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This is a big part of the reason I support the idea of a "basic income" system. I believe there are lots of people out there not wired for dealing with the pol

This is a big part of the reason I support the idea of a "basic income" system. I believe there are lots of people out there not wired for dealing with the politics or immediate-results stress of the VC system but who are self-directed, interested and motivated enough to work on big problems, but whose energy is destroyed by having to deal with the immense bullshit inherent in modern office-style software development to make money to pay the bills. As a society I believe we would be better off if these people were free to go live in some cheap cost of living area while just doing their thing and contributing to the commons in the form of open source or taking what they eventually create and marketing it (if it is marketable when complete) in order to generate wealth on top of their basic income. I believe the same would hold for non-software creative jobs as well. But, of course, I'm not holding my breath for this to happen.

verbin217 13y ago
I've argued this before. People usually tell me I'm living in a bubble and that the general public is too lazy for this to work.
- rhizome 13y ago
  It's not aimed at the general public though, only those who would create IP, businesses, etc. but otherwise than through established economic engines (businesses and companies).
  - chad_oliver 13y ago
    But how do you choose who would create IP, businesses, etc? Seems like the selection process would become just as politicized as the processes which it has been set up to avoid. Not to mention, we already have this scheme (tenure) and it's slowly going out of fashion.
    - rhizome 13y ago
      Well, I'm not versed in the minimum-income ideas GP was describing, but one way to think about it might be as an expansion of the Small-Business Administration.
- michaelochurch 13y ago
  People usually tell me I'm living in a bubble and that the general public is too lazy for this to work. Right now, we have a problem with parasitic moochers who ruin society-- a parasitic set of nonproducers who have destroyed our values and bankrupted us. They're at the top of it. If the worst thing that happens out of BI is that there's a class of parasites at the bottom, that I can deal with it. It improves the leverage of the productive middle against the parasitic, progress-averse top of society, and that's a really good thing.
  - verbin217 13y ago
    > It improves the leverage of the productive middle against the parasitic, progress-averse top of society, and that's a really good thing. I'm certainly inclined to agree with you. However, many of the people I've discussed this with think the middle wouldn't be so productive if their livelihood didn't depend on it. I usually argue that with automation we don't need as many people working. Imagine a machine is invented that is capable of replacing every facet of human labor. While this is obviously a great invention in our current system it would condemn the majority to insurmountable poverty. This machine is already being invented slowly. With private ownership of the means of production basic income will become a social necessity.
    - michaelochurch 13y ago
      I'm certainly inclined to agree with you. However, many of the people I've discussed this with think the middle wouldn't be so productive if their livelihood didn't depend on it. Most people are stuck in a mindset appropriate to a world where the most productive people are 1.25-1.50x more productive than average ones and reducing variance (bringing everyone to the middle) has expectancy. Now, it's 10x. Everything a company does to detect and punish slackers takes several times more productivity off the best people-- who might drop from 10x to mere 4x-- than it induces gain. To quote Gus Fring, "I don't find fear to be an effective motivator".
    - saraid216 13y ago
      > However, many of the people I've discussed this with think the middle wouldn't be so productive if their livelihood didn't depend on it. I usually argue that with automation we don't need as many people working. I essentially agree. Why do we need people to be productive? Why do we need people working? We do need this, but do we really understand why? What is the moral argument derived from, that we say people must work because otherwise they're lazy? I tried to write out an answer to these, since I have it somewhat in my head, but it's too incoherent to come out as sentences right now, so I'll just leave them here unanswered.
- strlen 13y ago
  The economists' argument is that the rest of society is better of with the "too lazy too work" part of general public receiving a negative income tax. Several reasons for this: 1) A person that only does the bare minimum amount of work needed to avoid being fired exerts a cost on the economy, e.g., work place accidents due to negligence, "work shirking", taking credit for others' work through bullying and politics, etc... 2) To an extent these individuals are already using other welfare programs, e.g., social security disability payments ( see http://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2011/09/how_to_be_mean_to_your_kids.html http://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2011/09/how_to_be_mean_to_you... ) to this end, despite these programs not being designed with this goal in mind. Of course this is complete a red herring in the first place: like most behavioural traits, industriousness is distributed along a normal distribution. In other words "too lazy to do any kind of work" people exist, as do people working 18 hour days, but the average individual falls somewhere in between. Finally it's also easy to design a work around for this: even the name negative income tax hints at this -- these individuals would still receive these payments if they're working (either full time but below a living wage, or underemployed/consulting) so there's still incentive to earn more (much like a progressive income tax means there's still an incentive to earn more even once you've exceeded a certain tax bucket). We could even make a requirement that individuals remain in the work force (even if they can't find an employer willing to hire them at this time): they would provide proof that they've applied to jobs, were seeking further education, or the like. The fact that both liberal and Friedman/Hayek libertarian economists support this idea means there's probably something to it. In any case, the comparison is not with an ideal system, but with what with have now: on the net, a negative income tax would actually mean a smaller government and greater negative liberty (less welfare administration agencies, more individual choice and less compulsory-participation programs like an insurance mandate or social security) and it would mean those worse off in society would fare better than they do today (i.e., greater "social justice").
  - gizmo686 13y ago
    >greater negative liberty What does this mean? >We could even make a requirement that individuals remain in the work force (even if they can't find an employer willing to hire them at this time): they would provide proof that they've applied to jobs, were seeking further education, or the like. I've long been a supporter of a negative income tax (actually, until recently it was a basic income), and this is one idea I've been trying to develop. I have some concerns about how well the idea you layed out could be implemented. It seems like it is doomed to fail due to the nessasary bueracracy. Either the process of proving you were looking for work becomes so streamline that you do not need to actually exert meaningfull effort (and possibly waste employers time to get the needed paperwork), or proving that you are seeking work would become a significant burden. The solution I've been thinking of is some sort of work on demand program, where, while your unemployed and reiciving your guaranteed income, you can be asked to do short term work for the government (and/or private companies). Obviously this would need regulation to prevent it from being exploitative, but it would allow the governent to make more infastructure investments without needing nearly as much money. It might even save more money than we are paying people through the program as we would effectivly be getting labor at below market wages. An important part of this system is that there be no long term commitment, so if you find a job, want to move, etc, you will not be prevented from doing so. This may also require an additional investment in training the unemployed to do the specific job we need them to (but training the workforce is a good idea anyway). Apart from the obvious regulatory issues, which seem solvable, what I can't quite figure out is how to make this fit in with a negative income tax. Effectivly the work on demand model makes the government an employer of last resort, and what would be negative income tax simply becomes a paycheck. The best solution I can come up with is abandon the negative income tax idea and embrace the government as an employer of last resort model. This sidesteps the problem of a lazy unemployed by requiring them to work to receive the income. If the 'normal' workforce gets to small employers could 'rent' these workers from the government, again at sub-market wages. This however, risks employers not hiring 'normal' workers, but rather work on demand`ers. If this is the case, then many people would be unable to get a normal job, and effectivly be forced to work for sub-market wages, potentially leading to a situation like the industrial revolution where much of the workforce is trapped in low paying jobs because they are the only ones available. However, because the government controls the minimum income, they control the wages of these workers, so they can increase said wages as this starts to become the case. But, as this happens we move even more into the government become the sole employer. Once this happens we begin to loose the free market, causing us to be in an effectivly socialist state. However, when a specific region of this economy becomes inneficient, an entrapanuer would have the oppurtunity to make above minimum wages by competing with the existing provider. If quality of life is good enough for everyone that no one wants to do this, then we win. If quality of life is bad enough then someone will do this. Hopefully this will allow the free market to create and maintain the proper equilibrium point between socialism and free-market.
- wisty 13y ago
  Yes, the general public is lazy. But they are more greedy than than they are lazy. You can probably already work 3 months a year doing some kind of seasonal work, and lay around the rest of the time but you won't be able to afford anything nice. Guess what - most people want nice things.
jfb 13y ago
I have always liked Friedman's negative income tax proposal for exactly this reason.
- skyraider 13y ago
  Just going to add a bit about some potentially fertile intellectual grounds for bipartisan support for some form of universal minium income. From the right: F.A. Hayek, another right-leaning Nobel-winning economist, also supported a universal minimum income (not a negative income tax, but similar, of course. He also added a caveat that he thought it should be implemented IFF it was implemented everywhere). I like the idea because it doesn't involve eliminating market economies. It's kind of like food stamps, but for a broader array of things: You can competitively purchase basic goods and services, which generally drives down costs and drives up quality. From the left: One big concern with cash transfers is that some goods are complicated for consumers to understand (healthcare, for example). So, if you are left-leaning, maybe you can support a universal minimum income because the government could have a big role to play in, say, acting as a neutral agent and creating web portals and apps that efficiently disseminate excellent and easy-to-understand information about the types of healthcare plans available for purchase.
  - jfb 13y ago
    I like it because it presumes that people are capable, when left to their own devices, to make decisions on their own.
  - lolcraft 13y ago
    > From the left: One big concern with cash transfers is that some goods are complicated for consumers to understand (healthcare, for example). Not really. The problem with health care is that it works if it's socialized, and it doesn't if it's private, as shown by about all the entire developed world. And Saudi Arabia. No way to patch it to make it palatable to the right wing, but that shouldn't be a problem. There wasn't any way to make the USSR being a failure palatable to the left, either. To clarify, health care is not a consumer product, it's a particular kind of insurance. It doesn't make sense to bring consumer choice into it. [1] > if you are left-leaning, maybe you can support a universal minimum income What are you talking about? Universal minimum income is a socialist proposal. It has been for a fairly long time. I suppose they'll be glad to see the libertarians also agree that it could work, but it's not like Hayek alone invented it. [1] http://www.who.int/bulletin/volumes/82/2/PHCBP.pdf http://www.who.int/bulletin/volumes/82/2/PHCBP.pdf
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
charlieflowers 13y ago
Question (and this is motivated out of my ignorance, not any political leaning) -- If everyone gets a Basic Income, wouldn't prices merely rise to compensate for it, leaving us in the same state we're in now? In other words, when it comes to prices, isn't everything "relative," since prices are determined by supply and demand?
- textminer 13y ago
  I feel like it'd be affine, so the floor buying power of each individual wouldn't be zero, but some offset of zero that nonetheless has buying power (even if that marginal amount is less than in the original system).
- skyraider 13y ago
  The income must be cash or cash-equivalent (as opposed to a monopsony, where a single payer buys tries to negotiate lower rates with, say, farms and landlords) so that purchasing occurs competitively. Government's role would be to break up monopolies on basic goods and services.
- gizmo686 13y ago
  Economics is one of those subjects where simple questions have complicated answers. At a basic level, we have more than ample resources to give everyone ample food, shelter, etc. However, because of the way money is distributed, it is more profitable for producers to create less nessasary items for those with a lot of money. With a Basic Income, producers would have a reason to create more of the basic goods now that more people have money to give for it. Of course, the fact that these people are now spending more money does have a significant positive effect on the economy, as it is essential the definition of not a depression.
  - sliverstorm 13y ago
    the fact that these people are now spending more money does have a significant positive effect on the economy This sounds like a house of cards. Does Zimbabwe have a significantly positive economy because of just how many Zimbabwean dollars are being spent?
1123581321 13y ago
I do not agree this essay is a reason and I have two specific reasons for it from the essay: "I was approaching my 20s and I had to get a job. Living at home off of my parents was not sustainable, and wasn’t conducive to a better future." I do not think that a life on basic income would have been appealing to the author based on this remark. "I began doing non-consulting, full-time work several of years ago. During the span of those years, I have made moves between the plains, the mountains, and the coast. I have learned a good deal (though I don’t claim expertise) about different facets of the tech industry from different perspectives. But I also took a great hit. I got stupid." I do not believe the author presented with a life on basic income would have wanted to have foregone the prospect of this experience despite the prospect of the cost of it. I lament that I haven't read 200 books a year since my teens and I hope nobody would mistake that to mean that I want to be paid by the government to read 200 books a year.
- 3rd3 13y ago
  > "I was approaching my 20s and I had to get a job. Living at home off of my parents was not sustainable, and wasn’t conducive to a better future." Maybe a basic income would have encouraged him to go the academic track which seems to suit him so well.
  - 1123581321 13y ago
    If he was attracted to the idea of going to grad school for free, I think he would have gotten a grad assistant scholarship/stipend. He would certainly qualify. However, I don't see any indication that academia would have addressed the needs expressed in what I quoted from the essay. Academia has its own grinds and banalities and does not have an easy exit.
- andor 13y ago
  I do not think that a life on basic income would have been appealing to the author Basic income isn't supposed to be your only source of income. Rather, it's income you can take for granted and that therefore gives you some financial security to do riskier or financially less rewarding (e.g. social) work.

verbin217 13y ago

I've argued this before. People usually tell me I'm living in a bubble and that the general public is too lazy for this to work.

rhizome 13y ago
It's not aimed at the general public though, only those who would create IP, businesses, etc. but otherwise than through established economic engines (businesses and companies).
- chad_oliver 13y ago
  But how do you choose who would create IP, businesses, etc? Seems like the selection process would become just as politicized as the processes which it has been set up to avoid. Not to mention, we already have this scheme (tenure) and it's slowly going out of fashion.
  - rhizome 13y ago
    Well, I'm not versed in the minimum-income ideas GP was describing, but one way to think about it might be as an expansion of the Small-Business Administration.
michaelochurch 13y ago
People usually tell me I'm living in a bubble and that the general public is too lazy for this to work. Right now, we have a problem with parasitic moochers who ruin society-- a parasitic set of nonproducers who have destroyed our values and bankrupted us. They're at the top of it. If the worst thing that happens out of BI is that there's a class of parasites at the bottom, that I can deal with it. It improves the leverage of the productive middle against the parasitic, progress-averse top of society, and that's a really good thing.
- verbin217 13y ago
  > It improves the leverage of the productive middle against the parasitic, progress-averse top of society, and that's a really good thing. I'm certainly inclined to agree with you. However, many of the people I've discussed this with think the middle wouldn't be so productive if their livelihood didn't depend on it. I usually argue that with automation we don't need as many people working. Imagine a machine is invented that is capable of replacing every facet of human labor. While this is obviously a great invention in our current system it would condemn the majority to insurmountable poverty. This machine is already being invented slowly. With private ownership of the means of production basic income will become a social necessity.
  - michaelochurch 13y ago
    I'm certainly inclined to agree with you. However, many of the people I've discussed this with think the middle wouldn't be so productive if their livelihood didn't depend on it. Most people are stuck in a mindset appropriate to a world where the most productive people are 1.25-1.50x more productive than average ones and reducing variance (bringing everyone to the middle) has expectancy. Now, it's 10x. Everything a company does to detect and punish slackers takes several times more productivity off the best people-- who might drop from 10x to mere 4x-- than it induces gain. To quote Gus Fring, "I don't find fear to be an effective motivator".
  - saraid216 13y ago
    > However, many of the people I've discussed this with think the middle wouldn't be so productive if their livelihood didn't depend on it. I usually argue that with automation we don't need as many people working. I essentially agree. Why do we need people to be productive? Why do we need people working? We do need this, but do we really understand why? What is the moral argument derived from, that we say people must work because otherwise they're lazy? I tried to write out an answer to these, since I have it somewhat in my head, but it's too incoherent to come out as sentences right now, so I'll just leave them here unanswered.
strlen 13y ago
The economists' argument is that the rest of society is better of with the "too lazy too work" part of general public receiving a negative income tax. Several reasons for this: 1) A person that only does the bare minimum amount of work needed to avoid being fired exerts a cost on the economy, e.g., work place accidents due to negligence, "work shirking", taking credit for others' work through bullying and politics, etc... 2) To an extent these individuals are already using other welfare programs, e.g., social security disability payments ( see http://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2011/09/how_to_be_mean_to_your_kids.html http://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2011/09/how_to_be_mean_to_you... ) to this end, despite these programs not being designed with this goal in mind. Of course this is complete a red herring in the first place: like most behavioural traits, industriousness is distributed along a normal distribution. In other words "too lazy to do any kind of work" people exist, as do people working 18 hour days, but the average individual falls somewhere in between. Finally it's also easy to design a work around for this: even the name negative income tax hints at this -- these individuals would still receive these payments if they're working (either full time but below a living wage, or underemployed/consulting) so there's still incentive to earn more (much like a progressive income tax means there's still an incentive to earn more even once you've exceeded a certain tax bucket). We could even make a requirement that individuals remain in the work force (even if they can't find an employer willing to hire them at this time): they would provide proof that they've applied to jobs, were seeking further education, or the like. The fact that both liberal and Friedman/Hayek libertarian economists support this idea means there's probably something to it. In any case, the comparison is not with an ideal system, but with what with have now: on the net, a negative income tax would actually mean a smaller government and greater negative liberty (less welfare administration agencies, more individual choice and less compulsory-participation programs like an insurance mandate or social security) and it would mean those worse off in society would fare better than they do today (i.e., greater "social justice").
- gizmo686 13y ago
  >greater negative liberty What does this mean? >We could even make a requirement that individuals remain in the work force (even if they can't find an employer willing to hire them at this time): they would provide proof that they've applied to jobs, were seeking further education, or the like. I've long been a supporter of a negative income tax (actually, until recently it was a basic income), and this is one idea I've been trying to develop. I have some concerns about how well the idea you layed out could be implemented. It seems like it is doomed to fail due to the nessasary bueracracy. Either the process of proving you were looking for work becomes so streamline that you do not need to actually exert meaningfull effort (and possibly waste employers time to get the needed paperwork), or proving that you are seeking work would become a significant burden. The solution I've been thinking of is some sort of work on demand program, where, while your unemployed and reiciving your guaranteed income, you can be asked to do short term work for the government (and/or private companies). Obviously this would need regulation to prevent it from being exploitative, but it would allow the governent to make more infastructure investments without needing nearly as much money. It might even save more money than we are paying people through the program as we would effectivly be getting labor at below market wages. An important part of this system is that there be no long term commitment, so if you find a job, want to move, etc, you will not be prevented from doing so. This may also require an additional investment in training the unemployed to do the specific job we need them to (but training the workforce is a good idea anyway). Apart from the obvious regulatory issues, which seem solvable, what I can't quite figure out is how to make this fit in with a negative income tax. Effectivly the work on demand model makes the government an employer of last resort, and what would be negative income tax simply becomes a paycheck. The best solution I can come up with is abandon the negative income tax idea and embrace the government as an employer of last resort model. This sidesteps the problem of a lazy unemployed by requiring them to work to receive the income. If the 'normal' workforce gets to small employers could 'rent' these workers from the government, again at sub-market wages. This however, risks employers not hiring 'normal' workers, but rather work on demand`ers. If this is the case, then many people would be unable to get a normal job, and effectivly be forced to work for sub-market wages, potentially leading to a situation like the industrial revolution where much of the workforce is trapped in low paying jobs because they are the only ones available. However, because the government controls the minimum income, they control the wages of these workers, so they can increase said wages as this starts to become the case. But, as this happens we move even more into the government become the sole employer. Once this happens we begin to loose the free market, causing us to be in an effectivly socialist state. However, when a specific region of this economy becomes inneficient, an entrapanuer would have the oppurtunity to make above minimum wages by competing with the existing provider. If quality of life is good enough for everyone that no one wants to do this, then we win. If quality of life is bad enough then someone will do this. Hopefully this will allow the free market to create and maintain the proper equilibrium point between socialism and free-market.
wisty 13y ago
Yes, the general public is lazy. But they are more greedy than than they are lazy. You can probably already work 3 months a year doing some kind of seasonal work, and lay around the rest of the time but you won't be able to afford anything nice. Guess what - most people want nice things.

jfb 13y ago

I have always liked Friedman's negative income tax proposal for exactly this reason.

skyraider 13y ago
Just going to add a bit about some potentially fertile intellectual grounds for bipartisan support for some form of universal minium income. From the right: F.A. Hayek, another right-leaning Nobel-winning economist, also supported a universal minimum income (not a negative income tax, but similar, of course. He also added a caveat that he thought it should be implemented IFF it was implemented everywhere). I like the idea because it doesn't involve eliminating market economies. It's kind of like food stamps, but for a broader array of things: You can competitively purchase basic goods and services, which generally drives down costs and drives up quality. From the left: One big concern with cash transfers is that some goods are complicated for consumers to understand (healthcare, for example). So, if you are left-leaning, maybe you can support a universal minimum income because the government could have a big role to play in, say, acting as a neutral agent and creating web portals and apps that efficiently disseminate excellent and easy-to-understand information about the types of healthcare plans available for purchase.
- jfb 13y ago
  I like it because it presumes that people are capable, when left to their own devices, to make decisions on their own.
- lolcraft 13y ago
  > From the left: One big concern with cash transfers is that some goods are complicated for consumers to understand (healthcare, for example). Not really. The problem with health care is that it works if it's socialized, and it doesn't if it's private, as shown by about all the entire developed world. And Saudi Arabia. No way to patch it to make it palatable to the right wing, but that shouldn't be a problem. There wasn't any way to make the USSR being a failure palatable to the left, either. To clarify, health care is not a consumer product, it's a particular kind of insurance. It doesn't make sense to bring consumer choice into it. [1] > if you are left-leaning, maybe you can support a universal minimum income What are you talking about? Universal minimum income is a socialist proposal. It has been for a fairly long time. I suppose they'll be glad to see the libertarians also agree that it could work, but it's not like Hayek alone invented it. [1] http://www.who.int/bulletin/volumes/82/2/PHCBP.pdf http://www.who.int/bulletin/volumes/82/2/PHCBP.pdf

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

charlieflowers 13y ago

Question (and this is motivated out of my ignorance, not any political leaning) -- If everyone gets a Basic Income, wouldn't prices merely rise to compensate for it, leaving us in the same state we're in now? In other words, when it comes to prices, isn't everything "relative," since prices are determined by supply and demand?

textminer 13y ago
I feel like it'd be affine, so the floor buying power of each individual wouldn't be zero, but some offset of zero that nonetheless has buying power (even if that marginal amount is less than in the original system).
skyraider 13y ago
The income must be cash or cash-equivalent (as opposed to a monopsony, where a single payer buys tries to negotiate lower rates with, say, farms and landlords) so that purchasing occurs competitively. Government's role would be to break up monopolies on basic goods and services.
gizmo686 13y ago
Economics is one of those subjects where simple questions have complicated answers. At a basic level, we have more than ample resources to give everyone ample food, shelter, etc. However, because of the way money is distributed, it is more profitable for producers to create less nessasary items for those with a lot of money. With a Basic Income, producers would have a reason to create more of the basic goods now that more people have money to give for it. Of course, the fact that these people are now spending more money does have a significant positive effect on the economy, as it is essential the definition of not a depression.
- sliverstorm 13y ago
  the fact that these people are now spending more money does have a significant positive effect on the economy This sounds like a house of cards. Does Zimbabwe have a significantly positive economy because of just how many Zimbabwean dollars are being spent?

1123581321 13y ago

I do not agree this essay is a reason and I have two specific reasons for it from the essay: "I was approaching my 20s and I had to get a job. Living at home off of my parents was not sustainable, and wasn’t conducive to a better future." I do not think that a life on basic income would have been appealing to the author based on this remark. "I began doing non-consulting, full-time work several of years ago. During the span of those years, I have made moves between the plains, the mountains, and the coast. I have learned a good deal (though I don’t claim expertise) about different facets of the tech industry from different perspectives. But I also took a great hit. I got stupid." I do not believe the author presented with a life on basic income would have wanted to have foregone the prospect of this experience despite the prospect of the cost of it. I lament that I haven't read 200 books a year since my teens and I hope nobody would mistake that to mean that I want to be paid by the government to read 200 books a year.

3rd3 13y ago
> "I was approaching my 20s and I had to get a job. Living at home off of my parents was not sustainable, and wasn’t conducive to a better future." Maybe a basic income would have encouraged him to go the academic track which seems to suit him so well.
- 1123581321 13y ago
  If he was attracted to the idea of going to grad school for free, I think he would have gotten a grad assistant scholarship/stipend. He would certainly qualify. However, I don't see any indication that academia would have addressed the needs expressed in what I quoted from the essay. Academia has its own grinds and banalities and does not have an easy exit.
andor 13y ago
I do not think that a life on basic income would have been appealing to the author Basic income isn't supposed to be your only source of income. Rather, it's income you can take for granted and that therefore gives you some financial security to do riskier or financially less rewarding (e.g. social) work.