4 ms·
Even more radically, you might as well just give everybody a universal basic income instead of heading back for a pre-industrialized way of life (though the Ami
by fnl 9y ago
Even more radically, you might as well just give everybody a universal basic income instead of heading back for a pre-industrialized way of life (though the Amish people seem to like it?!).
- jimmywanger 9y agoIf you give people a universal basic income, you need to both increase taxes a lot and completely restrict immigration - a basic income in the US is incredibly luxurious for people who live in sub-saharan Africa. Or else the universal basic income is going to be too low in first world countries to make a difference.
- egypturnash 9y agoOr you just start taxing corporations and rich people again. Some stupidly huge percentage of dollars are just sitting in their coffers doing nothing.
- jimmywanger 9y agoCorporations and rich people have ways (completely legal) to get around taxes. If the tax burden becomes too onerous, they'll just move residences and/or stop doing business in your country. You can see this in one of the founders of Facebook - he renounced his US citizenship, because of the onerous tax burdens. (https://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/05/11/a-facebook-founder-renounces-his-u-s-citizenship/?hpw https://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/05/11/a-facebook-founder...) It's foolish to just say "we should tax rich people and rich corporations more." You're incentivizing them to not play the game, and wealthy people generally have more abilities to evade taxes than people in the lower upper class or middle class, which is who the burden will inevitably fall upon.
- egypturnash 9y agoWe just have to start guillotining them again, I guess. You need a good revolution once every generation or three to keep capital scared.
- jimmywanger 9y agoDid you not see my previous comment about capital flight? This is not the middle ages anymore, where peoples' riches are tied up in real estate and machinery. Immovable capital. Capital is fluid these days. If you start guillotining people for absolutely nothing except being rich (which is what you're insinuating) they'll just leave and take all the capital and productive capacity with them. See Venezuela.
- fnl 9y agoI am fully aware that UBI is an utopia that would require at the very least a Zeitgeist well evolved beyond our species' current, most common world views. But a similar "time-inverse" utopia is trying to stop technological progress with laws.
- tanilama 9y agoUBI seems unlikely now, maybe very low level like 500 dollars per month, but definitely not going to support a comfortable living, that is only fantasy.
- prawn 9y agoPerhaps if the costs to maintain a comfortable living are lowered? It might be that people end up choosing between city living and the 40 hours a week of work required to support that, and living in a regional area where you can get by working 10 hours/week.
- manigandham 9y ago> not going to support a comfortable living It's not supposed to.
- majewsky 9y agoDepends on whom you ask, and on the definition of "comfortable".