Why are we creating less jobs for people and not more? Universal Basic Income?

Hvizsgyak said:

Is that a good thing or bad thing?

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Neither, but I thought being outside the US might add some context to her assertions that might not necessarily be true here.

Hvizsgyak said:

This one will get me in alot of trouble with posters to this forum but I am dumbfounded as to why anybody is pushing for Universal Basic Income. Is this where capitalism is taking us? As Christians we know that we will need to work everyday (except Sundays and possibly Saturdays (of course, there are always the home choirs)). And work makes people happy alot of times (except when your boss is a micro-managing slave driver). They feel a sense of accomplishment when they do meaningful work and feel like they are contributing to helping out others. I'm sure there are some out there who disagree with me and that is ok with me; I'm no expert in work studies.

My question to those who support Capitalism (the way we have it in America today): why are we trying to do away with millions of jobs for the sake of saving money (by being more efficient?) and then turn around to pay those workers to just stay home? Sure they could take a meaningful hobby like bird watching, knitting, painting, day traders, or my favorite amateur archeologist but ...

We need an economic system that pays ALL workers a living wage (or more) and we need to get rid of some of this automation and go back to real workers manning those jobs. Universal Basic Income is an idiotic solution to helping out the working person.

The YouTube video I provided I found informative and interesting BUT I have no idea whether this lady is a decent person to take advice from. Also, sorry about her scantly dress, she usually dresses more conservatively.

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UBI will make the average voter beholden to federal government for everything.

Belk said:

People don't commit crime due to lack of money? Got a citation for that because crime is highly correlated with poverty so you will need some pretty convincing evidence.

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Nepal vs United States: Crime Facts and Stats

Average income in nepal is about 700USD a month.

Larnievc said:

Based on what evidence?

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Wait, are you unaware that most violent crime is perpetrated by those that are unemployed or do not work full time? You think all the inner city crime is being done by employed people?

Then there is the recidivism rate that happens and part of that is the fact that people can't get jobs after they have been in prison.

So it starts with people not working and they commit crimes due to poor character because they have too much time on their hands.

I do think there is a point to be made though. Character is the real issue. If someone is working full time and holds a steady job and is a responsible person they would be less likely to commit crime if they had more free time. It's in their character.

Then there are the people with poor character who would commit crime whether they had more time on their hands or not. They probably are not working now and are irresponsible without a sense of responsibility.

Why do you think the poor commit more crime? They are not working full time. Too much idle time combined with poor character leads to sustained poverty and criminal activity.

RDKirk said:

The median annual individual income in the US is only $33K.

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So? If you raised it to $66K a year the cost of goods would be such that you'd end up in the same boat.

Larnievc said:

This sounds really authoritarian and creepy. Work is to earn money to live a happy life- not a tool by those in power to keep people off the street because ‘some people’ think you might be up to no good (and a ‘no good’ defined only by ‘some people’).

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You mean no good like robbing, burglarizing and shooting people? That no good? Or is that just what "some people think" is no good?

RDKirk said:

My daughter reminded me that every US colony was set up as a for-profit enterprise. Wage-slavery is baked into the bones of the USA. Making profit for investors is the American base code.

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Wage slavery? Are you kidding? What exactly does that mean?

And what is wrong with making profit for investors? Didn't they invest their money? Should they expect a return on it? That's good he reason people invest in a business.

Firstly let's be clear on technology and automation. They will never displace manpower. Yes some jobs will disappear, but new one will be created. You will need people who can program and maintain the AI and IT infrastructure that runs the automation. No matter how advanced an AI gets it still needs to be operated by humans.

But I agree that universal basic income is a horrible idea. Around the world most countries already have a form of pension system for the retirees. That takes care of this segment of people. It is the working age people who shouldn't be getting UBI. It creates a lowest common denominator that cannot sustain a market regardless of the amount dispensed.

My country tried that with what they called aid for the poor. Every month households below certain level of income are supplemented with a fixed stipend. It was meant to help elevate them to a better standard of living. After years of implementation the results are they remained where they were prior. I believe now it has been scrapped. Not too sure. I never kept up with it. I wasn't allegeable anyway.

Many didn't use this boon in income improve and get better jobs or make expansion to their businesses. Most use the extra income to on items that put them further down in financial difficulty. It is just human nature.

Larnievc said:

The problem is that technology marches on and more and more jobs are being taken away from workers by corporations. This concentrates the wealth in the hands of those in big business.

So if there was a UBI then the most well off would contribute more and the jobs that need to be done by people would have to pay at least as much as the UBI to make them attractive enough for people to want to do them. So there’s you minimum wage forced on to the business sector (by the invisible hand of the market).

There’s a bit of research out there and some of it (if I recall) says that when UBI has been trialled people reducing their hours was mostly limited to mums (who could spend more time with the kids at home) or teens (who could then devote more time to studies).

So as far as I can see the only people who would lose out are the corporations. Businesses that were not paying a living wage would suffer but I don’t see that as a problem as they are parasites on society.

Ultimately this would lead to less wealth inequality and fewer extremely poor people because there would be more of the pie for everyone.

I reckon Jesus would have liked looking after the poor and not the corporations.

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Corporations take away jobs.
Seriously?

IceJad said:

Firstly let's be clear on technology and automation. They will never displace manpower. Yes some jobs will disappear, but new one will be created. You will need people who can program and maintain the AI and IT infrastructure that runs the automation. No matter how advanced an AI gets it still needs to be operated by humans.

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Human intelligence levels do not increase with technological levels, though. Not everyone can be a computer programmer. When all jobs require the intelligence level of a computer programmer, there will be a large portion of people who simply don't have the intellectual capacity to do those jobs.

That truth is in effect even today. The US military contains nearly every job available in US civilian society, but has a low limit of 83 IQ because a person below that point cannot be trained to do any military job. That's essentially the lowest IQ that can be trained into any US job. Yet, that includes 15% of the population.

Those new jobs exclude Forrest Gump. In not too long, they'll exclude Gomer Pyle, and then Barney Fife, and in not too much longer, even Sheriff Andy.

Estrid said:

Corporations take away jobs.
Seriously?

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Yeah, when the dividends to the share holders drop the first people to be affected are the workers as ‘cost cutting’ and ‘streamlining’ means they lose their jobs.

Certainly not CEOs.

RDKirk said:

Human intelligence levels do not increase with technological levels, though.

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But they do increase each generation.

Larnievc said:

Yeah, when the dividends to the share holders drop the first people to be affected are the workers as ‘cost cutting’ and ‘streamlining’ means they lose their jobs.

Certainly not CEOs.

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So, a corporation creates jobs, each of which
contributes to the success.
In general, fewer workers equals less profit.
You sound like all they do is unfairly fire people.

Corporations, like everything else, must adapt to
changes.
That can include downsizing.
Eliminating leadership (chopping head
off) is an insensible way to downsize.
A corp that loses money does not stay
in business and everyone loses.

You ever take a business course?

Larnievc said:

But they do increase each generation.

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No, they don't. Evolution doesn't move that fast. Don't confuse education with IQ. Uneducable stays educatable.

Estrid said:

In general, fewer workers equals less profit.

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Fewer workers for the same level of profit is the gold standard for capitalism. Maximise revenue and minimise overheads. The vast majority of the time the overheads are paying workers.

That’s why so many decry the minimum wage: it is in the interest of the owners of the means of production to minimise outlay on the workers- and to only employ as few workers as possible for the lowest wage possible.

Estrid said:

A corp that loses money does not stay in business and everyone loses.

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But there is the rub. It’s not that the are losing money and going out of business it that they are making less money (while still turning significant profit).

But at the shareholders meetings when profits are down the CEOs need to reassure stakeholders that profits will continue to increase (not just maintain a level of profit but to be continually increase the rate of profit).

So the corner cutting, wage freezes and layoff happen. Corporate social responsibility have been over run by the moral case to maximise profits.

Profit > people in late stage capitalism.

RDKirk said:

No, they don't. Evolution doesn't move that fast. Don't confuse education with IQ. Uneducable stays educatable.

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Then I’m not sure what your point is.

Larnievc said:

Then I’m not sure what your point is.

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The point is that not everyone has the IQ to be a computer programmer, or even to maintain computerized machinery.

And it won't be too long before computers are doing most of the computer programming...I'd give it another five years before half of current coding jobs will have been automated.

When I was in the military, we had the concept of "one-time good deal." Sometimes a window of opportunity opens; some people are in the right time and place to take advantage of it, some aren't. Oh, well. Take the educational benefits of the GI Bill for instance. Those have changed from "war to war," better for the veterans of some wars, not as good for the veterans of others. But you won't usually hear, for instance, a Vietnam war veteran protesting a bill to provide an Afghanistan veteran a better deal that he got. We accepted it philosophically.

People who work to prevent others from getting in on a one-time good deal doom themselves to a mean life.

It wouldn't bother me if current student loans were forgiven up to $50,000 because I see the government as being in cahoots with the banking industry and the education industry in luring kids into them with "get a college degree by any means possible or your life will be *****" indoctrination from K-12, then locking them into practically Mafia-style loans with interest continually rising and fees added to the balances seemingly at random. They offer "grant" programs that have such arcane and complex rules that most people, sooner or later, make a mistake and suddenly the "grant" turns into a loan with years of unpaid interest tacked on. The Mafia wishes they had that racket.

But I think any bill to forgive college loans must also come with some very significant simultaneous changes in the loan process. First, the government has to break away from the banking and education industries.

First, the loans should be disposable in bankruptcy like any other debt. That will force banks to approve or disapprove them according to the creditworthiness of the borrower like any other debt.

Second, the government acknowledge the fact that a bachelor's degree is not for most people. Most people should be in advanced technical training, which the government ought to promote and support as vigorously as it has been supporting bachelor's degrees.

Third, we ought to look seriously into the government simply financing college for many students in public colleges. That doesn't even need new money--the federal government already spends more money handing out grants than public colleges collect in tuition. But that should also come with some requirements for which degrees get such funding...degrees in proportion to the public need to students who seem best able to achieve them. In other words, government scholarships to government schools done more broadly. Actually, that's rather a return to what many states used to do.

Fourth, the government needs to look seriously into the reasons higher education costs are zooming higher and faster than any other cost besides medicine (and I suspect the reason is the same). When I was in college in 1972, my tuition was $25 per credit hour. Minimum wage was $1.25 per hour. I had a part-time job making $2.50 an hour. I could pay off my tuition by the middle of the semester. Today at that same university, tuition is $400 per credit hour. A student would have to make $40 an hour part time to do as well as I did in 1972.

IceJad said:

Firstly let's be clear on technology and automation. They will never displace manpower.

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That so wrong as to be farcical. Every new technological advancement means less physical labor is needed for the task it is applied to.

Yes some jobs will disappear, but new one will be created.

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That are vastly out numbered by the ones made redundant and require higher levels of skill to preform. Hence the issue of what is to be done for those displaced.