5 ms·

I just can't get behind basic income. It makes sense from a very self-motivated individual's point of view (which many/most on HN are) but if you look at the m

I just can't get behind basic income. It makes sense from a very self-motivated individual's point of view (which many/most on HN are) but if you look at the majority of the country in my opinion most people are not driven this way. I really feel like we would end up with a country where the majority just live on basic income and do nothing. At least now they must contribute to society on a basic level to earn an income, even if it is unsatisfactory (welfare and social programs aside).

siscia 12y ago
This is something I cannot figure out, people do not get bored after a while of doing nothing ?
- nightski 12y ago
  There is a large difference between doing nothing, and doing nothing of value to society. For example, I love to learn. I could spend ages reading books and learning as much as possible for my meager brain to understand about physics and it would be very fulfilling. But unless I apply that knowledge, it really wasn't of much value to anyone (even myself, depending on how you look at it). So why do I deserve to take advantage of all society would provide with basic income (food, shelter, safety, etc..) if I provided nothing in return?
  - siscia 12y ago
    Ok, I see, but after you spend 5 years of your life learning you will be able to do a lot of thing. Now, why should you start doing something different from learning ? Maybe because if you do something productive you will product value that will let you to live in a better house, or to learn more... The point is not to let everybody doing nothing of productive, the point is to give to everybody the choice, between doing nothing of productive now vs. bringing values to the society...
    - nightski 12y ago
      I have been surprised over and over again at the powerful force that is doing "just enough" to get by. So many people are affected by it. It's really quite impressive. You know those bars you go to? Restaurants? Theatres? The list goes on. No one would work at those shitty jobs any more. Because 25k is comfortable - why would I work at a shitty job for another few thousand?
      - siscia 12y ago
        You definitely get a point. However, in my opinion, the point is that nobody should work at such "shitty jobs", who enjoy being a waiter, will be one in some high end restaurant where he will compensate in an extremely honest way. The introduction of basic income will need a complete mental switch. We can dream about robot that serve us, or we can start to realize that the quicker way would be to change mentality and stop to need somebody (or something) that serve us.
        gfodor 12y ago
        I think the challenge is we are currently in the middle of a transitionary period towards full automation of "shitty jobs." Basic income is a logical model once those shitty jobs have been commoditized: there is no need for the jobs, and the people who normally would only be qualified for those jobs need to survive somehow. But we're not there yet, our economy is still reliant upon a large number of people doing "shitty jobs" in order to grow in general, and more specifically to continue this push towards further automation. This is the challenge: you need a way to alleviate human suffering during the transition towards a greater world for everyone, but the most obvious way to do that (basic income) may halt the transition itself. What we probably need is something that looks more like a bridge than a final destination, but any such bridge starts to resemble the experiments in communism that cost the world so much during the 20th century.
raincom 12y ago
> I really feel like we would end up with a country where the majority just live on basic income and do nothing. The people who end up on "basic income" would do something they like to do; but that something is nothing of value to the economic elite of the world. In that sense, they do "nothing".
- tbrownaw 12y ago
  but that something is nothing of value to the economic elite of the world It has absolutely nothing to do with any "elite". It has to do with being economically visible. If the government pays 300M citizens each $25k annually, that's $7.5T that has to come from somewhere. If you play videogames all day, or turn your back yard into a decorative garden, or anything else you don't get paid for, then you are not contributing to that $7.5T. Which can kinda be a problem if too many people do that and there's nowhere for it to come from.
  - candu 12y ago
    From [1], we already allocate roughly $6k per person per year in the US, enough to fork over $25k/year to the poorest 20%. (This doesn't account for the potential savings of reduced crime (prisons are expensive!), improved health/nutrition, reduced administrative overhead of replacing all welfare systems with a single basic income, etc.) Also: not all value is neatly captured on a W-2 form. If turning my backyard into a decorative garden allows me to set a higher sale price for my home later, I've contributed. If I buy groceries so that I can play videogames all day without falling over from hunger, I've contributed. (If I can pay in cash instead of food stamps because I collect a basic income, even better: there's less bureaucracy on the way to collecting tax on my purchases from the grocery store.) [2] notwithstanding, people who contribute literally nothing to the economy are extremely rare. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2015_United_States_federal_budget https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2015_United_States_federal_bud... [2]: http://www.becomingminimalist.com/the-man-who-quit-money-an-interview-with-daniel-suelo/ http://www.becomingminimalist.com/the-man-who-quit-money-an-...
    - nightski 12y ago
zaroth 12y ago
I think the problem is that what we have now is much worse. Today we pay people to not work, as in quite literally by earning less you can take home more. Plus, if you don't work, then you can do all sorts of other productive (cost reducing) things with your time, and you also don't carry all the associated non-deductible costs of working. The slope of progressive taxes and regressive subsidies is bewilderingly high. Particularly if you have higher health care expenses or anything which might be considered a disability, the first $90k of gross earnings for a family of 4 is almost entirely going to the State & Fed.* As more people "catch on" to the math we see more people dropping out of the labor pool. The story in the media is it's because people have given up on finding work. But I think a significant portion of it is because it's simply not worth working. Not everyone has figured out yet how much the Fed will pay you to not work, but when you do the math I think every middle-class worker should be very angry about it. Now I'm not sure we want to have a system where everyone is paid exactly the same amount no matter what, but I'm pretty sure that a system which pays less as you pay more taxes is broken. * If you take the total market value of all subsidies available to a family of 4 earning nothing, and add in the all-inclusive taxes paid as a result of a family of 4 earning $90k (at about which point subsidies have gone to zero), together those numbers will add to about $90k. If we get more technical, the numbers are actually shifted up by about $30k, because of the standard exemption and child tax credits, the first $30k of income doesn't count. So really it's $30k - $120k where you're effectively working for the Fed.

siscia 12y ago

This is something I cannot figure out, people do not get bored after a while of doing nothing ?

nightski 12y ago
There is a large difference between doing nothing, and doing nothing of value to society. For example, I love to learn. I could spend ages reading books and learning as much as possible for my meager brain to understand about physics and it would be very fulfilling. But unless I apply that knowledge, it really wasn't of much value to anyone (even myself, depending on how you look at it). So why do I deserve to take advantage of all society would provide with basic income (food, shelter, safety, etc..) if I provided nothing in return?
- siscia 12y ago
  Ok, I see, but after you spend 5 years of your life learning you will be able to do a lot of thing. Now, why should you start doing something different from learning ? Maybe because if you do something productive you will product value that will let you to live in a better house, or to learn more... The point is not to let everybody doing nothing of productive, the point is to give to everybody the choice, between doing nothing of productive now vs. bringing values to the society...
  - nightski 12y ago
    I have been surprised over and over again at the powerful force that is doing "just enough" to get by. So many people are affected by it. It's really quite impressive. You know those bars you go to? Restaurants? Theatres? The list goes on. No one would work at those shitty jobs any more. Because 25k is comfortable - why would I work at a shitty job for another few thousand?
    - siscia 12y ago
      You definitely get a point. However, in my opinion, the point is that nobody should work at such "shitty jobs", who enjoy being a waiter, will be one in some high end restaurant where he will compensate in an extremely honest way. The introduction of basic income will need a complete mental switch. We can dream about robot that serve us, or we can start to realize that the quicker way would be to change mentality and stop to need somebody (or something) that serve us.
      - gfodor 12y ago
        I think the challenge is we are currently in the middle of a transitionary period towards full automation of "shitty jobs." Basic income is a logical model once those shitty jobs have been commoditized: there is no need for the jobs, and the people who normally would only be qualified for those jobs need to survive somehow. But we're not there yet, our economy is still reliant upon a large number of people doing "shitty jobs" in order to grow in general, and more specifically to continue this push towards further automation. This is the challenge: you need a way to alleviate human suffering during the transition towards a greater world for everyone, but the most obvious way to do that (basic income) may halt the transition itself. What we probably need is something that looks more like a bridge than a final destination, but any such bridge starts to resemble the experiments in communism that cost the world so much during the 20th century.

raincom 12y ago

> I really feel like we would end up with a country where the majority just live on basic income and do nothing. The people who end up on "basic income" would do something they like to do; but that something is nothing of value to the economic elite of the world. In that sense, they do "nothing".

tbrownaw 12y ago
but that something is nothing of value to the economic elite of the world It has absolutely nothing to do with any "elite". It has to do with being economically visible. If the government pays 300M citizens each $25k annually, that's $7.5T that has to come from somewhere. If you play videogames all day, or turn your back yard into a decorative garden, or anything else you don't get paid for, then you are not contributing to that $7.5T. Which can kinda be a problem if too many people do that and there's nowhere for it to come from.
- candu 12y ago
  From [1], we already allocate roughly $6k per person per year in the US, enough to fork over $25k/year to the poorest 20%. (This doesn't account for the potential savings of reduced crime (prisons are expensive!), improved health/nutrition, reduced administrative overhead of replacing all welfare systems with a single basic income, etc.) Also: not all value is neatly captured on a W-2 form. If turning my backyard into a decorative garden allows me to set a higher sale price for my home later, I've contributed. If I buy groceries so that I can play videogames all day without falling over from hunger, I've contributed. (If I can pay in cash instead of food stamps because I collect a basic income, even better: there's less bureaucracy on the way to collecting tax on my purchases from the grocery store.) [2] notwithstanding, people who contribute literally nothing to the economy are extremely rare. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2015_United_States_federal_budget https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2015_United_States_federal_bud... [2]: http://www.becomingminimalist.com/the-man-who-quit-money-an-interview-with-daniel-suelo/ http://www.becomingminimalist.com/the-man-who-quit-money-an-...
  - nightski 12y ago

zaroth 12y ago

I think the problem is that what we have now is much worse. Today we pay people to not work, as in quite literally by earning less you can take home more. Plus, if you don't work, then you can do all sorts of other productive (cost reducing) things with your time, and you also don't carry all the associated non-deductible costs of working. The slope of progressive taxes and regressive subsidies is bewilderingly high. Particularly if you have higher health care expenses or anything which might be considered a disability, the first $90k of gross earnings for a family of 4 is almost entirely going to the State & Fed.* As more people "catch on" to the math we see more people dropping out of the labor pool. The story in the media is it's because people have given up on finding work. But I think a significant portion of it is because it's simply not worth working. Not everyone has figured out yet how much the Fed will pay you to not work, but when you do the math I think every middle-class worker should be very angry about it. Now I'm not sure we want to have a system where everyone is paid exactly the same amount no matter what, but I'm pretty sure that a system which pays less as you pay more taxes is broken. * If you take the total market value of all subsidies available to a family of 4 earning nothing, and add in the all-inclusive taxes paid as a result of a family of 4 earning $90k (at about which point subsidies have gone to zero), together those numbers will add to about $90k. If we get more technical, the numbers are actually shifted up by about $30k, because of the standard exemption and child tax credits, the first $30k of income doesn't count. So really it's $30k - $120k where you're effectively working for the Fed.