Universal Basic Income Study Findings Released

bearmtnmartin (Forum Supporter) said:

Rather than think about how to have a more fair system of handing out free money we would be better off creating a society where it is not needed to begin with. If you earn enough money in fewer hours so you can have more free time to spend your excess income, and you spend it on stuff from Amazon or Walmart you are mostly benefiting the working poor in china. I was driving by a very large homeless camp in Sacramento yesterday and wondering how many of those people, even with presumably limited life and work skills, might not be in the camp if there were positions available doing some of the low skill tasks we depend on China for now. In other words bring manufacturing home again. 

 

There's also something like 10% of the working age population who are unable to work, for physical or mental reasons.

Something that people don't like to point out about the homeless is that many homeless ARE working.  They have jobs.  They just can't afford a home.

aircooled said:

I mean, as with many things, you really just need to look at some SciFi for potential examples.

Some examples:

Marshall Brain's Manna is a shortish story that explores some utopian and dystopian possibilities. This was written years before Amazon had their warehouse workers being ordered around by a similar system to what's described in the beginning BTW.

Star Trek and The Orville both vaguely explore some utopian possibilities but it's rarely more than background lore. ST:DS9 probably goes the deepest into it.

Advantageous is an interesting short film and a snoozer of a full-length movie that feels like it's set maybe a couple years into the future at most at this point, with a more dystopian take. One of the 2-3 subplots added to the full-length version almost makes it worth sitting through the extra runtime.

The Expanse - on Earth we see a few glimpses of a perhaps slightly dystopian take on a world with UBI. It's not really a dystopia but it's not exactly good either.

Elysium sets a collection of Neill Blomkamp's kickass action sequences in a world that looks like it could really use some UBI due to extensive labor automation and near-human-level AI but appears to have approximately none. Call it the do-nothing business-as-usual scenario, or what the dystopian possibilities from Manna would look like with less berkeleys given.

Note that in all of these the dystopias generally come from a lack of UBI in a world that no longer has much need for human labor rather than the presence of UBI itself. The one that comes closest to making UBI look like a bad thing is probably The Expanse.

In reply to Peabody :

Any system is going to be subject to abuse. Our current system isn't great but if we could make it cheaper to run, I'm all for it.

Unfortunately, never in the history of mankind has the government been able to run something at a lower cost than the private sector.

I live in a community full of people who live life on government handouts, smoking weed or being drunk all day. 

I think the UBI system puts a lot more faith in humankind than it deserves.

If we managed to create a perfect utopia. You can be sure that one of your fellow primates will try to smash it, just to see what would happen.

In reply to RX Reven' :

So... robots are nearly free to create, own, and operate, are they?

Duke said:

In reply to RX Reven' :

So... robots are nearly free to create, own, and operate, are they?

 

No, they're absolutely free if they're fully self managing.

In reply to Duke :

They are if you get other robots to do it, and dig the ore, process it, form it etc.

Eventually you can theoretically get robots and AI to do pretty much anything, just a matter of time.  Until that happens, human will still need to do things, just progressively fewer and fewer things.

RX Reven' said:

Duke said:

In reply to RX Reven' :

So... robots are nearly free to create, own, and operate, are they?

 

No, they're absolutely free if they're fully self managing.

Oo, Oo, Oo... I wanna buy me some free robots!! 🙄

RX Reven' said:

Duke said:

In reply to RX Reven' :

So... robots are nearly free to create, own, and operate, are they?

No, they're absolutely free if they're fully self managing.

So... they cost zero to build, zero to operate, and zero to maintain?  No raw materials, no power consumption, nothing?

Awesome!  You just solved the world and discovered perpetual motion, all at the same time.  Share your secret and retire an instant billionaire.  Collect your Nobel prize and your sainthood.

Hi SV reX & Duke,

From my prospective, you're applying old rules to a new game.

Specifically, you seem to be operating from a humancentric paradigm where technology can only enhance worker productivity.

I think we're on the eve of robots designing, producing, maintaining, & improving robots - soup to nuts, no human involvement required other than for us to tell the robots what we want.

I think this could end badly but I don't think it necessarily must which takes us back to my first post which was a suggestion that we focus on implementation.

In reply to RX Reven' :

I don't disagree that we are on the brink of major changes. I disagree with the assertion that robots can be free.  I think that is silly. 
 

Isaac Asimov wrote about what you are suggesting in the 1950's. 70 years ago. This ain't nothing' new. 

SV reX said:

In reply to RX Reven' :

I don't disagree that we are on the brink of major changes. I disagree with the assertion that robots can be free.  I think that is silly.

This.  Your human labor cost may (eventually) (approach) zero.  But that does not mean production cost will ever get anywhere near zero.

So what?

Look, this isn't a hill I'm willing to die on.

I appear to have a world view that is more fluid than yours...most of the time I'm well aligned with your thinking but on this topic, I seem to be an early adopter that senses a rule busting, paradigm shift on the horizon.

It's all good man.

In reply to RX Reven' :

You're sounding kinda judgy

Duke said:

that does not mean production cost will ever get anywhere near zero.

 

I think they can...so long as robots don't want to get paid, I see no constraint.

In reply to RX Reven' :

Owners of robots want to be paid, and have no interest in paying people for being non-productive. 
 

THAT will never change. 

SV reX said:

In reply to RX Reven' :

You're sounding kinda judgy

I was careful to use plenty of "could / may" types of words in my posts...again, this isn't a hill I'm willing to die on.

GameboyRMH said:

Note that in all of these the dystopias generally come from a lack of UBI in a world that no longer has much need for human labor rather than the presence of UBI itself. The one that comes closest to making UBI look like a bad thing is probably The Expanse.

I think The Expanse probably has the most believable depiction. It doesn't show how they got into the situation they did, but the setting implies more that overpopulation, environmental destruction, and corporatism were the causes of things being bad, and that UBI is an ineffective bandaid on larger systemic problems. It is pretty strongly implied that no one wants to be "on basic". It shows people needing to work hard and effectively win a lottery to get education program placements.

We see characters work around or against the system to make things of themselves, but we see more characters try to do that and get chewed up and ground down hoping and trying.

I think it's much more a caution about self reinforcing systems of power and privilege. A modern form of quasi-aristocracy where the "haves" set up soft systems to keep their children privileged.

SV reX said:

In reply to RX Reven' :

Owners of robots want to be paid, and have no interest in paying people for being non-productive.

THAT will never change. 

Again, THIS.

Not to mention mineral rights, petroleum rights, land area for sustainable raw material production and waste disposal.  Even if you factor labor costs out 100%, you can't create a thriving industrial economy out of thin air.

I think we'd be better tackling the question of Universal Healthcare first.

I think it would solve most of the same problems that people are looking to UBI for, and have many other benefits. It's a much simpler sell with successful large-scale proofs of concept. Yes, I know that the U.S. is larger, more populous, and more diverse than any other advanced economies, but not by an order of magnitude.

Many people this would have the same effect of just more money in their pockets.

Medical care can be a major expense and unexpected injury or illness is frequently financially devistating. I'm currently dealing with health issues that the average person in this country couldn't afford my out-of-pocket expenses *after* insurance.

People with chronic illnesses would not be disincentivized from getting jobs for fear of losing health care.

Decoupling health care from employment would make it easier for people to leave jobs to start their own businesses.

Small businesses would better be able to attract and retain skilled workers, because "more job satisfaction or more money" is a tough question, but "more job satisfaction or having healthcare" isn't. Small businesses would have an easier time becoming medium sized businesses.

SV reX said:

alfadriver said:

SV reX said:

In reply to alfadriver :

I can't even extrapolate my example to the next door neighbor. Wouldn't try to. 
 

Im just saying unintended consequences happen. I think this would end badly. 

Trying to figure out how bad the unintended consequences would be.  Some people would stop working, but keep consuming.  Is that so bad?  Some people would keep working and consume a little more.  Most others would not really be impacted.

The only "bad" think would be the continuation of the debate whether people "deserve" to not work.  Which, any more, sounds to me that people still want cheap labor and are mad that people can avoid working at a price that is too for others to pay for their labor.  And that "deserve" debate then is very political.  That part is bad, for sure- we don't need more arguing.  But at the same time, what's so harmful of keeping money flowing in the consumer side of the economy?

Ok, I'll bite. 
 

How about if I agree that the "bad" might not be so bad...

Can we also agree that the "good" might not be so good?

I see zero advantages. Add money to the economy without any productivity causes instant inflation, which then needs more money.  Sooner or later the owners of the productivity (robots, etc) who are creating the wealth are no longer interested in paying non-productive workers for not working.  That won't lead to people being happy.

We already give money to people who are not adding to the productivity of the country.  Some even argue that they add cost to producing things- in the interest of keeping people healthy and safe (do the police add to your companies productivity?  Or do you just pay for it?  The fire department is more insurance than a productivity add.  For you- do the building inspectors add to your productivity- or just make sure it's done in a specific way?).  So worrying about a reasonably small part of the population will even have any noticeable impact- you are welcome to, but I really don't see it. 

Let alone, the people who would really get UBI are ones who are probably already getting help from all of us.  And UBI seems to be a less expensive version of that aid we already supply.  As it seems, we would be adding less money to the economy than before, which will keep inflation in check.  

In reply to Beer Baron 🍺 :

Some person's opinion turned into fiction probably isn't a great way to claim what will happen in the future.  Sometimes it's gotten right, sometimes it's gotten wrong.  I would not wager a bet on the future based on someone's fictional story.

In reply to alfadriver :

Police, firemen, and building inspectors DO contribute to the productivity of the country, because the cost of failure or anarchy is far more expensive than paying them.

Ask any businessman who owns a business in a crappy part of town if he's willing to do business without law enforcement. It's literally impossible.

Thats significantly different than paying someone to stay home and play video games. (Even if it's in the form of a taxation)

Another thread is discussing the soaring cost of condos and assessments throughout the state of FL. Because of the recent collapse of the Surfside Towers. 
 

The state is implementing regulations which are costing building owners hundreds of millions of dollars because of the failure of building inspectors. 
 

That's not a zero cost to productivity. 

In reply to alfadriver :

Are you suggesting that the UBI is only for those already on the dole? My impression is that UBI goes to every citizen, hence the Universal part of the name. If it's only going to the poor, it's not universal.