Universal Basic Income: Ideas on how to make it work?

[NotATether]

Cnut237 and I were having a conversation about wealth distribution in this thread, where he mentions UBI. So rather than derailing that thread I'm going to open it here.

In case you don't know what UBI means it is a program for all citizens of a country, rich and poor, to be paid a fixed amount by their government and the goal of this program is to make sure everyone can pay for what they need. There are obviously many challenges to address before this works out, the most basic ones are:

- How much to pay? Since they're paying millions of people, they need to ensure they have enough money set aside for that, or UBI payments will deplete the government's money.
- What time interval to pay in - If this is not controlled we get the same consequence as paying too much at a time.
- Should people be filtered out based on financial status (EDIT: and employment status as well)? Presumably finance ministries of governments have records of every citizen's earnings (as in profit not balance), and a UBI proposal needs to be crafted meticulously to be very precise in the criteria for organizing everyone into (only a few) financial wellness categories, a vague set of requirements can be challenged by parliaments and get the proposal blocked.
- Corruption: Some of the budget can be stolen and laundered by people in charge of safekeeping it. Look at 1MDB for example, $700million was stolen from them with the help of the prime minister.

Let's assume people will be filtered by status, since giving everyone a fixed amount while keeping withing the budget risks not giving the most needy people enough money, the main hurdle faced here is parliamentary consensus of how to classify everyone in different categories so they can set different incomes for each group. And that's complicated because government budgets decrease and sometimes increase so you have politicians arguing that the income should be raised or lowered accordingly and this just entangles entire proposals.

We basically have nobody in power agreeing with each other on how much money to pay each person.

[1715115439]

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[1715115439]

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[Poker Player]

Not giving it.

If it is really universal (i.e given to everybody) it will create inflation. If it's only given to some, it will not be very different from the existing systems of support for the most disadvantaged, which consist of a redistribution of wealth from the middle class to the poor.

[Coyster]

The major challenge to this is the wealth of a particular nation, how buoyant their economy is and how low their level of unemployment is. UBI is a good initiative, but in a struggling country/third word country it'll be impossible to achieve, a country still struggling with an impoverished economy and writhing debts cannot undertake this program.

A country with a high unemployment rate will also struggle, you'll expect the nation to channel much of their funds into creating more jobs for it's citizens, as that will give them a stable income, rather than paying them a little amount that can hardly meet their needs. There is also the problem of creating inflation by printing more money to fulfil this program, that being said, I'd only expect this sort of program to be possible in first world countries.

[Wexnident]

- How much to pay? Since they're paying millions of people, they need to ensure they have enough money set aside for that, or UBI payments will deplete the government's money.

That would vary, if we were to place a central body that would manage the UBI for the entire world, then varying payments would happen due to different inflations of each country, not to mention that each country has different levels of financial assistance they could provide.

- What time interval to pay in - If this is not controlled we get the same consequence as paying too much at a time.

This also depends on how much pay would one get. If a central body were to set the maximum amount of expenses for each group (high class, middle class and low class) then things would probably be a lot easier, but then again, let's not even mention how some people don't have any proper way to regulate their expenses, there's also disparity when it comes to people from each class.

- Should people be filtered out based on financial status (EDIT: and employment status as well)? Presumably finance ministries of governments have records of every citizen's earnings (as in profit not balance), and a UBI proposal needs to be crafted meticulously to be very precise in the criteria for organizing everyone into (only a few) financial wellness categories, a vague set of requirements can be challenged by parliaments and get the proposal blocked.

Financial status should be more than enough, though changes with employee status may change their financial status at times, so finding a solution for that could be pretty helpful. With this issue, it may be a lot easier if they gave out UBI monthly to avoid issues when people get fired from their jobs abruptly.

- Corruption: Some of the budget can be stolen and laundered by people in charge of safekeeping it. Look at 1MDB for example, $700million was stolen from them with the help of the prime minister.

Nothing we can do about this really. Corruption has and always be somewhere money is.

Let's assume people will be filtered by status, since giving everyone a fixed amount while keeping withing the budget risks not giving the most needy people enough money, the main hurdle faced here is parliamentary consensus of how to classify everyone in different categories so they can set different incomes for each group. And that's complicated because government budgets decrease and sometimes increase so you have politicians arguing that the income should be raised or lowered accordingly and this just entangles entire proposals.

We basically have nobody in power agreeing with each other on how much money to pay each person.

Then how about a fixed amount is obtained from government budget? That, or you could set a sort of tax that varies with wealth which directly goes to UBI funds. Though this makes it look like the rich is supporting the poor, while the poor is making the losses of the rich be at the bare minimum.

[SANihal02]

What is Universal Basic Income? Simply put, this means that every citizen will receive a certain amount of money from the government as income, unconditionally, without question. In our society, many types of work are considered 'inferior' and workers are looked down upon. Such as cleaning toilets, cleaning garbage, skinning dead animals, prostitution, etc. Those who do these things do not seem to do so happily, they do so out of helplessness. If they have a regular income, don't do this anymore. Society will then try to meet those needs in other ways.

[Upgrade00]

- How much to pay? Since they're paying millions of people, they need to ensure they have enough money set aside for that, or UBI payments will deplete the government's money.

This would be dependent on the nation's economy. Emerging markets and developing economies may not be able to carry out this sustainably as their economies are not as robust and they usually have a rapidly growing population.

- What time interval to pay in - If this is not controlled we get the same consequence as paying too much at a time.

This would still be dependent on the above factor as well as the living wages in a particular country.

- Should people be filtered out based on financial status (EDIT: and employment status as well)? Presumably finance ministries of governments have records of every citizen's earnings (as in profit not balance), and a UBI proposal needs to be crafted meticulously to be very precise in the criteria for organizing everyone into (only a few) financial wellness categories, a vague set of requirements can be challenged by parliaments and get the proposal blocked.

If people were filtered out then it will no longer be universal, but rather a selective palliative giving you those who are most in need.

- Corruption: Some of the budget can be stolen and laundered by people in charge of safekeeping it.

This is an issue that should be addressed with or without such a program. Corruption especially at a large scale when left unchecked has limited the growth of many rich economies with enough resources and work force to become a developed nation.

[exstasie]

- How much to pay? Since they're paying millions of people, they need to ensure they have enough money set aside for that, or UBI payments will deplete the government's money.

To be sustainable, it would need to be a function of ongoing tax revenue, so it would differ from country to country based on economic output and tax structure.

What time interval to pay in - If this is not controlled we get the same consequence as paying too much at a time.

Rent and billing cycles are usually due on a monthly basis. That seems reasonable enough if the goal is meeting basic needs.

Should people be filtered out based on financial status (EDIT: and employment status as well)? Presumably finance ministries of governments have records of every citizen's earnings (as in profit not balance), and a UBI proposal needs to be crafted meticulously to be very precise in the criteria for organizing everyone into (only a few) financial wellness categories, a vague set of requirements can be challenged by parliaments and get the proposal blocked.

The strength of UBI is there is no means test or work requirement, so it doesn't suffer from the bureaucratic mess of red tape, government waste, human error, and months of waiting time we see with unemployment and other benefits.

I would view it less as a welfare payment for poor people, and more as a tax on large corporations who are making living wages increasingly unattainable, payable directly to all citizens or residents.

[GeorgeJohn]

Cnut237 and I were having a conversation about wealth distribution in this thread, where he mentions UBI. So rather than derailing that thread I'm going to open it here.

In case you don't know what UBI means it is a program for all citizens of a country, rich and poor, to be paid a fixed amount by their government and the goal of this program is to make sure everyone can pay for what they need. There are obviously many challenges to address before this works out, the most basic ones are:

- How much to pay? Since they're paying millions of people, they need to ensure they have enough money set aside for that, or UBI payments will deplete the government's money.
 how much money to pay each person.

We can't concentrate on government finance I don't think is ideal because politicians can't released any money to the masses because of their selfishness.
Looking out how much government will pay us is not the problem.
The problem should be,has government accepted to pay people?
If yes the money is not going to be circulate properly because their most be atoms of embezzlement.

[jseverson]

- How much to pay? Since they're paying millions of people, they need to ensure they have enough money set aside for that, or UBI payments will deplete the government's money.

Shouldn't the answer to this simply be enough money to lift the poorest of the poor out of the poverty line? I mean, that's kind of the point, right? It depends per country, but each should have their own metric. This should be what's ideal, at least.

- What time interval to pay in - If this is not controlled we get the same consequence as paying too much at a time.

I don't think there's really a sweet spot as far as this is concerned. It simply depends on how it's implemented and how well it's managed.

- Should people be filtered out based on financial status (EDIT: and employment status as well)? Presumably finance ministries of governments have records of every citizen's earnings (as in profit not balance), and a UBI proposal needs to be crafted meticulously to be very precise in the criteria for organizing everyone into (only a few) financial wellness categories, a vague set of requirements can be challenged by parliaments and get the proposal blocked.

By definition, everyone should qualify under UBI. If the goal is simply to provide money for the poor, then all we need to do is look into expanding existing social services like unemployment benefits, etc. True UBI is meant to treat everyone equally, nothing less.

- Corruption: Some of the budget can be stolen and laundered by people in charge of safekeeping it.

I don't think there's a real solution to this. Power can be used and abused, and that's really all there is to it. You can probably go after centralization, but that also means less organization, and an even smaller chance for this to work.

In an ideal world, everyone should be guaranteed at least a comfortable standard of living. UBI can provide that, which is why I like the idea. The devil is in the details, however, and I'm not entirely sure how possible it is for this to be implemented.

[Ucy]

Well, something like that (not necessarily giving out money) should be for the needy (actual needy). But I don't think it's a good idea to give able-bodied people who aren't adding good value to society (when they can) such basic income. There should be something good and valuable most people are good at and talented in that can benefit their society rightly.
So instead of paying people huge amount for doing nothing, get them to do what they are good at and pay them what they deserve. You can only guarantee everyone his/her basic daily needs so they don't die or get into trouble due to not having the basic needs. There should be no condition for having the basic needs. Even prisoners deserve them. And the basic needs do not have to be in "cash" for the needy to spend on things they don't need.
I would prefer a system where those who work hard the right way, get lots of such guaranteed income to help them to continue to produce good value quickly for the good of society. And the needy are helped with the good things they need.

[Cnut237]

The strength of UBI is there is no means test or work requirement, so it doesn't suffer from the bureaucratic mess of red tape [...] I would view it less as a welfare payment for poor people, and more as a tax on large corporations who are making living wages increasingly unattainable, payable directly to all citizens or residents.

Yes, I think that's how it has to work. An equal amount for everyone. Obviously this means that progressive income tax brackets will need to be tweaked accordingly. In part, for example, the removal of an initial tax free allowance; you earn $1 a year, you would be taxed on that $1. And UBI is only partially self-funding; we would probably need a wealth tax or some other taxation of the ultra-rich to make it viable.

Shouldn't the answer to this simply be enough money to lift the poorest of the poor out of the poverty line? I mean, that's kind of the point, right?

The point is to reduce inequality, yes, but UBI is in large part a solution to the current (and coming) wave of automation. Automation in the past has created new jobs in new spheres. People moved from agriculture to industry to offices. What is happening now is automation of office jobs (and skilled jobs in general), and we will soon be at the point where a lot of jobs can be done better and more cheaply by machines. The anticipation is a huge level of unemployment. UBI means a minimum to live on. It means that if there is 1 full-time job available, this can be split between several part-time employees, so that each has a decent standard of living (the alternative being one person gets the full-time job, and the others register for state benefits, which then need to be assessed). Many people will still want full-time jobs, and that's fine, we are just saying that full-time employment will no longer be a necessity. UBI takes away the inefficiency of managing a complex and expensive welfare system. What it also does, is to grant bargaining power to prospective employees. In a country with high unemployment and people desperate for work, the employers can pay a pittance, and someone will still take the job, even if they know they are being exploited. UBI gives prospective employees the option to refuse a job if the conditions are exploitative.

[mu_enrico]

Hmm, here's what I think when I heard about UBI:
The program needs funding, who or what will fund it? Taxing the rich? Will they cooperate?
Or use State-Owned Enterprise's (SOE's) profits? Or both?

If the government uses the ways above, there will be no inflation. But is it enough?

Another easy way is to print more money from thin air that will undoubtedly lead to hyperinflation.

[Hydrogen]

Programs like UBI have existed for decades (if not centuries) and been commented upon by famous economists like Milton Friedman.



Image link in case embed doesn't work:  https://i.imgur.com/weKszn4.jpg

• The first part of the quotation describes how to solve long term unemployment
• The second part of the quote describes how increasingly taxing work to subsidize non work is the opposite of everything he described to fix unemployment

People discuss programs like UBI as if they're new. When in reality, they're virtually identical to social security. Which has existed for awhile now.

What we're lacking is honest and educated commentary upon how effective and efficient these types of programs have been from a historical perspective.

The silence of real commentary on the issue is deafening.

[exstasie]

Programs like UBI have existed for decades (if not centuries) and been commented upon by famous economists like Milton Friedman.

There are lots of means tested welfare programs, especially in western countries, but UBI (unconditional basic income) has never existed before. Switzerland had a national referendum about basic income in 2016; it was rejected. I believe they are the only country to put the matter to a vote.

People discuss programs like UBI as if they're new. When in reality, they're virtually identical to social security. Which has existed for awhile now.

Social security is a social safety net for the retired and disabled. UBI is more intent on delivering payments to the active labor force. In fact, one of the arguments for UBI is that it empowers labor, giving workers more bargaining power regarding wages and workplace standards. It also gives workers freedom to pursue their own small businesses.

[Yey09]

Universal bacis income will make everything worse. People who works will maintain people who too lazy for them

[teosanru]

Cnut237 and I were having a conversation about wealth distribution in this thread, where he mentions UBI. So rather than derailing that thread I'm going to open it here.

In case you don't know what UBI means it is a program for all citizens of a country, rich and poor, to be paid a fixed amount by their government and the goal of this program is to make sure everyone can pay for what they need. There are obviously many challenges to address before this works out, the most basic ones are:

- How much to pay? Since they're paying millions of people, they need to ensure they have enough money set aside for that, or UBI payments will deplete the government's money.
- What time interval to pay in - If this is not controlled we get the same consequence as paying too much at a time.
- Should people be filtered out based on financial status (EDIT: and employment status as well)? Presumably finance ministries of governments have records of every citizen's earnings (as in profit not balance), and a UBI proposal needs to be crafted meticulously to be very precise in the criteria for organizing everyone into (only a few) financial wellness categories, a vague set of requirements can be challenged by parliaments and get the proposal blocked.
- Corruption: Some of the budget can be stolen and laundered by people in charge of safekeeping it. Look at 1MDB for example, $700million was stolen from them with the help of the prime minister.

Let's assume people will be filtered by status, since giving everyone a fixed amount while keeping withing the budget risks not giving the most needy people enough money, the main hurdle faced here is parliamentary consensus of how to classify everyone in different categories so they can set different incomes for each group. And that's complicated because government budgets decrease and sometimes increase so you have politicians arguing that the income should be raised or lowered accordingly and this just entangles entire proposals.

We basically have nobody in power agreeing with each other on how much money to pay each person.

Hey hey no no you are absolutely wrong. Economy doesn't works like this. Otherwise every country would be doing this. It's because of few basic concepts of inflation. Income is equals to purchasing power of any person. The purchasing power in hands of every person would mean that every person in the Economy would be willing to pay higher price for goods. Let me explain this with an example:

For example there is a good named X. There is only one quantity of X. Then there are only two people A & B in the economy having disposable incomes A of $80 and B of $100. Now if both want to buy the good they will bid on the prices which would increase the prices to a certain point but as here A is having merely $80 his purchasing power would end at $80 and B could quote anything above $80 let's say 90 to buy the product. Which would become the price
Now if every person in the Economy gets $100 basic income which means A has $180 and B has $200. the purchasing power would go up they will be willing to take prices upto $180 as after that A can't afford it and B would buy it. Now the same commodity priced at 90 would get priced at $190.
Think of this at the whole economic level because the goods/resources will always be limited. But the wants will always be unlimited. Some here argue the utility of the product doesn't increases with increased income so why would someone pay $180? But it's not because of utility of the product but diminution of currency that X get's a higher price.

I hope I was clear. This makes the idea of Universal basic income useless.

[Cnut237]

Programs like UBI have existed for decades (if not centuries) and been commented upon by famous economists like Milton Friedman.

Yes, Friedman was broadly in favour of UBI:

One of Friedman’s main principles in favor of a basic income was the fact that the welfare system at the time punishes people for working. If someone receives employment and begins getting paid while on welfare, they will eventually lose their benefits.
"You could have a program that would be far superior to the present structure in that it would help people who are poor because they are poor. It would help them in a way which would retain an incentive for them to work," Friedman said. "Maybe a job comes up that looks better than welfare but they’re afraid to take it because if they lose it after a few months, it may be six month or nine months before they can get back onto welfare."
Friedman also thought UBI would increase levels of equality since everyone, no matter the race, class or religion of an individual would receive a guaranteed income.
"It’s a system which would have the effect of eliminating the separation of a society into those who receive and those who pay, a separation that tends to destroy the whole social fabric," Friedman said.

https://heavy.com/news/2019/06/milton-friedman-on-ubi/

The silence of real commentary on the issue is deafening.

Not really. Discussion of UBI is becoming louder and louder. There have been a lot of trials in recent years, and the idea is spreading. It is popular with the left because it reduces social inequality. It is popular with the right because it reduces welfare bureaucracy. It is popular with long-term thinkers who can see it as a solution to the unemployment caused by the ever-increasing automation of jobs.

~

I don't agree with this assessment at all. You are talking about people trying to outbid each other for very limited quantities of products. And we aren't talking about giving everyone extra money; UBI is a form of wealth redistribution. Tax brackets will have to be adjusted accordingly. It may be that if you earn $50k after tax now, you would still earn $50k after tax under UBI, the difference being with say the bottom $10k guaranteed as UBI, and the upper $40k coming from your employment (at a higher tax rate, or without the initial lower-earnings tax-free threshold). UBI is not about magically creating free money.

[teosanru]

~

I don't agree with this assessment at all. You are talking about people trying to outbid each other for very limited quantities of products. And we aren't talking about giving everyone extra money; UBI is a form of wealth redistribution. Tax brackets will have to be adjusted accordingly. It may be that if you earn $50k after tax now, you would still earn $50k after tax under UBI, the difference being with say the bottom $10k guaranteed as UBI, and the upper $40k coming from your employment (at a higher tax rate, or without the initial lower-earnings tax-free threshold). UBI is not about magically creating free money.

Even in that situation the general price level of the economy would rise. What you aren't keeping in mind is that money isn't free. When it's created it reduces the overall credibility of the currency UBI would mean creating more and more currency. Imagine govt aren't able to meet our expenses with 30-50% taxes how much taxes do you want? It would ultimately be a deficit only thereby govt creating more and more currency and increasing general level of economic inflation. Either you are planning to pay 70% taxes it's not a good idea at all.

[exstasie]

Universal bacis income will make everything worse. People who works will maintain people who too lazy for them

Maybe, but I doubt it. I would use every UBI payment I got as capital towards building and maintaining my businesses. For a lot of people, it could mean the difference between staying self-employed and contributing to the small business economy, and being forced to work for a large corporation like Amazon or Uber.

We should be thinking about what kind of economy we want: one ruled by Jeff Bezos and his ilk, or one where small businesses can thrive.

[jseverson]

Shouldn't the answer to this simply be enough money to lift the poorest of the poor out of the poverty line? I mean, that's kind of the point, right?

What it also does, is to grant bargaining power to prospective employees. In a country with high unemployment and people desperate for work, the employers can pay a pittance, and someone will still take the job, even if they know they are being exploited. UBI gives prospective employees the option to refuse a job if the conditions are exploitative.

This still wouldn't be effective if said UBI doesn't lift people out of poverty though. If people only have just enough to put food on the table and not much else, they're still going to need work, and all the power will remain with employers all the same. That's why I think it has to be enough to lift people above the poverty line.

You could maybe get away with a smaller amount -- I mean, something has to be better than nothing, right, especially for the poorest of the poor. It would at least solve the issue of hunger, but the issues you outlined, not as much. If the problem is companies not hiring to protect their bottom line, then it might be easier to address that with legislation over actually implementing UBI. They're shit out of luck either way anyway; you either cripple them with massive taxes to fund UBI, or you force them to spend more on labor.

[mu_enrico]

About Master Friedman's opinion, we should tell the whole story about it. What he proposed was to remove subsidies and give the fund directly to all people. Hence:
- It's not adding UBI on top of current government subsidies but reallocates them, therefore rational from the budgeting view.
- It simplifies bureaucracy (or removing government), let's say the Health Department no longer manages social health program since people are free to choose to manage their own health program. Less government, less bureaucracy, fewer inefficiencies, are equal to more money for UBI.
- Since everyone will be provided with UBI, then people are free to choose what they are going to do with it. They might use it for stupid things, but hey, it's freedom! So when you see SJ Warriors crying about how the government didn't take care of the poor, you can say, "it's UBI! they are poor because of their own stupidity."

The key is, instead of the government manages tax payer's money, let's distribute it directly to the people and let them free to choose what to do with it.

[Cnut237]

money isn't free. When it's created it reduces the overall credibility of the currency UBI would mean creating more and more currency. Imagine govt aren't able to meet our expenses with 30-50% taxes how much taxes do you want?

UBI doesn't mean creating more money. There would have to be some tax changes, yes, particularly at the top-end, but I don't think it would be excessive. Removal of the tax-free allowance on its own would generate huge revenue. People currently aren't taxed on the first £12.5k (for the UK)... if we had £10k UBI, then you'd only earn £2.5k before you'd get taxed, so an extra £10k would become taxable... and if you're a higher-rate tax payer, then an extra £10k at higher rate, too... and that's without adjusting the bands at all.

I would use every UBI payment I got as capital towards building and maintaining my businesses.

If you already have a decent income, chances are that UBI wouldn't mean that your total income would increase, because of off-setting through tax changes. What it would mean is that if your business failed completely, you'd still have some guaranteed UBI coming in. UBI isn't magic money printer, it's a form of wealth redistribution. If you already have a decent income, chances are you wouldn't gain - except through living in a more equitable and harmonious society.

If people only have just enough to put food on the table and not much else, they're still going to need work, and all the power will remain with employers all the same. That's why I think it has to be enough to lift people above the poverty line.

You're probably right. But even if the UBI takes people up to the poverty line and no further, they'd still gain some small amount of power.

[Febo]

If it is really universal (i.e given to everybody) it will create inflation. If it's only given to some, it will not be very different from the existing systems of support for the most disadvantaged, which consist of a redistribution of wealth from the middle class to the poor.

It is universal since it is given same amount to everyone. It will not increase country spending's since it will just redistribute founds that are already given to people. Just that UBI will give same to all instead of a lot to some and none to others. UBI is very different from the system that exist in most countries.

[teosanru]

money isn't free. When it's created it reduces the overall credibility of the currency UBI would mean creating more and more currency. Imagine govt aren't able to meet our expenses with 30-50% taxes how much taxes do you want?

UBI doesn't mean creating more money. There would have to be some tax changes, yes, particularly at the top-end, but I don't think it would be excessive. Removal of the tax-free allowance on its own would generate huge revenue. People currently aren't taxed on the first £12.5k (for the UK)... if we had £10k UBI, then you'd only earn £2.5k before you'd get taxed, so an extra £10k would become taxable... and if you're a higher-rate tax payer, then an extra £10k at higher rate, too... and that's without adjusting the bands at all.

I would use every UBI payment I got as capital towards building and maintaining my businesses.

If you already have a decent income, chances are that UBI wouldn't mean that your total income would increase, because of off-setting through tax changes. What it would mean is that if your business failed completely, you'd still have some guaranteed UBI coming in. UBI isn't magic money printer, it's a form of wealth redistribution. If you already have a decent income, chances are you wouldn't gain - except through living in a more equitable and harmonious society.

If people only have just enough to put food on the table and not much else, they're still going to need work, and all the power will remain with employers all the same. That's why I think it has to be enough to lift people above the poverty line.

You're probably right. But even if the UBI takes people up to the poverty line and no further, they'd still gain some small amount of power.

Haha either you are not pretty familiar with concepts of Economics and taxation or maybe you are too lame to explain your idea. You know a concept of per capita GDP? Go and check the per capita income of different countries of the world. You will be shocked to see it being that low for many countries. Even their per capita income is so low than what a normal resident needs for it's household. You are being to naive and just doing calculations in your mind regarding taxation and everything. Leave the universal income part and See how much money is created each year by big Economies every year? You think they don't know the idea of magically reforming the tax regime as they get more money? Why devaluate their currency? UBI looks too good on paper but actual practical implications will make it more or less useless and burdensome. Think of it you are saying govt will abolish minimum tax slab and will get revenue of 2.5k pounds each? Using this they will distribute 10k pounds each to half of the country? Makes sense? No!!

[Mauser]

If it is really universal (i.e given to everybody) it will create inflation. If it's only given to some, it will not be very different from the existing systems of support for the most disadvantaged, which consist of a redistribution of wealth from the middle class to the poor.

It is universal since it is given same amount to everyone. It will not increase country spending's since it will just redistribute founds that are already given to people. Just that UBI will give same to all instead of a lot to some and none to others. UBI is very different from the system that exist in most countries.

I don't think you should be eligible for basic income if you have a job. I would understand its for people who are unemployed or who earn less than the basic income. In the end its just another form of redistribution of wealth from the rich to the poor. It should be paid out of taxes and not the printing press to avoid inflation. Due to technology advancement the human factor in the workforce keeps getting forgotten. In 20 years less and less people will be needed as most production jobs will be done by robots.

It's a good idea to think about the people left behind. A universal basic income could be a good start.

[Salauddin1994]

There are many variations of universal basic income. The most basic of these proposals will simply replace social security unemployment compensation and public assistance programs with the basic income per citizen. The US Basic Income Guarantee Network supports the plan saying it is trying to force workers into poverty as a way to alleviate poverty. Hard work and a fast-paced economy have not come close to eradicating poverty. A universal program like the Basic Income Guarantee could alleviate poverty group states. The group is most helpful as a universal process.

[Spaffin]

There are many variations of universal basic income. The most basic of these proposals will simply replace social security unemployment compensation and public assistance programs with the basic income per citizen. The US Basic Income Guarantee Network supports the plan saying it is trying to force workers into poverty as a way to alleviate poverty. Hard work and a fast-paced economy have not come close to eradicating poverty. A universal program like the Basic Income Guarantee could alleviate poverty group states. The group is most helpful as a universal process.

What is happening today not only in the United States, but also in other countries, can in no way be called an attempt to eradicate poverty from society. It seems that the government continues to act in a different direction, aggravating the situation, dividing the interests of the state and the people.

[Febo]

I don't think you should be eligible for basic income if you have a job.

That is not UBI then. That is social welfare. In most countries you allready get that for unemployed if you are actively searching for a job.  UBI is that every single citizen no matter who. Or Bill Gates or Mother Theresa or Messi or Lebron James all get the same amount of money each month. There is no social welfare office needed anymore that decide who will get help and who not. All money that will be given away is thrown into one bag and evenly divided out.

Right now many are cheating and are getting help others that should get it dont get it. Right now many are employed to decide who get it and who not. With UBI all is known in advance and no need to pay people doing it.  

In country where I live. Parents of kids that dont earn that much get some help. There is a limit like ( I will throw random numbers)  If family per every member earn less then $500 a month, then for every kid they get $100 a month. So there is a family where one parent earn a lot and other less. They dont marry. And then one parent gets this pay. Other family that overall earns exactly the same dont get it, because parents are married. Our old government had idea to make UBI for kids. So every kid would automatically get it no matter how rich their parent are. Sadly the government was replaced in March and it was not implemented.

[Cnut237]

You know a concept of per capita GDP? Go and check the per capita income of different countries of the world. You will be shocked to see it being that low for many countries. Even their per capita income is so low than what a normal resident needs for it's household. You are being to naive and just doing calculations in your mind regarding taxation and everything. Leave the universal income part and See how much money is created each year by big Economies every year? You think they don't know the idea of magically reforming the tax regime as they get more money? Why devaluate their currency? UBI looks too good on paper but actual practical implications will make it more or less useless and burdensome.

Why would I be shocked that some countries have very low GDP per capita? I'm sure that's obvious to everyone. UBI is a form of wealth redistribution. It doesn't involve creating new money out of nothing, it doesn't magically make everyone rich or eliminate corruption or raise entire countries out of poverty. No-one ever suggested that solves all the problems in the world. But it does reduce inequality.

Haha either you are not pretty familiar with concepts of Economics and taxation or maybe you are too lame to explain your idea.

It's not my idea. Although my example illustration should be fairly simple to understand.

Think of it you are saying govt will abolish minimum tax slab and will get revenue of 2.5k pounds each? Using this they will distribute 10k pounds each to half of the country? Makes sense? No!!

No, I'm not saying that, please read it again. I said: "There would have to be some tax changes, yes, particularly at the top-end". The bit about the tax-free allowance is saying that UBI partially funds itself. If you get £10k UBI, that increases the amount of tax you pay on your earnings even without adjusting tax bands, because the UBI takes up most of your tax free allowance.

UK tax bands up to £150k income:
up to £12.5k - no tax
£12.5k - 50k - 20% tax
£50k - 150k - 40% tax

Say you earn £60k a year, the first £12.5k is tax free, the next £37.5k is taxed at basic rate 20%, the next £10k is taxed at higher rate 40%.
Now say you get paid £10k per year UBI. You still earn your £60k from your job, but now of that £60k, the first £2.5k is tax free, the next £37.5k is taxed at 20%, the final £20k is taxed at 40%.

Obviously this increases tax revenue, which can partially fund UBI.
It can also partially be funded by the massive simplification to the welfare system - everyone gets the same basic amount, eliminating wasteful bureaucracy.

But this won't fully fund it. You'd also need to increase tax percentages. Take that person who earns £60k, a fairly decent salary in the UK. It might be reasonable to increase tax such that with their £10k UBI plus their income, they have the same amount of money coming in from UBI + salary as they did from salary alone in the old system.
Poor people would tend to gain under UBI. Rich people would tend to lose. Average people would not really notice much of a change. The difference being that the UBI is guaranteed, a universal safety net.
UBI does not mean giving out new money to everyone, it does not mean everyone becoming richer.... it's just a form of wealth redistribution!

[mu_enrico]

I don't think you should be eligible for basic income if you have a job.

Again with Friedman's concept of negative income tax, a person can still have a job and still get basic income (partially).
Let's say tax-free income is up to $2,000 monthly, and the excess (taxable) income is taxable by 20%.
- If a person has zero income (-$2,000), he shall receive $2,000 * 20% = $400 UBI monthly;
- If a person has $1,000 income (-$1,000), he shall receive $1,000 * 20% = $200 UBI monthly. So his total income will be $1,200;
- If a person has $2,000 income (0), he receive no UBI, but he pay no taxes.
- If a person has $5,000 income (+$3,000), he shall pay $3,000 * 20% = $600 tax.

*Above figures are just an illustration, not sure if it's too big or too small.

[teosanru]

You know a concept of per capita GDP? Go and check the per capita income of different countries of the world. You will be shocked to see it being that low for many countries. Even their per capita income is so low than what a normal resident needs for it's household. You are being to naive and just doing calculations in your mind regarding taxation and everything. Leave the universal income part and See how much money is created each year by big Economies every year? You think they don't know the idea of magically reforming the tax regime as they get more money? Why devaluate their currency? UBI looks too good on paper but actual practical implications will make it more or less useless and burdensome.

Why would I be shocked that some countries have very low GDP per capita? I'm sure that's obvious to everyone. UBI is a form of wealth redistribution. It doesn't involve creating new money out of nothing, it doesn't magically make everyone rich or eliminate corruption or raise entire countries out of poverty. No-one ever suggested that solves all the problems in the world. But it does reduce inequality.

Haha either you are not pretty familiar with concepts of Economics and taxation or maybe you are too lame to explain your idea.

It's not my idea. Although my example illustration should be fairly simple to understand.

Think of it you are saying govt will abolish minimum tax slab and will get revenue of 2.5k pounds each? Using this they will distribute 10k pounds each to half of the country? Makes sense? No!!

No, I'm not saying that, please read it again. I said: "There would have to be some tax changes, yes, particularly at the top-end". The bit about the tax-free allowance is saying that UBI partially funds itself. If you get £10k UBI, that increases the amount of tax you pay on your earnings even without adjusting tax bands, because the UBI takes up most of your tax free allowance.

UK tax bands up to £150k income:
up to £12.5k - no tax
£12.5k - 50k - 20% tax
£50k - 150k - 40% tax

Say you earn £60k a year, the first £12.5k is tax free, the next £37.5k is taxed at basic rate 20%, the next £10k is taxed at higher rate 40%.
Now say you get paid £10k per year UBI. You still earn your £60k from your job, but now of that £60k, the first £2.5k is tax free, the next £37.5k is taxed at 20%, the final £20k is taxed at 40%.

Obviously this increases tax revenue, which can partially fund UBI.
It can also partially be funded by the massive simplification to the welfare system - everyone gets the same basic amount, eliminating wasteful bureaucracy.

But this won't fully fund it. You'd also need to increase tax percentages. Take that person who earns £60k, a fairly decent salary in the UK. It might be reasonable to increase tax such that with their £10k UBI plus their income, they have the same amount of money coming in from UBI + salary as they did from salary alone in the old system.
Poor people would tend to gain under UBI. Rich people would tend to lose. Average people would not really notice much of a change. The difference being that the UBI is guaranteed, a universal safety net.
UBI does not mean giving out new money to everyone, it does not mean everyone becoming richer.... it's just a form of wealth redistribution!

Okay leave everything aside. Let's agree with you that tax revamping can do this. If it's so easy to restructure tax revenues and everything. Why don't governments just make daily necessities of life free for every citizen? Why don't the governments just decide let's buy from the farmers in bulk and everyone can get that ration for free. Further that all basic necessities like simple clothes would be free for everyone let's set a limit to it that every person will get this much ration plus clothing free every month despite of what they earn/do. Why don't governments just simply increase taxes, collect revenues and run this scheme permanently? Expense of such a scheme would be much lesser than that on Universal Basic Income.

Tell me one country which has such a scheme running for long period of time for all citizens? Any Country? NO!! because practical reality is that nothing is free and it can never be. Limited Resources, Unlimited wants. A very basic rules of Economics!

Fun Fact: You know how much taxes are collected in UK already? It's 36% of GDP roughly £13,500 for every adult and even then there is a fiscal deficit in the economy which means they generate more money. Now for giving every person £10,000 you will need to double the taxes roughly upto 72%. Source of these numbers: Google. And yes UK is one of those countries with highest GDP per capita think of rest of the world. Wealth redistribution looks good in theory only practical problems are the reason why no government/state has been able to do it ever.

[Cnut237]

Why don't the governments just decide let's buy from the farmers in bulk and everyone can get that ration for free. Further that all basic necessities like simple clothes would be free for everyone let's set a limit to it that every person will get this much ration plus clothing free every month despite of what they earn/do. Why don't governments just simply increase taxes, collect revenues and run this scheme permanently? Expense of such a scheme would be much lesser than that on Universal Basic Income.

Sure, governments can do that if they want. It's kind of a throwback to Soviet-style communism, though, so I'm not sure why anyone would think it's a good idea. Also this suggestion is utterly different to UBI; I'm not sure how you've made a connection. UBI does not involve nationalising industries, forcing clothes on people, rationing food, or limiting consumer choice. UBI is simply a more equitable distribution of wealth.

Tell me one country which has such a scheme running for long period of time for all citizens? Any Country? NO!! because practical reality is that nothing is free and it can never be. Limited Resources, Unlimited wants. A very basic rules of Economics!

Many countries are running (or considering running) limited trials; the idea is gaining a lot of momentum. Certainly no country has been running full UBI for all citizens for a long period of time, I'll agree on that. But the argument of "this thing hasn't been done before, therefore it's a bad idea" is not particularly convincing. If everyone went along with that, we'd still be living as we were thousands of years ago.
And on your point of "nothing is free and it can never be"... once again, UBI is redistribution of what is already there. There is nothing 'free' or created out of nothing.
Alice has $8, Bob has $2. I redistribute this so Alice has $7 and Bob has $3. You can't argue that this is impossible, where will all this money come from? That doesn't make sense.

Fun Fact: You know how much taxes are collected in UK already? It's 36% of GDP roughly £13,500 for every adult and even then there is a fiscal deficit in the economy which means they generate more money. Now for giving every person £10,000 you will need to double the taxes roughly upto 72%.

Again, we are not giving people free money. The £10k was purely illustrative, but we are not giving people £10k on top of what they already receive after tax. We are giving on top of what they receive before tax is applied. This is a crucial difference. I am certainly not suggesting a £10k UBI involves everyone in the country gaining £10k post-tax income. The average person would not be expected to gain at all, other than having the UBI segment guaranteed rather than from employment.
UBI involves taxing people more, removing the expensive welfare bureaucracy, and then giving the proceeds from these two approaches equally to everyone, to ensure that everyone can afford to live. Poor people gain. Average people see no change (other than having a safety net). Rich people lose some money. That's all. The specific figures involved are speculative, that's why countries are trialling it (or considering trialling it).


I should add, although we disagree completely with one another, I enjoy the discussion. If everyone agreed all the time, we would never question anything and we'd never advance.


---
Edit, additional:

I don't think you should be eligible for basic income if you have a job.

Again with Friedman's concept of negative income tax, a person can still have a job and still get basic income (partially).
Let's say tax-free income is up to $2,000 monthly, and the excess (taxable) income is taxable by 20%.
- If a person has zero income (-$2,000), he shall receive $2,000 * 20% = $400 UBI monthly;
- If a person has $1,000 income (-$1,000), he shall receive $1,000 * 20% = $200 UBI monthly. So his total income will be $1,200;
- If a person has $2,000 income (0), he receive no UBI, but he pay no taxes.
- If a person has $5,000 income (+$3,000), he shall pay $3,000 * 20% = $600 tax.

*Above figures are just an illustration, not sure if it's too big or too small.

Negative income tax is a different method to UBI, which results in a similar outcome. Below is a good summary. Which option you prefer is probably dependent on your ideological perspective with regards to taxation. There's a compare-and-contrast scenario at the link below, too.

"A negative income tax (NIT) and an unconditional basic income (UBI) are two ways of achieving a basic income guarantee (BIG). One gives a varying amount of money according to income, and the other gives the same amount to all and taxes different amounts back."

_{https://www.scottsantens.com/negative-income-tax-nit-and-unconditional-basic-income-ubi-what-makes-them-the-same-and-what-makes-them-different#:~:text=A%20negative%20income%20tax%20(NIT,and%20taxes%20different%20amounts%20back.}

[Yatsan]

It is really a great challenge for the Universal Basic Income (UBI) to be implemented due to various reasons that involves of course (1) the limited resources of the government when it comes to financial capability to support its people specially at times like this the almost all countries that are directly affected by the pandemic is experiencing an economic declination making them very limited to have a source for financial resource that will cover the needs of its people. (2) How the people are being recognized to be capable of acquiring and to belong on the said program of the government because we do have 3 social classes and excluding the upper class which I am pretty sure they won't barge to argue anymore not being included in the said program, still it would be hard to classify the two social classes because many people do not have record on local government units about their salary record to classify them as lower class or middle class.

In our country, financial assistance have made by filling out forms which excludes those rich people from filling out the forms and that is where our local government units filtered out those that are in need to have financial support and then passed it to the national government. But even if such have already been solved through that way, still that financial assistance have lasts only for two months due to limited financial resources and speculation of corruption on the national funds intended to support the needy. Such program of wealth distribution or UBI is a great idea but the execution or implementation is the hardest part of it that national government must think of their own way but still the main limiting factor is really the financial capability of the nation.

[Hydrogen]

There are lots of means tested welfare programs, especially in western countries, but UBI (unconditional basic income) has never existed before. Switzerland had a national referendum about basic income in 2016; it was rejected. I believe they are the only country to put the matter to a vote.

Social security is a social safety net for the retired and disabled. UBI is more intent on delivering payments to the active labor force. In fact, one of the arguments for UBI is that it empowers labor, giving workers more bargaining power regarding wages and workplace standards. It also gives workers freedom to pursue their own small businesses.

UBI is identical to SS in that both payout benefits derived from tax hikes.

If a person had a choice of pension plan and their options were social security, 401k, IRA roth or a basic savings bank account. No one would choose SS. It pays negative returns. Its the worst investment on top of being the worst managed and structured system.

UBI is identical to SS in that its a big government, big tax, big spending program that would payout negative returns. Surplus tax revenues collected from UBI would be redistributed towards war in the middle east, free healthcare for illegal immigrants and other dubious special interests.

Over the long term, UBI like social security, doesn't solve real problems. It only creates worse ones.

Yes, Friedman was broadly in favour of UBI:

One of Friedman’s main principles in favor of a basic income was the fact that the welfare system at the time punishes people for working. If someone receives employment and begins getting paid while on welfare, they will eventually lose their benefits.
"You could have a program that would be far superior to the present structure in that it would help people who are poor because they are poor. It would help them in a way which would retain an incentive for them to work," Friedman said. "Maybe a job comes up that looks better than welfare but they’re afraid to take it because if they lose it after a few months, it may be six month or nine months before they can get back onto welfare."
Friedman also thought UBI would increase levels of equality since everyone, no matter the race, class or religion of an individual would receive a guaranteed income.
"It’s a system which would have the effect of eliminating the separation of a society into those who receive and those who pay, a separation that tends to destroy the whole social fabric," Friedman said.

https://heavy.com/news/2019/06/milton-friedman-on-ubi/

Heavy.com disables comments by default to further close their publication to honest peer review. If you read that quotation carefully, you might notice it makes no sense.



Read the 2nd half of the quotation above, carefully.

"We make it costly for employers to employ people; we subsidize people not to work. We have a system that increasingly taxes work and subsidizes non work."

Here Milton Friedman criticizes programs like UBI. What "makes it costly for employers to employ people"? UBI does exactly that through tax hikes on businesses and workers utilized to fund UBI. What increasingly taxes work, to subsidize non work? UBI does. Even if Milton Friedman doesn't mention UBI by name, we can clearly see he would be against the program.

The silence of real commentary on the issue is deafening.

Not really. Discussion of UBI is becoming louder and louder. There have been a lot of trials in recent years, and the idea is spreading. It is popular with the left because it reduces social inequality. It is popular with the right because it reduces welfare bureaucracy. It is popular with long-term thinkers who can see it as a solution to the unemployment caused by the ever-increasing automation of jobs.

Commentary on UBI normally doesn't amount to more than political propaganda.

Claiming that UBI is popular with the right is the same as saying Jesus supports socialism/communism.

UBI is like strapping windmills and solar panels on top of a tesla electric car. Expecting the additional energy generated to compensate for the added weight. There's a law of diminishing returns which applies here that proves it won't work even before its attempted.

But some are determined to --try it-- anyway.

Maybe it is due to them not comprehending basic logic/science.

[teosanru]

I should add, although we disagree completely with one another, I enjoy the discussion. If everyone agreed all the time, we would never question anything and we'd never advance.


---

Actually we don't only disagree but we are actually not able to keep our point onto each other. I would surely first of all, like to know from you your definition of "Income and Wealth"?.

Why don't the governments just decide let's buy from the farmers in bulk and everyone can get that ration for free. Further that all basic necessities like simple clothes would be free for everyone let's set a limit to it that every person will get this much ration plus clothing free every month despite of what they earn/do. Why don't governments just simply increase taxes, collect revenues and run this scheme permanently? Expense of such a scheme would be much lesser than that on Universal Basic Income.

Sure, governments can do that if they want. It's kind of a throwback to Soviet-style communism, though, so I'm not sure why anyone would think it's a good idea. Also this suggestion is utterly different to UBI; I'm not sure how you've made a connection. UBI does not involve nationalising industries, forcing clothes on people, rationing food, or limiting consumer choice. UBI is simply a more equitable distribution of wealth.

There is nothing to do with nationalizing Industries. What I meant was taxing the rich and using that money to provide basic necessities to everyone. Which too is a way/ mean of wealth distribution.

Tell me one country which has such a scheme running for long period of time for all citizens? Any Country? NO!! because practical reality is that nothing is free and it can never be. Limited Resources, Unlimited wants. A very basic rules of Economics!

Many countries are running (or considering running) limited trials; the idea is gaining a lot of momentum. Certainly no country has been running full UBI for all citizens for a long period of time, I'll agree on that. But the argument of "this thing hasn't been done before, therefore it's a bad idea" is not particularly convincing. If everyone went along with that, we'd still be living as we were thousands of years ago.
And on your point of "nothing is free and it can never be"... once again, UBI is redistribution of what is already there. There is nothing 'free' or created out of nothing.
Alice has $8, Bob has $2. I redistribute this so Alice has $7 and Bob has $3. You can't argue that this is impossible, where will all this money come from? That doesn't make sense.

I said this line about that free rationing scheme and not about UBI. Now coming to the second part. Let me explain you how this works. Alice has $8, Bob has $3, Casy has $4 Dobby earns nothing and Finy has $15. Now for your equitable distribution to take place total in the Economy currently is $30. Now we say everyone to has UBI of $5. Now, please help me out on calculating a proportion of tax rate we should put in this situation. Take this is as a numerical from my side. As per me this equation would never be equated at the end the large chunk of deficit would be from Deficit Financing.

Fun Fact: You know how much taxes are collected in UK already? It's 36% of GDP roughly £13,500 for every adult and even then there is a fiscal deficit in the economy which means they generate more money. Now for giving every person £10,000 you will need to double the taxes roughly upto 72%.

Again, we are not giving people free money. The £10k was purely illustrative, but we are not giving people £10k on top of what they already receive after tax. We are giving on top of what they receive before tax is applied. This is a crucial difference. I am certainly not suggesting a £10k UBI involves everyone in the country gaining £10k post-tax income. The average person would not be expected to gain at all, other than having the UBI segment guaranteed rather than from employment.
UBI involves taxing people more, removing the expensive welfare bureaucracy, and then giving the proceeds from these two approaches equally to everyone, to ensure that everyone can afford to live. Poor people gain. Average people see no change (other than having a safety net). Rich people lose some money. That's all. The specific figures involved are speculative, that's why countries are trialling it (or considering trialling it).

Actually, at the end of the day ownership of money is changing so you are giving people free money. I would suggest you to go through a reading of Micro-Macro Paradox. Healthcare and social welfare schemes are freebies too. Giving someone free money/ freebies and naming it wealth distribution doesn't changes the fact that it's free money.

Also I genuinely understand that ideals behind the UBI concept might be pretty pure and good for society but economically it's almost impossible to implement with hundreds of dynamics working together.

Edit: oh yes! I forgot to add that how population charts would rise especially in developing economies due to this. For people it would mean more members in family therefore more Income.

[Cnut237]

I would surely first of all, like to know from you your definition of "Income and Wealth"?.

This is a bit silly. Income is the money you have coming in. Wealth is the total money you have. Excluding other assets for simplicity.

Let me explain you how this works. Alice has $8, Bob has $3, Casy has $4 Dobby earns nothing and Finy has $15. Now for your equitable distribution to take place total in the Economy currently is $30. Now we say everyone to has UBI of $5. Now, please help me out on calculating a proportion of tax rate we should put in this situation. Take this is as a numerical from my side. As per me this equation would never be equated at the end the large chunk of deficit would be from Deficit Financing.

Okay, I'll indulge you. The $5 UBI is too extreme for this example as you're putting it higher than most people's earnings, but we can establish a decent level. And obviously this is all a huge oversimplification as we're ignoring other tax revenues and other government spending.

[exstasie]

This still wouldn't be effective if said UBI doesn't lift people out of poverty though. If people only have just enough to put food on the table and not much else, they're still going to need work, and all the power will remain with employers all the same.

If you have your basic needs covered, you aren't nearly as desperate to sell your labor. You can value it much more highly. That forces employers to pay a higher premium for competent workers, whether in wages or benefits.

They're shit out of luck either way anyway; you either cripple them with massive taxes to fund UBI, or you force them to spend more on labor.

I'd like to see evidence they'd be crippled by the increased taxes. For some reason, this is just taken as a given.

American companies are paying much lower corporate taxes today thanks to the Trump tax cuts, yet the obvious trajectory is still slashing benefits across the board for workers. More part-time workers, more gig workers, more ICs, while wages haven't been increasing once you account for inflation. And this was true long before the pandemic; COVID-19 is just accelerating the trend.

UBI is identical to SS in that both payout benefits derived from tax hikes.

That still completely ignores who gets paid, which is pretty damn important when considering the effects of entitlement programs.

If a person had a choice of pension plan and their options were social security, 401k, IRA roth or a basic savings bank account. No one would choose SS. It pays negative returns. Its the worst investment on top of being the worst managed and structured system.

The Social Security fund isn't intended to be an investment vehicle. It exists to pay monthly installments for retired and disabled people.

Are you saying the fund should be used to inflate the stock market, and that fixed income Social Security recipients should be exposed to those market risks? That would be better? If the market crashes, so does their monthly stipend.

Over the long term, UBI like social security, doesn't solve real problems. It only creates worse ones.

What are those worse problems? Walk me through it, and give me more than rhetoric.

Do you see no problem with the current system, where most industries have been completely consolidated by a few giant companies, and where worker benefits (including employer-funded 401Ks) are disappearing and wages are stagnant? Is this an optimal trajectory for the economy?

[Cnut237]

~

Thank you.

Do you see no problem with the current system, where most industries have been completely consolidated by a few giant companies, and where worker benefits (including employer-funded 401Ks) are disappearing and wages are stagnant? Is this an optimal trajectory for the economy?

This is the important point. I have two questions for those who have posted in this thread, but who are opposed to (at least trying) UBI.

I am in favour of trying UBI, but I'm not a UBI-zealot. It's just that I see it as potentially the best solution to a certain problem. Inequality is high, and is worsening. There are more people than there are jobs. But the biggest problem is the near future, with ever-increasing automation. Many skilled jobs will be at risk of automation as AI develops. The solution won't be to retrain people, because there will be far too few jobs available. If we do nothing, unemployment will be huge. A small minority will make vast fortunes running largely automated companies. Some lucky people will have jobs. Many won't. A radical redistribution of wealth will be required in order to keep society functioning. Otherwise we will be faced with a huge 'worthless' class, with little to no prospect of ever finding a job, and jobs themselves will be so scarce that employers can offer to pay a pittance and still get huge numbers of applicants. A degree of inequality within a fair society is good, it gives people something to strive for. But beyond a certain point it is hugely destructive. The world's richest man, Jeff Bezos, has over $190b. That's $190,000,000,000. Meanwhile, 1 in 3 people in the world don't have access to safe drinking water. This is an extreme example to illustrate the point... but do we really want this situation to continue to worsen? Yes, I'm aware that a US-based UBI would not be available to for example people in sub-saharan Africa... but huge inequality exists even within the US.

So my two questions, specifically to these people, are:
1) Do you agree that if nothing is done, then inequality will worsen and jobs will become increasingly scarce, and that this is a problem that will need fixing?
2) If so, what options other than UBI might be viable?

I am genuinely interested in answers and different opinions. I'm in favour of UBI largely because I think a solution is needed, and I can't think of anything that might be better.

[suchmoon]

jobs will become increasingly scarce

I disagree with that. Massive technological advances over the last couple of hundred years didn't result in fewer jobs, quite the opposite. Nor will the "AI" happen overnight. Automation has been going on for decades and it's certainly something to keep in mind for someone choosing a career path.

As for UBI, I'm all for it if it simplifies welfare systems and government in general. But I'm not too hopeful that a clean simple UBI is possible in the current political system. 50-100 years from now - maybe.

[verita1]

I am in favor of UBI but I also see a great challenge from governments as they cannot have the resources to finance the program.
The government needs to have digitized data of its population that includes bank accounts to send the benefit. In addition to knowing the income of the participants of the program to support those most in need.

[hatshepsut93]

Different countries will implement it differently. Obviously the poorest countries won't be able to afford UBI, while the more rich countries can afford to give their citizens higher UBI. But at its core, I believe it will be tied to automation caused unemployment - if this statistic will be very high, then UBI will be more likely to be needed and will more likely work. But if automation-caused job loss will be small, and if a lot of new types of jobs will emerge, then UBI could do more harm than good, because the tax burden will be more shifted towards the middle class.

[bitgolden]

I agree that UBI is a must in the future, it will definitely happen one day, but that doesn't mean that it will happen to make sure that people are getting free money to sit at home, people all around the world will still want to make money and live, you are underestimating the greed of humanity.

Amazon owner worths around 200 billion dollars nowadays, he still wants to make even more money, he doesn't go "I have enough money let's give some of it away to help people" or "we made enough profit as a company last year, let's give everyone a 10% raise in salary this year" no he is still trying to screw workers over to make more money.

There will always be people like that, but if we can make sure everyone has steady income even if low, and free healthcare and education, we can still continue to prosper without any trouble.

[exstasie]

But at its core, I believe it will be tied to automation caused unemployment - if this statistic will be very high, then UBI will be more likely to be needed and will more likely work.

This is definitely one scenario I'm considering. If we're heading towards a situation where capital is very concentrated and the labor market is insufficient to provide jobs to the working and middle classes (if the middle class still exists, that is ) then there needs to be something done to bridge the gap. The entire economy is built on consumer spending. That doesn't really work if consumers have no money to spend.

[Vishnu.Reang]

But at its core, I believe it will be tied to automation caused unemployment - if this statistic will be very high, then UBI will be more likely to be needed and will more likely work.

This is definitely one scenario I'm considering. If we're heading towards a situation where capital is very concentrated and the labor market is insufficient to provide jobs to the working and middle classes (if the middle class still exists, that is ) then there needs to be something done to bridge the gap. The entire economy is built on consumer spending. That doesn't really work if consumers have no money to spend.

I agree with your post. But then, handing out money for free would send the wrong message. There needs to be a compromise in between. I have this suggestion: to qualify for the UBI (Universal Basic Income), the recipient should volunteer for community service (let's say 10 hours or 15 hours per month). Those who don't want to do community service, can skip the UBI receipts.

[suchmoon]

I have this suggestion: to qualify for the UBI (Universal Basic Income), the recipient should volunteer for community service (let's say 10 hours or 15 hours per month). Those who don't want to do community service, can skip the UBI receipts.

What about people who can't work? You would need to create all sorts of exceptions and conditions, turning this into yet another welfare/unemployment type of bureaucracy layer. To me the greatest appeal of UBI would be the simplicity and less room for waste or corruption. Everyone gets it without having to prove anything.

[hatshepsut93]

This is definitely one scenario I'm considering. If we're heading towards a situation where capital is very concentrated and the labor market is insufficient to provide jobs to the working and middle classes (if the middle class still exists, that is ) then there needs to be something done to bridge the gap. The entire economy is built on consumer spending. That doesn't really work if consumers have no money to spend.

It all boils down to how many jobs will be lost and how many new will emerge. There's so many different calculations and it all heavily varies from country to country, with some expected to lose 10% of its jobs while other might lose even 50-70%. But what no one is talking about is the new jobs being created. IT industry is growing, social media and content creation are brand new fields that have potential to create new jobs. There's so many factors at play that it's really hard to make good predictions about the future in this case, so it's probably better to not make any hasty decisions like adopting UBI today.

[SquallLeonhart]

I feel like if the world can reach to a place where automation could help with crops and manufacturing to a level where all of humanities needs could be met with just robots (or basically automation as it is called) we could not only do UBI but we could also have a system where government gives you free housing somewhere where there is a ton of free land, and also food so you can stay alive and not starve.

Now you might say "why should people get free stuff" which is a weird and awful thing to say, but the real answer that you should be hearing is ; because those will be free as well, nothing will be spent on it so nothing will be earned on it, free to make free cost and that is why it is free. But reaching that level of automation would probably take decades and decades.

[NotATether]

A lot of good replies here, so let's list them all in one place. We got:

The major challenge to this is the wealth of a particular nation, how buoyant their economy is and how low their level of unemployment is. UBI is a good initiative, but in a struggling country/third word country it'll be impossible to achieve, a country still struggling with an impoverished economy and writhing debts cannot undertake this program.

A country with a high unemployment rate will also struggle, you'll expect the nation to channel much of their funds into creating more jobs for it's citizens, as that will give them a stable income, rather than paying them a little amount that can hardly meet their needs. There is also the problem of creating inflation by printing more money to fulfil this program, that being said, I'd only expect this sort of program to be possible in first world countries.

Now the question to ask is what percentage of countries have a high unemployment rate, and it would be better if we split the data by continent. Your first point I highlighted in blue eliminates almost all African, South American and Southeast Asian countries, except for ones like Singapore but countries like that are outliers so I'll omit them from my study. If such a program were to be made for these impoverished countries it would have very different policies for a program to target unemployment, we now have UBI objective of increasing standard of living vs. objective of simulating the economy due to less cash flows to unemployed people (but then, it's not a UBI program anymore, it's a stimulus program).

Good thing is we already have such data, look at https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/unemployment-by-country, What's interesting about this data is for many of the developed countries with unemployment rates <5%, they still have thousands of people unemployed so a government that wants to increase cash flow around the economy would make a stimulus program targeting these people.

UBI appears to be suitable only for countries with extremely high unemployment rates >30% as it can be safely assumed that without work, most of the population lives in poverty.

To be sustainable, it would need to be a function of ongoing tax revenue, so it would differ from country to country based on economic output and tax structure.

Then it means that different taxes have to be made to make this work. For UBI to work there has to be a source of revenue to fund it and taxes appear to be the only sustainable means to make it happen. But having said that, the last thing working-class people want is more taxes to pay and depending on what is being taxed, it can even cause mass outrage, like Lebanon attempting to tax WhatsApp messages a year or so ago. Which brings us to the next point:

The strength of UBI is there is no means test or work requirement, so it doesn't suffer from the bureaucratic mess of red tape, government waste, human error, and months of waiting time we see with unemployment and other benefits.

I would view it less as a welfare payment for poor people, and more as a tax on large corporations who are making living wages increasingly unattainable, payable directly to all citizens or residents.

Yes, I think that's how it has to work. An equal amount for everyone. Obviously this means that progressive income tax brackets will need to be tweaked accordingly. In part, for example, the removal of an initial tax free allowance; you earn $1 a year, you would be taxed on that $1. And UBI is only partially self-funding; we would probably need a wealth tax or some other taxation of the ultra-rich to make it viable.

Since we now have the entire population requesting a fixed budget this comes as an additional burden to taxpayers who now have to pay more taxes to finance this, and in return only get a percentage of their tax back as UBI (a fixed rate, upper class people also get this rate so it's not very useful to them). The higher tax bracket you're in the more you lose. But this strategy hurts the working class people the most because they don't have large savings and whatever savings they do have is now being slowly eaten up by the UBI program, potentially even lowering their standard of living as they're forced to sell stuff to pay the tax. So while it's good for the poor it looks like it's going to hurt the group of people just above them.

Which leads us to a problem: I just mentioned money is also going to people who have no use for it. So with UBI we are now giving money to people who don't need it, and it's putting the workers, a portion of the people who are employed at a net loss. So it makes me think UBI only works for poor countries with few rich people.

Also for those countries that can't afford the budget needed for UBI they can set up some kind of welfare system instead.

What it also does, is to grant bargaining power to prospective employees. In a country with high unemployment and people desperate for work, the employers can pay a pittance, and someone will still take the job, even if they know they are being exploited. UBI gives prospective employees the option to refuse a job if the conditions are exploitative.

I should mention though, that UBI is merely a weapon to combat exploitative jobs -  it doesn't get rid of the exploitative jobs themselves. As I said a few times before, the companies responsible for allowing these conditions to fester have the option to invest in better conditions or ways to automate the job if it's too dangerous but they choose not to. People can always take advantage of this benefit of UBI and not take an exploitative job, but this is not going to hurt production rates of those companies.

Programs like UBI have existed for decades (if not centuries) and been commented upon by famous economists like Milton Friedman.
~
The second part of the quote describes how increasingly taxing work to subsidize non work is the opposite of everything he described to fix unemployment

Read the 2nd half of the quotation above, carefully.

"We make it costly for employers to employ people; we subsidize people not to work. We have a system that increasingly taxes work and subsidizes non work."

Here Milton Friedman criticizes programs like UBI. What "makes it costly for employers to employ people"? UBI does exactly that through tax hikes on businesses and workers utilized to fund UBI. What increasingly taxes work, to subsidize non work? UBI does. Even if Milton Friedman doesn't mention UBI by name, we can clearly see he would be against the program.

I'm no economist but perhaps taxing non-work to subside work is a good program for low unemployment rate countries (not the high unemployment rate countries I wrote about above). But this hits the working-class taxing problem above, putting taxes on them while they continue to look for work. The logical solution to this problem is to create more jobs in those areas but I'm not at this time sure how that would be done.

This still wouldn't be effective if said UBI doesn't lift people out of poverty though. If people only have just enough to put food on the table and not much else, they're still going to need work, and all the power will remain with employers all the same. That's why I think it has to be enough to lift people above the poverty line.

You could maybe get away with a smaller amount -- I mean, something has to be better than nothing, right, especially for the poorest of the poor. It would at least solve the issue of hunger, but the issues you outlined, not as much. If the problem is companies not hiring to protect their bottom line, then it might be easier to address that with legislation over actually implementing UBI. They're shit out of luck either way anyway; you either cripple them with massive taxes to fund UBI, or you force them to spend more on labor.

And to further complicate the minimum amount required, different regions of a country have different standards of living, so obeying the fixed amount rule we set above, it's going to be enough for some regions, and maybe even more than enough, but severely lacking for higher standard of living regions. We can't resolve this and keep a fixed payment amount at the same time.

American companies are paying much lower corporate taxes today thanks to the Trump tax cuts, yet the obvious trajectory is still slashing benefits across the board for workers. More part-time workers, more gig workers, more ICs, while wages haven't been increasing once you account for inflation. And this was true long before the pandemic; COVID-19 is just accelerating the trend.

And as long as it continues this way, no social welfare program (forget about UBI at this point) will be able to secure enough funding to give specifically workers a wage buffer for their taxes, let alone the unemployed.

1) Do you agree that if nothing is done, then inequality will worsen and jobs will become increasingly scarce, and that this is a problem that will need fixing?
2) If so, what options other than UBI might be viable?

I am genuinely interested in answers and different opinions. I'm in favour of UBI largely because I think a solution is needed, and I can't think of anything that might be better.

To be honest I'm starting to think we can implement better social welfare programs than UBI, I suggest two different programs for the unemployed and the workers in low tax brackets respectively. The workers program will pay only as much to cover basic benefits. The unemployed program will pay much more money but say half as much as an average job's salary. These amounts are then adjusted for each region or state depending on their standard of living.

I don't know if such programs are being tried now but I think it's better than getting only a few government benefits and then suddenly losing them by policy change.

[Cnut237]

Since we now have the entire population requesting a fixed budget this comes as an additional burden to taxpayers who now have to pay more taxes to finance this, and in return only get a percentage of their tax back as UBI (a fixed rate, upper class people also get this rate so it's not very useful to them). The higher tax bracket you're in the more you lose. But this strategy hurts the working class people the most

The crucial point is that they can get more than 100% back, because people on higher salaries are taxed more. For example, someone on a reasonable but below average salary might pay an additional $7k tax, but get a UBI payment of $10k, making an overall gain of $3k. Working class people would gain, not lose.
The expectation surely would be that if you are a below-average earner you'd gain, average you'd notice no change, above average you'd lose. Ignoring the fact that in a sense everyone gains from having a healthier and more robust economy with fewer social problems.

To be honest I'm starting to think we can implement better social welfare programs than UBI, I suggest two different programs for the unemployed and the workers in low tax brackets respectively. The workers program will pay only as much to cover basic benefits. The unemployed program will pay much more money but say half as much as an average job's salary. These amounts are then adjusted for each region or state depending on their standard of living.

I'm not sure about this approach. Wouldn't it disincentivise work?

To me the greatest appeal of UBI would be the simplicity and less room for waste or corruption. Everyone gets it without having to prove anything.

Yes, this is how it needs to be implemented. It is part-financed by dismantling the complex and expensive-to-maintain welfare system and replacing it with something much, much simpler.
I will come back on your other point about the automation question later today, if I get the chance.

[Hydrogen]

The Social Security fund isn't intended to be an investment vehicle. It exists to pay monthly installments for retired and disabled people.

Are you saying the fund should be used to inflate the stock market, and that fixed income Social Security recipients should be exposed to those market risks? That would be better? If the market crashes, so does their monthly stipend.

What are those worse problems? Walk me through it, and give me more than rhetoric.

Do you see no problem with the current system, where most industries have been completely consolidated by a few giant companies, and where worker benefits (including employer-funded 401Ks) are disappearing and wages are stagnant? Is this an optimal trajectory for the economy?

This is social security

• Taxes are collected to fund SS
• "Surplus" SS tax revenues are diverted towards the pockets of the rich, war in the middle east, feminist marches, transgender beauty pageants and other dubious special interest causes of the rich and powerful
• After decades upon decades of diverting "surplus" revenues, to redistribute wealth from the poor to the rich, the program is catastrophically underfunded
• The media says the problem with social security is old people are living too long, there isn't enough money being collected, taxes must be raised higher(essentially identical to what europe says about their failing universal healthcare)

UBI would undoubtedly be the same as the public has not learned the necessary lessons, or researched the minimum amount of information to prevent history from repeating.

I have two questions for those who have posted in this thread, but who are opposed to (at least trying) UBI.

1) Inequality is high, and is worsening. There are more people than there are jobs. But the biggest problem is the near future, with ever-increasing automation. Many skilled jobs will be at risk of automation as AI develops.

2) If so, what options other than UBI might be viable?

I am genuinely interested in answers and different opinions. I'm in favour of UBI largely because I think a solution is needed, and I can't think of anything that might be better.

...

• UBI is funded by tax hikes on workers and employers
• Said UBI tax hikes cripple the ability of small businesses and employers to create jobs and employ workers
• This leads to more tax hikes being necessary to fund programs like UBI, which then go on to kill more jobs and make it harder for small businesses to create jobs or employ workers

How did Donald Trump achieve record low unemployment and record high job creation BTW?

Was it through tax hikes and massive spending programs like UBI. Or simple and affordable tax cuts.

[Cnut237]

jobs will become increasingly scarce

I disagree with that. Massive technological advances over the last couple of hundred years didn't result in fewer jobs, quite the opposite. Nor will the "AI" happen overnight. Automation has been going on for decades and it's certainly something to keep in mind for someone choosing a career path.

Certainly if you disagree on this point, then UBI becomes much less of a pressing issue. I agree that automation will take time, but I don't think we can use history as a guide in this instance. Historic automation has largely been about replacing human physical skills with something better. This led to a increase in jobs that use human cognitive skills. The difference this time is that it is human cognitive skills that are being automated. I'm not saying AI will wipe out all jobs, merely that once human physical and cognitive skills are automated, it is difficult to envisage where new opportunities may arise.

Numerous recent studies have concluded that there will be huge job losses:

A number of studies have predicted that automation will take a large proportion of jobs in the future, but estimates of the level of unemployment this will cause vary. Research by Carl Benedikt Frey and Michael Osborne of the Oxford Martin School showed that employees engaged in "tasks following well-defined procedures that can easily be performed by sophisticated algorithms" are at risk of displacement. The study, published in 2013, shows that automation can affect both skilled and unskilled work and both high and low-paying occupations; however, low-paid physical occupations are most at risk. It estimated that 47% of US jobs were at high risk of automation.[19] In 2014, the economic think tank Bruegel released a study, based on the Frey and Osborne approach, claiming that across the European Union's 28 member states, 54% of jobs were at risk of automation. The countries where jobs were least vulnerable to automation were Sweden, with 46.69% of jobs vulnerable, the UK at 47.17%, the Netherlands at 49.50%, and France and Denmark, both at 49.54%. The countries where jobs were found to be most vulnerable were Romania at 61.93%, Portugal at 58.94%, Croatia at 57.9%, and Bulgaria at 56.56%.[109][110] A 2015 report by the Taub Center found that 41% of jobs in Israel were at risk of being automated within the next two decades.[111] In January 2016, a joint study by the Oxford Martin School and Citibank, based on previous studies on automation and data from the World Bank, found that the risk of automation in developing countries was much higher than in developed countries. It found that 77% of jobs in China, 69% of jobs in India, 85% of jobs in Ethiopia, and 55% of jobs in Uzbekistan were at risk of automation.[112] The World Bank similarly employed the methodology of Frey and Osborne. A 2016 study by the International Labour Organization found 74% of salaried electrical & electronics industry positions in Thailand, 75% of salaried electrical & electronics industry positions in Vietnam, 63% of salaried electrical & electronics industry positions in Indonesia, and 81% of salaried electrical & electronics industry positions in the Philippines were at high risk of automation.[113] A 2016 United Nations report stated that 75% of jobs in the developing world were at risk of automation, and predicted that more jobs might be lost when corporations stop outsourcing to developing countries after automation in industrialized countries makes it less lucrative to outsource to countries with lower labor costs.[114]

The Council of Economic Advisers, a US government agency tasked with providing economic research for the White House, in the 2016 Economic Report of the President, used the data from the Frey and Osborne study to estimate that 83% of jobs with an hourly wage below $20, 31% of jobs with an hourly wage between $20 and $40, and 4% of jobs with an hourly wage above $40 were at risk of automation.[115] A 2016 study by Ryerson University found that 42% of jobs in Canada were at risk of automation, dividing them into two categories - "high risk" jobs and "low risk" jobs. High risk jobs were mainly lower-income jobs that required lower education levels than average. Low risk jobs were on average more skilled positions. The report found a 70% chance that high risk jobs and a 30% chance that low risk jobs would be affected by automation in the next 10–20 years.[116] A 2017 study by PricewaterhouseCoopers found that up to 38% of jobs in the US, 35% of jobs in Germany, 30% of jobs in the UK, and 21% of jobs in Japan were at high risk of being automated by the early 2030s.[117] A 2017 study by Ball State University found about half of American jobs were at risk of automation, many of them low-income jobs.[118] A September 2017 report by McKinsey & Company found that as of 2015, 478 billion out of 749 billion working hours per year dedicated to manufacturing, or $2.7 trillion out of $5.1 trillion in labor, were already automatable. In low-skill areas, 82% of labor in apparel goods, 80% of agriculture processing, 76% of food manufacturing, and 60% of beverage manufacturing were subject to automation. In mid-skill areas, 72% of basic materials production and 70% of furniture manufacturing was automatable. In high-skill areas, 52% of aerospace and defense labor and 50% of advanced electronics labor could be automated.[119] In October 2017, a survey of information technology decision makers in the US and UK found that a majority believed that most business processes could be automated by 2022. On average, they said that 59% of business processes were subject to automation.[120] A November 2017 report by the McKinsey Global Institute that analyzed around 800 occupations in 46 countries estimated that between 400 million and 800 million jobs could be lost due to robotic automation by 2030. It estimated that jobs were more at risk in developed countries than developing countries due to a greater availability of capital to invest in automation.[121] Job losses and downward mobility blamed on automation has been cited as one of many factors in the resurgence of nationalist and protectionist politics in the US, UK and France, among other countries.[122][123][124][125][126]

_{https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technological_unemployment#Studies}

Whilst this is not a universal consensus, there is still a lot of agreement.

A PWC study (2018) breaks this into 3 (overlapping) waves:

1. Algorithm wave: focused on automation of simple computational tasks and analysis of structured data
in areas like finance, information and communications – this is already well underway.
2. Augmentation wave: focused on automation of repeatable tasks such as filling in forms, communicating
and exchanging information through dynamic technological support, and statistical analysis of
unstructured data in semi-controlled environments such as aerial drones and robots in warehouses – this is
also underway, but is likely to come to full maturity in the 2020s.
3. Autonomy wave: focused on automation of physical labour and manual dexterity, and problem solving in
dynamic real-world situations that require responsive actions, such as in manufacturing and transport (e.g.
driverless vehicles) – these technologies are under development already, but may only come to full maturity
on an economy-wide scale in the 2030s.

_{https://www.pwc.co.uk/economic-services/assets/international-impact-of-automation-feb-2018.pdf}

[suchmoon]

I'm not saying AI will wipe out all jobs, merely that once human physical and cognitive skills are automated, it is difficult to envisage where new opportunities may arise.

Anybody who's seen a plumber at work will have serious doubts about that statement. Even if AI could possibly get better than the usual "automated customer service" BS that answers a yes/no question correctly 55% of the time, it could still arguably be worth hiring a human for anything that involves any sort of inventiveness or creativity or critical thinking, particularly combined with physical work.

AI-driven robots won't be cheap. I'd imagine them being very very expensive for the most part except the ones that don't need need to do much more than do a google search... basically the "virtual" stuff, the vestiges of last century when all that was done over the phone and via mail - that perhaps can be automated to some degree. Anything beyond it faces massive hurdles that will take decades of painful slow progress.

Then there is the whole new industry to maintain the army of robots and massive data centers.

Obviously I can't argue with the studies that someone spent $millions and years doing... all I have to go on is my personal experience, which is not directly related to AI but revolves around many of the same technologies. All I can say - let's bookmark this thread and check back in 2030 how much automation we'll have by then.

[Vishnu.Reang]

I have this suggestion: to qualify for the UBI (Universal Basic Income), the recipient should volunteer for community service (let's say 10 hours or 15 hours per month). Those who don't want to do community service, can skip the UBI receipts.

What about people who can't work? You would need to create all sorts of exceptions and conditions, turning this into yet another welfare/unemployment type of bureaucracy layer. To me the greatest appeal of UBI would be the simplicity and less room for waste or corruption. Everyone gets it without having to prove anything.

There are already welfare schemes in place for those who can't work. They probably don't need the UBI. I am not suggesting UBI to replace the existing welfare schemes. UBI is meant for those people who are fed up with low paying jobs, and those who are unable to find a decent job. These people may benefit from passive income in the form of UBI, and in return they can do community service in their spare time.

[Cnut237]

AI-driven robots won't be cheap [...] massive hurdles that will take decades of painful slow progress. [...] Then there is the whole new industry to maintain the army of robots and massive data centers. [...] all I have to go on is my personal experience, which is not directly related to AI but revolves around many of the same technologies.

Yes, agreed. This is all speculative. There will doubtless be some automation and some new job creation, but we are just estimating the extent. I will also concede that speculation as to what sort of technologies we will have 5 or 10 years down the line has a tendency to be wildly optimistic.
Similarly to yours, my personal experience also relates to these technologies. I have seen a lot of job losses through automation of lower-level technical roles, and the process is accelerating. This has been partially offset by the creation of new higher-level roles, but a considerably smaller number. Appreciate this is anecdotal, but I believe it to be representative of the underlying trend.

Yes, let's (get our robots to) check back in 10 years' time.

[fiulpro]

Cnut237 and I were having a conversation about wealth distribution in this thread, where he mentions UBI. So rather than derailing that thread I'm going to open it here.

In case you don't know what UBI means it is a program for all citizens of a country, rich and poor, to be paid a fixed amount by their government and the goal of this program is to make sure everyone can pay for what they need. There are obviously many challenges to address before this works out, the most basic ones are:

- How much to pay? Since they're paying millions of people, they need to ensure they have enough money set aside for that, or UBI payments will deplete the government's money.
- What time interval to pay in - If this is not controlled we get the same consequence as paying too much at a time.
- Should people be filtered out based on financial status (EDIT: and employment status as well)? Presumably finance ministries of governments have records of every citizen's earnings (as in profit not balance), and a UBI proposal needs to be crafted meticulously to be very precise in the criteria for organizing everyone into (only a few) financial wellness categories, a vague set of requirements can be challenged by parliaments and get the proposal blocked.
- Corruption: Some of the budget can be stolen and laundered by people in charge of safekeeping it. Look at 1MDB for example, $700million was stolen from them with the help of the prime minister.

Let's assume people will be filtered by status, since giving everyone a fixed amount while keeping withing the budget risks not giving the most needy people enough money, the main hurdle faced here is parliamentary consensus of how to classify everyone in different categories so they can set different incomes for each group. And that's complicated because government budgets decrease and sometimes increase so you have politicians arguing that the income should be raised or lowered accordingly and this just entangles entire proposals.

We basically have nobody in power agreeing with each other on how much money to pay each person.

Unfortunately this would never work for underdeveloped and developing countries since they are fighting the economic war since long and they cannot pay each and every citizen because these institutions have to first handle the overflowi population of these countries and then again , this would need them to print more money , which would actually cause their economic situation to decline.

Therefore I do think this method will only be good for the developed nations since they don't have much to worry about in this case , but due to COVID-19 the Government of US for example has given stimulus bills for the rich and the poor alike , but mostly it was for the registered people , which also included the families which did not need the money , we need to filter out the system and then agree on the wealth distribution which is a really hard thing to actually get going.

We cannot get anyone agreeing on this ever since it's a matter of money and Government is always blinded , one cannot professionally decide how much to give each family until and unless they are personally involved with them , Because there are things that are not written on the paper and no one is that transparent , now that won't happen ever therefore the system might fail until and unless they decide to do something like:

-Taxes be paid by only richest

-Poor people living on streets should be taken to shelters , registered and then Government should get them some job because those people are most of the time forgotten about

-Small families given incentives

-Talking to the people about population control

-Education made free for all

There are a lot of things that we have to do before agreeing to do something like this , it is a complicated matter and therefore it will first require educated citizens with a small family, for it to be working well.

[mu_enrico]

@Cnut237 human tends to be overly optimistic about technological development. Remember about flying cars and stuff when we watch old sci-fi movies? This argument about the robot and AI exist decades ago, remember Skynet? And yet our current technology not even close to Android Arnold Swzwzwzwzzzz.

Hence, the job loss because of automation will not be that huge because of robots' technological limitations and also expensive in terms of investment and maintenance cost. Even now, in 3rd world countries (and China), it's still cheaper to employ human force in various industries. Furthermore, some services always require human to human contacts, such as in hospitality.

[Cnut237]

@Cnut237 human tends to be overly optimistic about technological development. Remember about flying cars and stuff when we watch old sci-fi movies? This argument about the robot and AI exist decades ago [...] the job loss because of automation will not be that huge because of robots' technological limitations and also expensive in terms of investment and maintenance cost. Even now, in 3rd world countries (and China), it's still cheaper to employ human force in various industries. Furthermore, some services always require human to human contacts, such as in hospitality.

Yes, I made that point myself in the post responding to Suchmoon... agreed, nothing is definite. The point about third world countries is addressed in some of my links above. Many companies have outsourced their labour to countries where work is cheaper... it has been mooted that with rising automation, the outsourcing will go into reverse, hitting countries like China quite hard.
Hospitality, yes, and there are other jobs where human contact will likely always remain. The question though is is this a large or a small proportion of total jobs? It's difficult to envisage millions of new hospitality jobs suddenly opening up.

I am meriting your post because you managed the correct spelling of the Terminator.

[RealMalatesta]

There is a ton of stuff we have to figure out before we could actually make UBI work. First of all we need to make sure that there is no nepotism in the government branches, there is no money that we paid for going into politicians families or people who bribed them, we need to make sure our tax is used 100% like it was intended and nothing more.

It to be perfectly honest with you is close to impossible because most of the politicians become big politicians because they do bad stuff, if they do not do bad stuff they can't grow that big, not all of them but most are like that. However, if you can manage to get 100% true taxes from every human without anybody avoiding paying taxes, and use 100% of all those taxes for the right causes, UBI is child's play, it would be so simple.

[suchmoon]

The question though is is this a large or a small proportion of total jobs? It's difficult to envisage millions of new hospitality jobs suddenly opening up.

I think 50-70 years ago it was similarly hard to imagine the growth of service industries at the expense of manufacturing and agriculture. I wouldn't bet against the emergence of new ways for people to waste their money.

[exstasie]

This is definitely one scenario I'm considering. If we're heading towards a situation where capital is very concentrated and the labor market is insufficient to provide jobs to the working and middle classes (if the middle class still exists, that is ) then there needs to be something done to bridge the gap. The entire economy is built on consumer spending. That doesn't really work if consumers have no money to spend.

I agree with your post. But then, handing out money for free would send the wrong message.

It's not that simple.

Government regulations have completely monopolized industry. It has made it next to impossible for regular people to launch startups anymore. We are completely dependent on external seed capital, and having connections who can grease the wheels regarding permitting, licensing, etc. This monopoly dynamic hands entire markets to a small number of large companies, who generally treat their workers like shit and gradually jack up prices on all consumers once the market has been cornered.

We are those workers and consumers. We are getting jacked on our wages and overpaying for goods because governments (particularly the US) have created a system where the corporations pay a token price to bleed us all dry and leave us with nothing in savings.

Honestly, society (workers and consumers) deserves compensation for this total perversion of markets. That's what UBI represents to me. Taxing the same corporations who have been handed obscene profits from un-free markets, and paying that tax directly to the population, instead of some typical bureaucratic solution like means tested welfare, unemployment, etc. Those programs not only create massive government waste but they distribute payments extremely unevenly, subsidizing the lives of some while letting others fall through the cracks.

If we're not going to stop subsidizing corporations (not only with literal tax subsidies and loopholes but by handing them monopolies through regulatory barriers to entry), then we need to spread around the subsidies evenly to the actual population.

[lixer]

This is a good idea, but it’s also an idea that is not going to be easy to implement. Only big countries might afford to be paying every citizen in their country. And moreover they shouldn’t be paying the rich, the target should only be the citizens who are poor. Maybe they can set a limit that will be used for paying citizen; let’s say for example every month they will pay in money into the account citizens that has less than $100,000 or something like that. This will be handled by the arms of the government that is in charge of finance, the central bank and the rest of them.

[abhiseshakana]

Yes, agreed. This is all speculative. There will doubtless be some automation and some new job creation, but we are just estimating the extent. I will also concede that speculation as to what sort of technologies we will have 5 or 10 years down the line has a tendency to be wildly optimistic.
Similarly to yours, my personal experience also relates to these technologies. I have seen a lot of job losses through automation of lower-level technical roles, and the process is accelerating. This has been partially offset by the creation of new higher-level roles, but a considerably smaller number. Appreciate this is anecdotal, but I believe it to be representative of the underlying trend.

Yes, let's (get our robots to) check back in 10 years' time.

This continuous technological development cannot be limited, if it is limited, it can hinder future progress. There are many advantages that can be obtained if we use AI to help us solve problems and complete work appropriately, accurately, and correctly. The presence of technology has the potential to replace some of the existing jobs. However, on the other hand, it can also create many opportunities for business actors to explore new things and innovate to create new job opportunities.

The industrial revolution 4.0, which one of the concentrations is the development of automation, AI, advanced robotic, will bring a great change in the world order. Thus, if the government is too slow to adopt new technologies in the industrial era 4.0, they will fail to improve the services needed to maintain the stability of public services, and the government's reputation will decline.

[KnightElite]

This is a good idea, but it’s also an idea that is not going to be easy to implement. Only big countries might afford to be paying every citizen in their country. And moreover they shouldn’t be paying the rich, the target should only be the citizens who are poor. Maybe they can set a limit that will be used for paying citizen; let’s say for example every month they will pay in money into the account citizens that has less than $100,000 or something like that. This will be handled by the arms of the government that is in charge of finance, the central bank and the rest of them.

I think even the 1st world countries will have a hard time to implement that kind of idea, for me it is good but there are pros and cons. The pros is the government can help the people especially the poorest of the poor who are working hard physically just for them to earn money but there are many cons which are corruption, high budget where the government will sacrifice other things just to afford this kind of project and it will also lead to other people to just become dependable on government. That are the scenarios in my head right now, I know that people will become lazy to work because they know that they will earn passive income from the government.

[NotATether]

To be honest I'm starting to think we can implement better social welfare programs than UBI, I suggest two different programs for the unemployed and the workers in low tax brackets respectively. The workers program will pay only as much to cover basic benefits. The unemployed program will pay much more money but say half as much as an average job's salary. These amounts are then adjusted for each region or state depending on their standard of living.

I'm not sure about this approach. Wouldn't it disincentivise work?

I admit I had to think this over again for some time, especially the unemployment program of giving away money versus giving them free benefits. Free benefits do not disincentivise work. As for the worker program I now think a better idea is for governments to pay for their insurances instead of them doing it themselves, because a good amount of UBI money given to them will be spent on insurance anyway so why not cover the insurance themselves. It could be planned as the government buying insurance with some funding, maybe SS funding, from the largest insurance companies. It's not like they can go bankrupt and cause the plan to collapse because they keep getting bailouts.

Tax cuts are indeed a good way of erasing unemployment:

How did Donald Trump achieve record low unemployment and record high job creation BTW?

Was it through tax hikes and massive spending programs like UBI. Or simple and affordable tax cuts.

But now we have the problem of how to cover their insurances now that they are working.


About the topic of AI robots wiping out jobs, it's mostly felt by states and municipalities that invest on the infrastructure to sustain all that AI. Some places still have plenty of old-fashioned jobs and look like they're going to stay like that in the foreseeable future. Iowa comes to mind but let's not forget there are other first world countries with their own districts we need to account for

Government regulations have completely monopolized industry. It has made it next to impossible for regular people to launch startups anymore. We are completely dependent on external seed capital, and having connections who can grease the wheels regarding permitting, licensing, etc. This monopoly dynamic hands entire markets to a small number of large companies, who generally treat their workers like shit and gradually jack up prices on all consumers once the market has been cornered.

There's less money in circulation to hand to real people because more and more of it is being absorbed by corporations as revenue and cash assets. A handful of publishing conglomerates. Same goes for media, telecom, music distributors. Anyone that tries to challenge their businesses gets either acquired by one of the Big 3/4/5 or runs out of money to compete or even operate. Reminds me of when there were dozens of Bell telephone companies a few decades ago instead of the 3 or 4 there are now and in some places there is only one company to choose from!

[exstasie]

This continuous technological development cannot be limited, if it is limited, it can hinder future progress.

Progress is not the only good to be considered. Ever heard of "gray goo?" Variations on the "robots taking over the earth" scenario?

In my opinion, it's a pretty important thought experiment to ponder when considering the dangers of runaway technology, especially AI. Once you unleash technology, there's no putting the genie back in the bottle.

Gray goo is a useful construct for considering low-probability, high-impact outcomes from emerging technologies. Thus, it is a useful tool in the ethics of technology. Daniel A. Vallero applied it as a worst-case scenario thought experiment for technologists contemplating possible risks from advancing a technology.[16] This requires that a decision tree or event tree include even extremely low probability events if such events may have an extremely negative and irreversible consequence, i.e. application of the precautionary principle. Dianne Irving admonishes that "any error in science will have a rippling effect".[17] Vallero adapted this reference to chaos theory to emerging technologies, wherein slight permutations of initial conditions can lead to unforeseen and profoundly negative downstream effects, for which the technologist and the new technology's proponents must be held accountable.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gray_goo#Ethics_and_chaos

[panganib999]

The idea of doing an implementation of the UBI (Universal Basic Income) for the sake of the people most specially at this time of pandemic is really an essential thing to do but the OP was right that there are lots of challenges to be faced on implementing such thing which considerably of course involved financial stability and capacity of the government to provide the people's need since it is the reason why it is called UBI, the main problem to be faced on this is the limited resource which is the funding needed to support the idea because if you would think further, most countries are over populated on which the proportionality of sharing the funds the country have won't be enough to support individuals even if you say so it would be on a household basis.

Why would I say so? It is duly because our country have also done such thing and that concept have really faced a big problem and that involves (1) the filtering of the people who would get the financial aid because we have encountered greedy people applying two person in a household (married individuals) on which clearly state they would gain two financial aid that supposedly only one and the other for the other people's benefit. (2) the implementation or the distribution of the financial aid for it took weeks (1st tranche) and even months (2nd tranche) and that program only lasted for two distributions because of limited funding by the government.

The other thing that the OP was right is such program is prone to corruption that is sadly present even at times like this pandemic on which certain powerful officials make use of their power to obtain money that must be for the people and claim it for their own good sake.