6 ms·

What you call "anger" is probably just common sense that people express when proponents of basic income try to present such studies as a proof that basic income

What you call "anger" is probably just common sense that people express when proponents of basic income try to present such studies as a proof that basic income is the way. Of course a rich entity giving money to a limited number of poor people for a limited time will generate great results. Sure, a study is good but I would have guessed the correct outcome anyway. Now, compare this to a money transfer not from some rich external entity but from fellow citizens, countrywide, for generations. That's what basic income is. And it has very little to do with the study.

CuriousSkeptic 7y ago
No need to assume an income tax based financing if that’s what you mean. My own take on UBI is to finance it from land rent. In the way Henry George thought about it (or Thomas Paine, John Locke, or even John Rawls for that matter) See Geolibertarianism for good start to learn about the argument https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geolibertarianism https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geolibertarianism
- mdorazio 7y ago
  Another word for "land rent" is "property tax". I know there are differences from the geolibertarianism view, but in the context of funding something like UBI they amount to the same thing.
  - sagarm 7y ago
    They're quite different, because improvements to the land (buildings, etc) are not taxed under a land value tax but are taxed under a property tax. The argument is that the value of the land itself is collectively created, so it is morally justifiable to capture this value for public benefit. On the other hand, improvements on a particular piece of land represent an individual's investment.
    - zozbot234 7y ago
      There's a better-known argument that land itself is in fixed supply. (Even where land reclamation is a thing, say in the Netherlands, it's not the private sector doing it.) If you pay a tax on land rent, this doesn't alter your behavior compared to paying no tax, because you would've had to forgo that same rent anyway as part of holding that land for yourself. The fact that land rent correlates so well with locally-created value also makes it quite convenient as a source of funds for local government.
      - iguy 7y ago
        Sure. But if it's better, it's worth doing anyway. The question of how best to collect taxes is orthogonal to questions of what to spend them on.
      - sagarm 7y ago
        Yes, it's also economically efficient. A moral objection to land taxation is common enough that I now lead with the moral argument.
    - CuriousSkeptic 7y ago
      I would extend that argument even further. Not only is it morally justified to capture the value, its also the only means by which the private ownership can be justified at all. It is, after all, our rule of law and common institutions that will enforce the title to begin with. From a position of Rawls veil of ignorance, I don’t see how you could justify land title being granted on first come first served basis. Leased to the highest bidder (with a public dividend) seems much more agreeable.
  - mandelbrotwurst 7y ago
    Maybe "land tax" would be best here, with "tax" being a specific type of rent due to a government and "land" being a specific type of property (and not all property!).
- toast0 7y ago
  Taking the money from land ownership instead of from income doesn't make the taking more palatable to those you're taking it from. Chances are, if I've got a high enough income to be net taxed for UBI based on income tax, I've also got a high enough land interest to be net taxed based on UBI based on land rent/property tax. Personally, a system based on income tax works better for me, as I'd like to have some high income time, then retire and lower my tax burden. If land/property is a significant source of government revenue, I need to have a much larger reserve before I retire; it may be easier to accumulate, but it's a psychological barrier. If you're changing the rules after I've already retired though, I'm going to get out the torches and pitchforks.
  - zozbot234 7y ago
    > If land/property is a significant source of government revenue, I need to have a much larger reserve before I retire On the contrary, many people retire to low-cost areas where land rents are incredibly low. You can also move to a smaller house or apartment and lower your land "footprint" that you would be paying rent on. (This is of course the gains you would realize by selling the larger property, in the absence of taxation on land rent. Since land rent tax does not substantially alter incentives.) And you need to pay tax on your retirement savings anyway, either at saving or withdrawal. It amounts to the same thing.
  - CuriousSkeptic 7y ago
    My point was that it wouldn’t be collected from “fellow citizens” but, as you say, a few rich entities such as yourself.
    - steve_taylor 7y ago
      Calling fellow citizens “rich entities” doesn’t make it more palatable.
      - CuriousSkeptic 7y ago
        The original point was that there’s a difference between a rich entity and fellow citizens. I took it to imply the people around most people who would benefit, and support such a scheme. A large majority of citizens don’t own property, most have debt. And I would argue, mostly due to legislative capture from the few people who do own property. So when I think of the word “fellow citizens” attribute the word to how people in the first group relate to each other. The latter group would be fellow plutocrats.
- pakitan 7y ago
  You're mixing tax policy (land rent) with tax income distribution policy (UBI). I think property taxation should be improved and Geolib is one way to do it. However, if we assume that Geolib is the optimal taxation policy, by no means does it follow that UBI is the optimal distribution policy.
  - CuriousSkeptic 7y ago
    I’m mixing it on ideological grounds. Tax comes from the state, a violent actor with arbitrary rights to tax an distribute (although in democratic societies, ostensibly controlled by majority rule) For me land rent isn’t a tax, and it does not belong to the state in any shape or form. It’s about the commons and fundamental inalienable rights. Things I expect to see in the UNs declarations of human rights rather than in the tax-policy of the local government
    - pakitan 7y ago
      My point is that there are couple of problems/unknowns with UBI: 1. Where do we get the money from? 2. What will be the long term effects of UBI and does it constitute progress compared to the current system. I have no idea whether the math with Geolib checks out but even if it does, it only answers the first question. I just find it very amusing that UBI is aimed at fixing the inequality, yet its proponents are somehow oblivious to the obvious - UBI by design is increasing the inequality. UBI means the top 10% by income/wealth will receive exactly the same distributions as the bottom 10%. Jeff Bezos will be getting the same UBI as the bum on the street. How is that progress? Whatever your ideology is, I don't think Jeff Bezos should have any fundamental inalienable right to land rent/tax.
      - CuriousSkeptic 7y ago
        I happen to think he should. Not sure about the other income or wealth though, and I think it’s well within scope of the discussion to consider how he could be deprived of most of those while at the same time getting a fair deal. I do think capitalists can perform a useful service by calculating risks an moving resources around to productive use. I do not think, however, that such work automatically should reward people with the right to extract rent from those resources for private gain. So I’ll happily grant Bezos an UBI as long as any rent extract from resources under his control is payed back to the commons. Edit: Btw it’s not just about fixing inequality. For me it’s also the realization that markets are exceptionally bad at allocating resources to intrinsically motivated labor, biasing the whole economy toward optimizing for greed. An UBI could alleviate this problem somewhat by allowing more amateur work to flourish.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

CuriousSkeptic 7y ago

No need to assume an income tax based financing if that’s what you mean. My own take on UBI is to finance it from land rent. In the way Henry George thought about it (or Thomas Paine, John Locke, or even John Rawls for that matter) See Geolibertarianism for good start to learn about the argument https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geolibertarianism https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geolibertarianism

mdorazio 7y ago
Another word for "land rent" is "property tax". I know there are differences from the geolibertarianism view, but in the context of funding something like UBI they amount to the same thing.
- sagarm 7y ago
  They're quite different, because improvements to the land (buildings, etc) are not taxed under a land value tax but are taxed under a property tax. The argument is that the value of the land itself is collectively created, so it is morally justifiable to capture this value for public benefit. On the other hand, improvements on a particular piece of land represent an individual's investment.
  - zozbot234 7y ago
    There's a better-known argument that land itself is in fixed supply. (Even where land reclamation is a thing, say in the Netherlands, it's not the private sector doing it.) If you pay a tax on land rent, this doesn't alter your behavior compared to paying no tax, because you would've had to forgo that same rent anyway as part of holding that land for yourself. The fact that land rent correlates so well with locally-created value also makes it quite convenient as a source of funds for local government.
    - iguy 7y ago
      Sure. But if it's better, it's worth doing anyway. The question of how best to collect taxes is orthogonal to questions of what to spend them on.
    - sagarm 7y ago
      Yes, it's also economically efficient. A moral objection to land taxation is common enough that I now lead with the moral argument.
  - CuriousSkeptic 7y ago
    I would extend that argument even further. Not only is it morally justified to capture the value, its also the only means by which the private ownership can be justified at all. It is, after all, our rule of law and common institutions that will enforce the title to begin with. From a position of Rawls veil of ignorance, I don’t see how you could justify land title being granted on first come first served basis. Leased to the highest bidder (with a public dividend) seems much more agreeable.
- mandelbrotwurst 7y ago
  Maybe "land tax" would be best here, with "tax" being a specific type of rent due to a government and "land" being a specific type of property (and not all property!).
toast0 7y ago
Taking the money from land ownership instead of from income doesn't make the taking more palatable to those you're taking it from. Chances are, if I've got a high enough income to be net taxed for UBI based on income tax, I've also got a high enough land interest to be net taxed based on UBI based on land rent/property tax. Personally, a system based on income tax works better for me, as I'd like to have some high income time, then retire and lower my tax burden. If land/property is a significant source of government revenue, I need to have a much larger reserve before I retire; it may be easier to accumulate, but it's a psychological barrier. If you're changing the rules after I've already retired though, I'm going to get out the torches and pitchforks.
- zozbot234 7y ago
  > If land/property is a significant source of government revenue, I need to have a much larger reserve before I retire On the contrary, many people retire to low-cost areas where land rents are incredibly low. You can also move to a smaller house or apartment and lower your land "footprint" that you would be paying rent on. (This is of course the gains you would realize by selling the larger property, in the absence of taxation on land rent. Since land rent tax does not substantially alter incentives.) And you need to pay tax on your retirement savings anyway, either at saving or withdrawal. It amounts to the same thing.
- CuriousSkeptic 7y ago
  My point was that it wouldn’t be collected from “fellow citizens” but, as you say, a few rich entities such as yourself.
  - steve_taylor 7y ago
    Calling fellow citizens “rich entities” doesn’t make it more palatable.
    - CuriousSkeptic 7y ago
      The original point was that there’s a difference between a rich entity and fellow citizens. I took it to imply the people around most people who would benefit, and support such a scheme. A large majority of citizens don’t own property, most have debt. And I would argue, mostly due to legislative capture from the few people who do own property. So when I think of the word “fellow citizens” attribute the word to how people in the first group relate to each other. The latter group would be fellow plutocrats.
pakitan 7y ago
You're mixing tax policy (land rent) with tax income distribution policy (UBI). I think property taxation should be improved and Geolib is one way to do it. However, if we assume that Geolib is the optimal taxation policy, by no means does it follow that UBI is the optimal distribution policy.
- CuriousSkeptic 7y ago
  I’m mixing it on ideological grounds. Tax comes from the state, a violent actor with arbitrary rights to tax an distribute (although in democratic societies, ostensibly controlled by majority rule) For me land rent isn’t a tax, and it does not belong to the state in any shape or form. It’s about the commons and fundamental inalienable rights. Things I expect to see in the UNs declarations of human rights rather than in the tax-policy of the local government
  - pakitan 7y ago
    My point is that there are couple of problems/unknowns with UBI: 1. Where do we get the money from? 2. What will be the long term effects of UBI and does it constitute progress compared to the current system. I have no idea whether the math with Geolib checks out but even if it does, it only answers the first question. I just find it very amusing that UBI is aimed at fixing the inequality, yet its proponents are somehow oblivious to the obvious - UBI by design is increasing the inequality. UBI means the top 10% by income/wealth will receive exactly the same distributions as the bottom 10%. Jeff Bezos will be getting the same UBI as the bum on the street. How is that progress? Whatever your ideology is, I don't think Jeff Bezos should have any fundamental inalienable right to land rent/tax.
    - CuriousSkeptic 7y ago
      I happen to think he should. Not sure about the other income or wealth though, and I think it’s well within scope of the discussion to consider how he could be deprived of most of those while at the same time getting a fair deal. I do think capitalists can perform a useful service by calculating risks an moving resources around to productive use. I do not think, however, that such work automatically should reward people with the right to extract rent from those resources for private gain. So I’ll happily grant Bezos an UBI as long as any rent extract from resources under his control is payed back to the commons. Edit: Btw it’s not just about fixing inequality. For me it’s also the realization that markets are exceptionally bad at allocating resources to intrinsically motivated labor, biasing the whole economy toward optimizing for greed. An UBI could alleviate this problem somewhat by allowing more amateur work to flourish.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]