Could We Fund a Universal Basic Income with Universal Basic Assets? (fastcompany.com) 415
Universal Basic Incomes aren't really the issue, argues Fast Company staff writer Ben Schiller. "It's how you find $2 trillion to pay for it."
One answer may come in the form of "universal basic assets" (UBA). UBA can mean a fund of publicly-owned infrastructure or revenue streams -- like Alaska's Permanent Fund which pays residents up to $2,000 a year from state oil taxes. Or, it can mean actual assets that drive down the cost of living, like tuition-free education and free public broadband. There are lots of proposals going around now that fall into these two camps...
Entrepreneur Peter Barnes has called for the creation of a Sky Trust that would both limit the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and provide revenue from carbon taxes. These "carbon dividends" solve two problems at once: income inequality and climate change. He would also tax corporations for using natural resources, on the thinking that the atmosphere, minerals and fresh water around us represent a "joint inheritance." He would also tax speculative financial transactions and use of the electromagnetic spectrum. The U.K. think-tank IPPR recently proposed a similar "sovereign wealth fund owned by and run in the interests of citizens." It would finance the fund with "a scrip tax of up to 3% requiring businesses to issue equity to the government, or pay a tax of equivalent value," sales of land owned by the U.K. monarchy, and higher inheritance taxes.
Blockchain can help. Blockchain technology could offer a way to divide publicly-owned infrastructure so it's genuinely publicly-owned. We could issue tokenized securities in the assets around us giving everyone a stake in their environment. Then they could trade those tokens on exchanges, like they were cryptocurrencies, or use the tokens as collateral on loans.
Entrepreneur Peter Barnes has called for the creation of a Sky Trust that would both limit the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and provide revenue from carbon taxes. These "carbon dividends" solve two problems at once: income inequality and climate change. He would also tax corporations for using natural resources, on the thinking that the atmosphere, minerals and fresh water around us represent a "joint inheritance." He would also tax speculative financial transactions and use of the electromagnetic spectrum. The U.K. think-tank IPPR recently proposed a similar "sovereign wealth fund owned by and run in the interests of citizens." It would finance the fund with "a scrip tax of up to 3% requiring businesses to issue equity to the government, or pay a tax of equivalent value," sales of land owned by the U.K. monarchy, and higher inheritance taxes.
Blockchain can help. Blockchain technology could offer a way to divide publicly-owned infrastructure so it's genuinely publicly-owned. We could issue tokenized securities in the assets around us giving everyone a stake in their environment. Then they could trade those tokens on exchanges, like they were cryptocurrencies, or use the tokens as collateral on loans.
Figures (Score:2)
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"New technology" is what keeps more and more people from being able to sustain themselves economically, because in most parts of the so-called first world the continuous increase of productivity continually also reduces the amount of work needed to produce goods, while a full-time job is still going to be needed (and is not even always sufficient) for the foreseeable future to be able to pay rent and buy food.
The problem is, that neither the universal basic income nor the idea of universal basic assets deal
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"New technology" is what keeps more and more people from being able to sustain themselves economically
[...] What do you think has pulled 100's of millions of people out of poverty and squalor worldwide over the last few decades? [...]
Even if we'd answer that question to your ideological satisfaction, it is meaningless unless we don't ask at least one second question – why are there, depending on the measurement method, still between 1,2 and 1,6 billions of poor people, with zero chance for most of them to ever get out of it, in times of a formerly unknown abundance of the objective prerequisites for world-wide well-being, namely resources, productivity and workforce, and some calculations say the Earth could easily feed even twice
Re: Figures (Score:3)
why are there, depending on the measurement method, still between 1,2 and 1,6 billions of poor people
Mostly thanks to war and dysfunctional governments. See Syria and Venezuela.
You're welcome.
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The question is, will the changes in government required to accept and implement a UBI happen before or after the people start demanding one. Technology will eventually take away the choice to continue punting the issue. Wealth will be distributed somehow, and 'what job you have' will decreasingly be the determinant of that.
Re:Figures (Score:5, Insightful)
There is no need for 'Universal Basic Income' as its being envisioned.
People have certain needs, like food, shelter and safety (and this includes the feeling of being safe).
It not really matters how this is provided, as long it is. However, we do see that in many `developed` countries, there remain numerous issues that threaten the basic needs. While most countries have some sort of welfare system, it's often barely enough to live from. 'Enough not to die, not enough to live from' is often heard. Added to that are a lot of bureaucratic rules that, in order to keep the system 'fair' and 'cost effective' also limits people to escape their situation and improve it. A lot of welfare benefits evaporate the moment people accept (temporary) work, raising uncertainty while not immediately improving their situation. We see that in Europe a lot, even in countries with solid welfare. It is very hard to escape from the 'bottom' once there.
Ironically, in America, one of the richest countries, the welfare system is even worse than in most European countries, even the 'poor European countries'. And when doing the math, it is easy to see that in general the economy would benefit if everyone has a fair income, and everyone that can is productive a.k.a. working. So it is easy to see where the idea for basic income came from.
Now i do agree with you that 'basic income' has become a buzzword that is promising the silver bullet to poverty. And while it might not be that, it might be the direction that welfare systems should evolve: less bureaucracy, more opportunities, and more safety & guarantuee of basic needs.
Ironically, i think basic income is as easy as reforming the welfare and taxation system, as in zero (or even 'negative') tax up to a certain threshold that provides minimum living needs. And make sure that people always financially progress when accepting (any kind of) work, instead of penalizing them.
Poverty control needs political attention. Be it by 'buzzwords' like basic income, sure - if needed. But basic income in itself is a reasonable idea. Opponents usually pull it out of context, and calculate it as expensive, while not realizing it would not be any more expensive than any welfare system currently in place, and only aid economy by allowing more people in (part-time) jobs.
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A lot of welfare benefits evaporate the moment people accept (temporary) work, raising uncertainty while not immediately improving their situation.
If you let people work while receiving benefits (or worse, make the benefits contingent upon employment), you're essentially forcing the taxpayers to subsidize low-paying employers.
This shit flies in the USA, because we've got this collective mentality that if you're not successful, it's your own fault.
Re:Figures (Score:4, Interesting)
I read a postulation some time back that culturally, America is still puritan enough that we need to believe that bad people get punished. The only way to be sure that we see enough of that to be comfortable is to set up systems where people can fail and be miserable.
As a basic starting, point, we need to set up a system where every two dollars you make you lose one dollar of benefits. If we did that, our welfare systems would be a path out of poverty. As it is now, you can make up to like 50% of your benefit with no penalty, but once you go over, you lose your benefit entirely. Someone who wants to work their way out of poverty gets up to about 150% of their welfare benefit, and then it disappears and they're at 51% of their benefit from working. Where's the incentive to escape poverty now?
If we can't even get this right, I can't see us being able to do UBI correctly.
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Ironically, in America, one of the richest countries, the welfare system is even worse than in most European countries, even the 'poor European countries'.
I don't think this is true. In Amsterdam, for example, it's illegal to be homeless. Not only are they down, you kick them while they are down. Not cool at all.
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"try to chain him to government forever"
They've very much done that already, the only people free of the system are those that don't have to pay taxes or use any public services including roads. And you'll probably still have to pay land taxes.
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With the technology the same people say is going to force us into UBI should come self sufficiency.
Indeed. I have been a semi-serious prepper [wikipedia.org] since pre-www days, and it has gotten WAY easier. Solar is better. Wind generators are better. Batteries are better. Way more DC appliances are available. Food prep and storage are way easier (dryers, smokers, tofu presses, breadmakers, etc.).
Most importantly, WAY more information and advice is available. Social media makes it easier to link up with like minded local people, so you can work together to secure the zombie perimeter.
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What's the practical difference between a government and a small number of huge private-owned corporations?
The government has guns. Nobody has to worry about a corporation kicking down their door in the middle of the night because they didn't pay their bills.
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Perhaps the first sentence is the reason for the second sentence.
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You've never heard of repo men and bank foreclosures then, eh? Granted banks tend to get the local sheriff to kick you out, but the repo men just tend to show up in the middle of the night and steal the car back.
UBI Sounds Familiar (Score:4, Insightful)
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Publicly owned infrastructure is and has, to varying degrees, always been (necessary) part of functional capitalist nations. In communism the idea was to make the whole industry publicly owned. (Not a bad idea in itself, either, but not sufficient to make a society a nice place to live in, nor to really call a society communist.)
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Publicly owned infrastructure is and has, to varying degrees, always been (necessary) part of functional capitalist nations. In communism the idea was to make the whole industry publicly owned.
Publicly owned and operated, like the employees had no stake in the outcome. There's a very important distinction between what's offered as a public service and how it's delivered. For example when I was kid, trash collection was a public service delivered by public employees. while these days it's all through bids and tenders. Now that does have all the bad sides of a for-profit company like cutting corners and trying to take advantage of workers, but on the positive side it means that people are always re
Re:UBI Sounds Familiar (Score:5, Insightful)
You didn't read the last paragraph about blockchain.
Essentially, they want to do just what Russia did with its national assets.
Privatize them, give out shares to every citizen in the country, allow those citizens to trade those shares in an open market.
A few years later in Russia, all those shares held by the common people had been traded away to buy food or luxury goods. The real winners were the people with the cash who rounded up as much as those shares as possible. They had enough shares to take over the control of those companies and now those people are known as oligarchs. They were able to rob their country blind with this system.
Re:UBI Sounds Familiar - reservations (Score:4, Interesting)
Indeed this is an issue faced on reservations too. In places where shared ownership reservation lands were turned into individual owned plots, much of that land eventually became owned by a few outside corporations. This is not a new experience, per post USSR Russia, but rather it is a very old trick.
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If it looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, I shall call it a hamster.
Communism Redefined (Score:5, Insightful)
Publicly owned infrastructure used to be called Communism, but I guess they needed some re-branding.
No. Communism is public ownership of all assets. If there are still private assets it is not Communism. Communism is something rather more dramatic than most of the people who throw around the world Communism mean, but in recent years this has generally been done on purpose so that any idea that is not pure unfettered neoliberal capitalism can be shot down as 'crazy communism'.
Of course no country has actually ever had pure unfettered neo-liberal capitalism either, and very few people believe you can organise a society effectively without any form of 'community regulation of the means of production' - you know, things like food and drug safety standards, a centralised military and police force, competition and fraud rules for commerce. Stuff that is actually on the spectrum of Socialism (albeit the lighter end)
In the end though, this is all about trying to claim ownership of words so that the historical connotations associated with that word in popular culture can be loaded against an idea you don't like. So it doesn't matter what the merits of this idea actually are (and I question many of them), by claiming it is 'Communism' people will cease evaluating the idea rationally and just reject it because it is associated with bad stuff. In many ways, I think one of the most influential aspects of the1980s economic reforms was associating them with the word 'free'.
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No. Communism is public ownership of all assets. If there are still private assets it is not Communism.
Thats nonsense.
You are mixing up communism with hypotheticsl 'Ur-communism'.
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The lazy millennials are thinking that the game's rigged, and has been since before they were born. It shouldn't surprise anyone that they're willing to risk changing the rules.
Re:Saudi Arabia (Score:5, Insightful)
UBI and UBA are common items in Saudi Arabia
This argument has a fatal flaw, and unless you have ever been to Saudi Arabia, you probably won't know about it. Saudi Arabia is a two class system. Those who are Saudi Arabian citizens are of the elite class and have everything provided for them. Third country nationals (Pakistani, Ethiopian, Cambodian... et all.) do not have the same luxury. Instead they work for the Saudi's as little more than indentured slave labor.
This is the problem with UBI. Somebody has to do the menial work. If you are guaranteed UBI why would you choose to work as a garbage collector? There is no incentive to do so. UBI is the fastest way to destroy the middle class I can think of.
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If you are guaranteed UBI why would you choose to work as a garbage collector? There is no incentive to do so.
Hence you would have to create a proper incentive. A UBI would actually turn the labour market into a real functioning market, with real bargaining power on both the supply and demand side.
Or, in other words, "Why garbage collectors should earn more than bankers [evonomics.com]".
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As much as I'm pessimistic that we can do UBI as a society, this is why I'm super excited about UBI.
When you don't have to work to survive, it changes the power dynamic for employees. Employees may work for nothing if they love it enough, and employees may demand ridiculous salaries for things nobody wants to do. Best of all, people can follow their dreams without the risk of financial ruin.
I envision a world where someone in their 50s loves gardening, the house is paid off, and UBI can pay for the rest of
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Maybe free Ferraris or hookers and blow for garbage collectors?
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UBI is the fastest way to destroy the middle class I can think of.
How so? The money you would get from UBI is far lower than a middle class wage.
Blockchain (Score:3)
Blockchain can help. Blockchain technology could offer a way to divide publicly-owned infrastructure so it's genuinely publicly-owned
Bullshit. First of all, blockchains only work when the tokens have sufficient value, otherwise there's no incentive for miners. Secondly, even in the case of the most successful blockchain, Bitcoin, we have 99% of the miner capacity in the hands of a few big players, not the general public.
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I know. My point is that it's not going to work without a currency. If there's no money to be made, why would you dedicate your computer power to maintaining the blockchain ?
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Isn't blockchain with no mining just git?
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and there is also blokchain with no mining, just the ledger itself of some asset controlled by it (in this case oil or radio spectrum)
That's just a database.
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You can use blockchain to track physical asset ownership - things like mining for cryptocurrency have nothing to do with it.
Indeed, you don't need a cryptocurrency to make a blockchain. The problem is that without a reward from a coupled cryptocurrency, there's no incentive for anybody to dedicate resources to maintaining and verifying the blockchain. This means that it becomes easy for an attacker to rewrite parts of it.
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A currency connected to a blockchain does not need to be a cryptocurrency. A plain dollar would do it.
How do you control for population growth? (Score:4, Insightful)
So how do you control for population growth? Hundreds of millions of unemployed people with nothing to do but fuck. If you pay for babies, you get more babies. And since there is no more need to compete for resources, they will all be little morons.
Re:How do you control for population growth? (Score:4, Interesting)
education in what?
As to spending, we're spending more on education than we ever have... and spend more on education than any other country per capita.
What is more there is no correlation in US education achievement statistics between spending and grades.
There are areas in the US that spend very lavishly on education that have very low scores and areas that spend very little and have very high scores.
Education stats are more predictive on demographic levels. That is... population density... region... region of city... economic and academic achievement of parents... associated cultural groups... whether the child comes from a single parent house hold... is the single parent a single mother or a single father... etc.
What is spent on teachers has no correlative relationship with higher or lower scores or academic achievement. There are areas in the US that spend 7 thousand dollars per student that have very high test scores and areas that spend 24 or 35 thousand per student that have very low test scores.
I should point out further that even 7 thousand is actually lots of money to run a public education system but is considered to be on the very low end nationally. Consider 20 to 30 children in a class room times 7 thousand. 140 thousand for 20 students or 210 thousand for 30. Per year.
That's more than enough for a private school to manage the kids and you know damn well that a million companies would be beating on your door competing to get that contract.
Instead we have a state run system where that money is mostly wasted on administrators. For every teacher how many administrators are there? It varies but it is rarely better than 1:1 ratio which is absurd.
We can fix the education system but those fixes are matters of reform and not funding increases. The funding is already excessive in most cases.
And this is ignoring the colleges and universities which have increasingly become a national scandal with their geometrically rising tuition costs. Again, with no correlative increase in the quality of education as the price of education doubles and doubles and doubles again.
It used to be in the US that a University student could pay for their tuition by working a part time job and graduate debt free.
If you look at what university professors are paid, you can see that that is easily obtainable right now simply by assessing what the students actually use on campus, what they're actually interested in obtaining from the college/university, and limiting their fees to specifically those services.
What the students want generally... when push comes to shove... is to learn something and get a degree that is recognized by wider society as having some value to assist them with the rest of their lives.
Colleges and universities are widely regarded to be failing in this matter despite doubling costs. Where is the money going? Not into professors. If you look at what professors are paid now vs what they were paid 50 years ago and adjust for inflation they're often making LESS than they were back then. And yet costs are doubling and doubling and doubling. Where is the money going?
And instead of reforming this... the cry is always and ever more for more and more and more money.
To claim we should throw more gasoline on this dumpster fire is to proclaim ignorance of the issue, indifference to reality, or blatant corruption.
There are no other alternatives.
Re:How do you control for population growth? (Score:4, Insightful)
it clearly isn't inflated as the college debt issue makes extremely clear.
What is more, we can compare funds that go to the public school system. The money to those institutions are not inflated. And then divide by the student body.
That is how you get those numbers.
Now you are correct and also repeating what I said if you wish to say that funding to teachers does not exactly correlate with funding to a school district or funding to a professor etc.
That is true.
However, again... I literally said that and that was literally my primary point regarding reform. Cut down staff at school districts and colleges that are not teachers and professors. Reduce the ratio of administrators to teachers. The number should not exceed 1:10 at the highest and currently it is rarely below 1:1.
What is more and this really has to be conceded... there is no correlation between spending and academic achievement.
The worst performing areas in the US tend to be urban inner city schools. The best performing schools are often suburban and rural. Funding can be the same, higher in one, lower in the other... and it won't matter.
In New York for example funding per pupil is about 24 thousand dollars per student throughout the entire state of New York. That means everyone from Manhattan to upstate new york is getting about the same amount of money spent on their kids per pupil. Achievement despite equality in funds tends to fluctuate wildy from community to community.
I can show you areas with very poor performance that get a lot of money and areas that get very little that have very high performance. And these are not outliers. There is literally no correlation.
If you "actually" care about the students then increasing funding is not a helpful position. Reform is all you've got if you actually want to help. The studies on this have been exhaustive and definitive. Accept the results of the dice or don't play the game.
Re: How do you control for population growth? (Score:2)
Even China spents more money to educate low graders than the US does. And that with a currency/value difference of 1 : 3.
Has there ever been a single discussion in which you didn't feel the need to just make up blatant nonsense?
Re:How do you control for population growth? (Score:4, Informative)
False:
http://www.politifact.com/flor... [politifact.com]
Cite your source. I pulled one of out the air... its not hard. I am aware of per district spending across the US. You are not.
Do you know what is the highest spending school district per capita in California? Bet you don't.
Do you know which portion of Connecticut spends the least? Bet you don't.
Your position is based on ignorance. I've seen more than enough information which I've gone through in depth to know this for a fact.
But because you are making an ignorant statement and presuming to be in the know... I think you're going to have to be put in a position where your ignorance is obvious... even to you.
So... in service of what I believe is the only constructive course of action in this argument... please cite a source.
And know that when you do, you'll still be ignoring that spending on education has no correlation with achievement. Something which you're attempting to evade by citing other countries when it clearly is irrelevant. Within the US alone we can see there is no correlation. Changing the subject and refusing to acknowledge that money =/= performance in education is frankly dishonorable in this discussion. You are showing a lack of integrity.
Please address the lack of correlation and concede. Its been checkmate since the first post.
simple answer no (Score:2)
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Indeed, it would be easier to lower the cost of living so that they wouldn't need to pay out so much to give people enough to live off of. That might require some *shudder* regulations, though. Also, the money would have to go directly to the people rather than giving it to corporations and 'hoping' it'll trickle down to people.
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Indeed, it would be easier to lower the cost of living so that they wouldn't need to pay out so much to give people enough to live off of. That might require some *shudder* regulations, though. Also, the money would have to go directly to the people rather than giving it to corporations and 'hoping' it'll trickle down to people.
I fear the "solution" will be a lot more violent than that. We've been over-populating the earth for a long time now, and if Malthus' concept doesn't work it's destructive magic, simple economy will.
There are simply too many humans on earth. And ecology aside, the more automation of the simpler tasks and elimination of those methods of being productive occur, the acceleration of Scrooges "surplus population" will happen.
We will have some options. The best will be to acknowledge the issue, and allow th
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It's a tough thing to work out, but I don't think it's impossible.
US healthcare spending is like $3 trillion, existing social welfare spending around $1 trillion.
I'm guessing we could cut healthcare by a trillion with single payer, and UBI in theory eliminates a lot of existing social welfare spending, so let's say we get $600 billion freed up by replacing 2/3rds of welfare with UBI.
That gets us damn close without any new net spending or taxation.
I also think it helps to be somewhat philosophical about the
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Indeed, it is encouraging people not to work.
Which "economically non-productive assets"? Investments are highly economically productive
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Indeed, it is encouraging people not to work.
Unemployed do not work, we have plenty of them in germany, probably 5% of the population considerd being able to work.
Then we have those considered not being able to work, e.g. simply being unemployed for 5 years or longer.
Then we have the kids going to school (yes, they would get UBI, too!) they are not working either.
Then we have people to old and on pension.
Bottom line less than 30% of the population is working, the rest is on UBI, which is not called UBI but
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Simpler answer : yes.
Well, sorta.
$2T is less than we spend on SSA/Medicare/Medicaid. Which we should, theoretically, be able to dispense with if we have a UBI. So the money is already there.
Now, arguably, UBI really should come with government-run healthcare like the Europeans use. If so, we'll need a bit more than the 2$2.3T+ we're already spending on SSA/Medicare/Medicaid.
BUT...the money now being paid for health insurance should more than make up the difference, so we're (probably) good there, to
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$2T is less than we spend on SSA/Medicare/Medicaid. Which we should, theoretically, be able to dispense with if we have a UBI. So the money is already there.
Except that in the current social programs, there are all kinds of mechanisms to distribute the appropriate amount of money to a person. Someone with high medical costs gets more money than someone who's completely healthy.
Taking the same money, and spreading it all equally, means that the healthy person gets more, while the chronically ill gets much less.
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$2T is less than we spend on SSA/Medicare/Medicaid. Which we should, theoretically, be able to dispense with if we have a UBI. So the money is already there.
The average Social Security benefit is over $17,000/year; max is over $32,000. Looks like you want a lot of people to accept massive decreases.
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Now, arguably, UBI really should come with government-run healthcare like the Europeans use.
Health care in Europe is not government run, it is hevay regulated, yes.
In Scandinavia, it is government run ... of course you can argue that it is a part of Europe.
Probably Not (Score:2, Interesting)
Redistributing wealth gained from selling nationalized natural resources, ok, but that's not sustainable everywhere to the point to fund a UBI. What happens when electric vehicles drive down demand for oil? When coal electric generation is less profitable than solar? There goes your carbon tax income, too. Even for resources that won't become obsolete, it's presumed that a country is selling its resources more than it's importing i.e. running a trade surplus, and obviously not every nation can have a trade
"Blockchain can help." (Score:2)
Why do i imagine this being said in an almost pleading tone of voice?
An old proposal (Score:2, Insightful)
This is an old proposal - it has been around for decades. But I don't think it is going to happen, and the reason is simple:
Being rich means being in control. In control of your own life, your own destiny. A universal income would give poor people a similar level of control over their lives, a level they do not currently have. And many people do no think that is a good idea, for a wide range of reasons from envy to paternalism.
Comment removed (Score:3)
What would Delaware leverage? (Score:5, Insightful)
The example of Alaska is poor because naturally many states don't have resources that can be leveraged to provide 2000 dollars to each resident per year.
What is more, even alaska's oil reserves are finite. What happens when that runs out? And it will.
And it gets worse... you have to concede that this would just go federal... where in all national resources would go into some sort of federal pot to be spit up. But that's no good because once divided you won't have enough. Do the math.
But its worse than that because even if you did have enough... it would again be finite.
And worse than that because even if it weren't finite there would still be market fluctuation that would cause the pay out to change. That payout change would render the UBA unreliable. If you cached extra funds in good years to level out the payment in bad years then the payment would be more reliable but down turns or upturns in the commodities markets can last decades. Are you going to cache reserves to last decades? Come now.
And it gets worse because even if you didn't have any of those problems subsidizing the population in this manner would almost certainly lead to run away consumption. It would not be in the interest of the public to have population growth because that would be more mouths to divide the money between. And yet the UBA or UBI or really any radical expansion in the welfare system would encourage people to join just to suck at the tit.
It gets worse than that too because our agency in our republics is directly related to our economic logistical utility to the society. It was that increase in logistical utility that ended the rule of the nobles. Old Feudal style economies were not competitive because societies that did not grant agency to their valuable workers were not competitive. Economics is largely a question of motivating people. If individuals have more leverage then they must be bargained with to motivate them to work. If their labor is of no value then they have no leverage. The UBI and UBA concepts argue that large portions of the population will be of no value. One must hope that doesn't happen because if it does and the situation sustains throughout time then it is inevitable that they'll suffer extreme tyranny and possibly genocide.
The UBI and UBA are at best... death sentences... they are a suicide pact. At best. At worst they fail for screwing up an almost endless list of economic problems that are pretty obvious. But assuming you can deal with that, the ultimate political consequences will be fatal.
I would not advocate these policies unless you have nothing but malice in your heart for the people that will receive it.
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Venezuala also tried this socialist welfare program stuff. The country is full of oil. The problem is it gave out a lot of the money as welfare programs. This did not lead to the development of alternative industry in the country that could help diversify the economy, so it remained independent on oil. Maybe... if the oil companies could invest their profit in stock in other companies in the country with interesting ideas, that may have helped. Chavez because of all of the taxes and confiscation that he was
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To be shortsighted is to be a fool... the very nature of wisdom is to appreciate things in "time". The wise course is the one that will survive and thrive in time... and longer and more sustainable a policy is... the more it thrives in the fullness of time... the wiser it is.
Not disagreeing with you at all you understand... agreeing with you wholeheartedly. Such policies are the opposite of wisdom... foolish... ignorant... barbaric... simpleminded.
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You're talking about charging people for the land itself? The literal space? We already have property taxes in most states... and we have some notion of people with deeds owning the land they paid for... how would you leverage the land itself?
Any time you inhabit land you have to pay a fee to the government to build anything on it? Say your home or business whatever that might be? And that means what to the UBI or UBA? The idea that those that want to build anything anywhere must pay those can't afford to o
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That it is taxed already was something I said in the very post you're quoting from so I'm not sure who you think you're informing of anything.
Address perhaps my point here. If you increase the taxes on property to pay for your project then that is a tax ON TOP of the existing taxes on construction and land use and land purchases etc. And it is a large tax at that. This moves it beyond the current circumstance because you're talking about more than doubling that tax at the very least.
What is more there is no
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It doesn't matter... Oil, Silver, Corn, Copper, Coal, etc etc etc... The market goes up and down and tends to do so for years.
https://mrtopstep.com/wp-conte... [mrtopstep.com]
there is a 30 year cycle in commodities... They go up they go down.
If you base your income on this then your income will go up and down over 30 years... to balance it out you'll have to cache high prices from the high point to pay for low prices in the low point.
Do you honestly think the government has the discipline to do that? Because the trillion d
Re: (Score:2)
Towards a New Economy (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm ready for the post-blockhain reality (Score:2)
"Blockchain could help"
Yeah, so could a practically infinite number of other things. The 'put blockchain in everything' era of "ideas" is getting old fast. It's all very reminiscent of the game development space about four years ago when every game pitch was " IN VR!"
Communism by any other name (Score:4, Insightful)
...is still communism. Transferring vast amounts of wealth from the corporations and wealthy to the common people for the common good always sounds like a great idea in theory. But the practical results have pretty consistently proven disastrous.
Humans seem to need motivation to work and achieve. They need to feel like a big reward is possible, even if it's practically out of reach for most people. Penalizing success to give everyone more motivation to do the bare minimum is ultimately unhealthy for most societies (beyond a certain point anyway). No one disputes that we should have a social safety net for the old and infirm certainly, but a universal income for even the young and healthy only encourages a type of social stagnation.
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...is still communism.
This is not communism.
They need to feel like a big reward is possible, even if it's practically out of reach for most people. Penalizing success to give everyone more motivation to do the bare minimum is ultimately unhealthy for most societies (beyond a certain point anyway).
Between 1950 and 1980, the US had a constant top federal income tax rate of over 70% [bradfordtaxinstitute.com]. I'm not aware of any unhealthy effects that had. Additionally, a UBI does not mean that everyone earns the same. Everyone can earn as much as they want on top of their UBI. You do need taxes to pay for UBI, and even if you deduct the savings from having reduced poverty, getting rid of entire administrations etc, you still have a net gain from working. If that's work that you actually like, then you're
Re: (Score:3)
Communism by any other name is still communism
Wouldn't UBI only be equivalent to communism in the case that the UBI level is set to something like GDP / population? Anything above that must necessarily be debt funded and unsustainable. Anything below that would allow anyone earning wealth in excess of their tax bill to keep it, which provides the motivation you suggest is necessary.
We also need to solve the impending problem of massive unemployment as we make it illegal to buy or sell human labor at rates
Re: (Score:3)
...is still communism. Transferring vast amounts of wealth from the corporations and wealthy to the common people for the common good always sounds like a great idea in theory. But the practical results have pretty consistently proven disastrous.
Humans seem to need motivation to work and achieve. They need to feel like a big reward is possible, even if it's practically out of reach for most people. Penalizing success to give everyone more motivation to do the bare minimum is ultimately unhealthy for most societies (beyond a certain point anyway). No one disputes that we should have a social safety net for the old and infirm certainly, but a universal income for even the young and healthy only encourages a type of social stagnation.
I don't know enough about UBA, but not only is UBI fundamentally different than communism but you also misunderstand the true flaws of communism.
Communism failed because of the disconnect between information and incentives, an economy is simply too complex to plan centrally and it's really hard to design incentives that motivate people towards the desired outcome.
Soviet workers weren't demotivated because they thought they wouldn't get rich, they were demotivated because they could see how much their labour
Re: (Score:2)
Everyone agrees we should have unemployment insurance for people between jobs. It would be better to spend money however on job training so we can help people develop skills rather than become permenant dependants on government. UBI thinking is wrong. Once we cover the unemployment gap problem by covering people between jobs and putting them on a job placement queue, and provide job training for people who need to beef up their skills, the only people left on UBI are people who DONT WANT TO WORK
Ignorant author... (Score:2, Insightful)
UBI/UBA? (Score:2)
Blocky blocks? (Score:2)
We need a block chain version of the appy apps guy. That is all I got from this summary.
Marx (Score:2)
And I don't mean Groucho.
Redistribution (Score:2)
What does "carbon dioxide in the atmosphere" have to do with "universal basic income"?
haul out the grand old plan (Score:3)
Step 1: Postulate that a viable UBI program increases economic vitality. Any tenuous, single-dimensional projection of the global economic system onto the Graph of Progress is fine here, so long as it incorporates at least a single macroeconomic truism (these are a dime a dozen; if you're having trouble coming up with one, it's because you're failing to appreciate the true, deep, eternal genius of sweeping-paintbrush oversimplification).
Step 2: Feed a new sustained economic growth rate into your super-duper exponential-growth-ifier (add as many extra increments of 0.1% to the sustained economic growth rate as your ego, steely biceps, and self-importance warrant—don't be shy here, think of these as economic vitamin pills for the betterment of the whole society).
Step 3: Presto, bingo the program soon pays for itself. Crow loudly. Why, you could even borrow NOW from such an illustrious, wealth-dripping future.
Bonus marks: And if you're really good, have the program pay for itself while cutting taxes at the same time (but don't try this at home, for professional bullshit artists only).
Stupid idea, if it is as described (Score:3)
Entrepreneur Peter Barnes has called for the creation of a Sky Trust that would both limit the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and provide revenue from carbon taxes. These "carbon dividends" solve two problems at once: income inequality and climate change. He would also tax corporations for using natural resources, on the thinking that the atmosphere, minerals and fresh water around us represent a "joint inheritance." He would also tax speculative financial transactions and use of the electromagnetic spectrum.
So the idea is to monetize the air, water, and minerals around us, right? And how exactly do you realize the declared value in these 'shared assets'? By consuming them, which means the only way people get the financial benefit is by polluting/consuming precious natural resources... why that's as stupid as funding children's health care by taxing their parents for smoking known carcinogens. [taxfoundation.org]
Re:Depends (Score:5, Insightful)
The Nordic countries are rich in oil, low in population, and have been investing that money and it's working out for them.
The Nords also have much more impedance between the government and "the will of the people". America has weak political parties, and the smoke filled back rooms are long gone. The people get what they want, whether that is bread and circuses, or trillion dollar tax cuts. Any "asset fund" will end up liquidated and squandered on current consumption (or more tax cuts), much like what happened to most state level "rainy day" funds. For another example, look at how the states squandered the tobacco settlement, which was supposed to last for 30 years. Oops.
Talking about an "asset fund" is just silly when we have a rapidly growing national debt of $21 trillion [usdebtclock.org].
Oh, wait, I just read the rest of the summary. They are going to use blockchains, so nevermind, that solves everything. Whew.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
>or trillion dollar tax cuts.
So you're one of those people who can't do basic math (a tax cut is not a 'cost' to the gov't, its simply not stealing as much from person A to give to person B) yet think you can solve a math issue.
Wealth transfers don't work. It hasn't since the every country envisioned a social security type program that, due to basic math (more going out than coming in) is unsustainable.
UBI is not a solution, its more of the same. Unless there is a change in the mindset of the average p
Re: Depends (Score:3, Informative)
If you can't afford UBI, then your society can't afford to exist, because it does not generate enough productivity to keep your citizens alive. If you think the US can't afford UBI, you are too far gone to learn how economics and math work.
Re: Depends (Score:5, Insightful)
You are mistakenly equating an economy to UBI. If an economy ie the people can't support themselves by their own effort, nothing can.
But UBI is proposed as an alternative to "own effort". It's not economically or morally viable -- at best it can be described as a parasitical portion of the economy that consumes, while the others produce. So far people are managed to "live" under those conditions where the number of the paracites is low - eg under the monarchies. Unfortunately this doesn't scale. The opposite is even less viable -- that a few people would produce for the masses to consume.
Re:Depends (Score:4, Insightful)
"Wealth transfers don't work. It hasn't since the every country envisioned a social security type program that, due to basic math (more going out than coming in) is unsustainable."
Let me guess you are living in the US ?
Most western countries are doing very well actually.
Al though it might be going to get a lot harder to keep it going the way it is, because of how old populations are in comparison to the people still working.
I think the number was something like: average age around the world (not including Africa) 60 year old by 2050.
Wealth requires production (Score:5, Insightful)
Wealth comes from production. You can't arbitrarily declare a certain amount of money and then expect that to hold up; that's what central banks do and EVERY time it leads to an eventual market crash. F.A. Hayek won the Nobel Prize in Economics for this analysis of the business cycle.
Money is just a tool to facilitate trade; it's "stuff" that constitutes actual wealth: food, houses, cars, clothing, electronics, etc. And creating new stuff requires production.
Socialism cannot work over the long-term because it has no price system to deal with the scarcity of "stuff."
Here's some free economic education for you:
www.BernieIsWrong.com
Re: (Score:3)
But you're not understanding something fundamental. The link between people working and amount of production is going away due to smart automation. The engineered automation is getting significantly smarter and more physically flexible and capable every decade. While people's mental/physical capacity is relatively limited, at least in terms of population averages. At a certain point, which has already come for some percentage of the population, more education and training won't help you compete with a compu
Totally depends. There is a best tax rate (Score:4, Insightful)
Changing tax rates up or down doesn't "generally" move revenue either direction, it totally depends.
Starting with a communist country, 100% tax rate, cutting the rate by 80% will massively increase economic production and increase government revenue. Starting at a 0% tax rate, moving up to 20% will greatly increase government revenue. There is a rate which maximises revenue. If the current rate is too high, reducing it will boost the economy, increasing paychecks, and increase revenue. If the current rate is too low, increasing it will boost revenue to the government, at the cost of reducing people's paychecks.
There is of course a LOT of debate about what the ideal rate is for a given country, the rate which maximises government revenue. Studies indicate the best rate is probably somewhere between 20%-30%, that's the general range you get if you leave politics out of it and just try to objectively optimize revenue.
While either increasing or decreasing tax rates may increase government revenue, increased rates almost always decrease people's pay checks. Therefore it's better to err on the side of a tax rate that's slightly lower than what optimizes government revenue. Better for you to get $2000 and the government get $950 than for you to get $1000 and the government gets $1000.
Also of course the different types of taxes have completely different optimum rates. One of the best indicators for how well an economy will do is savings rate, how much people save up and invest. People who save up in a 401K now are generating revenue for the government both now and layer, so you want tax policy to strongly encourage savings and investment.
Total tax rate: How much the government takes (Score:3)
If there is a credit that averages and a 30% tax rate what is the total net tax rate? 20%.
With the the deductions, credits, brackets, etc the nominal tax rate has little to do with the actual net rate, and those are different each year, and of course different in each country. So for comparison purposes we can use the total net tax defined as "how much does the government take". In pure communism, the government takes all of it. There are no private pay checks in complete communism, all the money goes to
Re: (Score:2)
Oh, wait, I just read the rest of the summary. They are going to use blockchains, so nevermind, that solves everything. Whew.
Eventually we'll need to blockchain all of our blockchains.
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It's unprecedented and exponential!
Re:Depends (Score:4, Insightful)
The Nords also have much more impedance between the government and "the will of the people". America has weak political parties, and the smoke filled back rooms are long gone. The people get what they want, whether that is bread and circuses, or trillion dollar tax cuts
The American people didn't want the tax cut, it was actually pretty unpopular. Major GOP donors wanted the tax cut.
That's also why the US doesn't have Universal Healthcare or DACA despite both being popular policies.
The US does have weak parties, but the result isn't the public pulling the strings, it's donors and lobbyists. If the US had stronger parties they'd be free to spurn special interests and do what the public wants.
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Yes, I don't want a tax cut, I want to have less money to spend, I like having the government take all of my money! And I like driving companies out of the country with super high taxation so we don't have any jobs! Yes, Americans just LOVE our taxes because we want to give up everything to the government to give to a bunch of illegal aliens who steal our jobs!
Fair Share (Score:3)
The American people didn't want the tax cut, it was actually pretty unpopular. Major GOP donors wanted the tax cut.
That's also why the US doesn't have Universal Healthcare or DACA despite both being popular policies.
If you feel the government isn't requiring enough taxes from you under threat of violence, then by all means feel free to get out your checkbook and make a voluntary donation to the Government! As for Universal Healthcare, if most Americans really wanted it, the Democrats wouldn't have gotten massacred in the mid-term election after they passed it.
Re:Depends (Score:4, Insightful)
The US government is run by corporations who buy politicians. Voters are irrelevant. Corporations get tax breaks, subsidies and protection from competition. Voters get screwed.
Re: (Score:3)
Trump outspent/outsmarted Bush
Trump did NOT outspend Bush. When Jeb dropped out, he had spent far more than Donald
Jeb was the favorite of the corporations. He lost anyway. Then the corps shifted their support to Marco Rubio. He lost too.
Re:Depends (Score:4, Insightful)
I think that's the "outsmarted" part. Everyone knew Bush was an idiot and very unpopular. Trump was a much better liar.
Re:Depends (Score:5, Insightful)
"Blockchain can help."
When the only tool you have is a blockchain, every problem looks like a signed ledger.
The non-existence of extra money (Score:3)
It's absurd to earmark money from one source for another. All money should go into general revenues and then be spent in whatever is the most valuable way. It's the usual rubbish where people say we should have a state lottery. People disapprove. SO they then say, "we'll have a state lottery and the profits will go to the schools". The people approve. and then the legislature just reduces direct school funding because the state lottery pays. So the end is, there is a state lottery and the net funds go
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In the future the vast majority of people will be living in squalor. There is no way to avoid it.
Wrong.
It's just the opposite.
AI means production and transportation costs for food, housing, clothing, electricity, goods, services, etc etc etc will fall drastically to the point where cost is almost meaningless.
People will no longer be dependent on government, Governments are panicking.and this plan is TPTB's response to thwart that individual liberty and independence from government that AI will enable.
Gotta keep 'em on the plantation!
Strat
Re: 2 trillion is a lowball estimate (Score:2)
Shouldn't be that hard. The stock market is worth $30 trillion and that's just publically traded stock.
Re:2 trillion is a lowball estimate (Score:4, Interesting)
But the point is that 90% of the people already get this money. Either in form of welfare, pension, health care support, tax free allowance etc. Most of these could be reduced if a basic income is provided. Only a few people fall through the cracks of our systems, and those would benefit.
So it is less about the money, it is more about empowering the poor, rather than making them jump through hoops. Which is exactly why I think it is not going to happen.