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yes yes all of existence is suffering. we’ve known this for thousands of years. the escape from suffering is wisdom and compassion. in this new abundance, why

yes yes all of existence is suffering. we’ve known this for thousands of years. the escape from suffering is wisdom and compassion. in this new abundance, why not remove all the guns from all the heads?

dantheman 6y ago
I'm totally for that - make it voluntary. Or are we only going to point the gun at others to take what they have?
- krapp 6y ago
  If we made it voluntary, almost no one would volunteer, certainly not enough to be viable. Taxation and the rule of law aren't opt-in for the same reason.
- Talanes 6y ago
  I wasn't given a vote when we decided to hand out all of the land and resources to them in the first place, so I hardly see how the system as it stands is in any way voluntary.
  - dantheman 6y ago
    Do you think most wealth is from land? Is that who the UBI taxes would come from? Would it be funded by a property tax?
daseiner1 6y ago
in modernity, many of the guns’ hands & heads have the same owner
garmaine 6y ago
Because we are not living in an era of such abundance that we have the liberty to do that. Do the math: 300M people, $2k/mo, 12mo/yr is 7.2 trillion dollars. Even to first order that is unaffordable, and that’s without factoring in that UBI would decimate the tax base that’s supposed to support it, or the consumer price inflation that would result in that $2k not going as far as you’d expect.
bena 6y ago
You're inferring more than I'm implying. I'm not saying "existence is suffering". I'm saying existence requires maintenance and for all of human history, it's been up to one to do that maintenance on their own. We've never lived in a time where the majority could exist in the non-working class. Having the majority be in the non-working class raises certain issues. Like, who is going to be in the minority. I'm not worried about what happens at 100% automation. I'm more worried about what happens when there are too few jobs to reasonably distribute among the people. There's an icky issue of essentially slavery we're going to have to confront.

dantheman 6y ago

I'm totally for that - make it voluntary. Or are we only going to point the gun at others to take what they have?

krapp 6y ago
If we made it voluntary, almost no one would volunteer, certainly not enough to be viable. Taxation and the rule of law aren't opt-in for the same reason.
Talanes 6y ago
I wasn't given a vote when we decided to hand out all of the land and resources to them in the first place, so I hardly see how the system as it stands is in any way voluntary.
- dantheman 6y ago
  Do you think most wealth is from land? Is that who the UBI taxes would come from? Would it be funded by a property tax?

daseiner1 6y ago

in modernity, many of the guns’ hands & heads have the same owner

garmaine 6y ago

Because we are not living in an era of such abundance that we have the liberty to do that. Do the math: 300M people, $2k/mo, 12mo/yr is 7.2 trillion dollars. Even to first order that is unaffordable, and that’s without factoring in that UBI would decimate the tax base that’s supposed to support it, or the consumer price inflation that would result in that $2k not going as far as you’d expect.

bena 6y ago

You're inferring more than I'm implying. I'm not saying "existence is suffering". I'm saying existence requires maintenance and for all of human history, it's been up to one to do that maintenance on their own. We've never lived in a time where the majority could exist in the non-working class. Having the majority be in the non-working class raises certain issues. Like, who is going to be in the minority. I'm not worried about what happens at 100% automation. I'm more worried about what happens when there are too few jobs to reasonably distribute among the people. There's an icky issue of essentially slavery we're going to have to confront.