Universal Basic Income

Author: secularmerlin

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#61
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@Theweakeredge
Nope. The Declaration states you have the right to life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness, but as you have the right to life by automatic means, that is the only aspect of rights for which one personally has no ownership of their own power to provide. Nowhere do you find any other right for which you have no personal responsibility. You liberty is yours to obtain and maintain if you do not have it at birth With your liberty, you choose to take on other rights, but only to the extent that you agree with the requirements of maintenance and allow them to all others. Your happiness is on you, entirely, to obtain. Same with your income, housing, food & water, your healthcare, your employment, your transportation. Fo r all of that, you are personally responsible. Even your due process depends on your personal responsibility of comportment, and comes into play only because another may seek to take away your rights unlawfully. You do not automatically have due process until you go to court to seek a redress against another who has violated your rights, including the government. What makes you think you have these rights with no personal responsibility to them? A syllogism? Most syllogism make false claims of logic.
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#62
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@fauxlaw
I am not strictly speaking arguing that there should be a UBI, though I am tacitly in favor of the increased liberty it would provide citizens, I am more just discussing the implications and your ideas deserve to be heard too. That being said however I would be most gratified if you would recognize the difference between a substantive exercisable right and a privilege which can be taken away if you have not 'earned' it. 
#63
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@fauxlaw
You have simply asserted them to be privileges, I have explained why they are necessarily rights - please actually rebuke my points. You have just repeated a claim over and over, that means quite literally nothing to me. 

Nope. The Declaration states you have the right to life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness,
This doesn't contradict my statement, in order to have life you have to have food, water, and shelter - kinda like to have liberty you can't be enslaved, hence why slavery is not only a moral evil, but unconstitutional


but as you have the right to life by automatic means, that is the only aspect of rights for which one personally has no ownership of their own power to provide.
Nowhere is that stated in the constitution, that is asserted to be true by you - and furthermore, some people aren't able to provide food, shelter, and water for themselves, hence the people who starve, the homeless people, etc - furthermore this does not address my point.


Nowhere do you find any other right for which you have no personal responsibility.
Irrelevant


You liberty is yours to obtain and maintain if you do not have it at birth With your liberty, you choose to take on other rights, but only to the extent that you agree with the requirements of maintenance and allow them to all others.
So if you're kidnapped the government isn't obligated to restore your liberty? If you are enslaved there's nothing wrong with that constitutionally? You are simply ad hoc inserting your own bias into the constitution, we see a bunch of assertions with no evidence to back them up.


Your happiness is on you, entirely, to obtain. Same with your income, housing, food & water, your healthcare, your employment, your transportation.
Explain how happiness - shelter, food, water, and healthcare are equivalent? The latter things are all required to survive, happiness is not. You have inserted employment and transportation, I made no mention of them, stop with the inserting things into my argument.


For all of that, you are personally responsible.
Why? And demonstrate that assertion


Even your due process depends on your personal responsibility of comportment, and comes into play only because another may seek to take away your rights unlawfully.  You do not automatically have due process until you go to court to seek a redress against another who has violated your rights, including the government.
That does not mean it actually correlates with the principles of the constitution, furthermore, you have a right, as given to you by a societal contract, to not be killed on the street. I am arguing that the same thing applies to food, water, and shelter, just as you have a right to not be enslaved or killed because you are suicidal, and you have completely ignored my argument.


What makes you think you have these rights with no personal responsibility to them? A syllogism? Most syllogism make false claims of logic
Then actually address my logic. This is the last response you will get until you actually address my arguments - otherwise, you will be ignored because you are simply making red herrings and strawmen.
#64
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@secularmerlin
increased liberty it would provide citizens
Yeah, secure dat the expense of others, so what of their liberty? Or are you suggesting that some, by their own efforts of securing their happiness, must still fund others who don't give a shyte about supporting themselves, and, in effect, rob others of their earned liberty? I'll choose when, where, and how I give to others, and I do. Some 20% of my increase goes directly to my chosen charities, and a goos portion. of my time. It is my choice, not my government, how that is distributed, thanks.
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#65
secularmerlin
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@fauxlaw
Everyone would be equally free of securing their day to day needs. This is not the same as saying no one would work. If you want a car or a big mac or a beer or a Netflix subscription you must work for it. I actually doubt, once things have settled into their new shape, that unemployment will be much off what it is now. 

It would mean that there would be no land lords and that employers would have less control over their employees lives, after all if you don't strictly speaking need the job you are not going to do it unless you are adequately compensated and your safety is guaranteed. 

Truly I find it strange that you ate so worried about how unfair it would be to you if you no longer had to work for a living and instead could simply work for what you want.
#66
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@Theweakeredge
IF everyone had access to these things and free healthcare, THEN the disparity of education would be met, therefore increasing how much the average American could contribute to the economy.
Well stated.
#67
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@3RU7AL
I think people forget that it's the people that actually make up the economy... so if you increase the average income of the average American, you stimulate the economy. 
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#68
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@Theweakeredge
I think people forget that it's the people that actually make up the economy... so if you increase the average income of the average American, you stimulate the economy. 
The average income is not the issue if your goal is (roughly and in a much as it is even possible) equal freedoms to qualifying participants of an economy it is the wage gap.

That some DESPITE working very hard their entire lives have virtually nothing and struggle to feed and clothe and educate and provide medicine for their families whole others DESPITE living at the expense and/or exploitation of others are ridiculously wealthy. I'm not even impugning the wealthy. Having money does not make you a bad person (though it is hard to participate in American society at all, let alone become wealthy within it, without benefiting from the suffering of others in some way) but neither does not having money make you a lesser person (provided life is a freedom rather than just a privilege, it goes without saying that if life is a privilege which you must earn with money then people with less money regardless of how honest and hardworking are less deserving of it than the ultra wealthy even those whose wealth has been acquired largely through human exploitation).
#69
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@secularmerlin
Then what needs to be done is equity of opportunity, actual equity, not what we have now. However that does bring up a good point - how do you quantify "working hard", because its certainly true that people like farmer's work remarkably hard and they (typically) receive significant pay, but I would argue that Teachers also work very hard, and provide just as much of service; however they get paid barely anything. 

Raw capitalism will never deliver equity of opportunity or of "rising through the classes" - its inherently hierarchical - that doesn't mean I think that it should be hierarchical, it should, in fact, not be hierarchical. Especially not something like income.
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#70
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@Theweakeredge
What constitutes hard work is going to depend I think on a number of factors and is in any case different from adding much value which is also depends on a number of subjective factors. 
#71
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@secularmerlin
What constitutes hard work is going to depend I think on a number of factors and is in any case different from adding much value which is also depends on a number of subjective factors. 
In my personal experience, the easier the job is, the MORE it pays.
#72
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@secularmerlin
Truly I find it strange that you ate so worried about how unfair it would be to you if you no longer had to work for a living and instead could simply work for what you want.
No wonder you find it strange. I don't worry about it. I worked, earning more than sufficient because I educated myself to command and set my personal worth to employers until I no longer had to work for an employer, even though I enjoyed what I was doing, and could work for myself. Now, I don't have to work at all, but I do because I still enjoy it.
If you are willing to be entitled to have because other people do the work while you earn at leisure, you will never know that joy of personal responsibility of work, and when other people's money is gone, because your system never survives very long [forty years average], then you have nothing and are nothing. Congratulations.
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#73
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@fauxlaw
If you work at what you like just because you enjoy it even though you don't have to NOW

AND 

If you could work at what you like just because you like it even though you don't have to if sone form of UBI were instituted how does your situation change and why do you object? What is the REAL ISSUE?
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#74
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@fauxlaw
If you are willing to be entitled to have because other people do the work while you earn at leisure,
This is not at all what I am suggesting. 
#75
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@Theweakeredge
Then what needs to be done is equity of opportunity, actual equity, not what we have now.
Think of it like a game.

When you start the game, you are randomly assigned a time (ancient or modern) and place, physical characteristics, and parental social status (or orphan).

Some of these randomly assigned characteristics give you an advantage over other players and some of these give you a distinct disadvantage.

If you were playing this game (as a computer game) and you rolled a disadvantaged character, you'd probably just quit the game and roll a new character.

However, if this game had no NPCs, then it would be impossible for every single player to live in the lap of luxury.

It doesn't matter how rich you might be, if there is nobody willing to patrol the streets and remove the garbage and work for minimum wage at your local grocery store, then you will certainly starve to death.
#76
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@secularmerlin
What is the REAL ISSUE?
I spelled that out very clearly in my post #39. That you have a right to life, I acknowledge. That you have a right to a UBI as a result of a right to life is absurd. Your housing, food, employment, education beyond K-12, transportation are on you for you, not me and everybody else who actually works, whether for themselves or a boss. Your complete lack of considering your personal responsibility for those privileges is my real issue. Your right to life ends at your fingertips and do not include mine. I do not pay for your privileges; you do.
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#77
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@fauxlaw
 I do not pay for your privileges
I am not suggesting that you do. At the moment my questions are pretty simple. 

Is life a right or a privilege and (the question  of whether life is a privilege or not aside) how would your life be changed by a UBI? If people were provided with a UBI and worked only to obtain luxuries, to care for those who cannot care for themselves (sick, elderly, children) or for the satisfaction of the work itself how would the lives of the wealthy who already enjoy this state of affairs stand to lose anything?
#78
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@secularmerlin
Who, exactly, pays for your UBI? The government? And who funds the government, genius? Taxpayers. Tell if your UBI is sourced from anything but tax revenue.
#79
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@secularmerlin
Who, exactly, pays for your UBI?

Oh, I get it. Private industry employers pay your UBI? Directly? No. A UBI would still come directly to you from government, by a tax the government imposes on private industry, when over 40% of private industry is already earmarked to pay labor costs, the highest single expense paid from industry gross revenue. And who pays private industry gross revenue? Other businesses, and individual consumers. Me, for example. Is that crystal clear, yet?
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#80
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@fauxlaw
I have not suggested an implementation method yet. We are as of now examining the implications of the idea itself. 
#81
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@fauxlaw
Just cut all corporate subsidies and instead give those exact same subsidies directly to humans.
#82
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@3RU7AL
That is bullshit - sorry to be blunt but it is.

I'll explain why - you are thinking in a matter-of-fact hierarchical way - that it is both necessary and required that there be people below others. A couple of problems there - those people are only "below you" because of how you framed the discussion - the matter of fact is that those who keep up the infrastructure should be valued higher than they are. Furthermore, keeping up the infrastructure, even if you wanted to value it lower for some arbitrary reason, could easily be combining other jobs that could be keeping up the infrastructure. The entire:

"It doesn't matter how rich you might be, if there is nobody willing to patrol the streets and remove the garbage and work for minimum wage at your local grocery store, then you will certainly starve to death."

Is built on assumptions and presuppositions
#83
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@Theweakeredge

Is built on assumptions and presuppositions
Edge: Spot on.

Part of the assumption that is completely false is, first, the belief that the money supply is finite. It isn't. Oba'a tried to sell us that mantra, but, he was merely arguing for his perceived limitations. Dreams of his father? He couldn't dream for himself? He actually did, and has a place on Martha's Vineyard as a result, when he promised on the tarmac on 1/20/17 to just go back to Chicago streets to organize them. Seems he took a detour to Los Gatos, CA [HQ of Netflix[ and that's exactly where the plane in his background while giving us the organized streets routine was going, and now he has a house in the hood on Martha's Vineyard, and Chicago streets are still what they are. Oba'a proved he was wrong about the money supply. 


#84
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@3RU7AL
My point is that you do need to keep the hierarchy - its bullshit. The entire concept of keeping people beneath you is incorrect, caste systems are still caste, no matter how you dress it up
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#85
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@Theweakeredge

A large part of the problem I think
#86
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@Theweakeredge
"It doesn't matter how rich you might be, if there is nobody willing to patrol the streets and remove the garbage and work for minimum wage at your local grocery store, then you will certainly starve to death."
In game.

The hypothetical is in the context of a game.

Yes, (IFF) you want people to perform unpleasant and or uninteresting and or physically difficult tasks (THEN) you will need to increase the wages associated with those tasks.
#87
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@secularmerlin

A large part of the problem I think
Great point.
#88
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@Theweakeredge
My point is that you do need to keep the hierarchy - its bullshit. The entire concept of keeping people beneath you is incorrect, caste systems are still caste, no matter how you dress it up
WE MUST DEMAND HOLACRACY + RCV.
#89
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@fauxlaw
Part of the assumption that is completely false is, first, the belief that the money supply is finite.
The value of money is finite.

You can print as much as you like.

Now you don't even have to actually print it, you just type numbers into a federal reserve ledger.

However, the more you INFLATE the money supply, the LESS each $$$ is worth.
#90
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@Theweakeredge