well, I didn't downvote you, but I do feel like your comment ignores the elephant in the room. Your model ("takers rob makers with state") implicitly assumes something like a Labor Theory of Value, in which "value creation" always and only requires that a human being perform painful, undesirable labor. Within that model, the 20th century gave us all sorts of debates regarding job guarantees, job-creation programs by the government for stimulus, privatization, socialization, et cetera. The whole point of proposing UBI, however, is that we now (almost) universally agree that the LTV is just plain false, and much "value creation" actually involves machines doing the work. We believe that if we impose work requirements by force on humans by depriving them of machines of their own, forcing them to compete with machines to survive, there will be immense human suffering for completely arbitrary reasons. UBI is thus the moderate proposal to deal with the issue. The radical proposal is to give everyone whole or partial ownership of enough machines to supply for themselves, perhaps through some collective-ownership arrangement like a cooperative, commons trust, or the state.