3 ms·

They also have a much better safety net. Healthcare not being tied to employment is already massive. I think a flat tax + UBI is the only way to go. The dream

They also have a much better safety net. Healthcare not being tied to employment is already massive. I think a flat tax + UBI is the only way to go. The dream of AI should be a society where maybe 10% of people have to work. The nightmare is if the other 90% still need work but can’t find it.

andsoitis 2mo ago
> the other 90% still need work but can’t find it. Where do all jobs come from? Ultimately they’re created by people, so I wouldn’t worry about there being a demand but no supply.
- manlymuppet 2mo ago
  Jobs are created by desire, and the labor required to fulfill the market's desires. People won't ever stop wanting things. Our wants today are vastly different from our wants a hundred years ago, and thus the labor pool looks vastly different. We shouldn't make policy decisions based on the assumption that there is a limited lump of labor.
  - andsoitis 2mo ago
    > Jobs are created by desire This made me pause and think for a moment. Desire is not an external entity or being that manipulates us. Our biology generates desire, since it has been selected for by evolution through natural selection. People create jobs. But unlike the conventional picture people have in their head, it is a unidirectional creation process (i.e. by the "job giver"). The job is created through the dynamic of the "giver" and the "seeker".
    - manlymuppet 2mo ago
      Seeker and giver, and the ebb and flow between—-enlightening. Great perspective.
  - salawat 2mo ago
    >People won't ever stop wanting things. Citation required. I assure you, wanting vs. being able to realistically acquire is a very powerful force of want extinguishment. You cannot, in fact, get a thing, if the world around you is not conducive to enabling you to pull the requisite capital together to meet the prices set. Something that is getting markedly harder for various strata in the economy currently.
    - manlymuppet 2mo ago
      I don’t mean “wanting” in the traditional sense. In economics, “wanting” is more closely defined as a sort of always-on, unconscious self-interest. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scarcity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scarcity Sorry to be so overly-intellectual. I probably should’ve been simpler.
Retric 2mo ago
Flat tax is only ever flat when you hold down deductions. That’s way harder than it seems. The corporate veil is extraordinarily valuable to the point where a minimum 10% tax on any money passing through options makes a lot of sense. However, the idea you can pass liability off for free is so pervasive you’d never get something like that to pass. Not because of how good or bad the idea is, but because of how effective voting blocks + donors are.
manlymuppet 2mo ago
Yes to a stronger welfare state, including untying healthcare and employment, and a UBI (more specifically a negative income tax). But I think the nightmare you imagine is not realistic. There isn't a lump of labor. We shouldn't make policy decisions based on the assumption that the labor pool will be limited.
- genxy 2mo ago
  We have seen the labor pool shrink for construction, restaurant, cleaning, farming, etc greatly in the last couple years.
  - defrost 2mo ago
    To clarify, that's the demand for labour in farming has shrunk while crop yields per acre have increased. Three people doing the work required to seed, spray, harvest 4,000 Hectares for assorted barley, canola, etc is commonplace today in areas that once struggled to farm a few hundred hectares with four brothers and a father.
  - manlymuppet 2mo ago
    And yet, within the last couple years, the unemployment rate has remained stable within its usual 3-5% healthy band, and the total amount of people employed has increased overall. Where labor has contracted in some places, it has grown elsewhere.
    - ab5tract 2mo ago
      That metric is so gamed it doesn’t even make sense. If you’ve been out of work for 6 months (or is it 12) you just fall off the metric. So the entire homeless population of the US is not counted as unemployed. That’s been baked into the metric for decades and they have only gotten more discriminatory as to who counts as unemployed since.
      - forgotmypasswor 2mo ago
        Didn't we have negative unemployment rate sometime during or right after COVID? I remember people talking about how gamed and disconnected from reality these numbers were because (I think) a bunch of people stopped looking for work or filing for unemployment and were dropped from the labor force for official statistics. It really messed up the models being used.
t-writescode 2mo ago
Healthcare being tired to employment and related lacks of safety net are the only reason the most abusive companies (call centers, common retail experiences) have employees. We would do well to improve safety nets so that everyone benefits.
- deleted 2mo ago
  [deleted]
sublinear 2mo ago
I don't think I'll ever understand this perspective. To my ears, all the AI hype and profoundly ignorant economic fantasies sound exactly like the bidet hype of the 2010s. You can't have a revolution based entirely on not having to wipe your ass (except when you still do because bidets are garbage). Unless you are fresh out of college and working at some lame startup or coding sweatshop, mature white collar work has always been pretty damn close to "not having to work".
- manlymuppet 2mo ago
  Haha I agree. Although my bidet is phenomenal, air conditioned white collar work has always felt like a lucky getaway from real work to me.
  - sublinear 2mo ago
    To be clear, I meant that there are no threats to what has always kept white collar workers employed. The past few years have been nothing but the most asinine arguments by truly pitiable people. You're easily replaceable early on when your only value is doing, but with more experience come more meetings and responsibilities. You become valuable for knowing, and knowing is not mere knowledge. Assuming that the years of experience have shaken out the chaff, the only source of stress for those who remain employed is what is already inseparable from life itself. Personal growth without work doesn't even make sense. That's why it doesn't feel like work. That's why the concept of "not having to work" is pathological and ridiculous. Anyone feeling this way about "work" needs to get help. I'm totally serious when I say that.
    - mlrtime 2mo ago
      Is this another way of saying "choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life"?
      - sublinear 2mo ago
        With enough experience, it doesn't matter what you pick. Any job can become effortless. Choose a career that fucking pays at least.
SkiFire13 2mo ago
> flat tax FYI in some places flat taxes are technically unconstitutional

andsoitis 2mo ago

> the other 90% still need work but can’t find it. Where do all jobs come from? Ultimately they’re created by people, so I wouldn’t worry about there being a demand but no supply.

manlymuppet 2mo ago
Jobs are created by desire, and the labor required to fulfill the market's desires. People won't ever stop wanting things. Our wants today are vastly different from our wants a hundred years ago, and thus the labor pool looks vastly different. We shouldn't make policy decisions based on the assumption that there is a limited lump of labor.
- andsoitis 2mo ago
  > Jobs are created by desire This made me pause and think for a moment. Desire is not an external entity or being that manipulates us. Our biology generates desire, since it has been selected for by evolution through natural selection. People create jobs. But unlike the conventional picture people have in their head, it is a unidirectional creation process (i.e. by the "job giver"). The job is created through the dynamic of the "giver" and the "seeker".
  - manlymuppet 2mo ago
    Seeker and giver, and the ebb and flow between—-enlightening. Great perspective.
- salawat 2mo ago
  >People won't ever stop wanting things. Citation required. I assure you, wanting vs. being able to realistically acquire is a very powerful force of want extinguishment. You cannot, in fact, get a thing, if the world around you is not conducive to enabling you to pull the requisite capital together to meet the prices set. Something that is getting markedly harder for various strata in the economy currently.
  - manlymuppet 2mo ago
    I don’t mean “wanting” in the traditional sense. In economics, “wanting” is more closely defined as a sort of always-on, unconscious self-interest. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scarcity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scarcity Sorry to be so overly-intellectual. I probably should’ve been simpler.

Retric 2mo ago

Flat tax is only ever flat when you hold down deductions. That’s way harder than it seems. The corporate veil is extraordinarily valuable to the point where a minimum 10% tax on any money passing through options makes a lot of sense. However, the idea you can pass liability off for free is so pervasive you’d never get something like that to pass. Not because of how good or bad the idea is, but because of how effective voting blocks + donors are.

manlymuppet 2mo ago

Yes to a stronger welfare state, including untying healthcare and employment, and a UBI (more specifically a negative income tax). But I think the nightmare you imagine is not realistic. There isn't a lump of labor. We shouldn't make policy decisions based on the assumption that the labor pool will be limited.

genxy 2mo ago
We have seen the labor pool shrink for construction, restaurant, cleaning, farming, etc greatly in the last couple years.
- defrost 2mo ago
  To clarify, that's the demand for labour in farming has shrunk while crop yields per acre have increased. Three people doing the work required to seed, spray, harvest 4,000 Hectares for assorted barley, canola, etc is commonplace today in areas that once struggled to farm a few hundred hectares with four brothers and a father.
- manlymuppet 2mo ago
  And yet, within the last couple years, the unemployment rate has remained stable within its usual 3-5% healthy band, and the total amount of people employed has increased overall. Where labor has contracted in some places, it has grown elsewhere.
  - ab5tract 2mo ago
    That metric is so gamed it doesn’t even make sense. If you’ve been out of work for 6 months (or is it 12) you just fall off the metric. So the entire homeless population of the US is not counted as unemployed. That’s been baked into the metric for decades and they have only gotten more discriminatory as to who counts as unemployed since.
    - forgotmypasswor 2mo ago
      Didn't we have negative unemployment rate sometime during or right after COVID? I remember people talking about how gamed and disconnected from reality these numbers were because (I think) a bunch of people stopped looking for work or filing for unemployment and were dropped from the labor force for official statistics. It really messed up the models being used.

t-writescode 2mo ago

Healthcare being tired to employment and related lacks of safety net are the only reason the most abusive companies (call centers, common retail experiences) have employees. We would do well to improve safety nets so that everyone benefits.

deleted 2mo ago
[deleted]

sublinear 2mo ago

I don't think I'll ever understand this perspective. To my ears, all the AI hype and profoundly ignorant economic fantasies sound exactly like the bidet hype of the 2010s. You can't have a revolution based entirely on not having to wipe your ass (except when you still do because bidets are garbage). Unless you are fresh out of college and working at some lame startup or coding sweatshop, mature white collar work has always been pretty damn close to "not having to work".

manlymuppet 2mo ago
Haha I agree. Although my bidet is phenomenal, air conditioned white collar work has always felt like a lucky getaway from real work to me.
- sublinear 2mo ago
  To be clear, I meant that there are no threats to what has always kept white collar workers employed. The past few years have been nothing but the most asinine arguments by truly pitiable people. You're easily replaceable early on when your only value is doing, but with more experience come more meetings and responsibilities. You become valuable for knowing, and knowing is not mere knowledge. Assuming that the years of experience have shaken out the chaff, the only source of stress for those who remain employed is what is already inseparable from life itself. Personal growth without work doesn't even make sense. That's why it doesn't feel like work. That's why the concept of "not having to work" is pathological and ridiculous. Anyone feeling this way about "work" needs to get help. I'm totally serious when I say that.
  - mlrtime 2mo ago
    Is this another way of saying "choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life"?
    - sublinear 2mo ago
      With enough experience, it doesn't matter what you pick. Any job can become effortless. Choose a career that fucking pays at least.

SkiFire13 2mo ago

> flat tax FYI in some places flat taxes are technically unconstitutional