4 ms·

This is likely more of a moral than an economic thing - it's pretty much definitely going to be cheaper to just give people the money than maintain infrastructu

This is likely more of a moral than an economic thing - it's pretty much definitely going to be cheaper to just give people the money than maintain infrastructure to verify that people are doing something the Government sees as work, define what the Government sees as work (if you're not getting paid for it, why does smoking weed with your friends not count but making shitty music in your basement for an audience of 1 count?), claw back money from people who shouldn't have got it, implement an appeals process, pay for lawyers when that appeals process fails, and so on and so forth. And then people are still going to fall through the cracks, which is the entire thing we don't want. The other thing is that we've already massively decoupled value contributed to the tribe from value received from the tribe - many people's wages have absolutely nothing to do with how much they personally produce value. Generally speaking, employed people receive less than the value they create, and capital owners/employers receive more.

donw 6y ago
To quote H.L. Mencken: "For every complex problem, there is a solution which is clear, simple... and wrong." "Solving" poverty will be a complex thing no matter what we do. We want to keep people out of utter privation. Off the streets, as it were. A chicken in every chicken and pot in every pot... or something like that. At the same time, our resources are not infinite, and being valuable to your tribe -- e.g. "work" -- is a critical part of maintaining a healthy psychology. The thing we absolutely, positively, must avoid at all costs is what we do now: paying people to not work, and punishing them when they do.
- vertex-four 6y ago
  Paying people not to work is fine by me, because everyone I know who doesn't work (defined here as exchanging cash for labour - I'd love to see a definition which includes the contributions of these people comprehensively and remains worth enforcing) contributes to a better society in a variety of ways. This has been my experience in "rough" areas and otherwise. Even the weed smokers and the people playing video games are often maintaining a social glue with others and improving the lives of people around them - we might imagine that if these people didn't exist, multiplayer game creators might pay people to play video games and be friendly when the servers aren't particularly full, as a service to their paying players. We might actually see interactive platforms like Twitch as providing this in a roundabout sort of way - you can strike up a conversation with someone over a shared interest in video games for just a few cents. Japan has a small rent-a-friend economy, and there's a global cat cafe industry - people appear to be willing to pay for their social lives if they can't get it for free, suggesting that what many of these people do is in fact unpaid work. Punishing people for working is really the problem; if some work (paid or unpaid) needs to be done, and somebody wants to do it, they shouldn't feel that doing that work might affect their livelihood.
  - luckylion 6y ago
    > we might imagine that if these people didn't exist, multiplayer game creators might pay people to play video games and be friendly when the servers aren't particularly full, as a service to their paying players This is very far-reaching. We might also imagine, that, if only we sacrificed any and all redheads once they reach the age of eight to the volcano god, the world would be blessed by everlasting peace, wealth and bliss. But let's not do it just because we can imagine something. > suggesting that what many of these people do is in fact unpaid work No, it's really not. They accidentally do something that other people in other contexts will pay others for. It's not that you'd have to pay someone to play video games with you if some stoner wasn't online. You'd play video games with ... all the other people who want to play video games.
    - vertex-four 6y ago
      I accidentally wound up managing a cafe about 25 hours a week for free, was that not work? What's the definition of accidental here?
      - donw 6y ago
        > I accidentally wound up managing a cafe about 25 hours a week for free, was that not work? As long as the cafe pays taxes, follows the law like any other business, and claims you as an employee, sounds like work to me. You could also be part of a nonprofit that holds mini-concerts in nursing homes, provided that all the appropriate tax paperwork gets filed.
        vertex-four 6y ago
        I worked as a volunteer, not an employee. I also could've been volunteering looking after plants, or sitting around doing nothing in particular except chatting with people, and the organisation would've likely signed off on it. I also could've been volunteering as the one person who knew how to manage the sound system and turned up for two hours a week but was the reason we had any customers at all. There's no reason some random company is trustworthy, or some arbitrary amount of time is valued specifically. Would self-employed work not count under your system? What if I was doing something with the hope that it will make money in future? What if it's not, in fact, intended to make money at all, but would be non-profit work? If I set up a company that would sign off on me and my friends, would that change anything?

donw 6y ago

To quote H.L. Mencken: "For every complex problem, there is a solution which is clear, simple... and wrong." "Solving" poverty will be a complex thing no matter what we do. We want to keep people out of utter privation. Off the streets, as it were. A chicken in every chicken and pot in every pot... or something like that. At the same time, our resources are not infinite, and being valuable to your tribe -- e.g. "work" -- is a critical part of maintaining a healthy psychology. The thing we absolutely, positively, must avoid at all costs is what we do now: paying people to not work, and punishing them when they do.

vertex-four 6y ago
Paying people not to work is fine by me, because everyone I know who doesn't work (defined here as exchanging cash for labour - I'd love to see a definition which includes the contributions of these people comprehensively and remains worth enforcing) contributes to a better society in a variety of ways. This has been my experience in "rough" areas and otherwise. Even the weed smokers and the people playing video games are often maintaining a social glue with others and improving the lives of people around them - we might imagine that if these people didn't exist, multiplayer game creators might pay people to play video games and be friendly when the servers aren't particularly full, as a service to their paying players. We might actually see interactive platforms like Twitch as providing this in a roundabout sort of way - you can strike up a conversation with someone over a shared interest in video games for just a few cents. Japan has a small rent-a-friend economy, and there's a global cat cafe industry - people appear to be willing to pay for their social lives if they can't get it for free, suggesting that what many of these people do is in fact unpaid work. Punishing people for working is really the problem; if some work (paid or unpaid) needs to be done, and somebody wants to do it, they shouldn't feel that doing that work might affect their livelihood.
- luckylion 6y ago
  > we might imagine that if these people didn't exist, multiplayer game creators might pay people to play video games and be friendly when the servers aren't particularly full, as a service to their paying players This is very far-reaching. We might also imagine, that, if only we sacrificed any and all redheads once they reach the age of eight to the volcano god, the world would be blessed by everlasting peace, wealth and bliss. But let's not do it just because we can imagine something. > suggesting that what many of these people do is in fact unpaid work No, it's really not. They accidentally do something that other people in other contexts will pay others for. It's not that you'd have to pay someone to play video games with you if some stoner wasn't online. You'd play video games with ... all the other people who want to play video games.
  - vertex-four 6y ago
    I accidentally wound up managing a cafe about 25 hours a week for free, was that not work? What's the definition of accidental here?
    - donw 6y ago
      > I accidentally wound up managing a cafe about 25 hours a week for free, was that not work? As long as the cafe pays taxes, follows the law like any other business, and claims you as an employee, sounds like work to me. You could also be part of a nonprofit that holds mini-concerts in nursing homes, provided that all the appropriate tax paperwork gets filed.
      - vertex-four 6y ago
        I worked as a volunteer, not an employee. I also could've been volunteering looking after plants, or sitting around doing nothing in particular except chatting with people, and the organisation would've likely signed off on it. I also could've been volunteering as the one person who knew how to manage the sound system and turned up for two hours a week but was the reason we had any customers at all. There's no reason some random company is trustworthy, or some arbitrary amount of time is valued specifically. Would self-employed work not count under your system? What if I was doing something with the hope that it will make money in future? What if it's not, in fact, intended to make money at all, but would be non-profit work? If I set up a company that would sign off on me and my friends, would that change anything?