So, there's been a post on the reddit sub r/nostupidquestions recently about why basic income isn't pushed more. It was interesting to read the topic from the perspective that it tells me more about peoples' perceptions about UBI, rather than UBI itself being bad. While some good points were occasionally raised here, most of them seemed cringey. I won't respond to every single point here, but I would like to do one of my "response" type posts where I respond to many of the top posts.
Anyway, the question in full is this:
Why isn't Universal Basic Income pushed more? If people want luxury then they have to work for it, but right now most aren't even surviving. I understand there's a tax cost, but I'd rather pay more taxes and get this than pay what I'm paying now with no supports.
And I'm going to be honest. This guy gets it. It's a good question, and I largely agree with the premises. UBI is like that. Enough for the basics, not enough for the luxurious life most want. And yes, taxes are higher, but I'd argue most would benefit in net under it.
The top response:
Where are you asking about, that "most aren't even surviving" and there are "no supports"? Universal basic income is usually promoted as a replacement for the more complex system of existing welfare benefits, that's probably the more relevant context.
This is true, but let's keep a few things in mind. Most welfare is temporary. It has tons of means testing and other requirements, and it's not particularly generous. I bet most people would be better off getting like $1100+ a month than dealing with the specifics of the welfare program as it exists. I mean, welfare SUCKS, but a huge barrier, particularly from the left, is that UBI is bad because it replaces welfare. Basically, they argue that welfare is more generous and gives to those who need it, while UBI is less generous and gives to people who don't deserve it. There's a lot of moral loadedness in how they frame it. Liberals and socialists want to give stuff only to the deserving poor, ie, those who meet their requirements. I want to give to everyone. And these lefties will claim people will be worse off if we replace existing social programs for various reasons. That in kind aid is better than cash because of nebulous arguments from inflation. That people wouldn't spend it properly which has a benevolent authoritarian streak in it. And while there are a handful of people who would genuinely be better off on welfare, there are compromises to be made. I for example would only reduce programs that are smaller and less consequential. And Andrew Yang would allow people to choose. But that isn't good enough. Because it doesnt give everyone $1000 a month more, including welfare recipients, it's bad. And because it makes you choose, and because the overwhelming majority of the population WOULD choose a UBI over in kind welfare benefits, they're afraid this will erode support for those programs.
So basically, because a handful of people would be better off on welfare than UBI, we all must suffer. It's BS. They're literally choosing the needs of the few, against the means of the many. And often pushing ignorant arguments about the reality of the situation. As I said, we could mitigate the harm it does to those on existing programs simply by choosing which programs to cut and what not to. We could keep social security and medicaid for example while eliminating TANF and SNAP. but they don't wanna hear it. So they just drum up UBI BAD arguments without understanding the tradeoffs and how they actually help WAY more people than they hurt. I feel like that's a huge barrier to UBI. Political inertia. The current system just has so many special interests that rely on the system being as it is, and it just stops us from making it...better. because people fear the change might make them worse off.
I also believe that the democrats kind of refuse to allow any serious change to the welfare state that isn't from them because it hurts their pride. No one likes fighting for something, and then being told that idea is bad and here's a much better one. What ends up happening is the people who fought for the mediocre ideas want to defend their political accomplishments, so they fight against future changes. I feel like this is why the democrats couldn't back McGovern's plan in 1972. It would've completely undermined Johnson's legacy. We're also seeing a huge trend in centrist dems defending Obama era policies like the ACA that weren't that good against superior ideas like single payer. It sucks. We elect these centrists, then they get into office, and do things that we never wanted in the first place and then when we push for what we actually want, we're just told that we can't have that because blah blah blah and we're stuck with what we got. I hate the dems in large part for this reason. And even lefties are against UBI these days because they want complicated welfare, or even worse, literal socialism over a UBI. It's just irrational to me.
It seems that people here don't understand UBI.
This is literally my response to 90% of this, hence the title. The big problem is ignorance. Most don't understand UBI at all and are just projecting their ignorance onto the topic.
It's not clear if...
The average person would get back more than what they paid in taxes, and:
If unemployment would skyrocket, forcing the taxes paying for UBI to go up.
People receiving benefits today may actually end up worse off under UBI, since so many proposals discuss replacing those with UBI.
Yeah, this is the big one. And a lot of these stem from ignorance. Hence my blog posts full of pro UBI literature. Not to mention people like Scott Santens and Karl Widerquist who have written extensively about it. Anyway.
1) This one is easy for me. I admit it varies by plan, but generally speaking, uh...YEAH. Average person is better off. Median individual income in 2020 was $35,805. That's like $18 an hour, for reference. yeah. Many people aren't that well off. This needs to be emphasized. Anyway, let's do a few UBI plans I've studied in the past.
Here's what my own plan would do, from last year. You would get an increased tax of 18.5%, which translates to roughly $6,624. On the other hand, said person is getting $13,200 back from me. This translates to a net increase in income of $6,576. So, your MEDIAN, 50% richer, 50% poorer type guy, will get HALF of the benefit back in net. If I gave these guys a $6000 tax cut, republicans would hail me a hero and they'd want to put my face on conservative mount rushmore with Trump and Reagan. If we turned this into a tax credit, democrats would go on and on about how this would solve poverty. But because UBI is scary and no one knows what it does, people are afraid it will raise the "middle class's" taxes. Bro, no it wont. Unless you consider the top 20-30% of income earners middle class. Which some people strangely do, but I consider that a misnomer.
Translating this into families, we get a $67,521 median household income in 2020. Your median household has roughly 2-3 people in it. Let's assume for simplicity sake, 2 adults, 1 child. That should come out roughly about right demographically. Okay, so, they would pay $12,491 in taxes. BUT, let's consider the UBI. $13,200 for adult 1, $13,200 for adult 2, $4800 for the child. Their net income would increase by $18,709. This is your MEDIAN household with a MEDIAN income. It varies by household size, but you get the idea.
Now to look at Yang's plan. Yang's plan has a $12000 UBI with a 10% VAT. The VAT would exclude basics, but for the purposes of this discussion let's include the VAT on basics. The median adult would get $47,805 in gross, and then pay 10% back in taxes. That's a net increase of $7,219. Of course yang's numbers don't really work perfectly, which is why it's more generous than mine. Translating this to household income, they would get $91521 gross income, pay back $9152 in taxes, and get $14,848 in net. A bit less generous due to Yang not having a benefit for children, but you can see a clear benefit for the median.
The fact is, you're not going to break even until you're like 70-80th percentile income wise. Some NIT plans with 33-50% clawbacks or something might be worse, but that's also why i grade them poorly. The fact is, this will be a significant uplift to peoples' net income on average. Even accounting for lost tax credits and the like, I still expect it to be a net benefit to most.
2) This is a bit of a concern, but remember what we just went through with COVID? It won't be anywhere near as bad as that. Some economists think the work reduction would be minimal. The Finland study recently found no effects on employment. If anything I remember the media framing it as UBI is bad because it didn't significantly INCREASE employment, so even when it turns out fears are unfounded people just move the goalposts. The 1970s studies were more negative but found a net reduction of around 10-15% on average. That isn't bad. We could likely absorb that if we implemented UBI over the course of say, 5 years. And that's the worst I've found. The fact is, there just isn't any evidence for it having a major work reduction. Because the amounts are generally not generous enough to live on where every want is met. Even if it makes people comfortable and even if people can live on it, many would not want to, as they would desire to live better than that.
To be fair, experimental data isn't the same as what would happen in a real world environment without people watching and without it being temporary. But virtually all data I've seen suggests the worry over work incentive is largely irrational. And assuming the UBI is structured properly, the concern is minimal.
3) I already discussed this one in the previous one. While people worry about the fear that some may be worse off, assuming people do their homework or like Yang just give people the option, no one will actually be worse off. or very few people. And the only scenario I've had people challenge me on with my plan was a SSI and SNAP recipient who would claim they would lose $100 in benefits transitioning to my plan. I mean, any loss is regrettable, but if the worst case scenario is someone losing $100 because they max out both SSI and SNAP benefits, I'll take that as a win. SSI is actually an awful program with tons of limitations and the like. And SNAP isn't terrible by welfare standards, but I'd rather have cash anyway. Fact is, for everyone dude like this, UBI would help hundreds. Again, people seem intent in preserving a small negligible minority in favor of the many.
The fact is, these fears are irrational, and made by people who haven't done their homework on the subject. Yet for some reason we can't have nice things because people keep repeating the same garbage.
It would be a massive change to a national economy, and one that has yet to be tested anywhere on a large scale. It remains largely unpopular with both politicians and the public for that reason.
Gee, if only there was a crisis lately that put millions of people out of work and would have been the perfect test bed for sending out millions of checks to people. I mean, this is why when Biden passed his stimulus plan last year, I kept screaming that they should've been doing UBI trials. But no one wanted to hear that. Because I'm not being pragmatic and blah blah blah, welfarism.
Even then, we had those $1400 checks and the child tax credit, which was just a taste of UBI and greatly improved peoples' lives. And while that stuff is sometimes blamed for the current inflation, the people who do so are generally wrong. On a side note, part of me is glad we DIDN'T test a UBI because all the critics would be howling that that's what's causing inflation. Even though it's mostly supply shortages and price gauging, and the aftereffects of COVID in general. I'm not saying UBI wouldn't cause SOME inflation if implemented, people having more money in general does that, but again, if we implemented it slowly and responsibly, we could've accounted for that.
Either way, I kind of understand this. We have tons of studies on UBI. The overwhelming majority of evidence says it works. But it has never been tried in practice, and there's a lot of inertia in trying it because what works in an on paper environment might not work in practice. There could be macroeconomic problems that arise from it like inflation, or work reductions, that just aren't accounted for in these models. I do believe if we are careful that these things can be nipped in the bud before they become a serious issue, but no one wants to take that risk. They prefer the status quo, even if it's crap.
Even in European countries that have very strong social systems they don't have UBI implemented.
Financially it's a horrible idea and nobody truly knows if it's a good or bad idea in regards to it's effectiveness despite the cost.
Financially it seems risky. I mean no one wants to take a risk on a plan that costs $3-4 trillion annually. Even though the net cost is much less and much of that number is redundant. But just having those costs on the books is why people are afraid to implement UBI and instead go for roundabout ideas like EITC, child tax credit, or the negative income tax. Even if these ideas are knock off bureaucratic UBI, the number being lower makes it more acceptable even though on paper theyre similar in net.
As far as effectiveness, it depends on how you define that. For me there are a lot of moral virtues to UBI that go beyond the sheer cost. Sure you might get some of the results with welfare or an inferior program, but those programs also lead to much higher amounts of precarity, as less universal and more means tested programs tend to help people on paper, but also leave some behind, and stress those on them out for fear of being left behind too. UBI is an iron guarantee that you'll never be in poverty. And its mental health effects would be worth it in and of itself. It's worth it in and of itself to be able to say that you'll always be taken care of, no matter what. Most existing programs are less generous, they weild more control over peoples' lives, and put people in a state of precarity. In short, they're nightmares on peoples' mental well being.
Also as we saw from the finland thing, which was shot down purely because of cost concerns, they were upset with it because it didnt significantly INCREASE employment vs welfare, even if it made the citizens who were on it MUCH happier and better off mentally. I know, i'm making an ideological moral argument here, but that's why I'm for UBI. yes, you might be able to get similar numbers with a cheaper program. But that cheaper program isn't necessarily better at fixing society.
Why would you rather pay tax costs? Unless the country takes on more debt, if you work, its impossible for you to get more "basic income" than you pay.
Not everyone works, so you pay for them. The government is very inefficient and reckless with spending, it'd probably take $2k in taxes a month for them to get you $1k a month and thats assuming 100% of people work.
I addressed the math above, it just goes to show how ignorant people are. Also, the point of UBI is to NOT BE like other inefficient programs. Yet another moral argument I made.
That's probably because you are expecting to benefit from it. Whereas I will likely have to pay more than I get. It's a loss to me.
If this person is in the top 20%, well, yeah, they're gonna lose out. I don't expect to win them all and this is why im terrified of the democrats winning over formerly conservative suburbanites. With them in the democratic coalition, there will be no UBI, because they are against the kinds of changes that need to be made for UBI to work.
If this person isn't in the top 20%, then they're ignorant of how UBI works. Seriously. Just take your household income, subtract that number multiplied by 0.185, and then add $13200 for every adult and $4800 for every child. If your number is higher, then you're better off. If your number is lower, then you're worse off. But generally speaking, I think the break even point on my UBI was $69000 or almost twice the median income for an individual, and for a household it was generally speaking in the 6 figure range. Most people will be fine.
There is a universal basic income. It’s called hard work, innovation, education, whatever. What is really stopping anyone from achieving better? Racism? It adds to the difficulty, but doesn’t stop it. S.E.S.? Some of the powerful and wealthy people in history started out as plebeians. The man? Who specifically? The system? How specifically?
Oh #### off with the jobism. Some people are morally opposed to UBI. I don't expect to win them over either. Hence why I focus as well on my anti work ideology. To win fence sitters over and try to outnumber the job fetishists.
Because in the capitalist world, it is necessary to have masters and slaves, with very few at the top, while everyone else is exploited for labor. Economists will come up with fake reasons against UBI, even though money, economies, poverty are all manufactured/policy choices made by governments (ruled by rich people/corporations who bribe to write laws in their favor). Basically, the ultra-wealthy of the world cannot have their ridiculously lavish lifestyles if everybody is able to live comfortably. We can only live in a world of extreme wealth inequality if the masses are kept in check through stress, debt, poverty, prison, homelessness, etc.
This is true and why I seemed so left wing in 2016, before the LITERAL socialists started out lefting me. Because this is correct in a way. However, economists generally like UBI and similar proposals. Not all of them. Many are job fetishists themselves stuck in traditional paradigms, but when discussing welfare policy, UBI and similar offshoot programs are generally the favored way to go. Because the current safety net is garbage, inefficient, and full of perverse incentives.
Either way there is SOME validity to this. The big reason many are against it is because the rich are against it and use propaganda to brainwash the populace against it. Which is why you had MSNBC cutting Andrew Yang's mic and having Kevin O Leary from Shark Tank virtue signalling about work ethic when UBI came up. It was literally the "be the bee" lecture from bioshock infinite.
Again, this is why I'm so left wing sometimes, even though lately I sound like a centrist. My views haven't changed. The overton window has changed around me and I simply adapted to it.
Inflation would likely be a pretty huge issue if its on a large scale.
I mean, it can be. It depends how you implement it. If you fund it with taxation and cutting social programs it just moves money from one place to another. A lot of the costs are redundant. And while shifting money from the rich to the poor might impact overall levels of demand somewhat...well...it has to be done. What are people supposed to be poor and wage slaves just so inflation stays down? I believe inflation can be controlled. We would need to get the current wave of it under control first, but ultimately, you can just compensate with the issues now by shifting levers elsewhere. Like the fed raising interest rates NEEDS to happen. All in all I'm not TOO concerned about this.
I'd rather the rich pay their fair share in taxes so I don't have to make up the deficit. Everyone could live comfortably if the rich weren't so greedy.
As discussed previously, this is a lie. The rich can't fund a UBI or M4A. We are gonna need broad based taxes on everyone. But people will be better off in net. This guy just sounds like a neolib.
Because there's no need for it. Those people who you say are "just surviving" have two cars, electronics, and 4 walls and a roof. Go look at Africa or some southeast Asian country like Myanmar and you'll see people who really are "just surviving"
Americans as a whole are ravenous consumers and terrible at living within our very opulent means (on a global scale) and believe that if we can't afford a new TV, then we should whip out the credit card and get the TV now but pay triple the cost. Income isn't the problem, consumption is.
This guy sounds like a republican who doesn't know what cost of living is. Republicans love to make arguments about poor people owning TVs and air conditioners. it's like they dont understand many Americans are one pay check from losing it all, or that things like rent are expensive. These sentiments frustrate me.
Wouldn't paying more tax and getting more support be a net zero? The working middle class does not see benefits from a UBI, unless they become unemployed. The unemployed and people on government assistance get more flexibility in thier funds. The average middle class person is going to move very slightly more into the red or black.
It is a net zero in net, yes, but this guy really doesn't understand how much income inequality exists. Yes, the "average" or "median" person, I go by median BECAUSE of that income inequality, does benefit. Most income and wealth are owned by the top 20%. The bottom 70-80% would benefit and I did the math above for the median. The most middle of the middle class, will be getting about $6-7k in net per person. Around half the UBI benefits offered.
Unemployed people get limited assistance for up to 6 months, and are often harassed to look for a job, and fill out forms regularly proving they're looking. and no, people on other government assistance aren't more flexible. This is just more welfarism.
….there’s not enough money for UBI without taking money away from somewhere else. And you paying more taxes wouldn’t help UBI because I’m sure you’d prolly receive more from UBI than you’re paying in taxes. You either have rich people bare the cost of other peoples UBI or you reduce gov spending somewhere else (maybe military) to pay for everyone’s UBI
Uh, yeah, what's the problem? It's the top 20-30% paying for the bottom 70-80%.
if you gave every citizen of the united states 1000 dollars a month the country would be bankrupt in less than a year. you would end up with even more people destitute and starving than you already do. plus you would be amazed at how quickly tons of necessary industries and infrastructure that would collapse. the idea that people will just work for the good of society, never actually works.
This guy has no idea of how government budgets or funding UBI work. And because I haven't posted my UBI plan here yet. Here. Read it. By the way, I MIGHT update it soon, but I'm not sure yet. I kind of want to update the numbers for 2022 given the high inflation last year, but not sure if I wanna do anything else with it other than a numbers update yet.
Because it's probably a terrible idea that would destroy the economy to the point where people are actually starving.
There is a reason we don't just excuse people from unpleasant work; it has to get done.
1) This guy has no idea what he's talking about. Anyway, I addressed work disincentives above.
2) As for work that has to be done, I acknowledge that, and I've already written extensively about how to balance incentives on this blog. But generally speaking, this guy still lives in the illusion of a world in which we all must work to survive, ignoring the fact that technology has greatly reduced our labor needs over time.
Here is my main criticism of Universal Basic Income, from a leftist perspective:
Let's imagine it gets passed tonight. When everyone wakes up, they will be given $1200 in their bank accounts.
You know where they're gonna get that money? Already existing public spending programs.
Overnight, millions of people will be kicked off of Medicare, Medicaid, food stamps, disability benefits. The elderly are suddenly paying more for their medication, public housing is shutting down as Section 8 payouts decrease, unemployment decreases to borderline nothing.
I don't want that money if it means taking out of their mouths. Not until we find a better solution and set up a protection against siphoning the money from existing help.
OH NOES NOT THE EXISTING PUBLIC SPENDING PROGRAMS. Anyway, I addressed this. Anyone worth their salt would account for the programs among those like medicaid that are worth saving. That said, this is baseless fear mongering by someone putting their ideology and dedication to the current existing safety net before actually improving lives. I hate leftists just as much as right wingers and neolibs these days.
I live in a country where people don't even want to support Universal Healthcare. The idea of paying people during Covid made them lose their freaking minds. Many people still believe our government is still paying " lazy people" and "no one wants to work anymore!"
Sigh. I don't want to live on this planet anymore.
I'm with you, man. I'm with you.
If you’re talking about in the US, it’s because the greedy capitalists at the top feed all the sheeple lies about how universal basic income is communist or socialist and will cause the collapse of capitalism. They also make the Sheeple at the bottom/in the middle fight each other about the idea of paying more taxes because they simply don’t pay their fair share. If the 1% in this country payed the same percent as the middle class you could have your universal basic income and it wouldn’t raise any other tax %. You also have people voting against making the 1% pay because they drink the coolaid and think that one day they will be the 1% and the 1% use all that extra money to create jobs, they don’t. The 1% creates way less jobs than business owners in the upper middle class, because they’re already rich beyond their dreams and don’t need to start anything else. Another way to make room for that without raising taxes is lowering our military budget which again people are so misinformed about its spending that they think that means we’ll lose all our power and defenses. You don’t have universal basic income in the US because people don’t understand anything.
I'm not sure I agree with every aspect here like the specific funding questions, and I dont really want to address those, but I sympathize with the sentiment. The rich and specialized interests dont want a UBI. And we can definitely do it if we wanted to. But, as this person states, the problem is ignorance.
I think UBI is inevitable.
AI and automation will eventually reach a point where the vast majority of human labor won't be needed.
Some people feel we're rapidly reaching that point, while others feel its still 10, 20, or even 40 years away.
What no one argues is the idea that that point in time will never come.
So, once we reach a point where fifty to seventy percent of human labor is irrelevant, we're either going to have to institute some form of ubi, or we'll have to just come to terms with a dystopian nightmare where a massive percentage of the population is homeless, begging for spare change and scrounging for food.
Curious case in point: about 20 million people in America stopped working for a few months in 2019, and there was no discernable impact. This speaks to the idea that we may have already reached a point where most of the things middle and upper middle class people do all day at their jobs doesn't actually achieve anything. We made grocery store and food service people keep working. Cops, firemen etc. Most of the rest just stayed home, and what we sort of found out is that whatever it is those people do all day doesn't impact much of anything.
Preach man, preach. Of course, the jobists will create more jobs before they let us not work. And yes, there was sadly some impact. People couldn't go to the movies, or the amusement park, or eat out in resraurants, or go to the salon, but yeah, the sausage got made, and basic needs were taken care of. Much of our economy is luxuries these days. We dont NEED them. people miss them when they're gone, but meh, I'd rather free people than to subsidize slavery for peoples' entertainment in the form of cheaper luxuries. So yeah, dont totally agree with this guy, but I like his response.
Because rich people control policy and the narrative, and rich people do not want UBI as that would cost them a lot of money. And with control of the narrative it's easy to trick a lot of dumb people into acting against their own interests.
YEP.
The best way to redistribute wealth is to raise wages for labour
This is a moral question and one based on jobism, and I disagree, because I'm not a jobist.
There are some issues with it.
Poor people overwhelmingly struggle with debt - they have looming financial burdens to predatory corporations. UBI would involve collecting money from the overall population through taxes, and when that money goes into the hands of the people who are struggling, these predatory corporations come in, grab it all and we're back to square one. Most of the people struggling will STILL be struggling, and the most toxic middle-men in capitalism would gain billions of dollars of taxpayer money. Rather than rewarding predatory corporate activities at great expense to the population we need to create fair and meaningful solutions for the people who are struggling.
Poor people are in debt because they cant afford anything so they take out payday loans and crap. This SOLVES that issue, or at least reduces it. The whole "middle men of capitalism will screw the poor people" thing is a myth and a misconception by ideological leftists who hate the market and advocate for socialism and/or welfarism.
A UBI would require dramatic reforms to the welfare state, big increases in taxation and significant cultural changes. Numerous industries would be at risk of serious disruption and the full economic impacts are hard to foresee. That's a lot of disruption and uncertainty to accept for a scheme that, frankly, doesn't have a huge body of supporting research.
Many people who want to solve the issues UBI seeks to address feel that incremental improvements and reforms are far more likely to be implemented and less likely to have serious negative consequences. Despite the strange coalition of enthusiasts UBI attracts there is also a significant proportion of the population, many of whom are centrist and/or moderate, who find the idea of a UBI irresponsible or troubling. There are also people with a vested interest in opposing such measures for selfish reasons.
1) Yeah, but I support most of that. Others are more leery. As for supporting research, we have quite a lot, we just need to implement it. And while there is uncertainty there as real world conditions may differ from experimental ones, this is overstated.
2) This guy sounds like a neolib/centrist. But yeah, this is why i cant stand centrists either. It's UBI supporters vs the world at this point, and the neolib faction is more interested in messing around the edges than actual systemic fixes. And then most "systemic change" people are on the "socialism" bandwagon. Hence why I am left of mainstream democrats, but arguably more right than socialists or even some progressives these days.
Never happen in the USA, to many people would rather starve to death themselves then take the chance a " lazy person " gets something free. Besides most believe they're 2 weeks away from becoming millionaires and taking advantage of all the tax benefits they defend by voting Republican.
Sadly, he's right.
So we tax the 1% more and they take the jobs out of the US and go elsewhere to pay less taxes. Then what?
Eh, I'm of the opinion that if they leave we just seize their assets and turn them into worker owned companies. And then continue to tax them. I dont like the idea of just caving to the 1% here.
Because the people who are pushing it are not politically powerful.
Bingo. We're like 2% of the population and have 0 power. And we've been pushed out of the democrats to the point we needed to literally make our own third party.
Why isn't UBI pushed more....
Well the easy answer is this is really close to socialism and every time that has been tried it fails miserably and people die.
Socialism = bad
if there us UBI it would NOT help...the people that are bad with money will simply piss it away on stuff that wont keep them out of poverty....
This is another myth, people actually use it responsibly.
It's been tried, didn't work and is unsustainable.
No it hasn't.
Theres two things that are universally hated and thats 1.lazy people 2. Poor people.
UBI should be a social safety net to help those around us that go through unpredictably bad times but because of the notion that itd create lazy people its not pushed forward.
Well, to paraphrase doreen ford, in our society, maybe laziness is a virtue? Maybe we need to break out of this? Either way, work reductions are within acceptable parameters. This is just a cultural circlejerk we need to break.
Anyway, that's all I have time for. Whats my takeaway from this? While some people have had decent takes here, and others have pointed out a handful of legitimate, but overexaggerated problems, for the most part, I have just concluded that most people are ignorant, and most peoples' moral compasses don't allow for us to have nice things like UBI. We've been indoctrinated against it, and this has left actual UBI supporters a laughably small minority competing with other ideologies both left, right, and center. Part of the problem is people just being ignorant of the policies, I've tried to address the concerns here. But some of it is peoples' morals. Which is why I'm so hard on the anti work and human centered capitalism stuff. I believe we need to break those things for UBI to succeed and I am an unapologetic advocate for it.
Either way this didnt go quite like I thought at first. A friend read this thread and sent it to me earlier today when it was new, and most of the comments were awful. So I mostly was going to make fun of these guys while correcting their arguments. But then it looks like the comments improved in the past few hours. Good to have some sane people left in the world. Anyway, hope you have as much fun reading this as I have had writing it.
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