6 ms·

This is a weird comment to make when people are simultaneously discussing how the rich have the state do what they need - corruption, lobbying, regulatory captu

This is a weird comment to make when people are simultaneously discussing how the rich have the state do what they need - corruption, lobbying, regulatory capture, tax breaks, interest-free loans... It shifts the power from employers to the state, not to the employees, the state then merely allows the former employees to play a little.

jonathanstrange 6y ago
That depends on the constitution of the country and how UBI is implemented. You can enact laws and mechanisms that prevent governments from influencing the UBI and make it very hard for parliament to change it in a negative way, e.g. require a 2/3 majority and other hurdles. You could even add a right to UBI in a section of the constitution that cannot be altered. Germany has the so-called Ewigkeitsklausel, for example, that makes any attempt to alter articles 1-20 of the constitution invalid. It's perfectly possible to build in security mechanisms.
- TomMarius 6y ago
  This discussion revolves around the USA. Do you expect the USA to solve the problems I listed within the next decade? I don't, definitely not if Trump wins again. > It's perfectly possible to build in security mechanisms. Sure it is, but there would have to be someone with the power to do so and more importantly the interest to do so. That's something I simply don't see happening in the USA - check their health insurance system for a concrete example. If they're unable to copy the similarly capitalistic but freer system of Switzerland or other countries with mixed private/public health insurance, then what hope is there with the issues I listed and the UBI?
  - jonathanstrange 6y ago
    I find it unlikely that genuine UBI will be implemented in any country in the near future, although, to be fair, history of mankind has brought surprising changes in the past such as e.g. the complete downfall of Feudalism. I just wanted to make clear that it's possible to implement UBI. There are many reasons against UBI, but not the ones you gave. Personally, I'm against UBI for two reasons. First, it does not solve the fundamental problem, which is capital accumulation an ever increasing gap between the rich and the poor. The more money you have, the more money flows to you, and the gap has grown insane. Unless this trend is addressed and reversed, even UBI cannot prevent massive social unrest in the long run. Second, UBI makes it mentally and morally easier for employers to fire people and to lower wages even further. In the end, it will lead to a grossly impoverished class of UBI recipients who will work 6 days a week for $3.25 an hour to supplement their meagre UBI. In my opinion a classical welfare state, maybe with a negative income tax, strong worker protections, tax-funded education and health care, and strong means to prevent wealth accumulation are the only ways to tackle the problem in the long run. Reforming hereditary laws and stopping almost all "financial products" would be a good start. Right now, once you have reached a certain threshold you can just live off by speculating on Wall Street and juggling around virtual money without ever producing anything of (non-monetary) value. That shouldn't be possible at all. A deeper problem is that the whole model of existing economy is flawed, because it's based on permanent expansion, which leads to fast exhaustion of natural resources. It is simply not maintainable on Earth for more than 200 years from now.
    - playworker 6y ago
      > In the end, it will lead to a grossly impoverished class of UBI recipients who will work 6 days a week for $3.25 an hour to supplement their meagre UBI. I don't know how to break this to you, but surely you know there is already a grossly impoverished group of people working 6 days a week for $3.25 an hour without UBI. If you add the UBI to their income they'll be hugely better off and they might even be able to choose between working those 6 days or staying at home and looking after their children, or caring for an elderly relative without the risk of being made homeless, or being unable to afford food for their family.
      - jonathanstrange 6y ago
        You have to understand that a sufficiently high UBI is very expensive. It either costs trillions of dollars or will be so low that poor people may be worse off than now due to lack of other welfare. Realistically affordable UBIs would amount to less that what jobless people get on social welfare, e.g. around 200-300 EUR in my country. I've seen the figures, and those were the ones of proponents of UBI. Do your own calculations and you will see what I mean. If you want to help poor people, start with radically capping and reducing rents per m^2 everywhere. And by "radically" I mean radically, not just halving them. That's one of the biggest problems in almost every country and it will get worse and worse if current trends continue.
        playworker 6y ago
        Expensive is okay, we're talking about eradicating poverty, as first world nations we should be judged on how well we look after the most vulnerable in society, not on how wealthy the 1% can get. US population is what, 300 million, ~75% of that are adults, multiplied by something like $35,000 is what, 8 trillion? The top 1% have a wealth of 35 trillion, US GDP is around 24 trillion - is it acceptable to spend 1/3rd of your GDP on eradicating poverty and creating a more equal society?
      - jlokier 6y ago
        > If you add the UBI to their income they'll be hugely better off and they might even be able to choose Maybe, maybe not. For clarity, I am a fan of UBI. But I'd like to run through a hypothesis about an adverse effect. If you add the UBI and costs go up accordingly, the real, marginal benefit they can obtain by working for $3.25 an hour will actually decrease. This means someone who is in circumstances where they can currently earn a meagre income to tip the balance to being able to make ends meet in that circumstance, will find their ability to work the same amount in a UBI world will not tip the balance to being able to make ends meet. In other words they will be pushed to change circumstance, towards more work and/or lower cost. E.g. move somewhere cheaper, work more hours. This does not sound like a net benefit for the already impoverished. It sounds like a trap, because low-wage working will provide less marginal benefit to change what people can afford when they are stuck.
mcv 6y ago
You're expecting UBI to also fix the lack of democracy? That's a separate problem, that definitely also needs to be addressed. UBI is just to prevent poor people from starving while rewarding working your way up out of poverty. It's not the magical supercure for all society's ills. Those need their own solutions. Like proportional representation, approval voting, banning corporate money from politics, etc.
- TomMarius 6y ago
  What I am saying is that expecting UBI to transfer power to the employees while these problems still exist might not go too well. I don't expect UBI to be perfect from the get go, and I don't expect these other problems to be solved within the next decade - so what now? Do we condone poor people (that have absolutely no way to fight back) to the whims of a corrupt government for a decade or more because it might get better sometimes in the future?
  - mcv 6y ago
    They already are. It's not something that's changing because of UBI. And if it's truly a UBI, then it will be a lot harder to deny people that basic income than it currently is with welfare and social security.
    - TomMarius 6y ago
      IMHO it's a lot harder to deny a concrete, targeted entitlement than a super-wide payment for everyone without a reason/need that might just get reduced to nothing over time.
      - mcv 6y ago
        It's much easier to deny that people meet a very specific set of criteria required for such a targeted entitlement, than to deny that they are citizens and alive.
- sillysaurusx 6y ago

jonathanstrange 6y ago

That depends on the constitution of the country and how UBI is implemented. You can enact laws and mechanisms that prevent governments from influencing the UBI and make it very hard for parliament to change it in a negative way, e.g. require a 2/3 majority and other hurdles. You could even add a right to UBI in a section of the constitution that cannot be altered. Germany has the so-called Ewigkeitsklausel, for example, that makes any attempt to alter articles 1-20 of the constitution invalid. It's perfectly possible to build in security mechanisms.

TomMarius 6y ago
This discussion revolves around the USA. Do you expect the USA to solve the problems I listed within the next decade? I don't, definitely not if Trump wins again. > It's perfectly possible to build in security mechanisms. Sure it is, but there would have to be someone with the power to do so and more importantly the interest to do so. That's something I simply don't see happening in the USA - check their health insurance system for a concrete example. If they're unable to copy the similarly capitalistic but freer system of Switzerland or other countries with mixed private/public health insurance, then what hope is there with the issues I listed and the UBI?
- jonathanstrange 6y ago
  I find it unlikely that genuine UBI will be implemented in any country in the near future, although, to be fair, history of mankind has brought surprising changes in the past such as e.g. the complete downfall of Feudalism. I just wanted to make clear that it's possible to implement UBI. There are many reasons against UBI, but not the ones you gave. Personally, I'm against UBI for two reasons. First, it does not solve the fundamental problem, which is capital accumulation an ever increasing gap between the rich and the poor. The more money you have, the more money flows to you, and the gap has grown insane. Unless this trend is addressed and reversed, even UBI cannot prevent massive social unrest in the long run. Second, UBI makes it mentally and morally easier for employers to fire people and to lower wages even further. In the end, it will lead to a grossly impoverished class of UBI recipients who will work 6 days a week for $3.25 an hour to supplement their meagre UBI. In my opinion a classical welfare state, maybe with a negative income tax, strong worker protections, tax-funded education and health care, and strong means to prevent wealth accumulation are the only ways to tackle the problem in the long run. Reforming hereditary laws and stopping almost all "financial products" would be a good start. Right now, once you have reached a certain threshold you can just live off by speculating on Wall Street and juggling around virtual money without ever producing anything of (non-monetary) value. That shouldn't be possible at all. A deeper problem is that the whole model of existing economy is flawed, because it's based on permanent expansion, which leads to fast exhaustion of natural resources. It is simply not maintainable on Earth for more than 200 years from now.
  - playworker 6y ago
    > In the end, it will lead to a grossly impoverished class of UBI recipients who will work 6 days a week for $3.25 an hour to supplement their meagre UBI. I don't know how to break this to you, but surely you know there is already a grossly impoverished group of people working 6 days a week for $3.25 an hour without UBI. If you add the UBI to their income they'll be hugely better off and they might even be able to choose between working those 6 days or staying at home and looking after their children, or caring for an elderly relative without the risk of being made homeless, or being unable to afford food for their family.
    - jonathanstrange 6y ago
      You have to understand that a sufficiently high UBI is very expensive. It either costs trillions of dollars or will be so low that poor people may be worse off than now due to lack of other welfare. Realistically affordable UBIs would amount to less that what jobless people get on social welfare, e.g. around 200-300 EUR in my country. I've seen the figures, and those were the ones of proponents of UBI. Do your own calculations and you will see what I mean. If you want to help poor people, start with radically capping and reducing rents per m^2 everywhere. And by "radically" I mean radically, not just halving them. That's one of the biggest problems in almost every country and it will get worse and worse if current trends continue.
      - playworker 6y ago
        Expensive is okay, we're talking about eradicating poverty, as first world nations we should be judged on how well we look after the most vulnerable in society, not on how wealthy the 1% can get. US population is what, 300 million, ~75% of that are adults, multiplied by something like $35,000 is what, 8 trillion? The top 1% have a wealth of 35 trillion, US GDP is around 24 trillion - is it acceptable to spend 1/3rd of your GDP on eradicating poverty and creating a more equal society?
    - jlokier 6y ago
      > If you add the UBI to their income they'll be hugely better off and they might even be able to choose Maybe, maybe not. For clarity, I am a fan of UBI. But I'd like to run through a hypothesis about an adverse effect. If you add the UBI and costs go up accordingly, the real, marginal benefit they can obtain by working for $3.25 an hour will actually decrease. This means someone who is in circumstances where they can currently earn a meagre income to tip the balance to being able to make ends meet in that circumstance, will find their ability to work the same amount in a UBI world will not tip the balance to being able to make ends meet. In other words they will be pushed to change circumstance, towards more work and/or lower cost. E.g. move somewhere cheaper, work more hours. This does not sound like a net benefit for the already impoverished. It sounds like a trap, because low-wage working will provide less marginal benefit to change what people can afford when they are stuck.

mcv 6y ago

You're expecting UBI to also fix the lack of democracy? That's a separate problem, that definitely also needs to be addressed. UBI is just to prevent poor people from starving while rewarding working your way up out of poverty. It's not the magical supercure for all society's ills. Those need their own solutions. Like proportional representation, approval voting, banning corporate money from politics, etc.

TomMarius 6y ago
What I am saying is that expecting UBI to transfer power to the employees while these problems still exist might not go too well. I don't expect UBI to be perfect from the get go, and I don't expect these other problems to be solved within the next decade - so what now? Do we condone poor people (that have absolutely no way to fight back) to the whims of a corrupt government for a decade or more because it might get better sometimes in the future?
- mcv 6y ago
  They already are. It's not something that's changing because of UBI. And if it's truly a UBI, then it will be a lot harder to deny people that basic income than it currently is with welfare and social security.
  - TomMarius 6y ago
    IMHO it's a lot harder to deny a concrete, targeted entitlement than a super-wide payment for everyone without a reason/need that might just get reduced to nothing over time.
    - mcv 6y ago
      It's much easier to deny that people meet a very specific set of criteria required for such a targeted entitlement, than to deny that they are citizens and alive.
sillysaurusx 6y ago