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Andrew Yang qualifies for first DNC debate with 65k unique donors

153 points by yasp 8y ago

KuiN 8y ago
You qualify for the debate by getting the right number of donors? Wow ...
- normal_man 8y ago
  Unique donors across (I believe?) all 50 states. It's to allow presumably grassroots candidates to achieve access. You can also qualify the normal way of scoring above some small percentage in national polls.
  - rexaliquid 8y ago
    The DNC doesn't require donors from all 50 states, but it does require a healthy diversity of states. I think it is 200 unique donors from 20 different states.
    - koolba 8y ago
      If it’s only $65K and 200 people that’s a low bar. That’s well within range of a determined troll to get a podium on live TV.
      - IfOnlyYouKnew 8y ago
        200 from each of 20 states.
      - jessaustin 8y ago
        Why should anything about this be designed to exclude "trolls"? Last time repubs got a troll, and he won the whole thing.
        koolba 8y ago
        Ha! For the record I’m all for it. I find the entire election procrsss highly entertaining. The funniest thing I heard on the subject was the suggestion to nominate Trump as a Democrat so he qualifies for their primary debates and can take on all of them at once.
      - rexaliquid 8y ago
        Not dollars, 65k unique donors. And 200 from each of 20 states.
- MichaelApproved 8y ago
  How would you propose a network select candidates for a debate?
  - Steltek 8y ago
    I thought traditionally it was polling numbers. But maybe that was just the RNC clown car from 2016...
    - rexaliquid 8y ago
      The DNC is using two criteria for qualifying for the debates. One is the traditional polling above 1% in three separate recognized polls. The other is a minimum number of donors (65k), with a minimum of 200 in each of 20 different states. Meeting either criteria qualifies a candidate for the debate, and should the field of qualifying candidates grow to more than twenty (gods forbid) priority is given to candidates that meet both and then by polling average.
      - everdev 8y ago
        65k donors doesn't seem like a lot especially since there's no minimum contribution. So raising $65,000 can put you on the DNC debate stage regardless of how you poll? A GoFundMe could raise more than that.
        EpicEng 8y ago
        How easy do you imagine it is to get that many people to put their name on a list saying they want you for president?
        everdev 8y ago
        Exponentially easier than polling 1% nationally.
        EpicEng 8y ago
- longhuei 8y ago
  It's to make sure "supporters" are actual supporters who put their money where their mouth is.
  - cphoover 8y ago
    That supposes "supporters" have disposable income, and don't support a candidate in other ways like donating time, or canvassing.
    - lkbm 8y ago
      The disposable income can be as little as $1 (though you also need a credit card and access to a computer with Internet), so it's not too exclusionary. You can also qualify by getting 1%+ support in 3+ "approved" polls.
      - barberousse 8y ago
        >though you also need a credit card and access to a computer with Internet), so it's not too exclusionary You'd be surprised
- jmull 8y ago
  It seems reasonable to me, for an early debate, assuming the minimum qualifying donation is small (like $1 or $5). For an early debate, I think one of the main goals would be to give exposure to "deserving" candidates who don't necessarily already have it. Polling isn't good for that since it will exclude anyone people haven't already heard of. But the question becomes what is "deserving" and how do you measure it? It's not like counting donors is perfect, but what is? And it has some things going for it: 1. Talk is just talk. If you can get a decent number of people who don't personally know you to support you with at least a few bucks, you've got some kind of appeal. 2. There are already a lot of laws, reporting rules, etc. around campaign donations that you can piggyback off of. That is, the campaigns are already tracking this stuff very carefully and, if they cheat the numbers, are risking something a lot worse than being left out of a debate.
  - thanatropism 8y ago
    Quadratic voting. You can give as many "pushes" to a candidate as you like, but the first costs $1, the second $2, the third $9, the fourth $16... At the end of the game everyone shares in the spoils equally so people get some of their money back.
bigbadgoose 8y ago
Is he a stalking horse for UBI, ahem Freedom Dividend™?
- guipsp 8y ago
  What?
  - bigbadgoose 8y ago
    Apparently, testing revealed that "Freedom Dividend" polled higher with conservatives than "Universal Basic Income". So, in a ham-fisted wide appeal play, he's rebranded UBI as "The Freedom Dividend" https://www.yang2020.com/policies/the-freedom-dividend/ https://www.yang2020.com/policies/the-freedom-dividend/ –– This brings us to our second point, which is a conjecture that such a move has a sniff of witting or unwitting use as a test candidate, not for serious contention of nomination, but as an indicator of conservative support for such a concept. ("stalking horse")
lawlington 8y ago
This is the guy whose site showed 65k after you changed your local date/time to the debate date, correct? lol
ed_balls 8y ago
Prediction: UBI won't go anywhere, because it has a branding problem. If we rebrand it as a Negative Income Tax it may actually go somewhere.
- chadmhorner 8y ago
  That's what the "Freedom Dividend" branding is all about!
  - ed_balls 8y ago
    I don't think that's good enough. Dividend still have a connotation that you are getting a handout.
    - minton 8y ago
      UBI is a handout is it not?
      - lwhalen 8y ago
        Yup. Cheerfully supporting those "unwilling to work".
        mattkrause 8y ago
        Compared to the US, Montreal seems to have a larger proportion of people with “weird jobs”: artists and performers, but also small, non-VC backed startups with unusual ideas. I think part of the reason is the more generous social safety net: you can follow your dream of becoming a circus performer or building highly-instrumented clothes for athletic training, without worrying about ending up sick and broke. As a result, people are happier, the city is more interesting, and some of the innovations seem to be panning out. I don’t actually know of anyone who is out-and-out abusing the system. I’m sure there may be some, but I think a lot of people seem disproportionately worried about someone, somewhere eeking out a meager existence vs. the possible benefits.
clarkevans 8y ago
Andrew Yang is popular for his promotion of Universal Basic Income ("UBI"). I've had success framing UBI as monthly compensation from government for the portion of natural space which has been reallocated to private ownership. In that regard, UBI could be funded though a national land value tax and though copyright/patent fees, both being government granted monopolies, carved from what would otherwise be public space. EDIT: One of the common critiques of UBI is that it's a "give away". Instead, I see UBI as a payment for natural rights (to walk, hunt, eat and sleep where ever one wishes) that are taken by society though its allocation and enforcement of private property. Hence, in my view, the concept of private property and UBI are intrinsically linked. Given this frame, what this natural right is worth is an important discussion to have -- should society provide basic shelter and sustenance in exchange? Free market perspective gives us an option, it could just be cash without any strings or requirements. But importantly, it's not a "hand out", it's compensation for a taking.
- IfOnlyYouKnew 8y ago
  I think you’re being downvoted for the mental gymnastics you’re attempting to haphazardly tie UBI to your personal obsession with land taxation.
onlydeadheroes 8y ago
This is the guy whose site showed 65k after you changed your local date/time to the debate date, correct?
- minton 8y ago
  It seems his donation site is powered by https://secure.actblue.com https://secure.actblue.com so if that was true I think it’s an issue with ActBlue’s platform.
- gridlockd 8y ago
  It's actually reasonable. There's a little animation that show "live" updates to donation value. If you were to implement this, would you have every active client update live on the actual amount of donations, or would you just calculate the trajectory from past donations? Unless the user is going to keep the browser tab open for days on end without reloading, this is going to be a fair and efficient approximation of the actual value.
  - onlydeadheroes 8y ago
    I don't disagree with you, querying for every page served could easily get out hand. Strictly speaking, I didn't even write the comment above. Someone else did, it got censored, and I found that disgusting, so I copy pasted and posted it. You can find the original at the bottom if you have showdead.
everdev 8y ago
Another topic Yang brings up frequently besides the Freedom dividend is retraining. Automation in retail, driving, etc. has the potential to make jobs obsolete at a rapid pace. Rather than trying to fight to save jobs that can be done by machines the idea is to retrain people in these industries to do things machines aren't good at. The idea is to not slow down progress but also not abandon people who happen to have built a life in a dying field.
- ousta 8y ago
  that is in every program since dawn of 20th century: Here is https://www.axios.com/trump-workers-program-ivanka-automation-high-tech-retraining-9a3e5b9f-df2e-4312-8d95-c4d4e4d6c4ac.html https://www.axios.com/trump-workers-program-ivanka-automatio...
- Alex3917 8y ago
  He does frequently bring up retraining, but in the context that government-sponsored retraining programs have between a 0% and a 15% success rate. E.g. the graduation rate for former military employees who then go to college is 0%. So retraining isn't a solution to jobs being lost by automation and even if we get significantly better at retraining it's still probably not a solution.
  - bazooka_penguin 8y ago
    Are there any retraining programs that have more than a 50% success rate? Has retraining ever been a realistic option for job loss? Seems more likely the next generation would make up for the lost jobs on paper
    - beat 8y ago
      Nope. Retraining has never worked. Yang is quite explicit about that.
      - eghad 8y ago
        And he's wrong. Retraining has been effective in several European nations like Germany, Sweden, and Switzerland, especially for older adults (there's a reason even DeVos and Trump name drop them). The fundamental difference (from the US programs attempted in the past) primarily lies in the amount of money per worker spent and the level of state control/centralization. Furthermore, companies there seem actively enthusiastic about ensuring they have a skilled population pool in the future regardless of the short term ROI. Personally I think the 2017 tax cuts should be rolled back for a lot of industries and used as an incentive for companies to develop proper apprenticeship programs and collaborate with universities/community colleges/trade schools to teach the exact skills they're looking for.
beat 8y ago
I'm currently reading Yang's book The War on Normal People and it is kind of terrifying. I highly, highly recommend it in preparation for this presidential race, whether or not you're a Yang supporter. There is a great deal of food for thought. (full disclosure: I'm a Yang supporter and donated twenty bucks) So, a few observations about him as a candidate. First, I think he's the only candidate really looking outside the box. It seems to me the political debate in this country is basically liberals saying the solution to our problems is more 1960s welfare and 1970s regulation, and conservatives saying the solution is less 1960s welfare and less 1970s regulation. We're stuck with a 50 year old model for the domestic responsibilities of our government. Andrew Yang is one of us. He's from the startup community, and has seen up close how disruption works. He understands technology, and he understands numbers. And what he sees as a result of this understanding is grim - tens of millions of working-class and middle-class jobs slated for obsolescence in the next couple of decades, and no real alternatives in place for those about to lose their livelihoods. The social implications are terrifying. Don't like his UBI solution? Come up with something else, or commit to ignoring the problem until there are bread riots. Another thing that strikes me is how he comes across. He reminds me of two important recent politicians - Barack Obama, and Bernie Sanders. Obama, because he's so clearly a nerd. It's such a rare pleasure to listen to a politician that I think is actually much smarter than me and not pretending otherwise. And Bernie, because Bernie's superpower isn't his policies - it's his integrity. You know deep down that Bernie isn't lying to you. I get that same vibe from Yang, and that's a very powerful thing these days. Anyway, just some observations.
- normal_man 8y ago
  The goal of government is to create the most stable, safe, and happy environment as possible for as much of the population as possible. What about the startup community, who obsessively chase endless growth, "innovation" and "disruption", makes you think they would be good at achieving that goal?
  - beat 8y ago
    He's not saying that the push to growth-by-disruption is a solution. He's saying it's a problem, and we have to deal with it quickly, because it moves quickly. He's not saying we should run the country like a Silicon Valley startup. He's also not saying innovation should be banned or punished (coughcoughWarrencough). He's saying that it's coming, and it's going to mess up a lot of people's lives, and if we don't do something big to deal with that, we're going to have a revolution on our hands.
intrasight 8y ago
I have a different spin on UBI to address automation. I proposed that any human job done by an automaton must be backed by a license holding human. And humans can only own a single license. But a license is something that you are - not something that you own (no sell/transfer/inherit). So for example to "build" a truck driving automaton, you must also "hire" the license holding human.
- mr_spothawk 8y ago
  it's a clever mechanic, but recursively... what if you want to automate automaton creation? must you then develop a licensing body for automaton creators? and who will administrate this most important committee?
  - intrasight 8y ago
    it automaton licenses all the way down ;)
- krapp 8y ago
  Since automation has rendered the "license holder's" value in the market to zero, companies would "hire" them and pay them nothing. What you're describing is simply not the way capitalism or automation works, or can ever work. No company is going to pay twice for the same labor.
  - intrasight 8y ago
    Lots of companies pay for lots of thing they don't want to pay for - due to regulations passed by society.
i_am_nomad 8y ago
Ha ha ha ha, no. He qualifies for the first debate because the DNC allows him to. If they didn’t want him there, they’d bend and rewrite the rules to prevent it. Witness Larry Lessig’s experience with this: https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.vox.com/platform/amp/2015/11/2/9659014/lawrence-lessig-quits-presidential https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.vox.com/platform/amp/2015/1...
- apearson 8y ago
  Non-amp link: https://www.vox.com/2015/11/2/9659014/lawrence-lessig-quits-presidential https://www.vox.com/2015/11/2/9659014/lawrence-lessig-quits-...
  - i_am_nomad 8y ago
    Thank you, I’m sorry about that.
- ForHackernews 8y ago
  Lessig was never a serious candidate. I'm not sure what your point is: Obviously the Democratic party decides who they invite to a debate that they're hosting.
  - i_am_nomad 8y ago
    If the DNC sets a policy that candidates meeting certain objective criteria can debate, they should uphold that policy. Otherwise they should be transparent about how candidates are admitted.
- colpabar 8y ago
  Maybe they don't want to turn him into a martyr like they did with Bernie. https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/11/2/16599036/donna-brazile-hillary-clinton-sanders https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/11/2/16599036/d...
  - jessaustin 8y ago
pastor_elm 8y ago
The neoliberal media is already trying to paint him as the white nationalist darling candidate[0] It is getting ridiculous. [0]https://www.vox.com/2019/3/11/18256198/andrew-yang-gang-presidential-policies-universal-basic-income-joe-rogan https://www.vox.com/2019/3/11/18256198/andrew-yang-gang-pres...
- feihcsim 8y ago
  an asian white nationalist - now that is something to behold
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- krapp 8y ago
  That article doesn't seem to be trying to paint Andrew Yang as a white nationalist. It literally quotes him disavowing support from white supremacists and their beliefs. It does say that his popularity on the internet extends to 4chan, where racists make racist memes about him, and it quotes a tweet[0] by him regarding a New York Times article[1] about death rates among white people, but I don't really see that as white supremacist. [0]https://twitter.com/andrewyangvfa/status/1010207553324806150 https://twitter.com/andrewyangvfa/status/1010207553324806150 [1]https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/20/us/white-minority-population.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/20/us/white-minority-populat...
OrgNet 8y ago
The Superdelegates are OK with it, I guess... or are the Superdelegates (AKA supercitizens) still a thing since the 2016 fiasco?
- Someone1234 8y ago
  They still exist, but they now only get to vote on the second round if the first round fails. The biggest problem with them from 2016 wasn't their actual vote, it was that many media outlets (including Google) listed Superdelegates non-binding preference as a delegate in the totals, making one candidate seem far ahead before many states had even voted. Unclear if that issue is resolve, because it is up to the media. This article as a screenshot from 2016/discussion: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/sanders-vs-clinton-delegate-count/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/sanders-vs-clinton-delegat...
thanatropism 8y ago
The Republican field had daytime and nighttime debates in 15. But that meant that the daytime people only debated with daytime people trying to get a spot on the nighttime. The debates were horribly crowded too. The best situation would be something like n-fold cross-validation. With 20 candidates you have 1140 possible arrangements for three-way debates. You have what, 40 to 60 weeks to converge on a candidate? Enumerate those 1140 arrangements, pick M integers from a lottery with white balls and hold weekly debates, preferably all over the country. For any given candidate, his probability of being on any single debate is 14,26% [0]. The probability that he's in at least one of 40 debates is 99,78%. If this happens, give this candidate an extra slot in the very last debate before primaries. [0] https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=1%2F20+%2B+(19%2F20)*(1%2F20)%2B(1%2F20)*(19%2F20)%5E2 https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=1%2F20+%2B+(19%2F20)*(...
anth_anm 8y ago
Change the rules please. or don't and I'm giving Matt Christman a dollar.
Simulacra 8y ago
I gave money to Yang for this because I think having an Asian American on the stage would be a good thing for the debate.
- chillacy 8y ago
  "The opposite of donald trump is an asian man who likes math"

153 points by yasp 8y ago

KuiN 8y ago

You qualify for the debate by getting the right number of donors? Wow ...

normal_man 8y ago
Unique donors across (I believe?) all 50 states. It's to allow presumably grassroots candidates to achieve access. You can also qualify the normal way of scoring above some small percentage in national polls.
- rexaliquid 8y ago
  The DNC doesn't require donors from all 50 states, but it does require a healthy diversity of states. I think it is 200 unique donors from 20 different states.
  - koolba 8y ago
    If it’s only $65K and 200 people that’s a low bar. That’s well within range of a determined troll to get a podium on live TV.
    - IfOnlyYouKnew 8y ago
      200 from each of 20 states.
    - jessaustin 8y ago
      Why should anything about this be designed to exclude "trolls"? Last time repubs got a troll, and he won the whole thing.
      - koolba 8y ago
        Ha! For the record I’m all for it. I find the entire election procrsss highly entertaining. The funniest thing I heard on the subject was the suggestion to nominate Trump as a Democrat so he qualifies for their primary debates and can take on all of them at once.
    - rexaliquid 8y ago
      Not dollars, 65k unique donors. And 200 from each of 20 states.
MichaelApproved 8y ago
How would you propose a network select candidates for a debate?
- Steltek 8y ago
  I thought traditionally it was polling numbers. But maybe that was just the RNC clown car from 2016...
  - rexaliquid 8y ago
    The DNC is using two criteria for qualifying for the debates. One is the traditional polling above 1% in three separate recognized polls. The other is a minimum number of donors (65k), with a minimum of 200 in each of 20 different states. Meeting either criteria qualifies a candidate for the debate, and should the field of qualifying candidates grow to more than twenty (gods forbid) priority is given to candidates that meet both and then by polling average.
    - everdev 8y ago
      65k donors doesn't seem like a lot especially since there's no minimum contribution. So raising $65,000 can put you on the DNC debate stage regardless of how you poll? A GoFundMe could raise more than that.
      - EpicEng 8y ago
        How easy do you imagine it is to get that many people to put their name on a list saying they want you for president?
        everdev 8y ago
        Exponentially easier than polling 1% nationally.
        EpicEng 8y ago
longhuei 8y ago
It's to make sure "supporters" are actual supporters who put their money where their mouth is.
- cphoover 8y ago
  That supposes "supporters" have disposable income, and don't support a candidate in other ways like donating time, or canvassing.
  - lkbm 8y ago
    The disposable income can be as little as $1 (though you also need a credit card and access to a computer with Internet), so it's not too exclusionary. You can also qualify by getting 1%+ support in 3+ "approved" polls.
    - barberousse 8y ago
      >though you also need a credit card and access to a computer with Internet), so it's not too exclusionary You'd be surprised
jmull 8y ago
It seems reasonable to me, for an early debate, assuming the minimum qualifying donation is small (like $1 or $5). For an early debate, I think one of the main goals would be to give exposure to "deserving" candidates who don't necessarily already have it. Polling isn't good for that since it will exclude anyone people haven't already heard of. But the question becomes what is "deserving" and how do you measure it? It's not like counting donors is perfect, but what is? And it has some things going for it: 1. Talk is just talk. If you can get a decent number of people who don't personally know you to support you with at least a few bucks, you've got some kind of appeal. 2. There are already a lot of laws, reporting rules, etc. around campaign donations that you can piggyback off of. That is, the campaigns are already tracking this stuff very carefully and, if they cheat the numbers, are risking something a lot worse than being left out of a debate.
- thanatropism 8y ago
  Quadratic voting. You can give as many "pushes" to a candidate as you like, but the first costs $1, the second $2, the third $9, the fourth $16... At the end of the game everyone shares in the spoils equally so people get some of their money back.

bigbadgoose 8y ago

Is he a stalking horse for UBI, ahem Freedom Dividend™?

guipsp 8y ago
What?
- bigbadgoose 8y ago
  Apparently, testing revealed that "Freedom Dividend" polled higher with conservatives than "Universal Basic Income". So, in a ham-fisted wide appeal play, he's rebranded UBI as "The Freedom Dividend" https://www.yang2020.com/policies/the-freedom-dividend/ https://www.yang2020.com/policies/the-freedom-dividend/ –– This brings us to our second point, which is a conjecture that such a move has a sniff of witting or unwitting use as a test candidate, not for serious contention of nomination, but as an indicator of conservative support for such a concept. ("stalking horse")

lawlington 8y ago

This is the guy whose site showed 65k after you changed your local date/time to the debate date, correct? lol

ed_balls 8y ago

Prediction: UBI won't go anywhere, because it has a branding problem. If we rebrand it as a Negative Income Tax it may actually go somewhere.

chadmhorner 8y ago
That's what the "Freedom Dividend" branding is all about!
- ed_balls 8y ago
  I don't think that's good enough. Dividend still have a connotation that you are getting a handout.
  - minton 8y ago
    UBI is a handout is it not?
    - lwhalen 8y ago
      Yup. Cheerfully supporting those "unwilling to work".
      - mattkrause 8y ago
        Compared to the US, Montreal seems to have a larger proportion of people with “weird jobs”: artists and performers, but also small, non-VC backed startups with unusual ideas. I think part of the reason is the more generous social safety net: you can follow your dream of becoming a circus performer or building highly-instrumented clothes for athletic training, without worrying about ending up sick and broke. As a result, people are happier, the city is more interesting, and some of the innovations seem to be panning out. I don’t actually know of anyone who is out-and-out abusing the system. I’m sure there may be some, but I think a lot of people seem disproportionately worried about someone, somewhere eeking out a meager existence vs. the possible benefits.

clarkevans 8y ago

Andrew Yang is popular for his promotion of Universal Basic Income ("UBI"). I've had success framing UBI as monthly compensation from government for the portion of natural space which has been reallocated to private ownership. In that regard, UBI could be funded though a national land value tax and though copyright/patent fees, both being government granted monopolies, carved from what would otherwise be public space. EDIT: One of the common critiques of UBI is that it's a "give away". Instead, I see UBI as a payment for natural rights (to walk, hunt, eat and sleep where ever one wishes) that are taken by society though its allocation and enforcement of private property. Hence, in my view, the concept of private property and UBI are intrinsically linked. Given this frame, what this natural right is worth is an important discussion to have -- should society provide basic shelter and sustenance in exchange? Free market perspective gives us an option, it could just be cash without any strings or requirements. But importantly, it's not a "hand out", it's compensation for a taking.

IfOnlyYouKnew 8y ago
I think you’re being downvoted for the mental gymnastics you’re attempting to haphazardly tie UBI to your personal obsession with land taxation.

onlydeadheroes 8y ago

This is the guy whose site showed 65k after you changed your local date/time to the debate date, correct?

minton 8y ago
It seems his donation site is powered by https://secure.actblue.com https://secure.actblue.com so if that was true I think it’s an issue with ActBlue’s platform.
gridlockd 8y ago
It's actually reasonable. There's a little animation that show "live" updates to donation value. If you were to implement this, would you have every active client update live on the actual amount of donations, or would you just calculate the trajectory from past donations? Unless the user is going to keep the browser tab open for days on end without reloading, this is going to be a fair and efficient approximation of the actual value.
- onlydeadheroes 8y ago
  I don't disagree with you, querying for every page served could easily get out hand. Strictly speaking, I didn't even write the comment above. Someone else did, it got censored, and I found that disgusting, so I copy pasted and posted it. You can find the original at the bottom if you have showdead.

everdev 8y ago

Another topic Yang brings up frequently besides the Freedom dividend is retraining. Automation in retail, driving, etc. has the potential to make jobs obsolete at a rapid pace. Rather than trying to fight to save jobs that can be done by machines the idea is to retrain people in these industries to do things machines aren't good at. The idea is to not slow down progress but also not abandon people who happen to have built a life in a dying field.

ousta 8y ago
that is in every program since dawn of 20th century: Here is https://www.axios.com/trump-workers-program-ivanka-automation-high-tech-retraining-9a3e5b9f-df2e-4312-8d95-c4d4e4d6c4ac.html https://www.axios.com/trump-workers-program-ivanka-automatio...
Alex3917 8y ago
He does frequently bring up retraining, but in the context that government-sponsored retraining programs have between a 0% and a 15% success rate. E.g. the graduation rate for former military employees who then go to college is 0%. So retraining isn't a solution to jobs being lost by automation and even if we get significantly better at retraining it's still probably not a solution.
- bazooka_penguin 8y ago
  Are there any retraining programs that have more than a 50% success rate? Has retraining ever been a realistic option for job loss? Seems more likely the next generation would make up for the lost jobs on paper
  - beat 8y ago
    Nope. Retraining has never worked. Yang is quite explicit about that.
    - eghad 8y ago
      And he's wrong. Retraining has been effective in several European nations like Germany, Sweden, and Switzerland, especially for older adults (there's a reason even DeVos and Trump name drop them). The fundamental difference (from the US programs attempted in the past) primarily lies in the amount of money per worker spent and the level of state control/centralization. Furthermore, companies there seem actively enthusiastic about ensuring they have a skilled population pool in the future regardless of the short term ROI. Personally I think the 2017 tax cuts should be rolled back for a lot of industries and used as an incentive for companies to develop proper apprenticeship programs and collaborate with universities/community colleges/trade schools to teach the exact skills they're looking for.

beat 8y ago

I'm currently reading Yang's book The War on Normal People and it is kind of terrifying. I highly, highly recommend it in preparation for this presidential race, whether or not you're a Yang supporter. There is a great deal of food for thought. (full disclosure: I'm a Yang supporter and donated twenty bucks) So, a few observations about him as a candidate. First, I think he's the only candidate really looking outside the box. It seems to me the political debate in this country is basically liberals saying the solution to our problems is more 1960s welfare and 1970s regulation, and conservatives saying the solution is less 1960s welfare and less 1970s regulation. We're stuck with a 50 year old model for the domestic responsibilities of our government. Andrew Yang is one of us. He's from the startup community, and has seen up close how disruption works. He understands technology, and he understands numbers. And what he sees as a result of this understanding is grim - tens of millions of working-class and middle-class jobs slated for obsolescence in the next couple of decades, and no real alternatives in place for those about to lose their livelihoods. The social implications are terrifying. Don't like his UBI solution? Come up with something else, or commit to ignoring the problem until there are bread riots. Another thing that strikes me is how he comes across. He reminds me of two important recent politicians - Barack Obama, and Bernie Sanders. Obama, because he's so clearly a nerd. It's such a rare pleasure to listen to a politician that I think is actually much smarter than me and not pretending otherwise. And Bernie, because Bernie's superpower isn't his policies - it's his integrity. You know deep down that Bernie isn't lying to you. I get that same vibe from Yang, and that's a very powerful thing these days. Anyway, just some observations.

normal_man 8y ago
The goal of government is to create the most stable, safe, and happy environment as possible for as much of the population as possible. What about the startup community, who obsessively chase endless growth, "innovation" and "disruption", makes you think they would be good at achieving that goal?
- beat 8y ago
  He's not saying that the push to growth-by-disruption is a solution. He's saying it's a problem, and we have to deal with it quickly, because it moves quickly. He's not saying we should run the country like a Silicon Valley startup. He's also not saying innovation should be banned or punished (coughcoughWarrencough). He's saying that it's coming, and it's going to mess up a lot of people's lives, and if we don't do something big to deal with that, we're going to have a revolution on our hands.

intrasight 8y ago

I have a different spin on UBI to address automation. I proposed that any human job done by an automaton must be backed by a license holding human. And humans can only own a single license. But a license is something that you are - not something that you own (no sell/transfer/inherit). So for example to "build" a truck driving automaton, you must also "hire" the license holding human.

mr_spothawk 8y ago
it's a clever mechanic, but recursively... what if you want to automate automaton creation? must you then develop a licensing body for automaton creators? and who will administrate this most important committee?
- intrasight 8y ago
  it automaton licenses all the way down ;)
krapp 8y ago
Since automation has rendered the "license holder's" value in the market to zero, companies would "hire" them and pay them nothing. What you're describing is simply not the way capitalism or automation works, or can ever work. No company is going to pay twice for the same labor.
- intrasight 8y ago
  Lots of companies pay for lots of thing they don't want to pay for - due to regulations passed by society.

i_am_nomad 8y ago

Ha ha ha ha, no. He qualifies for the first debate because the DNC allows him to. If they didn’t want him there, they’d bend and rewrite the rules to prevent it. Witness Larry Lessig’s experience with this: https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.vox.com/platform/amp/2015/11/2/9659014/lawrence-lessig-quits-presidential https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.vox.com/platform/amp/2015/1...

apearson 8y ago
Non-amp link: https://www.vox.com/2015/11/2/9659014/lawrence-lessig-quits-presidential https://www.vox.com/2015/11/2/9659014/lawrence-lessig-quits-...
- i_am_nomad 8y ago
  Thank you, I’m sorry about that.
ForHackernews 8y ago
Lessig was never a serious candidate. I'm not sure what your point is: Obviously the Democratic party decides who they invite to a debate that they're hosting.
- i_am_nomad 8y ago
  If the DNC sets a policy that candidates meeting certain objective criteria can debate, they should uphold that policy. Otherwise they should be transparent about how candidates are admitted.
colpabar 8y ago
Maybe they don't want to turn him into a martyr like they did with Bernie. https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/11/2/16599036/donna-brazile-hillary-clinton-sanders https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/11/2/16599036/d...
- jessaustin 8y ago

pastor_elm 8y ago

The neoliberal media is already trying to paint him as the white nationalist darling candidate[0] It is getting ridiculous. [0]https://www.vox.com/2019/3/11/18256198/andrew-yang-gang-presidential-policies-universal-basic-income-joe-rogan https://www.vox.com/2019/3/11/18256198/andrew-yang-gang-pres...

feihcsim 8y ago
an asian white nationalist - now that is something to behold
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
krapp 8y ago
That article doesn't seem to be trying to paint Andrew Yang as a white nationalist. It literally quotes him disavowing support from white supremacists and their beliefs. It does say that his popularity on the internet extends to 4chan, where racists make racist memes about him, and it quotes a tweet[0] by him regarding a New York Times article[1] about death rates among white people, but I don't really see that as white supremacist. [0]https://twitter.com/andrewyangvfa/status/1010207553324806150 https://twitter.com/andrewyangvfa/status/1010207553324806150 [1]https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/20/us/white-minority-population.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/20/us/white-minority-populat...

OrgNet 8y ago

The Superdelegates are OK with it, I guess... or are the Superdelegates (AKA supercitizens) still a thing since the 2016 fiasco?

Someone1234 8y ago
They still exist, but they now only get to vote on the second round if the first round fails. The biggest problem with them from 2016 wasn't their actual vote, it was that many media outlets (including Google) listed Superdelegates non-binding preference as a delegate in the totals, making one candidate seem far ahead before many states had even voted. Unclear if that issue is resolve, because it is up to the media. This article as a screenshot from 2016/discussion: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/sanders-vs-clinton-delegate-count/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/sanders-vs-clinton-delegat...

thanatropism 8y ago

The Republican field had daytime and nighttime debates in 15. But that meant that the daytime people only debated with daytime people trying to get a spot on the nighttime. The debates were horribly crowded too. The best situation would be something like n-fold cross-validation. With 20 candidates you have 1140 possible arrangements for three-way debates. You have what, 40 to 60 weeks to converge on a candidate? Enumerate those 1140 arrangements, pick M integers from a lottery with white balls and hold weekly debates, preferably all over the country. For any given candidate, his probability of being on any single debate is 14,26% [0]. The probability that he's in at least one of 40 debates is 99,78%. If this happens, give this candidate an extra slot in the very last debate before primaries. [0] https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=1%2F20+%2B+(19%2F20)*(1%2F20)%2B(1%2F20)*(19%2F20)%5E2 https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=1%2F20+%2B+(19%2F20)*(...

anth_anm 8y ago

Change the rules please. or don't and I'm giving Matt Christman a dollar.

Simulacra 8y ago

I gave money to Yang for this because I think having an Asian American on the stage would be a good thing for the debate.

chillacy 8y ago
"The opposite of donald trump is an asian man who likes math"