Larry Gude
Strung Out
That gives the hammock maker, the mini fridge guy, the side table dude and portable TV maker something to do as well as the people who make the supplies that go into and onto them. We NEED more consumers.
Universal Basic Income
- Thread starter GURPS
- Start date
That gives the hammock maker, the mini fridge guy, the side table dude and portable TV maker something to do as well as the people who make the supplies that go into and onto them. We NEED more consumers.
Clem72
Well-Known Member
I think the argument (not necessarily one I support) is that this isn't necessarily a bad thing. Motivated people will continue to thrive, the creative will create, while those who are satisfied with bottom feeding can do so without resorting to crime. Of course it's all predicated on a system with enough excess to support the freeloaders.
If you remember your calculus you can simplify things by assuming that their value approaches infinity, and get an approximate answer. So If labor becomes infinitely cheap, then being a laborer has no value. That leaves the value 100% with resources, and with IP. If you allow people to own the resources, then they will own all of the value in the system except for those that create IP. Obviously there are not enough resources for everyone to own them, and not enough original ideas (of value) for everyone to live off of their creations. So either you cede control of the resources to the state (yay communism) or you tax the resource owners and provide the income to the people so that they can live, and hopefully some of them will have original valuable ideas (yay socialism). The other alternative is that everyone who cannot come up with an original idea or inherit rights to an idea or does not inherits rights to a resource dies, and you have a society of those that collect rent on their resources, and those that collect rent on their ideas. Nobody works (labors) in any of these scenarios. So a society where most people get to live well because their ancestors bought land or invented a product, and everyone else dies, or a society where everyone lives well (and some live better based on ancestors).
That won't stop.
This_person
Well-Known Member
Larry?
Clem72
Well-Known Member
Won't stop, sure. But it would lessen. Some criminals do it for the thrills/lulz, some for the genuine need. Again, not my argument here just restating my understanding.
SamSpade
Well-Known Member
I cannot see a thriving nation - which will always have competitors - where some large portion is not contributing, but merely living off of the excess.
America works when Americans work.
No matter what people tell you, once you have a society where *some* people work and the rest sponge off of them - the workers will realize they can do a lot better without ANY sponges.
:shrug:
how many are on welfare now ?
but yes, IMHO providing a 'Universal Basic Income' will only make matters worse ... everyone has equal opportunities, Work or Starve is my motto
Clem72
Well-Known Member
Again, preface this by saying not-my-argument. But maybe you didn't make it past my first sentence. You take things not as they are today, but as they may likely be in the future, when the "workers" the haves, the justified beautiful job creators are separated from the unwashed masses simply because their great great grandfather purchased the right plot of land, or their umpteenth grandmother invented a novel way of extruding plastic into a mold, but does nothing themselves other than collect rent, then I wouldn't so much call taxing them "sponging" so much as keeping a society in tact that allows them to collect money for doing nothing (again, since all the real "work" in this future world is done by machines/automatons/whatever). This was the future absurd example, there is probably some middle ground.
What do you mean by "living off the excess"? Excess what? Doesn't that $19 trillion in current debt and not to mentioned the $150 - 200 trillion in unfunded liabilities maybe have first dibbs on any kind of "excess"? We have an excess of people living on the dole, for sure. At least all those millions of non-working (or retired)peeps that contributed into their retirement plan and/or the SS system paid into whatever they are receiving.
Under the hammock scenario, can you imagine the bellyaching when the gap between the productive and the idle widens. Hard workers will be rewarded with possessions that they rightfully earned. Meanwhile the class baiters will be beating into submission the drum of unfairness.
I think someone said this before, but if the UBI was all there was... no other govt handouts on top of that... then it might be something to consider.
This_person
Well-Known Member
Larry?
Larry Gude
Strung Out
What do any of those have to do with the topic at hand? What does basic income have to do with the latest iphone?
Larry Gude
Strung Out
if you are drawing UBI - you cannot VOTE
If you work for the gummint, you cannot vote?
if you are drawing UBI - you cannot VOTE
But if EVERYONE gets UBI then nobody votes???
Whoops ....
I was thinking welfare recipients shouldn't be voting, because they will naturally vote for the guy promising more goodies
[like we have now]