I find it very interesting that people consider work to be a kind of enslavement. You don't have to work for someone to earn money, you can also start your own business.
There's nothing more noble then going to your neighbour's house, seeing they have a need which you can fill, filling that need, and being paid with money for your effort. That's what work is. It's filling human needs for money.
Well the big problem I see is that all of the real, literal, needs have already been filled. What do you need, exactly? You need food, shelter, medicine, and some clothes to stay warm. That's it. You don't need anything else. All of those things are produced by huge, multi-national organisations, which an independant startup can't possibly compete with. And the same problem exists with the indirect needs- stuff like cars, and computers, stuff which isn't strictly necessary but helps a lot with everything in modern society- you can't do that yourself. There's a small number of people who produce enough to go around, for everyone. We don't need anyone else producing those things.
When people go in to business for themselves, what they do is produce luxuries. Stuff like handmade crafts, or paintings, or computer games, or a coffee shop, or a restaurant- all that stuff is fun, and I enjoy it, but we don't really need it. And they're all competing with each other- people only have a small amount of excess income to spend on luxuries like that. In order for a new startup like that to succeed, another small business has to lose money. Those small businesses would be more pleasant if they weren't trying to cut each others' throat to stay alive.
That's not true at all.
The reason why the video game industry is so big, vibrant, dynamic, fun and employs so many people is because there are so many companies making games on so many different platforms.
And they even employ people in side-related fields. 15 years ago it'd be insane to get a hot-shot music composer to score the games. Now it's common. It's common for them to employ videographers and voice actors now too.
The industry is big (and fun and high-quality) because there are lots of people making them.
Well sure, I always like trying new video games. But I only have a small amount of money to spend on them. In order for me to spend more money on video games (which allows the industry to employ more people) I'd have to stop spending money on other things, like eating at restaurants or buying new clothes. That's why I'm saying that all those industries are basically luxuries, which are indirectly competing with each other.
There are tonnes of free games. And the quality of free games is getting better and better too.
And the costs of premium games is coming down too.
You seem to be worried that you can't buy ALL of the videogames. That you have to pick and choose the best one. But under your proposed plan, there would only be 1 video game company, or just a few.
No, the problem is that consumers as a whole have a limited amount of money to spend on luxuries. That money will only employ a limited amount of people. If I'm playing free video games, the video game companies get no money, and can't employ any extra people. (and yes I know they make money from ad revenue but the same argument applies to the companies that advertise through them).
It doesn't make a happier and more equal society. It makes people doing jack squat get the same pittance someone is working for, leading the person who is working for said pittance, to not want to work for the same pittance someone can get for playing wow from their bolthole poopsocking all day.
It would certainly drive a lot of people out of the workforce. Or encourage them to drop down from working full-time down to part-time. I guess that would lead to a reduction in the unemployment rate.
Of course, one of the problems is you'd be creating an underclass of people who rely on the government for their survival. The problems with that should be self-evident to any thinking person.
Modern Man on
Aetian Jupiter - 41 Gunslinger - The Old Republic
Rigorous Scholarship
We could just print an extra $10,000 per person and give it all away. That would be the best solution. /sarc
The reason we have welfare programs is to make sure that people who can't find work or are unable to work don't die in the gutter. That's fine and necessary in a humane society. But what you seem to be proposing is simply giving everyone a handout, whether or not they're capable of working.
That's exactly what I'm proposing. What is your objection? Do you just feel a basic instinct that everyone should have to suffer if they want to live?
Work isn't "suffering". If work is the cause of your suffering you are doing it wrong.
My objection is that this is literally something for nothing. This is wealth redistribution for the sake of wealth redistribution.
Actually, it is wealth distribution for the sake of making a happier and more equal society.
$10k/yr is not a lot of money. The vast majority of people are still going to be motivated to work.
Wealth distribution does not equate to happiness. You can't just say, here's $10,000, make a better life! Or else all lottery winners would become self-funded businessmen, instead of pissing it all away within the first year.
Giving people "free" money is fundamentally not free. The valuation of the money goes way, way down. Devaluing currency means you end up like post-WWI Germany, or current day name-any-country-in-Africa, where they did the same thing you're proposing - print a ton of money and give it to everyone.
The poor and financially uneducated will remain poor and uneducated, the rich will in fact, get richer, because they're capable of investing that capital instead of either blindly spending it on immediate needs or blindly spending it on non-essential commodities.
"The money is there- like I said, this is only 1/5 of our per capita GDP, and it would only be given to the adults at the very bottom of the ladder. It's just a matter of finding the right taxation scheme to pay for it it. Eliminating the bush tax cuts would be a good start, and the rest could be made up by raising taxes on the wealthy, closing loopholes, and simply waiting for the economy to recover."
You say it like all of that is so easy. Closing loopholes? That would take billions of man-hours. Raising taxes on the wealthy? A few billion dollars in lobbying fees. Eliminating the bush tax cuts? They were just renewed.
Eddy on
"and the morning stars I have seen
and the gengars who are guiding me" -- W.S. Merwin
1. Does everyone get the basic income, or do you phase it out?
2. Where do you raise the funds?
You are talking about $3T or so in additional annual entitlement spending. However you raise those funds will put a serious dent into growth. In other words, redistributing 20% of our economic pie will make that pie smaller.
There's various ways you can implement it. It seems a bit silly to give everyone a basic income, and then tax it away from them, so I'd suggest a negative income tax for people earning less than $10,000 a year, which as been studied, and estimated to cost about $1.9 trillion annually. And mind you, that's just the amount of government spending- all that money will be spent, and a lot of it will come back to the government as extra tax income.
The money is there- like I said, this is only 1/5 of our per capita GDP, and it would only be given to the adults at the very bottom of the ladder. It's just a matter of finding the right taxation scheme to pay for it it. Eliminating the bush tax cuts would be a good start, and the rest could be made up by raising taxes on the wealthy, closing loopholes, and simply waiting for the economy to recover.
Please be specific. What negative income tax rate, up to what cut-off? This has major implications for your proposal.
And from the sound of it you want to finance it through additional taxation. If you let us know how high up the ladder you want to set that tax cut-off, we can work out (roughly) how much in extra taxes you're proposing.
I was deliberately trying to avoid specifics because I'm not an economist, and I don't know the optimal way to implement this. I'm just arguing for why it should be done, and why it would help us.
My ballpark guess is that we should give it to every adult who makes less than $10,000, which can be funded through a combination of tax increases, deficit spending until the economy improves, and some reduction in welfare programs.
Pi-r8 on
0
HachfaceNot the Minister Farrakhan you're thinking ofDammit, Shepard!Registered Userregular
Although if the median income is 33k, and you make 30k the cut-off point, you will end up in the ballpark of $1.5 trillion.
The cut-off point should probably be much lower.
Unfortunately the OP has addressed neither means testing nor funding. Since those two questions determine the cost of the proposal, there's no way to discuss it.
Well, the proposal to limit the GBI to people who make less than 30k is right in the OP.
One immediate consequence that I can see is that no job will ever pay anywhere in the range of 29,999.99/yr to 40k, since anything in that range would be better-served by taking a lower paying job + GBI.
While I agree with many of pi-r8's points, I don't like the rhetoric used in his last argument in the OP.
That being said, this is something I have been thinking for a long time.
The american economy is built on a large amount of luxury purchases- things you don't necessarily need, but rather things that you want. In many ways the american economy is devoted not necessarily to to life or liberty, but rather the pursuit of happiness, if you will pardon the rhetoric here.
I have always wondered what our economy would look like if every adult citizen was provided with the bare necessities for life: food, water, sanitation, shelter, and health care. As in, these things are guaranteed to you in some fashion to a degree that if you so desired you could live off of them forever.
Surely they would be the barest of necessities, but I have always felt that this option would allow more economic freedom for individuals to invest in luxury goods. Obviously the incentive to perform a task for money would be so that you could afford the luxury products you desired (video games, car, jet ski, skateboard, fancy food, beer, dining out, and so forth) with the satisfaction of knowing that at least at the end of the day you have something to eat no matter what.
I just feel like that security would alleviate a lot of societal problems.
I guess I am advocating a sort of trickle up economy then.
But I mean feel free to tell me why I am wrong about this- There are many things I know about, but economics are not really in that list.
And mother of god, say goodbye to incentive-driven free markets. You'll need government intervention / subsidies for a shit ton of job markets to even survive; imagine the massive government subsidies going into the agricultural workforce and apply that to EVERY UNDESIRABLE FIELD.
But of course, you'd just pay for that by printing more money, right?
Eddy on
"and the morning stars I have seen
and the gengars who are guiding me" -- W.S. Merwin
It doesn't make a happier and more equal society. It makes people doing jack squat get the same pittance someone is working for, leading the person who is working for said pittance, to not want to work for the same pittance someone can get for playing wow from their bolthole poopsocking all day.
It would certainly drive a lot of people out of the workforce. Or encourage them to drop down from working full-time down to part-time. I guess that would lead to a reduction in the unemployment rate.
Of course, one of the problems is you'd be creating an underclass of people who rely on the government for their survival. The problems with that should be self-evident to any thinking person.
I want you to spell them out, specifically, because I really don't think it's that big of a problem. Why is it bad to be reliant on the government, when it's not bad to be relying on a corporation? Nevermind the fact that we're all pretty reliant on the government anyway- I don't think I'd survive without it, for a lot of reasons.
Basically I want to challenge the idea that only those who work, deserve to live. I believe that everyone deserves to live.
My ballpark guess is that we should give it to every adult who makes less than $10,000, which can be funded through a combination of tax increases, deficit spending until the economy improves, and some reduction in welfare programs.
Our current welfare programs are pretty well targeted to meet the required needs of poor people. If people can't afford food, they get food stamps. There are subsidies for housing. And so forth. One of the reasons we target these programs specifically is because poor people are, generally, kind of bad when it comes to life decisions, especially when it comes to money.
Giving poor people free money, rather than subsidizing their life needs will lead to a lot of bad results, such as them spending the money on booze, cigarettes and drugs, rather than food, clothing and shelter.
(obviously a generalization, but bad financial decisions are a pretty common characteristic of poor people)
Modern Man on
Aetian Jupiter - 41 Gunslinger - The Old Republic
Rigorous Scholarship
You can live without working. You can survive by not being a contributing member of society.
Does everyone, regardless of societal worth, deserve to live? Does a cancer cell deserve to live? Does something that does nothing but feed off of other things around it with absolutely no positive reverse contribution deserve to live?
If you say everyone should get enough to live off of, no questions asked, how will any of that get produced? What incentive is there for people who otherwise hold our entire infrastructure together, as shitty as their jobs are, to continue what they are doing?
Do you have any idea how difficult it is to grow crops? Or build a computerized data system from the ground up? Or run the stock market? Or any market? These are difficult, thankless jobs with a million entry-level thankless positions. What is the incentive to work at any of those positions when you can get the same thing for doing absolutely nothing?
Eddy on
"and the morning stars I have seen
and the gengars who are guiding me" -- W.S. Merwin
0
HachfaceNot the Minister Farrakhan you're thinking ofDammit, Shepard!Registered Userregular
My ballpark guess is that we should give it to every adult who makes less than $10,000, which can be funded through a combination of tax increases, deficit spending until the economy improves, and some reduction in welfare programs.
Our current welfare programs are pretty well targeted to meet the required needs of poor people. If people can't afford food, they get food stamps. There are subsidies for housing. And so forth. One of the reasons we target these programs specifically is because poor people are, generally, kind of bad when it comes to life decisions, especially when it comes to money.
I read a study pretty recently that showed that low-income people actually make much better financial decisions than most people believe. I am going to google for it right now.
While I agree with many of pi-r8's points, I don't like the rhetoric used in his last argument in the OP.
That being said, this is something I have been thinking for a long time.
The american economy is built on a large amount of luxury purchases- things you don't necessarily need, but rather things that you want. In many ways the american economy is devoted not necessarily to to life or liberty, but rather the pursuit of happiness, if you will pardon the rhetoric here.
I have always wondered what our economy would look like if every adult citizen was provided with the bare necessities for life: food, water, sanitation, shelter, and health care. As in, these things are guaranteed to you in some fashion to a degree that if you so desired you could live off of them forever.
Surely they would be the barest of necessities, but I have always felt that this option would allow more economic freedom for individuals to invest in luxury goods. Obviously the incentive to perform a task for money would be so that you could afford the luxury products you desired (video games, car, jet ski, skateboard, fancy food, beer, dining out, and so forth) with the satisfaction of knowing that at least at the end of the day you have something to eat no matter what.
I just feel like that security would alleviate a lot of societal problems.
I guess I am advocating a sort of trickle up economy then.
But I mean feel free to tell me why I am wrong about this- There are many things I know about, but economics are not really in that list.
What if I want a nicer house? Do I have to live in the government made concrete box?
What if I want to eat kumquats all day? Am I stuck with government cheese?
JebusUD on
and I wonder about my neighbors even though I don't have them
but they're listening to every word I say
0
Deebaseron my way to work in a suit and a tieAhhhh...come on fucking guyRegistered Userregular
edited December 2010
We already accept the notion that everyone deserves to live vis a vis Food stamps, Medicaid, section 8 housing, and homeless shelters. Everything else is a luxury.
Surely they would be the barest of necessities, but I have always felt that this option would allow more economic freedom for individuals to invest in luxury goods. Obviously the incentive to perform a task for money would be so that you could afford the luxury products you desired (video games, car, jet ski, skateboard, fancy food, beer, dining out, and so forth) with the satisfaction of knowing that at least at the end of the day you have something to eat no matter what.
Luxury goods are sort of built around someone getting screwed on one end of the deal. Maybe we can finance a large third-world country to produce an endless supply of iPods and Kawasakis for 300 million people, but the moral implications are kind of dire.
Note that this doesn't apply on the really high end of the spectrum (handmade Italian suits and custom-build cars, for example), but good luck finding enough manpower/resources to do that for an entire country and still meet basic needs.
You can live without working. You can survive by not being a contributing member of society.
Does everyone, regardless of societal worth, deserve to live? Does a cancer cell deserve to live? Does something that does nothing but feed off of other things around it with absolutely no positive reverse contribution deserve to live?
If you say everyone should get enough to live off of, no questions asked, how will any of that get produced? What incentive is there for people who otherwise hold our entire infrastructure together, as shitty as their jobs are, to continue what they are doing?
Do you have any idea how difficult it is to grow crops? Or build a computerized data system from the ground up? Or run the stock market? Or any market? These are difficult, thankless jobs with a million entry-level thankless positions. What is the incentive to work at any of those positions when you can get the same thing for doing absolutely nothing?
None of those things are difficult. Someone who has no idea may struggle, but it's as difficult as riding a bike. (As in, practice and teaching will get you there)
Do you think my girlfriend should die? She is the metaphorical cancer cell on society. Without society she would've died as a teenager. It's also because of society that she's not allowed to contribute... or else she'll die because society won't put up with her supporting herself while still aiding her.
bowen on
not a doctor, not a lawyer, examples I use may not be fully researched so don't take out of context plz, don't @ me
You can live without working. You can survive by not being a contributing member of society.
Does everyone, regardless of societal worth, deserve to live? Does a cancer cell deserve to live? Does something that does nothing but feed off of other things around it with absolutely no positive reverse contribution deserve to live?
If you say everyone should get enough to live off of, no questions asked, how will any of that get produced? What incentive is there for people who otherwise hold our entire infrastructure together, as shitty as their jobs are, to continue what they are doing?
Do you have any idea how difficult it is to grow crops? Or build a computerized data system from the ground up? Or run the stock market? Or any market? These are difficult, thankless jobs with a million entry-level thankless positions. What is the incentive to work at any of those positions when you can get the same thing for doing absolutely nothing?
This is a dangerous road to go down. I don't think your own self-worth as a human being should be decided by how well you work an entry-level position at Best Buy.
Or, to go the opposite route, by the power you have as CEO of, say, Blackwater, or Haliburton, or whatnot.
You can live without working. You can survive by not being a contributing member of society.
Does everyone, regardless of societal worth, deserve to live? Does a cancer cell deserve to live? Does something that does nothing but feed off of other things around it with absolutely no positive reverse contribution deserve to live?
If you say everyone should get enough to live off of, no questions asked, how will any of that get produced? What incentive is there for people who otherwise hold our entire infrastructure together, as shitty as their jobs are, to continue what they are doing?
Do you have any idea how difficult it is to grow crops? Or build a computerized data system from the ground up? Or run the stock market? Or any market? These are difficult, thankless jobs with a million entry-level thankless positions. What is the incentive to work at any of those positions when you can get the same thing for doing absolutely nothing?
None of those things are difficult. Someone who has no idea may struggle, but it's as difficult as riding a bike. (As in, practice and teaching will get you there)
Do you think my girlfriend should die? She is the metaphorical cancer cell on society. Without society she would've died as a teenager. It's also because of society that she's not allowed to contribute... or else she'll die because society won't put up with her supporting herself while still aiding her.
We probably shouldn't make this personal. Because in order to continue the discussion we'd have to know many personal details about your GF. And that's probably not such a good idea.
While I agree with many of pi-r8's points, I don't like the rhetoric used in his last argument in the OP.
That being said, this is something I have been thinking for a long time.
The american economy is built on a large amount of luxury purchases- things you don't necessarily need, but rather things that you want. In many ways the american economy is devoted not necessarily to to life or liberty, but rather the pursuit of happiness, if you will pardon the rhetoric here.
I have always wondered what our economy would look like if every adult citizen was provided with the bare necessities for life: food, water, sanitation, shelter, and health care. As in, these things are guaranteed to you in some fashion to a degree that if you so desired you could live off of them forever.
Surely they would be the barest of necessities, but I have always felt that this option would allow more economic freedom for individuals to invest in luxury goods. Obviously the incentive to perform a task for money would be so that you could afford the luxury products you desired (video games, car, jet ski, skateboard, fancy food, beer, dining out, and so forth) with the satisfaction of knowing that at least at the end of the day you have something to eat no matter what.
I just feel like that security would alleviate a lot of societal problems.
I guess I am advocating a sort of trickle up economy then.
But I mean feel free to tell me why I am wrong about this- There are many things I know about, but economics are not really in that list.
What if I want a nicer house? Do I have to live in the government made concrete box?
What if I want to eat kumquats all day? Am I stuck with government cheese?
If you want extra luxuries like that, then you'd still have to work a job to get the money to pay for them. This makes sense, since most jobs are producing luxuries anyway.
Basically- we have enough of the basic necessitiesfor everyone. The only shortage is in luxuries. Therefore, everyone should have access to the basic necessities, and those who want luxuries have to produce more luxuries themselves.
You can live without working. You can survive by not being a contributing member of society.
Does everyone, regardless of societal worth, deserve to live? Does a cancer cell deserve to live? Does something that does nothing but feed off of other things around it with absolutely no positive reverse contribution deserve to live?
If you say everyone should get enough to live off of, no questions asked, how will any of that get produced? What incentive is there for people who otherwise hold our entire infrastructure together, as shitty as their jobs are, to continue what they are doing?
Do you have any idea how difficult it is to grow crops? Or build a computerized data system from the ground up? Or run the stock market? Or any market? These are difficult, thankless jobs with a million entry-level thankless positions. What is the incentive to work at any of those positions when you can get the same thing for doing absolutely nothing?
This is a dangerous road to go down. I don't think your own self-worth as a human being should be decided by how well you work an entry-level position at Best Buy.
Or, to go the opposite route, by the power you have as CEO of, say, Blackwater, or Haliburton, or whatnot.
The OP is proposing a dangerous question. Why not just cut to the meat of his argument?
He is saying everyone is worth the same and must be treated the same. This is a difficult philosophical argument that can not be meaningfully solved in one fell swoop as he is suggesting.
Eddy on
"and the morning stars I have seen
and the gengars who are guiding me" -- W.S. Merwin
It doesn't make a happier and more equal society. It makes people doing jack squat get the same pittance someone is working for, leading the person who is working for said pittance, to not want to work for the same pittance someone can get for playing wow from their bolthole poopsocking all day.
It would certainly drive a lot of people out of the workforce. Or encourage them to drop down from working full-time down to part-time. I guess that would lead to a reduction in the unemployment rate.
Of course, one of the problems is you'd be creating an underclass of people who rely on the government for their survival. The problems with that should be self-evident to any thinking person.
I want you to spell them out, specifically, because I really don't think it's that big of a problem. Why is it bad to be reliant on the government, when it's not bad to be relying on a corporation? Nevermind the fact that we're all pretty reliant on the government anyway- I don't think I'd survive without it, for a lot of reasons.
Basically I want to challenge the idea that only those who work, deserve to live. I believe that everyone deserves to live.
We're all reliant on the government to provide certain services, yes. That's been the case since the first governments were organized in the Fertile Crescent.
But a society where significant percentage of the population is reliant on government transfer payments for the basics of food, water and shelter is a disaster waiting to happen. The people who live off of those payments provide little, if anything, to society. For all intents and purposes, they'd be kept as pets by the rest of society. Over time, those people would lose any conception of self-reliance. That's hazardous to the health of a democratic society.
And one side effect is that you'd see a drop in wages for a lot of lower-paying jobs. If I was paying someone $30K a year for a job and this program came into effect, I'd drop their salary $10K the next day. This would actually end up being a subsidy for corporations.
Modern Man on
Aetian Jupiter - 41 Gunslinger - The Old Republic
Rigorous Scholarship
We could just print an extra $10,000 per person and give it all away. That would be the best solution. /sarc
The reason we have welfare programs is to make sure that people who can't find work or are unable to work don't die in the gutter. That's fine and necessary in a humane society. But what you seem to be proposing is simply giving everyone a handout, whether or not they're capable of working.
That's exactly what I'm proposing. What is your objection? Do you just feel a basic instinct that everyone should have to suffer if they want to live?
If everyone suddenly got 10,000 dollars, the costs of rent and food would go up to compensate (if you print it). Or you take that money from productive people and you shrink they pie because they don't want to create businesses in your community anymore...
...and the people in Bowen's neighbourhood have to eat rotten vegetables because fresh ones are no longer availible.
Why is having the biggest pie (economic growth) more important than having a pie that more people get shares of (economic development)?
It's a principle tenet of trickle-down - "a rising tide lifts all boats."
The fact it has been shown to be false over and over doesn't stop it from being sprouted.
While I agree with many of pi-r8's points, I don't like the rhetoric used in his last argument in the OP.
That being said, this is something I have been thinking for a long time.
The american economy is built on a large amount of luxury purchases- things you don't necessarily need, but rather things that you want. In many ways the american economy is devoted not necessarily to to life or liberty, but rather the pursuit of happiness, if you will pardon the rhetoric here.
I have always wondered what our economy would look like if every adult citizen was provided with the bare necessities for life: food, water, sanitation, shelter, and health care. As in, these things are guaranteed to you in some fashion to a degree that if you so desired you could live off of them forever.
Surely they would be the barest of necessities, but I have always felt that this option would allow more economic freedom for individuals to invest in luxury goods. Obviously the incentive to perform a task for money would be so that you could afford the luxury products you desired (video games, car, jet ski, skateboard, fancy food, beer, dining out, and so forth) with the satisfaction of knowing that at least at the end of the day you have something to eat no matter what.
I just feel like that security would alleviate a lot of societal problems.
I guess I am advocating a sort of trickle up economy then.
But I mean feel free to tell me why I am wrong about this- There are many things I know about, but economics are not really in that list.
What if I want a nicer house? Do I have to live in the government made concrete box?
What if I want to eat kumquats all day? Am I stuck with government cheese?
If you want extra luxuries like that, then you'd still have to work a job to get the money to pay for them. This makes sense, since most jobs are producing luxuries anyway.
Basically- we have enough of the basic necessitiesfor everyone. The only shortage is in luxuries. Therefore, everyone should have access to the basic necessities, and those who want luxuries have to produce more luxuries themselves.
I don't see how your proposal is that different from the current system. Except there is "moar".
It seems that as technology advances, we increasingly have the ability to supply everything everyone needs, but it doesn't happen. Orwell says something about this in 1984, maybe I will look it up later. It is the supply solution wherein lies the rub.
It seems that we have a dilemma. As things become easier to make through automation, more people are free to do other things, or make other things. Yet instead of there being more for everyone, it seems that we just have a bunch of people out of work.
Are we just plain too stupid to come up with enough new things for people to do? Or is it that the uber rich already have most of the luxuries that are available and are now stockpiling vast hordes of cash?
It reminds me of a CNBC show I saw where a billionaire said he was just making more money to "keep score". But these games are not without consequence. There is a ton of money locked up, where it isn't used to make more TV's or couches, or... whatever.
I think what we have is a money flow problem. There isn't enough work because so much money stagnates.
JebusUD on
and I wonder about my neighbors even though I don't have them
but they're listening to every word I say
My ballpark guess is that we should give it to every adult who makes less than $10,000, which can be funded through a combination of tax increases, deficit spending until the economy improves, and some reduction in welfare programs.
Our current welfare programs are pretty well targeted to meet the required needs of poor people. If people can't afford food, they get food stamps. There are subsidies for housing. And so forth. One of the reasons we target these programs specifically is because poor people are, generally, kind of bad when it comes to life decisions, especially when it comes to money.
Giving poor people free money, rather than subsidizing their life needs will lead to a lot of bad results, such as them spending the money on booze, cigarettes and drugs, rather than food, clothing and shelter.
(obviously a generalization, but bad financial decisions are a pretty common characteristic of poor people)
And yet, our current welfare programs obviously don't work too well, seeing as how 1 in 6 Americans have trouble getting enough food, and about 3 million experience homelessness.
While I agree with many of pi-r8's points, I don't like the rhetoric used in his last argument in the OP.
That being said, this is something I have been thinking for a long time.
The american economy is built on a large amount of luxury purchases- things you don't necessarily need, but rather things that you want. In many ways the american economy is devoted not necessarily to to life or liberty, but rather the pursuit of happiness, if you will pardon the rhetoric here.
I have always wondered what our economy would look like if every adult citizen was provided with the bare necessities for life: food, water, sanitation, shelter, and health care. As in, these things are guaranteed to you in some fashion to a degree that if you so desired you could live off of them forever.
Surely they would be the barest of necessities, but I have always felt that this option would allow more economic freedom for individuals to invest in luxury goods. Obviously the incentive to perform a task for money would be so that you could afford the luxury products you desired (video games, car, jet ski, skateboard, fancy food, beer, dining out, and so forth) with the satisfaction of knowing that at least at the end of the day you have something to eat no matter what.
I just feel like that security would alleviate a lot of societal problems.
I guess I am advocating a sort of trickle up economy then.
But I mean feel free to tell me why I am wrong about this- There are many things I know about, but economics are not really in that list.
What if I want a nicer house? Do I have to live in the government made concrete box?
What if I want to eat kumquats all day? Am I stuck with government cheese?
If you want extra luxuries like that, then you'd still have to work a job to get the money to pay for them. This makes sense, since most jobs are producing luxuries anyway.
Basically- we have enough of the basic necessitiesfor everyone. The only shortage is in luxuries. Therefore, everyone should have access to the basic necessities, and those who want luxuries have to produce more luxuries themselves.
I was interested in Arch's answer to his specific assertion. If the government provided those specific goods, like a house and food, it would severely restrict options. I think a money solution would be better.
JebusUD on
and I wonder about my neighbors even though I don't have them
but they're listening to every word I say
0
HachfaceNot the Minister Farrakhan you're thinking ofDammit, Shepard!Registered Userregular
The OP is proposing a dangerous question. Why not just cut to the meat of his argument?
He is saying everyone is worth the same and must be treated the same. This is a difficult philosophical argument that can not be meaningfully solved in one fell swoop as he is suggesting.
No. You are wrong.
Even if we accept some variation of the premise "your worth is determined by how much you work," the OP still does not claim that all people are worth the same. The OP merely claims that there is a floor to worth, and that floor is somewhere in the neighborhood of 10k/year. If you can convince a board of directors somewhere that you are worth $20m/year plus stock options, more power to you.
83% of Americans receive enough food. 99% of Americans have a roof over their heads. Obviously we want both numbers to be 100% but what country actually reaches those numbers without sacrificing democracy? The freedom of choice is a double-edged sword because not everyone makes the right financial choice.
You're talking about radically changing the economic, political, and cultural realities of a society that has, for over two hundred years, stated that its creed is not equality of results, but equality of opportunity.
Eddy on
"and the morning stars I have seen
and the gengars who are guiding me" -- W.S. Merwin
He is saying everyone is worth the same and must be treated the same. This is a difficult philosophical argument that can not be meaningfully solved in one fell swoop as he is suggesting.
If you lose sleep at night wondering if the poor person getting your tax dollars is worth something, you should probably get your priorities straight.
It's certainly no skin off my back to treat everyone with basic respect and assume they possess some intrinsic level of worth, and if I can't afford a luxury good or two for a little while longer because some of my money is going towards helping people, fuck it, I'll go home and go on my computer or play my Wii or enjoy myself in one of a bajillion ways I already can as a relatively successful member of society.
It doesn't make a happier and more equal society. It makes people doing jack squat get the same pittance someone is working for, leading the person who is working for said pittance, to not want to work for the same pittance someone can get for playing wow from their bolthole poopsocking all day.
It would certainly drive a lot of people out of the workforce. Or encourage them to drop down from working full-time down to part-time. I guess that would lead to a reduction in the unemployment rate.
Of course, one of the problems is you'd be creating an underclass of people who rely on the government for their survival. The problems with that should be self-evident to any thinking person.
I want you to spell them out, specifically, because I really don't think it's that big of a problem. Why is it bad to be reliant on the government, when it's not bad to be relying on a corporation? Nevermind the fact that we're all pretty reliant on the government anyway- I don't think I'd survive without it, for a lot of reasons.
Basically I want to challenge the idea that only those who work, deserve to live. I believe that everyone deserves to live.
We're all reliant on the government to provide certain services, yes. That's been the case since the first governments were organized in the Fertile Crescent.
But a society where significant percentage of the population is reliant on government transfer payments for the basics of food, water and shelter is a disaster waiting to happen. The people who live off of those payments provide little, if anything, to society. For all intents and purposes, they'd be kept as pets by the rest of society. Over time, those people would lose any conception of self-reliance. That's hazardous to the health of a democratic society.
And one side effect is that you'd see a drop in wages for a lot of lower-paying jobs. If I was paying someone $30K a year for a job and this program came into effect, I'd drop their salary $10K the next day. This would actually end up being a subsidy for corporations.
Why would anyone work for a wage of $10k, if they could get a wage of $10k for doing nothing? The only reason would be if they loved that job, and wanted to do it for free. This would just force corporations to raise the lost wages, actually.
I think that part of the reason that jobs at the bottom suck so much is that workers have no leverage- they need those jobs to survive. If a midlevel employees are fed up with their jobs, they can quit, and find another, but low level employees really don't have that choice. So they just put up with whatever the boss man tells them to do. A basic income guarantee would give them some bargaining power.
We could just print an extra $10,000 per person and give it all away. That would be the best solution. /sarc
The reason we have welfare programs is to make sure that people who can't find work or are unable to work don't die in the gutter. That's fine and necessary in a humane society. But what you seem to be proposing is simply giving everyone a handout, whether or not they're capable of working.
That's exactly what I'm proposing. What is your objection? Do you just feel a basic instinct that everyone should have to suffer if they want to live?
If everyone suddenly got 10,000 dollars, the costs of rent and food would go up to compensate (if you print it). Or you take that money from productive people and you shrink they pie because they don't want to create businesses in your community anymore...
...and the people in Bowen's neighbourhood have to eat rotten vegetables because fresh ones are no longer availible.
Why is having the biggest pie (economic growth) more important than having a pie that more people get shares of (economic development)?
It's a principle tenet of trickle-down - "a rising tide lifts all boats."
The fact it has been shown to be false over and over doesn't stop it from being sprouted.
Unless you're talking about a society in demographic decline, economic growth is absolutely crucial to at least maintain current standards of living.
Income inequality is a different discussion. But it's hard to find the downside of economic growth.
Modern Man on
Aetian Jupiter - 41 Gunslinger - The Old Republic
Rigorous Scholarship
The OP is proposing a dangerous question. Why not just cut to the meat of his argument?
He is saying everyone is worth the same and must be treated the same. This is a difficult philosophical argument that can not be meaningfully solved in one fell swoop as he is suggesting.
No. You are wrong.
Even if we accept some variation of the premise "your worth is determined by how much you work," the OP still does not claim that all people are worth the same. The OP merely claims that there is a floor to worth, and that floor is somewhere in the neighborhood of 10k/year. If you can convince a board of directors somewhere that you are worth $20m/year plus stock options, more power to you.
So the value of a life is $10,000 a year, essentially. You can not be worth less than $10,000 dollars to America. Even if you do absolutely nothing, you will receive $10,000 just for being an American citizen.
Eddy on
"and the morning stars I have seen
and the gengars who are guiding me" -- W.S. Merwin
83% of Americans receive enough food. 99% of Americans have a roof over their heads. Obviously we want both numbers to be 100% but what country actually reaches those numbers without sacrificing democracy? The freedom of choice is a double-edged sword because not everyone makes the right financial choice.
That 1% that doesn't have a roof over their head? They didn't end up that way because of "poor financial choices." They wound up that way because of broken families, mental illness, drug addiction, etc. Were they afforded a choice, I would imagine they would not choose "hungry and homeless."
Also, they generally do not receive government help outside of, say, shelters and soup kitchens because you need a home to get most government benefits (also employment, too.)
Psycho Internet Hawk on
0
HachfaceNot the Minister Farrakhan you're thinking ofDammit, Shepard!Registered Userregular
Unless you're talking about a society in demographic decline, economic growth is absolutely crucial to at least maintain current standards of living.
Income inequality is a different discussion. But it's hard to find the downside of economic growth.
You've removed a great deal of subtlety from what I and AngelHedgie were saying. Economic growth and economic development are both obviously important. It is by no means certain, however, that they the correlation between them is absolutely positive 100% of the time. Policies that promote equality may very well decrease efficiency and retard growth. The very difficult question in front of us is how much we want to prioritize speed along one axis over the other. At the moment, I think it is obvious that the US needs to focus on development.
83% of Americans receive enough food. 99% of Americans have a roof over their heads. Obviously we want both numbers to be 100% but what country actually reaches those numbers without sacrificing democracy? The freedom of choice is a double-edged sword because not everyone makes the right financial choice.
That 1% that doesn't have a roof over their head? They didn't end up that way because of "poor financial choices." They wound up that way because of broken families, mental illness, drug addiction, etc. Were they afforded a choice, I would imagine they would not choose "hungry and homeless."
Also, they generally do not receive government help outside of, say, shelters and soup kitchens because you need a home to get most government benefits (also employment, too.)
You're not going to eliminate homelessness by giving people a baseline income if they are mentally ill, or have a drug addiction.
Eddy on
"and the morning stars I have seen
and the gengars who are guiding me" -- W.S. Merwin
Why would anyone work for a wage of $10k, if they could get a wage of $10k for doing nothing? The only reason would be if they loved that job, and wanted to do it for free. This would just force corporations to raise the lost wages, actually.
I'm not sure I'm seeing why society is obligated to pay able-bodied people to quit their jobs.
what about the positions that are no glory and have zero social esteem?
What are some of these positions? I already talked about the McDonald's job in the OP- do you really think that's a job that needs to be done?
Sure, why wouldn't it be? McDonald's sells a legal product that people want to buy. It employs some people in making that product. Where's the downside?
Anyway, if you make labor for that job too expensive, McDonalds will just rely on more automation.
Modern Man on
Aetian Jupiter - 41 Gunslinger - The Old Republic
Rigorous Scholarship
The OP is proposing a dangerous question. Why not just cut to the meat of his argument?
He is saying everyone is worth the same and must be treated the same. This is a difficult philosophical argument that can not be meaningfully solved in one fell swoop as he is suggesting.
No. You are wrong.
Even if we accept some variation of the premise "your worth is determined by how much you work," the OP still does not claim that all people are worth the same. The OP merely claims that there is a floor to worth, and that floor is somewhere in the neighborhood of 10k/year. If you can convince a board of directors somewhere that you are worth $20m/year plus stock options, more power to you.
So the value of a life is $10,000 a year, essentially. You can not be worth less than $10,000 dollars to America. Even if you do absolutely nothing, you will receive $10,000 just for being an American citizen.
The bigger issue is that the market will rebalance to profit from the 10K the poor get.
Will diapers get more expensive? You bet.
Food? Yes.
Rent? Yes.
By trying to help the poor, you will make more people poor. Because this plan will hurt lower-middle income people the most.
Posts
No, the problem is that consumers as a whole have a limited amount of money to spend on luxuries. That money will only employ a limited amount of people. If I'm playing free video games, the video game companies get no money, and can't employ any extra people. (and yes I know they make money from ad revenue but the same argument applies to the companies that advertise through them).
Of course, one of the problems is you'd be creating an underclass of people who rely on the government for their survival. The problems with that should be self-evident to any thinking person.
Rigorous Scholarship
Wealth distribution does not equate to happiness. You can't just say, here's $10,000, make a better life! Or else all lottery winners would become self-funded businessmen, instead of pissing it all away within the first year.
Giving people "free" money is fundamentally not free. The valuation of the money goes way, way down. Devaluing currency means you end up like post-WWI Germany, or current day name-any-country-in-Africa, where they did the same thing you're proposing - print a ton of money and give it to everyone.
The poor and financially uneducated will remain poor and uneducated, the rich will in fact, get richer, because they're capable of investing that capital instead of either blindly spending it on immediate needs or blindly spending it on non-essential commodities.
You say it like all of that is so easy. Closing loopholes? That would take billions of man-hours. Raising taxes on the wealthy? A few billion dollars in lobbying fees. Eliminating the bush tax cuts? They were just renewed.
and the gengars who are guiding me" -- W.S. Merwin
I was deliberately trying to avoid specifics because I'm not an economist, and I don't know the optimal way to implement this. I'm just arguing for why it should be done, and why it would help us.
My ballpark guess is that we should give it to every adult who makes less than $10,000, which can be funded through a combination of tax increases, deficit spending until the economy improves, and some reduction in welfare programs.
Well, the proposal to limit the GBI to people who make less than 30k is right in the OP.
One immediate consequence that I can see is that no job will ever pay anywhere in the range of 29,999.99/yr to 40k, since anything in that range would be better-served by taking a lower paying job + GBI.
That being said, this is something I have been thinking for a long time.
The american economy is built on a large amount of luxury purchases- things you don't necessarily need, but rather things that you want. In many ways the american economy is devoted not necessarily to to life or liberty, but rather the pursuit of happiness, if you will pardon the rhetoric here.
I have always wondered what our economy would look like if every adult citizen was provided with the bare necessities for life: food, water, sanitation, shelter, and health care. As in, these things are guaranteed to you in some fashion to a degree that if you so desired you could live off of them forever.
Surely they would be the barest of necessities, but I have always felt that this option would allow more economic freedom for individuals to invest in luxury goods. Obviously the incentive to perform a task for money would be so that you could afford the luxury products you desired (video games, car, jet ski, skateboard, fancy food, beer, dining out, and so forth) with the satisfaction of knowing that at least at the end of the day you have something to eat no matter what.
I just feel like that security would alleviate a lot of societal problems.
I guess I am advocating a sort of trickle up economy then.
But I mean feel free to tell me why I am wrong about this- There are many things I know about, but economics are not really in that list.
But of course, you'd just pay for that by printing more money, right?
and the gengars who are guiding me" -- W.S. Merwin
I want you to spell them out, specifically, because I really don't think it's that big of a problem. Why is it bad to be reliant on the government, when it's not bad to be relying on a corporation? Nevermind the fact that we're all pretty reliant on the government anyway- I don't think I'd survive without it, for a lot of reasons.
Basically I want to challenge the idea that only those who work, deserve to live. I believe that everyone deserves to live.
Giving poor people free money, rather than subsidizing their life needs will lead to a lot of bad results, such as them spending the money on booze, cigarettes and drugs, rather than food, clothing and shelter.
(obviously a generalization, but bad financial decisions are a pretty common characteristic of poor people)
Rigorous Scholarship
Does everyone, regardless of societal worth, deserve to live? Does a cancer cell deserve to live? Does something that does nothing but feed off of other things around it with absolutely no positive reverse contribution deserve to live?
If you say everyone should get enough to live off of, no questions asked, how will any of that get produced? What incentive is there for people who otherwise hold our entire infrastructure together, as shitty as their jobs are, to continue what they are doing?
Do you have any idea how difficult it is to grow crops? Or build a computerized data system from the ground up? Or run the stock market? Or any market? These are difficult, thankless jobs with a million entry-level thankless positions. What is the incentive to work at any of those positions when you can get the same thing for doing absolutely nothing?
and the gengars who are guiding me" -- W.S. Merwin
I read a study pretty recently that showed that low-income people actually make much better financial decisions than most people believe. I am going to google for it right now.
What if I want a nicer house? Do I have to live in the government made concrete box?
What if I want to eat kumquats all day? Am I stuck with government cheese?
but they're listening to every word I say
Luxury goods are sort of built around someone getting screwed on one end of the deal. Maybe we can finance a large third-world country to produce an endless supply of iPods and Kawasakis for 300 million people, but the moral implications are kind of dire.
Note that this doesn't apply on the really high end of the spectrum (handmade Italian suits and custom-build cars, for example), but good luck finding enough manpower/resources to do that for an entire country and still meet basic needs.
None of those things are difficult. Someone who has no idea may struggle, but it's as difficult as riding a bike. (As in, practice and teaching will get you there)
Do you think my girlfriend should die? She is the metaphorical cancer cell on society. Without society she would've died as a teenager. It's also because of society that she's not allowed to contribute... or else she'll die because society won't put up with her supporting herself while still aiding her.
This is a dangerous road to go down. I don't think your own self-worth as a human being should be decided by how well you work an entry-level position at Best Buy.
Or, to go the opposite route, by the power you have as CEO of, say, Blackwater, or Haliburton, or whatnot.
How much is a life worth to our modern society? Perhaps it is as much as a private citizen, helped by government programs, is willing to pay for it.
and the gengars who are guiding me" -- W.S. Merwin
We probably shouldn't make this personal. Because in order to continue the discussion we'd have to know many personal details about your GF. And that's probably not such a good idea.
If you want extra luxuries like that, then you'd still have to work a job to get the money to pay for them. This makes sense, since most jobs are producing luxuries anyway.
Basically- we have enough of the basic necessitiesfor everyone. The only shortage is in luxuries. Therefore, everyone should have access to the basic necessities, and those who want luxuries have to produce more luxuries themselves.
The OP is proposing a dangerous question. Why not just cut to the meat of his argument?
He is saying everyone is worth the same and must be treated the same. This is a difficult philosophical argument that can not be meaningfully solved in one fell swoop as he is suggesting.
and the gengars who are guiding me" -- W.S. Merwin
But a society where significant percentage of the population is reliant on government transfer payments for the basics of food, water and shelter is a disaster waiting to happen. The people who live off of those payments provide little, if anything, to society. For all intents and purposes, they'd be kept as pets by the rest of society. Over time, those people would lose any conception of self-reliance. That's hazardous to the health of a democratic society.
And one side effect is that you'd see a drop in wages for a lot of lower-paying jobs. If I was paying someone $30K a year for a job and this program came into effect, I'd drop their salary $10K the next day. This would actually end up being a subsidy for corporations.
Rigorous Scholarship
It's a principle tenet of trickle-down - "a rising tide lifts all boats."
The fact it has been shown to be false over and over doesn't stop it from being sprouted.
I don't see how your proposal is that different from the current system. Except there is "moar".
and the gengars who are guiding me" -- W.S. Merwin
It seems that we have a dilemma. As things become easier to make through automation, more people are free to do other things, or make other things. Yet instead of there being more for everyone, it seems that we just have a bunch of people out of work.
Are we just plain too stupid to come up with enough new things for people to do? Or is it that the uber rich already have most of the luxuries that are available and are now stockpiling vast hordes of cash?
It reminds me of a CNBC show I saw where a billionaire said he was just making more money to "keep score". But these games are not without consequence. There is a ton of money locked up, where it isn't used to make more TV's or couches, or... whatever.
I think what we have is a money flow problem. There isn't enough work because so much money stagnates.
but they're listening to every word I say
And yet, our current welfare programs obviously don't work too well, seeing as how
1 in 6 Americans have trouble getting enough food, and about 3 million experience homelessness.
I was interested in Arch's answer to his specific assertion. If the government provided those specific goods, like a house and food, it would severely restrict options. I think a money solution would be better.
but they're listening to every word I say
No. You are wrong.
Even if we accept some variation of the premise "your worth is determined by how much you work," the OP still does not claim that all people are worth the same. The OP merely claims that there is a floor to worth, and that floor is somewhere in the neighborhood of 10k/year. If you can convince a board of directors somewhere that you are worth $20m/year plus stock options, more power to you.
You're talking about radically changing the economic, political, and cultural realities of a society that has, for over two hundred years, stated that its creed is not equality of results, but equality of opportunity.
and the gengars who are guiding me" -- W.S. Merwin
If you lose sleep at night wondering if the poor person getting your tax dollars is worth something, you should probably get your priorities straight.
It's certainly no skin off my back to treat everyone with basic respect and assume they possess some intrinsic level of worth, and if I can't afford a luxury good or two for a little while longer because some of my money is going towards helping people, fuck it, I'll go home and go on my computer or play my Wii or enjoy myself in one of a bajillion ways I already can as a relatively successful member of society.
Why would anyone work for a wage of $10k, if they could get a wage of $10k for doing nothing? The only reason would be if they loved that job, and wanted to do it for free. This would just force corporations to raise the lost wages, actually.
I think that part of the reason that jobs at the bottom suck so much is that workers have no leverage- they need those jobs to survive. If a midlevel employees are fed up with their jobs, they can quit, and find another, but low level employees really don't have that choice. So they just put up with whatever the boss man tells them to do. A basic income guarantee would give them some bargaining power.
Income inequality is a different discussion. But it's hard to find the downside of economic growth.
Rigorous Scholarship
So the value of a life is $10,000 a year, essentially. You can not be worth less than $10,000 dollars to America. Even if you do absolutely nothing, you will receive $10,000 just for being an American citizen.
and the gengars who are guiding me" -- W.S. Merwin
That 1% that doesn't have a roof over their head? They didn't end up that way because of "poor financial choices." They wound up that way because of broken families, mental illness, drug addiction, etc. Were they afforded a choice, I would imagine they would not choose "hungry and homeless."
Also, they generally do not receive government help outside of, say, shelters and soup kitchens because you need a home to get most government benefits (also employment, too.)
You've removed a great deal of subtlety from what I and AngelHedgie were saying. Economic growth and economic development are both obviously important. It is by no means certain, however, that they the correlation between them is absolutely positive 100% of the time. Policies that promote equality may very well decrease efficiency and retard growth. The very difficult question in front of us is how much we want to prioritize speed along one axis over the other. At the moment, I think it is obvious that the US needs to focus on development.
You're not going to eliminate homelessness by giving people a baseline income if they are mentally ill, or have a drug addiction.
and the gengars who are guiding me" -- W.S. Merwin
What are some of these positions? I already talked about the McDonald's job in the OP- do you really think that's a job that needs to be done?
Sure, why wouldn't it be? McDonald's sells a legal product that people want to buy. It employs some people in making that product. Where's the downside?
Anyway, if you make labor for that job too expensive, McDonalds will just rely on more automation.
Rigorous Scholarship
The bigger issue is that the market will rebalance to profit from the 10K the poor get.
Will diapers get more expensive? You bet.
Food? Yes.
Rent? Yes.
By trying to help the poor, you will make more people poor. Because this plan will hurt lower-middle income people the most.