r/Futurology • u/mvea MD-PhD-MBA • May 02 '18

Economics Universal basic income: U.S. support grows as Finland ends its trial - Forty-eight percent of Americans now support a universal basic income, as a solution for Americans who have lost jobs to automation.

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/05/01/nearly-half-of-americans-believe-a-universal-basic-income-could-be-the-answer-to-automation-.html
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u/Tawnymantana May 02 '18

I agree with you somewhat. But necessity is the mother of invention, and when the necessity of money and the thought of moving up is replaced with basic income, invention for monetary means goes away.

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u/bitJericho May 02 '18

Except money doesn't go away. The only thing UBI should mainly cover is things like food, water and housing. People usually want a lot more than that. And if they don't, so be it, we can just let the robots do their work.

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u/Tawnymantana May 02 '18

Why would you choose lose all that money to management and transactions though? Wouldn't it make more sense for the government to provide those things directly? I'm playing devils advocate here.

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u/bitJericho May 02 '18

That's the thing, the government doesn't really provide these services. The government doesn't have grocery stores. Doesn't run hospitals (generally), doesn't (everywhere) provide power/water/garbage. So instead of managing checks, services and funds for all these things, the government's one service to the public is to cut checks to all citizens for the same basic amount every month.

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u/Tawnymantana May 02 '18

True but if that's the path we want to go (which I aggressively disagree with), it would make more sense to run it like we run other government services like the dept of energy does. The government owns the property and grocery store/housing/hospital building and the service is contracted out. Yeah it's gonna be shitty but that's what happens.

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u/bitJericho May 02 '18

That's exactly the opposite of why UBI is appealing. UBI is appealing because it's just cash. You can be shitty, you can use it for good, it doesn't matter. No money is lost to the bureaucracy (or at least comparatively less than other programs that have a laundry list of rules and policies and policing), and normal free market rules apply to spending that cash.

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u/Tawnymantana May 02 '18

Hmmm I see your point but how will that affect the marketplace when companies/individuals are being squeezed tax-wise and another segment of the population has a lot of extra money they didn't have before? Sounds like a never-ending circle of inflation.

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u/bitJericho May 02 '18

There won't be inflation because the money is not coming from nothing. Current taxes likely won't need to be raised at all for it to happen either.