Basic income

i think it's valuable for this reason tho - zizek claimed "it is easier to imagine the end of the world than it is to imagine the end of capitalism" so this allows for radical change w/out forcing ppl to imagine the impossible

nb i agree 100% that it's a radical and fantastic idea and i'm in favor 👍

It's probably a mistake to imagine that the end of history has happened or is imminent. People have been wrong about that repeatedly.

history is... constantly ending... think abt it

just a continuous, unending now... history's ended.. war to win all wars

the technocratic paper of record examines the silicon valley-basic income connection http://www.vox.com/2016/1/28/10860830/y-combinator-basic-income

other hypothesis: ppl figure out how to get paid under the table more easily, cash transactions flourish

i love cash tbh feels good to hold

cold, hard, stinky cash

its good

dean baker:

First, the robots taking all the jobs story is almost absurd on its face. How fast do we think productivity will grow that demand and reduced hours cannot keep pace? Productivity grew at a 3.0 percent annual rate from 1947 to 1973. We saw rapid growth in pay and living standards and very low rates of unemployment. Do we think the story would have looked worse if annual productivity growth was 4.0 percent?

It is almost impossible to imagine a story where productivity growth suddenly jumps from its current rate of less than 1.0 percent annually to a pace so rapid that we are losing jobs left and right due to improvements in technology. It is possible to tell a story where the Fed raises interest rates to slow the economy and job creation even as technology is displacing more and more workers.

That is a plausible story given that we have had several members of the Fed’s Open Market Committee that sets interest rates who have been worried about hyper-inflation. But the problem in that case is crazy-bad Fed policy, not robots taking jobs. And, we do the country a horrible disservice if we imply that the problem is somehow technology rather than the people running the Fed.

http://cepr.net/blogs/beat-the-press/cheap-thoughts-on-productivity-growth

Still have no idea the difference btwn this and yknow adequate unemployment benefits

About 10k/annum to you and me.

Looking at the green party's policy document and it's more like 5k. Great, the magical unicorn that no-one has promised me is already failing to live up to expectations.
https://policy.greenparty.org.uk/assets/files/Policy%20files/Basic%20Income%20Consultation%20Paper.pdf

shd be owgg

lol shd be pegged to just above the poverty line imo eliminate poverty altogether

otm

you have to jump through all kinds of hoops to get unemployment benefits and the state workers reviewing crap are way overworked. likely to get some notice a year after you stopped collecting benefits related to some arcane piece of paper they think you didn't mail in triplicate

just gimmie the cash! damn

if we make it too easy for people to survive, will there still be any exceptionalism in america? will excellence itself become extinct, like hereditary aristocracy?

do we have that much exceptionalism now? how many people are working a job they're exceptional at rather than the first one they were offered when they needed to pay rent?

doesnt matter america has fulfilled its destiny of inventing the internet now its time to kick back in ones government issue yurt and game

I imagine that a universal basic income for adults would fuel a boom in additional housing units, as more young adults can afford to live on their own. Also could spark increased migration to small towns, where cost of living is cheap, but well-paid jobs are few.

yeah my yurt is definitely gonna be in the middle of nowhere in northern new england or the upper midwest i've got this planned out already

feel like u might want to think about somewhere a lil more temperate

i mean i know mongolians live in them in extreme cold but those are hardy folk

no its ok climate change will make those places good by the time this all enacts

ya good point

i heard of this again recently, paraphrasing: proposing a basic income non taxable: people would be free to go out there and add to their basic situation to improve their situation if they swing that way. groovy!

wait this is not a drunk chat? ok.

I imagine that a universal basic income for adults would fuel a boom in additional housing units, as more young adults can afford to live on their own. Also could spark increased migration to small towns, where cost of living is cheap, but well-paid jobs are few.

― a little too mature to be cute (Aimless), Saturday, 30 January 2016 21:05 (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

From a country with rent supplement and social welfare payments where there exists great disparity in rents within very short distances, this has not been the experience. People on these benefits do not move to less popular areas for cheaper rent.

you could see towns competing for the new tax base, offering free wifi or something, dog parks. not totally out of the imagination. i know we're trying to set up free wifi here

https://medium.com/@morganwarstler/guaranteed-income-choose-your-boss-1d068ac5a205#.ttqiaqsml

feel like you guys would hate this stuff cause it's a bit too tech-posi but i find this kind of speculative thinking up different welfare systems stuff interesting at the very least

choose yr own bossventure

something like a quarter of all impoverished people in this country are disabled and many other have other things that make it difficult for them to work like responsibilities caring for disabled relatives

not to mention that one of the really attractive things about basic income is its simplicity it removes the job of interacting with bureaucracy

lmao k

Using Paypal and an OPEN SOURCE MASHUP of Monster.com and eBay, the US govt. should block grant / waiver states (likely Texas first) to establish a Guaranteed Income, wage subsidy welfare system.

yeah you would still have to have disability

this is not even getting into the whole liberation from coercive capitalism aspect which is kinda the best part, instead its just the government guaranteeing everyone 7 dollar an hour jobs, i mean fine if youre just interested in dystopian fiction but this is a terrible terribly half assed plan

does the person who wrote this know that ppl who are able to work can generally get 7 dollar an hour jobs

except that theyre illegal in many place being below the minimum wage

Anyone who wants to work registers, receives a Paypal Debit Card, and each Friday at 5PM has their GI deposited.

still dying at the inscistance on PAYPAL

we shd go venmo imo

lol

i think the idea is there's a lot of desirable jobs that are priced out by min wage/not profitable enough for employer, so the govt subsidizes them and lets people choose. so instead of the only min wage/7$ per hour available being hellish jobs at walmart or scraping pool scum you get to do more enjoyable stuff that someone wouldn't actually pay you 7$ an hour for and the govt pays the difference

the really bad part abt $7 an hour jobs tho which btw is less than the federal minimum wage is that they pay $7 an hour, youre still gonna work yr 40 hours and have not enough to live on and have no time to say care for your child

i think a lot of ppl on various forms of welfare now make less than equiv of 7$/hr, and it goes up to 400/wk which is 10$/h

also i think the idea is by expanding the choices to low wage workers, who currently choose between mcdonalds harveyrs and burger king who all pay the same wage, you put more pressure on employers to raise wage or improve working standards etc

u cld raise the minimum wage or just give ppl money instead of giving the money to businesses

which is not even to mention that this whole scheme wld be an extremely obvious vector for fraud

u cld create an enforcement agency and pay $7 an hour

if this plan paid $15 it wld have more promise but u wld still be failing to help a lot of ppl who need it the most and failing to address the more profound underlying problems

Serious minimum wage increases ($15 and inflation indexing) are the thin end of the wedge imo, it's a pretty palatable populist message across demos that working full-time should pay you enough to survive. (Demonstrably so, it's passing in cities and by ballot initiative in lotsa places.) Get people on board with that and "not working at all should pay you and your family enough to thrive" starts seeming more attainable and attractive.