2 ms·
what about all the people who work long, hard hours (often doing two or three jobs), who still don't attain a middle class lifestyle? do you think, given the op
by zem 9y ago
what about all the people who work long, hard hours (often doing two or three jobs), who still don't attain a middle class lifestyle? do you think, given the option of a ubi and those jobs, they would still continue to do them? the lack of basic income adds a huge distortion to the equation of "the work you do is worth X to me, but i will pay you Y for it, and X can be way greater than Y because your side of the balance sheet is Y + not starving".
also, where do you get "permanent underclass" from? if you posit that there is some way to acquire skills that are so valuable people will pay you a middle-class salary for them, surely acquiring those skills is easier if you don't have to also do a laborious and crappy job at the same time. contrariwise, if you think that someone on pure ubi is doomed never to be able to transition from there to a job, what in that equation changes if you give that person a minimum-wage job instead of ubi?
- Mz 9y agoYou know, I am homeless right now and I don't know how I will eat for the rest of this month. I am finding your remarks insulting, depressing, frustrating and obnoxious. Are you doing anything to help lift me up while trying to prove your point that I am wrong and you are right? In my eyes, you continuing to argue this while doing nothing to help me grow my online income just supports my point of view that UBI will be yet another source of class divide. I have $10k a year unearned income and I have been on HN for several years. I am the top ranked woman here. I still can't make the business connections I need to figure out how the hell to make good money online. I don't know a stronger argument for what I am saying than my life and you can't be arsed to even finish reading things I have written. I don't plan to continue to engage you. I don't feel your argument is remotely in good faith. I think if you were right and I was wrong, then I would have long ago established sufficient income to get my sorry ass off the fucking street. Having $10k in unearned income in no way gives you the business connections you need and if other people for any reason don't want to make those connections with you, then trying to figure it out your damn self tends to involve painfully slow progress that has little hope of ever leading to a middle class income.
- zem 9y agookay, I apologise and will not argue any further.