5 ms·

Would be nice to hear why are you against UBI. For starter, here are my main doubts: 0. The most important one. The true UBI - not the one-year-hundred-bucks-

Would be nice to hear why are you against UBI. For starter, here are my main doubts: 0. The most important one. The true UBI - not the one-year-hundred-bucks-pilot-projects - but a true lifetime promise of some significant money will be extremely hard to roll back. Once the djinn is out of the bottle it will be close to impossible to squeeze it back in. We have to think twice before cutting. 1. There are a lot of talks about wealth inequality. What are we going to do if UBI actually increases it? Which actually has great chances of happening, because the money paid to poor will eventually be pumped into more wealthy pockets. Are we suddenly going to change the narrative and conclude that wealth inequality is okay as long as everyone is fed and has roof above their heads? 2. Are we going to get UBI ghettos? This is the question to which temporary pilots won't answer. In twenty years of UBI are we going to get neighborhoods where children don't go to schools, because - well, because why would they? Actually, the question is not even whether we gonna get these ghettos. In a country with 350 million of diverse population we will get a bit of every possible outcome. The questions are (a) how many and (b) what are we going to do with them? 3. Who gets the UBI? All the citizens, but not the aliens? Something seems wrong in a situation when some people - by the virtue of being born in a specific place - don't work and rely on foreign workforce for all their needs. It's not exactly slavery, but looks ethically wrong. 4. We have enough trouble funding retirement pensions. Funding UBI will be double that - at least. What's the plan here? What do we do if the country literally runs out of money? Any thoughts?

mmmeff 5y ago
Fire up the printers, lads!
seibelj 5y ago
We have had a sort of UBI with the pandemic and a sizable portion of people have chosen not to work. I think if you have healthcare, your rent paid for, and free food then there could be 15 to 30% of the population that will just watch Netflix and hang out all day. It’s enough to erode support for the entire program.
- giantg2 5y ago
  I think the number of people that would FIRE would grow exponentially. I know I would if I had healthcare and enough income for all the basics ($1000 per month).
  - seibelj 5y ago
    FIRE is financial independence. It implies you worked hard, scrimped, and lived frugally to earn an early retirement. Getting free everything is not FIRE. It’s reliance on the welfare to eliminate any requirement of productivity. I’m not even saying that’s a bad thing, I’m just stating what it is.
    - giantg2 5y ago
      But people who FIRE today do depend on things that are publically funded. If you read blogs about it, people talk of free library programs, subsidized public transit, tax credits where you get more back than you paid in - net profit, etc. I didn't include Social Security or Medicare since they are supposed to be single payer systems, yet the way they are funded today doesn't exactly jive with that. All I'm saying is that they would FIRE sooner with the extra income.
      - seibelj 5y ago
        You are right but IMO the difference is that the government is enabling people to “retire” without ever working a day in their life. If you have enough money for food, shelter, and free healthcare from cradle to grave with zero requirement of ever working a single day in your life, I think society will change.
  - b9a2cab5 5y ago
    "FIRE" is more accurately described here as not being a productive member of society, which is fine if you've contributed your fair share for 20 years, but not so fine if you're 22 and just out of college. Somehow I doubt that these people are going to use their free time to get education. Without the pressure of parents/society to get good grades (i.e., achieve mastery of the content, although I recognize in some schools classes are poorly taught and tests don't reflect mastery) most college students would cruise through their classes - just talk to any student who took classes P/NP this past year.
giantg2 5y ago
Your #1 is something I have thought about as well. Specifically, if the higher income people don't need the money, they will invest it while the lower income people are spending it. Although this might be offset by the increased tax burden (who knows how that will look). If everyone is getting this money, then I would also expect some inflation, which would likely hit the lower income people harder than the wealthy. For #4, they will never run out of money. It will be worth less from inflation. Or they will take it from the people that have it.
trident5000 5y ago
Agreed, I cant imagine people not just voting in the politician that promises them the most money once that train leaves the station.
bsenftner 5y ago
UBI has the fundamental problem of not addressing inequality, but further fueling greater inequality. It is essentially a free license for those economically abusing employees and anonymous others to continue unchecked, and, frankly, double down because now their economically captured serfs have their guards down and their employers can push more healthcare expenses their way, and there will be a huge jump in multi-level marketing within UBI communities, and several more eyeball rolling developments. The answer to all our woes is that unpopular Education Funding issue. No UBI would be needed with a nation of educated self-actualizers, rather than the nation of marginally educated workers with blinders on and kids that need far more attention they they can give. That's the society we have created thus far. If UBI were in a form such as "free room and board and spending money as long as one is in school, thru a PhD if one wants", I might think differently. As it is being formulated now, it is a recipe for Mr. Obvious to say "look, UBI does not work, it created this giant worse than before mess".
- AlexTWithBeard 5y ago
  > Education Funding issue I understand you're talking about college education. But I can't avoid mentioning my beloved Baltimore School District. Awesome funding. Shitty results. [1] https://foxbaltimore.com/news/project-baltimore/baltimore-city-schools-graduation-rate-drops-to-six-year-low https://foxbaltimore.com/news/project-baltimore/baltimore-ci... [2] https://www.forbes.com/sites/adamandrzejewski/2021/03/30/baltimore-city-public-schools-promoted-student-with-013-gpa-while-spending-a-14-billion-budget https://www.forbes.com/sites/adamandrzejewski/2021/03/30/bal... [3] https://educationdata.org/public-education-spending-statistics https://educationdata.org/public-education-spending-statisti...
  - giantg2 5y ago
    I had a friend who worked at the Baltimore Aquarium. The workers there had college degrees in stuff like biology and were only paid about $30k per year. Yet they had about a dozen executives making salaries that were 10x higher. Your link with salaries made me think about that.
    - 5y ago

mmmeff 5y ago

Fire up the printers, lads!

seibelj 5y ago

We have had a sort of UBI with the pandemic and a sizable portion of people have chosen not to work. I think if you have healthcare, your rent paid for, and free food then there could be 15 to 30% of the population that will just watch Netflix and hang out all day. It’s enough to erode support for the entire program.

giantg2 5y ago
I think the number of people that would FIRE would grow exponentially. I know I would if I had healthcare and enough income for all the basics ($1000 per month).
- seibelj 5y ago
  FIRE is financial independence. It implies you worked hard, scrimped, and lived frugally to earn an early retirement. Getting free everything is not FIRE. It’s reliance on the welfare to eliminate any requirement of productivity. I’m not even saying that’s a bad thing, I’m just stating what it is.
  - giantg2 5y ago
    But people who FIRE today do depend on things that are publically funded. If you read blogs about it, people talk of free library programs, subsidized public transit, tax credits where you get more back than you paid in - net profit, etc. I didn't include Social Security or Medicare since they are supposed to be single payer systems, yet the way they are funded today doesn't exactly jive with that. All I'm saying is that they would FIRE sooner with the extra income.
    - seibelj 5y ago
      You are right but IMO the difference is that the government is enabling people to “retire” without ever working a day in their life. If you have enough money for food, shelter, and free healthcare from cradle to grave with zero requirement of ever working a single day in your life, I think society will change.
- b9a2cab5 5y ago
  "FIRE" is more accurately described here as not being a productive member of society, which is fine if you've contributed your fair share for 20 years, but not so fine if you're 22 and just out of college. Somehow I doubt that these people are going to use their free time to get education. Without the pressure of parents/society to get good grades (i.e., achieve mastery of the content, although I recognize in some schools classes are poorly taught and tests don't reflect mastery) most college students would cruise through their classes - just talk to any student who took classes P/NP this past year.

giantg2 5y ago

Your #1 is something I have thought about as well. Specifically, if the higher income people don't need the money, they will invest it while the lower income people are spending it. Although this might be offset by the increased tax burden (who knows how that will look). If everyone is getting this money, then I would also expect some inflation, which would likely hit the lower income people harder than the wealthy. For #4, they will never run out of money. It will be worth less from inflation. Or they will take it from the people that have it.

trident5000 5y ago

Agreed, I cant imagine people not just voting in the politician that promises them the most money once that train leaves the station.

bsenftner 5y ago

UBI has the fundamental problem of not addressing inequality, but further fueling greater inequality. It is essentially a free license for those economically abusing employees and anonymous others to continue unchecked, and, frankly, double down because now their economically captured serfs have their guards down and their employers can push more healthcare expenses their way, and there will be a huge jump in multi-level marketing within UBI communities, and several more eyeball rolling developments. The answer to all our woes is that unpopular Education Funding issue. No UBI would be needed with a nation of educated self-actualizers, rather than the nation of marginally educated workers with blinders on and kids that need far more attention they they can give. That's the society we have created thus far. If UBI were in a form such as "free room and board and spending money as long as one is in school, thru a PhD if one wants", I might think differently. As it is being formulated now, it is a recipe for Mr. Obvious to say "look, UBI does not work, it created this giant worse than before mess".

AlexTWithBeard 5y ago
> Education Funding issue I understand you're talking about college education. But I can't avoid mentioning my beloved Baltimore School District. Awesome funding. Shitty results. [1] https://foxbaltimore.com/news/project-baltimore/baltimore-city-schools-graduation-rate-drops-to-six-year-low https://foxbaltimore.com/news/project-baltimore/baltimore-ci... [2] https://www.forbes.com/sites/adamandrzejewski/2021/03/30/baltimore-city-public-schools-promoted-student-with-013-gpa-while-spending-a-14-billion-budget https://www.forbes.com/sites/adamandrzejewski/2021/03/30/bal... [3] https://educationdata.org/public-education-spending-statistics https://educationdata.org/public-education-spending-statisti...
- giantg2 5y ago
  I had a friend who worked at the Baltimore Aquarium. The workers there had college degrees in stuff like biology and were only paid about $30k per year. Yet they had about a dozen executives making salaries that were 10x higher. Your link with salaries made me think about that.
  - 5y ago