D
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Lets get something straight conversion rates between these countries is NOT the same. It's not an apple to apples comparison. And no one in fast food today makes $7.25/hour.
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Mark Zuckerberg Calls for Universal Basic Income in Harvard Commencement Speech
- Thread starter Megalith
- Start date
Lets get something straight conversion rates between these countries is NOT the same. It's not an apple to apples comparison. And no one in fast food today makes $7.25/hour.
Virtually none of that was due to Reagan's leadership abilities or decisions and several things you're saying are flat out BS (ie. SDI being put into use today). I also remember watching North's trial on TV and the guy clearly took the fall for Reagan, it was as plain as day to anyone at the time what had happened. All that crap with Poindexter as a go between him and Reagan was so much nonsense as a cover.
SPARTAN VI
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You probably missed it, but I basically copy & pasted jpm100's post#234 and changed "rich" to "left" among other edits. It doesn't directly address the topic at hand, it's just a battle between two philosophies.
Also worth pointing out that my concept of the "left" is a modern term for those who believe equality of outcome > equality of opportunity; that government force is the first/only way to create equality between people of dissimilar socio-economic dispositions.
griff30
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Why do those who have no foresight for themselves, blame others for their own short comings?
Because it's easy.
" It's not my fault I don't make enough money to pay for a house and car as a short order cook (Insert exscuse such as I was not born rish or have the right skills.)..so we need Universal Welfare "
Wrong, just wrong.
Millions of returning soldiers came home and their wives who found jobs in the workforce were working along side them. We had a massive workforce and a country that needed that workforce to continue what had ramped up because of the war, not because of unions, not because of politics.
Changing key words changes the whole thing though so I don't see what point you're trying to make here.
This is also a bad strawman. Maybe a few Communists feel this way but the "modern" Left in the US as a whole does not. Most people on the Left would prefer some form a Democratic Socialist govt. where essentially some few key parts of the economy are ran by the govt. rather than private enterprise.
Why don't you underline and address the part about widespread automation and high unemployment?
Nah that wasn't how it was at all. The size of the workforce had nothing to do with increases in wages, benefits, work safety, and worker treatment. All of those things were fought long and hard for by unions and none of it was given freely by the companies.
Armenius
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I would support UBI if all the current welfare programs and the bureaucracy around them were completely eliminated. But the leftists in this country would never allow it.
Another 20-something who thinks he's better than everybody else. If UBI is so great, there really need to be better proponents for it than supposed "geniuses" with no life experience lecturing me about what is good for society. His website is the most bloviating piece of drivel I have ever seen.
Another 20-something who thinks he's better than everybody else. If UBI is so great, there really need to be better proponents for it than supposed "geniuses" with no life experience lecturing me about what is good for society. His website is the most bloviating piece of drivel I have ever seen.
I bet you're one of those who thinks Trump should be impeached because you disagree with him. By the way: there is no evidence that Reagan had any involvement in the arms deal at the center of the Iran-Contra scandal.
Funny how you dismiss Reagan's accomplishments out of hand, but are quick to pin the arms deal on him based simply on his public support for the Contra cause.
SPARTAN VI
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I stated my point in the post you quoted and conveniently snipped in the response; just comparing our philosophies using his own vernacular.
Lastly, do you even know what a "strawman" fallacy really is...? I elaborated on my post with how conservatives define "the left." If that defintion differs from yours, that's fine.. I see your definition. That's not a strawman fallacy.
I'm not sure if Trump should be impeached but I definitely think he should undergo a thorough investigation which I strong suspect would lead to his successful impeachment.
Well there is North's own words. If you mean legal evidence that was shredded by North, which he admitted doing as well.
Where did I say it was due to Reagan's support for the Contra's? I mentioned North for a reason.
Your point makes no sense though. I mean I can change the words around in almost any given statement to make it say whatever I want to. How is that a demonstration of any sort of ideology? Its just word games.
Its a strawman because its complete nonsense that isn't based at all on how modern US Leftists would define or describe themselves. edit: Its a crappy caricature of the Left at best. Just because many modern conservatives use that definition doesn't make it accurate or correct.
SPARTAN VI
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It's the exact opposite of jpm100's post, I don't know how to make the counterpoint any more clear.
A disagreement on terms does not make a strawman fallacy.
And how is that ideology? At best its snark, at worst you're misrepresenting what was said completely.
It does when its not at all accurate and has considerable political slant to it.
Communism is just socialism at the point of a gun.
Darunion
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you are confusing communism with dictatorship, unless you are just making a joke in which case ignore, but it seems like a serious conversation thread so I took it as such.
Read up on socialism and communism, both are actually very interesting ideas. Both have pluses and minuses. Really though the fundamental flaw of any social or government structure is the people.
Greed weakens any of them. Think about it, really the only reason anarchy doesn't work is because we as individuals don't give a crap about our neighbor even when problems with others indirectly affects us.
A UBI of $45,000/year for each adult? Is that tax free too?
That's great. I can stop working and retire early. That would give me and the wife $90,000 a year, more than I've ever made in a single year. I might even be able to move from my upper middle class home in Southern California to something with an ocean view.
Medicare for all that covers 100%?
Even better. Now I don't even need to worry about having to pay for health insurance. Should make the $90,000 a year go even further.
It's not magical thinking, it's a gamble v. slow death. You just said there's no clear path from good to come from bad. The good comes from people responding. Upton Sinclaire wrote The Jungle, Teddy Roosevelt responded with the FDA. The Cuyahoga River caught on fire, there was lots of pressure from environmentalists, Nixon responded with the EPA. Now imagine if only food was a LITTLE unsanitary, or the river was toxic, but not FLAMMABLE, but in both cases, they got gradually worse, year after year. These reforms may not have had the energy they needed to be passed through. When a situation is bad and visible enough, it can inspire people from all over to take action where they might not otherwise. There are countless examples of this throughout history. But hey, if you call that magical, let's contrast that with the democrats:
How is a wall-street favored, war-happy party that was pushing corporate-rule trade agreements whose entire platform has mutated into a mantra of neoliberalism going to help things in the LONG term? I'd say believing that things are going to get better under modern Democrats is simply wishful thinking. They're not the party they once were.
This mentality is exactly what got Trump elected and will continue getting Republicans elected. Clinton was the status quo candidate, and for huge portions of the country, it can't get any worse for them, they have no conceivable reason to vote for the status quo. Again, I think our system is broken and the only way out (if there is any way out at all) is to rub our faces in it, rather than one step forward three steps back approach of modern Democrats.
We dropped so many bombs in 2016 we ran out of them. That's not cleaning up Bush's mess, that's feeding the military industrial complex. You've made a point here though, that the Democrats are CORRUPT. Your argument seems to be that because they are a little less corrupt than the Republicans in some areas, that's making things better overall by and large. I disagree.
DukenukemX
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The French don't use dollar's so the currency was adjusted to match that of America's. Also, if the value of currency was a factor then why doesn't the Australian burger cost more? France has €9.76 per hour and Australia has $17.70 per hour.
You can see a list of prices for a Big Mac around the world. The actual price of a Big Mac in Australia is $4.30. New Zealand has NZ$15.75 per hour and their Big Mac is $4.22.
http://www.businessinsider.com/big-mac-cost-around-the-world-2017-1/#-20
Lets see that. You're right it's $8.60.
https://www.glassdoor.com/Hourly-Pay/McDonald-s-Hourly-Pay-E432.htm
D
Deleted member 126051
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By "makes money" they mean "turns a profit".
The US Government hasn't turned a real profit (not some paper fantasy) in will over 100 years (if ever).
Then you better not look at other countries which pay far more than the crap wages we have here. BTW Asutralia's minimum wage is now $17, but the burgers are still the same price.
Plenty of people with Bachelor's Degree's working at Burger joints and Starbucks. When the market simply doesn't have that many good paying jobs available you get what you can.
Australia's minimum wage is $16.88 right now. In Australian (not US) dollars.
That's $12.60 US.
And actually, the gross minimum wage in France right now is €9.61.
That's $10.70 US.
As for for illegals. My beef isn't with them taking jobs nobody else wants.
My beef is that they shouldn't be here, PERIOD.
This country simply isn't able to throw its borders wide open and accept EVERYONE that wants to come here.
And we have a method for coming into this country and working/naturalizing LEGALLY.
Sure, we can make it easier for people to do.
But we need to stem the tide of illegals.
If this hurts farmers because they can't get cheap labor?
Pay more.
Automate more.
Choose a more lucrative business.
Maybe that's hard-hearted.
Such is life.
D
Deleted member 126051
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Depends on what field you're in. If you're in a grunt labor field, expect to be obsoleted. Look for fields that aren't so easily automated out of existence.
WHOOSH!
My point was that insurance exists to minimize those costs.
And the remainder can be set up in a structured payback system that doesn't involve you being tossed out of your home and divested of your means of transport to work.
Not terribly sure why you're so obtuse on this.
But hey. NMP.
DukenukemX
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Yes but the money you use to exchange goods and services are made by the US government. They could if they they wanted to, just print money and hand it out. It would devalue the currency but it is literally made by them.
So if say a catastrophe occurs and the government is wiped off the face of the Earth, that money you have is worth fuck of it all. Next thing you'll know you're using bottle caps for a currency.
It's $17.70 from what I've lasted checked, and I know some Australians. The Big Mac would be $3.30 if converted to US money. Going by your math, someone in Australia with one hour of work at McDonalds can buy 3xBig Macs. While in America you can only buy 1 Big Mac for one hour of work.
That's still better than America's minimum wage.
I agree but those big companies don't seem to agree. They keep hiring them illegally, and little is done to punish them. Instead of building a stupid wall.
You're missing the entire point, in fact, go read my previous post then come back here. We need more experiments just like this all around the world because there's so many environmental factors that come into play:
• Culture
• Religion
• Diet
• Population
• Economic System
• Family
• Environment
• Genetic Pre-Dispositions
• Education
Without knowing the data between multiple countries, it's difficult (if not impossible) to assess how it will work on a global scale, however if you go back again to my post, you'll see the experiments in Canada and India are optimistic and it's an indication those effects will also trickle in other countries. But again, we need more data first to find out. While I understand your immediate skepticism, and you bring up valid points, what you should be more concerned about is how Finland drew up their random pool. Instead of focusing on wider range households with varied range of incomes, like the middle class, they chose specifically on the poor. Personally, I would love to see what changes are likely to occur with a middle income household and it just gives out a more fleshed out analysis statistics wise. But at the end of the day, it's primarily on households below the poverty line because BI impacts them the most, so I can understand why.
Oh... and to double down on the experiments, I also forgot to mention that Oakland is also conducting a Basic Income study, which will focus on 30-50 individuals living below the poverty line and they'll be receiving $1,500-2,000 a month for one year.
Um... no. Returning soldiers displaced the women who had sustained the war effort. Those women went home and had babies. They were called the baby Boomers. It was not until the 1970's and 80's that women entered the workforce in any significant numbers.
There is a significant amount of scholarly research which suggests that your statement "The US does not have class" is complete nonsense. Every nation has a class structure. Some are acknowledged and some are not. Google "mudsill theory" to begin with. Then start looking at the various levels of societal stratification based on factors and cultural myths. And then look up "white trash". Then read this book. Find out if you are a mudsill, a cracker, a hillbilly, a hoe wielder. Beware. It's uncomfortable stuff. https://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/22/...ruminates-on-an-american-underclass.html?_r=0
D
Deleted member 126051
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No. Actually I'm not. We're saying the same essential thing. Just from different points of view.
By itself, a study of the Finnish experiment is worth exactly the effort it takes to hit DELETE.
Now, multiple experiments, over time, will be marginally more useful.
And, as always, I'd want a fully fleshed out plan before implementing it, even experimentally, here in the US.
People really hate it when you fuck with their cash flow and, a badly implemented plan could lead to massive social unrest.
And, as always, I want to know how it's getting paid for my a government that's far, FAR more than just "broke".
Sounds a lot like "Problems with socialism? I know what you need! MORE SOCIALISM!"
How exactly are the right people, with the right ideas, to pop up in the right place and at the right time to do the right things to fix all the problems though? There is no mechanism for that. You're just hoping they appear from nowhere. If that isn't magical thinking then what is?
With Accelerationism there isn't. With measured incremental improvements there is.
What about how the German people responded to Hitler back in the 1920's and 30's? Or the South's response to Reconstruction and post-Civil War attempts at eliminating racism in the South? Or how many Americans rallied around W. Bush after 9/11? Good does not always automagically follow bad. And people do not always make the right choices under stress.
In order for there to be any long term you have to have policies that get you through the short term too and while bad for various reasons many of the Dem policies would've actually allowed for there to be a functional society and govt. Many of the Repub policies would cheerfully tear all that down. I don't think you have any real clue how bad things could get.
Uh Trump got elected due to the quirks of our electoral college system. If it was a simple majority vote Clinton would've won by several million votes.
No, the F35 is feeding the MIC. All that bomb dropping was due to having to essentially re-fight Bush's failed interventions.
Not a little less corrupt. The difference is huge, as I've noted to you before at least once in thread.
When you're looking at permanent unemployment numbers in the 30%+ range, so worse than the Great Depression, in a decade or 2 all talk of "looking for the right field" is laughably out of touch.
The economy and job market as we currently know it is going to cease to exist under that sort of scenario. Again, that is why a UBI/Mincome is being brought up more and more. Nothing else is going to work if you want there to still be a functional economy and society that at least somewhat treats the people well and fairly.
No. You were specific. And "payment plans" do not minimize costs by definition. All they do is spread out the costs over time. And since we're talking about healthcare, which is incredibly expensive, my comment was not all hyperbolic.
If you want to minimize costs you have to get the costs of healthcare down. That either means cutting quality of service or changing up the current system drastically by going to something like Medicare-For-All.
Everyone gets sick eventually. It may not be your problem today, tomorrow, a week from now, etc. but it will be eventually.
D
Deleted member 126051
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I also wish people would stop bringing up Star Trek. It's about as applicable to current economic discussion as concrete is to a cake.
ST had WW3 and a huge population cull, followed by a galactic diaspora. We haven't. We still have 7 billion people operating under (marginally) functional governments that are all more or less uniformly evil.
ST has solved the supply problem. Goods are now, effectively, infinite (replicators) and that leaves the populace to concentrate on service-oriented professions.
Additionally, ST has a perfect lock on matter-energy conversions.
So, if they need materials for something, they could literally disassemble a large chunk of an otherwise uninhabitable star system for raw stock.
The last two are the main sticking points as to why ST is a nice, utopian fantasy. But trying to draw WORKING corollaries to real life break down almost immediately.
At worst, citizens of Star Trek have an "energy budget". A maximum amount of energy they're allotted to take care of their needs.
And they're only limited by thermodynamics. So, so long as the waste heat can be mitigated, they're golden.
ESPECIALLY since they use Matter-Antimatter for a primary power source.
And the fact that they have the means to manually terraform a planet (not Genesis, but the old fashioned way), complete with weather/climate control devices.
Things are a bit more prosaic on "THIS" Earth.
And, EVEN THEN, you'll make note of the fact that there are STILL people out there trying to "game" the system for things they haven't earned. And people in a society of ostensible equals trying to become "more equal" than others and playing all sorts of odious power games.
I'm not saying accelerationism will magically solve all problems. The point is we need an agent of CHANGE. The analogy I made before the election was pretend we're driving towards a cliff off in the distance. Trump would mash on the accelerator, which would get people's attention. Bernie would have tried to swerve the car away. Hillary would have kept the car cruising at a steady speed, no disruptions.
This may be the crux of our disagreement. I think our measured incremental improvements are being OUTPACED by the backsliding brought about due to terrible decisions made from corruption. Because if you think everything is slowly getting better, you're absolutely right, stay on course. If NOT, then I think it's better to deal with problems asap before they balloon even more. I think most of our successes are short term that are borrowing against the future. I think our economic stability, environmental state, and sustainability all round have been DECLINING under the Democrats. I do NOT think this is solely at the feet of obstructionist Republicans either. Left to their own devices, we would be getting tame neoliberal policies that exacerbate the problems a whole, just at a slow rate. Again, I think the party has been largely corrupted.
I think we're heading towards the largest Banana Republic the world has ever seen with the majority of its citizenry in poverty, a horrendous ecological impact that will affect us for many generations, and a crash that's going to dwarf the great depression. Wars as a consequence are not off the table either. I don't think this destination would have changed under Hillary or Trump, just the time table.
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D
Deleted member 126051
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The job market "as we know it" will cease to exist. Whoa, fearmonger much? That doesn't mean the job market is "going away". It merely means that the distribution and types of jobs that make up the market are going to change and people are going to need to be prepared for that change.
You're conflating insurance and payment plans for paying expenses over and above what is covered by insurance and co-insurance. Insurance generally reduces the amount you'd owe in any given situation. A payment plan spreads out the amount you owe, providing you with a smaller month-to-month outlay, rather than expecting you to drop an untenable lump sum.
And health care is as expensive as it is partially BECAUSE of the insurance system.
Most of the rest is because people don't realize that healthcare is a limited resource and place an unlimited demand on it.
Before Obamacare, you have some people doing everything in their power to avoid having to go to a doctor. Afterward, people who'd gone DECADES without more than emergency health care now ABSOLUTELY HAD TO have every cough, sneeze and sniffle seen to.
Basically you're talking about Medicaid or the system in place at the VA hospital. Rationed health care.
Believe me, you REALLY don't want that. ESPECIALLY if you have a condition more serious than a case of the flu.
Because you'll likely DIE before any sort of effective care is even considered, much less rendered.
This is the voice of actual "worked in the industry" experience talking.
D
Deleted member 184142
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When things like this are talked about, it is easy to cheer and support it, because everyone would help people if they could. However the world does not work that way, nature does not work that way. People who are against things like this are not against it because they don't want people to have free money, it is because they understand there is no such thing as free money, and that it has to come from somewhere. By and large today the Socialist and Communist leanings of people in this country have been growing, a sad sight to see, the ideas, the propaganda they spread etc is amazing, yet talk to people who have come from or lived in a Socialist or Communist state and they will not agree with any of it. My grandmother having come from one I remember getting furious with a person who suggested a Communist system would be better, she went off on the person, and at 88 years old, that was something to see. She grew up in it, she saw and experienced first hand this "wonder world" they promise, and she wanted nothing of it again.
The best way to think about things like this are to take it to a logical conclusion, pay everyone, just give everyone anything they want, pay people 1 million dollars a day if you wish, no poverty will exist at all then, everyone will have whatever they want. And then you realize that wont work, because this idea of giving people basic income requires other people to provide it, by force. And a state of compulsion where one has to work for another is not freedom, nor is it some superior moral high ground they seem to think they stand on to pronounce these platitudes to the "greedy", who really just want nothing more than to be left alone with their own money and goods they have earned with their willing exchange of labor.
The best way to think about things like this are to take it to a logical conclusion, pay everyone, just give everyone anything they want, pay people 1 million dollars a day if you wish, no poverty will exist at all then, everyone will have whatever they want. And then you realize that wont work, because this idea of giving people basic income requires other people to provide it, by force. And a state of compulsion where one has to work for another is not freedom, nor is it some superior moral high ground they seem to think they stand on to pronounce these platitudes to the "greedy", who really just want nothing more than to be left alone with their own money and goods they have earned with their willing exchange of labor.
Took a fall for something that was illegal for 3wks. It was a law designed to be in violation when it was snuck in.
AltreineirialX
Weaksauce
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UBI with required:
Mandatory drug testing
a dna swab to put into our genetic database
biometreic id card tied to your retina, ear lobe, or thumb
Mandatory drug testing
a dna swab to put into our genetic database
biometreic id card tied to your retina, ear lobe, or thumb
xX_Jack_Carver_Xx
2[H]4U
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Nutzo, that's an idea of how much wealth the nation creates, that the 99.9% do NOT ever see, that it can fund a decent basic living for all by more fairly distributing that wealth.
But you wouldn't retire, there will be inflation, but a new equilibrium which assures most have a living income, while the most wealthy are only very wealthy not obscenely wealthy.
The $45K is a target, best guess, but if it's $20K or $30K or $40K .... the point is to completely END poverty and the need for any of the safety net programs.
By putting the meet of the nations wealth in the hands of the population, it gets spent generating more economic activity, rather than stuffed in a 'mattress' overseas.
But you wouldn't retire, there will be inflation, but a new equilibrium which assures most have a living income, while the most wealthy are only very wealthy not obscenely wealthy.
The $45K is a target, best guess, but if it's $20K or $30K or $40K .... the point is to completely END poverty and the need for any of the safety net programs.
By putting the meet of the nations wealth in the hands of the population, it gets spent generating more economic activity, rather than stuffed in a 'mattress' overseas.
DukenukemX
Supreme [H]ardness
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The idea is that how would an extremely technological society deal with wealth. The answer is they wouldn't. I find it interesting that we can look to Star Trek for things like Tablets but not for things like an economy.
Star Trek also had warp drives, but that isn't likely to ever happen.
Goods will be infinite without replicators. Lots of factories that are 100% automated now, and lots of farming is done with very little man power.
So if no one makes 7.25, you in for a minimum of .. ? 15? or do you oppose higher minimum too? (that is what I find often... which is weird. )
That is patently false. Natural resources are finite, which means the human population consuming them cannot be infinite.
UBI is a band-aid for a problem that cannot be solved by subsidization. Of course it shows immediate benefit in studies, it instantly erases overhead. Long term though it won't actually solve anything, 2 or 3 generations later you'll be asking for a bigger net with the same small chunk of people paying for it. Eventually there will not be enough of other people's money. A 5-10 year study is effectively meaningless, it ignores the long term impact, which has already been observed on a much longer time scale in other empires, having the same employment issues as a result of slavery instead of robots.
D
Deleted member 126051
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No. It won't. Because we're still limited by materials at hand, refinement and our inability to surpass the Von Neumann limit (essentially self-replication).
In ST, we can have replicators build replicators that can build more replicators. We simply need raw materials and energy (which they have in abundance).
The technological differential between robotic construction/assembly and a replicator are a large multiple of orders of magnitude. It's like comparing a slingshot and a rock to a guided missile.
Which is why our economy is based upon endless growth and is completely sustainable.