Universal Basic Income

[blandy]

1 hour ago, Xann said:

Is broken and unworkable.

It's looking that way, for sure, in places. Certainly for a lot of people. However, whatever the system, UBI is still unworkable. Like I said in my first post on this, UBI is a sort of wet dream for (some) idealists, and when reality meets idealism, you never, ever, end up with the ideal as a result. It's always a changed reality that is the consequence. Whether it's the ideal of full employment, everyone having home and heating and safety, whatever it is, and it's often laudable, there is always a tear in the fabric.

You're right, our current fabric of society is badly torn. It needs stitching back together and modifying, but for all the will in the world, it isn't going to end up with everything done by robots and machines with nothing for humans to do but to scurry around on UBI sourced from the taxes on the few mega wealthy.

Humans will always, always create, repair, nurture, fight, invent, investigate, build, knock down...and so on. We'll always communicate, share, steal, give, fetch, farm, travel and so much more. It will always need humans to facilitate and perform those tasks, whether unaided by tech, or helped by it. We're not going to end up in a world of close to zero employment with everyone given shiny coins to tide them over.

[VILLAMARV]

How broken does the system have to be exactly before the people that run it start chucking sweets out the tanks to all the little kids to pacify them?

Personally I'm not in favour of it in a solving all the ills of the world type of context. It doesn't even scratch the surface of many of our problems.

It's an interesting concept whose time may yet come though as the people that run the federal reserve/BoE etc cling on with dear life to the power and influence they have carved out for themselves.

Systems, in theory at least can be perfect. Humans are not. Any system we try and implement will have imperfections. It's not about blindly attacking capitalism itself, but to blindly defend it when the checks and balances societies have have been eroded to the point they have would be a little churlish. Progress not perfection though as some do-gooder's once came up with.

Much like a fair bit of the current Brexit fury though for me. Are we going to use the opportunity to implement any real progressive change? or just bury or heads in the sand and carry on regardless because we've always done it like that? It's not 'the people' who need convincing to come together and work together to make things better whatever your chosen media outlet may be telling you. Not many people in the street would have come up with bail all the banks out, we'll pay the bills and then start up again with you all owning all the resources and land still. It's mass insanity. It's deference through a perceived lack of understanding. "What? you don't understand the basic principals of Keynesian-ism? Well then prole we shall scoff at you from afar and send you the bill!" - no, the vast majority of people may not understand the intricacies of your/our chosen fields of expertise but most people understand the basic principle of fairness and decency. Profit is not inherently evil. Usury is though.

We live in a time where anyone deviating from a particular ideology will face the wrath of the international community either with covert/direct military action, economic 'sanctions' or both. We'll either take you out or starve you out. Hardly a new tactic. And it's not a rant about the 1%, it's just what actually happens. See the evidence we'd want to see of how things could work differently - yeah good luck with collecting that in the current climate.

But there's a conversation taking place around the globe about this issue and it at  least frames the debate from the point of view that there IS a problem with the unevenness of the distribution of wealth. How many years has it taken to get just that concession exactly? But that's got to be a good thing imo. We're getting somewhere, albeit very slowly.

UBI itself though is just papering over the cracks in the dam to me.

 

[snowychap]

6 hours ago, Michelsen said:

«How dare you complain about unemployment? We’re giving you money for free!»

or 

«Why do you need access to a good education? We’re already giving you money for free!» 

or

«How dare you question our fantabulous wealth? We pay for everything you have. For free!»

or 

«Why would you vote for anyone but us? We’re the ones giving you all your money!»

Okay, that's expounding upon your fear(s) - you've failed to indicate how the UBI would lead to this. It might, I suppose, in a very extreme example but it seems like quite a leap to make this your considered reaction. You also seem to have brought other things in to the mix including something about a reduction in educational possibilities. Why?

The last is just bizarre. If there were a UBI then the only way that this would become of relevance would be if someone standing for election were to be standing on removing the UBI. It makes no real sense as an explanation for your fears.

Quote

When I say I believe in the value of work, it means that I see intrinsic good in people coming together in productive arenas. It strengthens communities and social bonds, and it gives people a stake in our collective productivity. I think there’s something fundamentally democratic about our collective goods being the product of our collective contribution. I may be an old fashioned, semi-Marxist luddite, but I want fair work for fair wages, not pacifying blanket handouts from a capitalist de facto aristocracy.  

That's all very well but that's hardly a universal 'value of work'. You've qualified it immediately by talking about productive arenas: what if the work that one is being compelled to do by circumstance at the margins of the labour market is not in any way productive, or is not seen as important or productive by society or is not given the recompense that would suggest that it is particularly productive (which would, almost by definition, be the case at the bottom end of the labour market)?

Your 'value of work' theory appears to be rooted in a concept of the present and the near past as somewhat immutable rather than likely to change or even as a mere snapshot on an ever changing path. As you're a history teacher, I do find that position quite troubling. As you've put in a claim of semi-Marxism, I find the position illogical.

Edited March 3, 2018 by snowychap

[VILLAMARV]

To me the voting point there is more about a "keep voting for us (or the us with the different colour badge) Or your money might stop. And then what do you do? Is that what you want coz that's what'll happen" type scenario.

If it ever became a thing it would be a political football used to spread fear among the populous like the NHS is now of that I have no doubt.

If someone needs to give me £10k a year to be free I'm not really free am I?

[snowychap]

18 minutes ago, VILLAMARV said:

To me the voting point there is more about a "keep voting for us (or the us with the different colour badge) Or your money might stop. And then what do you do? Is that what you want coz that's what'll happen" type scenario.

You're going to really have to explain how this would apparently work as an argument against a UBI.

Who is issuing this threat and who are they threatening? It can't be only a section of society as the income would be universal and therefore everyone would lose it. It can't be if a group or all people failed to vote for one particular party that is returned to power otherwise everyone would have to lose out on the universal income even the ones who complied with the threat for the punishment to take hold.

The only way for it to work would be for the income not to be truly universal and for it to be conditional - in which case it would not be a UBI and thus the argument is against something else completely.

18 minutes ago, VILLAMARV said:

If it ever became a thing it would be a political football used to spread fear among the populous like the NHS is now of that I have no doubt.

Probably but that's politics. Political topics discussed are political footballs.

18 minutes ago, VILLAMARV said:

If someone needs to give me £10k a year to be free I'm not really free am I?

I think we'd do well to accept that freedoms are constrained necessarily by the political framework that we choose to fit our societies in to and the political decisions we make within these frameworks. It's only the levels of freedom that we give up that are up for discussion not a notion about whether we are free.

As far as looking at it as a 'sum in order to be free' then I think you're coming at it with preconceived sword unsheathed.

Edited March 3, 2018 by snowychap

[VILLAMARV]

The point I'm making is about how invested in the system people's income is.

[snowychap]

15 minutes ago, VILLAMARV said:

The point I'm making is about how invested in the system people's income is.

That's a rather different and more generally applicable point.

[HanoiVillan]

For those who would like to read more opinions on this, several of us had this argument before on here about a year and a half ago:

Start about halfway down page 107 and it goes on for four or five pages. 

[theboyangel]

This sounds as likely as a nation being hoodwinked into voting to leave a union with no plan or idea what to do upon leaving......

oh wait, it’s going to happen isn’t it 

 

[snowychap]

11 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

Start about halfway down page 107 and it goes on for four or five pages.

Though, as @Limpid reminded me a week or so ago, not everyone sees threads split across pages in the same way (i.e. it's not page 107 for all) so it's better to go with a link to a specific post as the starting point.

[HanoiVillan]

5 minutes ago, snowychap said:

Though, as @Limpid reminded me a week or so ago, not everyone sees threads split across pages in the same way (i.e. it's not page 107 for all) so it's better to go with a link to a specific post as the starting point.

Oh, right! I wonder how many people have me on ignore  The first post seems to be this one:

 

[VILLAMARV]

21 minutes ago, snowychap said:

You're going to really have to explain how this would apparently work as an argument against a UBI.

Who is issuing this threat and who are they threatening? It can't be only a section of society as the income would be universal and therefore everyone would lose it. It can't be if a group or all people failed to vote for one particular party that is returned to power otherwise everyone would have to lose out on the universal income even the ones who complied with the threat for the punishment to take hold.

The only way for it to work would be for the income not to be truly universal and for it to be conditional - in which case it would not be a UBI and thus the argument is against something else completely.

Probably but that's politics. Political topics discussed are political footballs.

I think we'd do well to accept that freedoms are constrained necessarily by the political framework that we choose to fit our societies in to and the political decisions we make within these frameworks. It's only the levels of freedom that we give up that are up for discussion not a notion about whether we are free.

As far as looking at it as a 'sum in order to be free' then I think you're coming at it with preconceived sword unsheathed.

I'm not arguing Michelsen's point for him or purporting to know what he meant. I can tell you how I took it though.

My point is that while we all must adhere to taxes and so on regardless of profession, certain sections of society have more to gain or lose in different scenarios. Someone who works for the council has more invested in the system than someone who works in private business for example. The more you rely on the system (whichever one is the vogue of the time) for survival is what I mean by "invested in the system" in my above reply. Therefore to my way of thinking - one way to keep people on-side for regimes of ever increasing taxation for example, is to have their incomes directly or indirectly linked at the source. It all becomes too big to fail.

There's no need for the threats or the jackboots if everyone's running around like good little consumers and voters is there? Fear of the unknown is very real and very powerful, surely the Stasi stands as a great example. The more people perceive they have to lose the more control over their thinking. If people are going to be happy to continue trading morals for cash or turning a blind eye of tacet approval to those who do, then take the money, just like every tax policy that swung their votes before and will continue to do so. I feel like posting a John Carpenter inspired "This is your God" dollar but it might seem like I'm joking. Like I said in my earlier post UBI would just be papering over the cracks in the dam to me. It's not that UBI will cause any of it, but will it buy enough people off if they did it? is the interesting question to me.

The idea that certain sections of society would be set upon and deemed as non-worthy of reciepence is entirely valid imo. Is the Mail going to be happy about handing over £10k/£20k/10p whatever it might be to convicted peadophiles? or people on a terrorist watchlist? - Yeah I get the term universal meaning universal but you surely see the point. More than just another political football to me. More, conceptually, about economic slavery or an extension of the penal system without the high prison costs perhaps? Either way there's an instant reliance on the state for a proportion of income that isn't currently there.

Ok there's a certain triteness in my use of the word free and the allusion toward freedom. It wasn't meant in a Braveheart way.

going back to "Who is issuing this threat and who are they threatening?", surely the questions are "Who is handing this money out?" and "Why do they want to give it to me?". How about curbing the ability of those making these decisions to control the markets and global arena as they do? Isn't the threat of losing that why we're all having the conversation in the first place?

[VILLAMARV]

15 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

Oh, right! I wonder how many people have me on ignore  The first post seems to be this one:

 

It just dawned on me there'll be posters now going "why am I getting likes for a post that's 2 years old?"

Cheers for the link though.

[VILLAMARV]

 

There was a conversation about UBI on Joe Rogans podcast before Xmas. Just thought I'd leave a link.

[snowychap]

9 hours ago, VILLAMARV said:

The idea that certain sections of society would be set upon and deemed as non-worthy of reciepence is entirely valid imo. Is the Mail going to be happy about handing over £10k/£20k/10p whatever it might be to convicted peadophiles? or people on a terrorist watchlist? - Yeah I get the term universal meaning universal but you surely see the point.

I think your point is invalid because your argument against something universal is an argument against something else which wouldn't be universal.

If your point were merely, universality wouldn't work then that's fine. I don't agree with it but it's a valid argumnt.

Changing the attributes of something so that you can create an argument means that you aren't arguing against the original thing but rather what you have had to change it to. I'd agree with you that some form of conditional income guarantee system that relies upon meeting certain criteria is open to the criticisms that you have levelled above.

As to your 'certain sections' then I can't see that it should apply to anyone else other than those who are convicted and incarcerated. Anyone in this group could be penalized by the criminal justice system so as they wouldn't receipt the cash amount of their universal income (their payment could be required to partially fund the cost of their incarceration, for example). This would keep the universality aspect of it whilst dealing with any problems of someone having money paid to them whilst being inside.

9 hours ago, VILLAMARV said:

Isn't the threat of losing that why we're all having the conversation in the first place?

Oh, very much so, I think.

Unless anyone can direct me to a clear mapping out of a post-capitalist economic system and how we get there then I'll probably stick to looking at and thinking about how one can paper over the cracks in the dam. If it helps to stop those at the bottom getting wet then I think that I'm less worried about the postponement of the revolution than I may have been a decade or so ago.

9 hours ago, VILLAMARV said:

How about curbing the ability of those making these decisions to control the markets and global arena as they do?

Other than The Revolution, I don't see how that's going to happen and, if we're coming at it from a western perspective, then you'd still have to be dealing with the might of the authoritarian state capitalists afterwards.

Edited March 4, 2018 by snowychap

[VILLAMARV]

 

17 minutes ago, snowychap said:

I think your point is invalid because your argument against something universal is an argument against something else which wouldn't be universal.

If your point were merely, universality wouldn't work then that's fine. I don't agree with it but it's a valid argumnt.

Changing the attributes of something so that you can create an argument means that you aren't arguing against the original thing but rather what you have had to change it to. I'd agree with you that some form of conditional income guarantee system that relies upon meeting certain criteria is open to the criticisms that you have levelled above.

you have just quoted the part about my knowing what universal means snowy

I'm not trying to reframe the argument - just extrapolating on whats been said and wading in on the reaction to Michelsens point. My own view on UBI is laid out in my first post. I just feel questioning the validity of someone saying it could be used as a political weapon because it would become by definition a basic income and therefore not a universal basic income may be technically correct but ignores the reality. Humans make a mess of things. Words can mean a lot, but also very little.

I am not saying universality is impossible. Or that it wouldnt/couldnt operate and have an immediate impact on the lives of the vast majority of us. What form that impact might take or what changes sociologically may happen is surely one of the points of discussion on this topic though.

Personally I feel it is a distraction. When someone starts waving 1000's of pounds at me to go away I know I'm close to something When the company I owe my bills to wants to give me the money to pay my bills......

Quote

As to your 'certain sections' then I can't see that it should apply to anyone else other than those who are convicted and incarcerated. Anyone in this groupcould be penalized by the criminal justice system so as they wouldn't receipt the cash amount of their universal income (their payment could be required to partially fund the cost of their incarceration, for example). This would keep the universality aspect of it whilst dealing with any problems of someone having money paid to them whilst being inside.

The entire course of human history is littered with examples of sections of society be it races/religions, sexes, wealth, criminality - you name it, used as scapegoats. When the money is rolling and the problems remain where do you honestly believe the focus will be shifted to? Will the animosity towards 'different' people stop because everyone has enough to buy some things? All very well to say what you say above but what about when the paedo has done his time. Back out, living next door to Mrs Jones? What if 10 years down the line he has invested well and the rest of the street have not. Where is the animosity in the Mail headlines going to be aimed exaclty? Like blandy already touched upon, if the people in this equation are to be relied upon to spread the load of work as well as the spoils then great!, We've cracked it. But people are people and they will react in ways we cant imagine or account for in well meaning economic hypotheses. No one thinks pensions are bad do they? We would all rather one than not I'm guessing. Look at the way the welfare state is used already by those wielding the power, against the people it's designed to help. And look at the way 'Welfare' is referred to when we're basically talking about making sure our grandparents can have the heating on. You honestly suggest none of this is relevant because it would render one word obsolete? When the very point of it is to uphold the status quo?

However I also take on board your point that we are talking hypothetical scenarios and like I said I'm not saying universality of payment is unachievable. What effect will it have? is surely the discussion to be had though.

Quote

Oh, very much so, I think.

Unless anyone can direct me to a clear mapping out of a post-capitalist economic system and how we get there then I'll probably stick to looking at and thinking about how one can paper over the cracks in the dam. If it helps to stop those at the bottom getting wet then I think that I'm less worried about the postponement of the revolution than I may have been a decade or so ago.

Like I said earlier it's not about knocking 'capitalism' but regaining a large enough element of control over it. Helping people at the bottom could start in earnest at 9am on Monday morning if there was the political will and it wouldn't need UBI or a new economic system either. The idea that this is in some way a humanitarian move though is, well, lets just say, not an idea that I would personally subscribe to. Your point about getting people to pay for their own incarceration rings true here though for me. Simply throwing money at amazingly complex problems is rarely the answer.

My point about papering over cracks in dams specifically is that paper doesn't hold the water back. Paper over cracks in walls if you want but dams? Something granite, concrete, long-lasting and proven please every time. Like you say a clear path for the future is hardly laid out for us.

Quote

Other than The Revolution, I don't see how that's going to happen and, if we're coming at it from a western perspective, then you'd still have to be dealing with the might of the authoritarian state capitalists afterwards.

Vive la revolution! I was trying to think of a more measured response but, nah, got nowt better than that! No, but seriously, how you would go about reigning in that influence is obviously a hot topic or we wouldn't be even having this conversation. And there is a massive problem with the distribution of wealth in the current system.

If a boat is taking in water you can always just bail it out and as long as the water going in is always equal to or less than the water going out, the boat will stay afloat. At some point you might want to actually fix the boat though.

Any way, for little reason other than to finish on a pleasant note. here's a lovely dam in Wales in the sunshine.

[snowychap]

1 hour ago, VILLAMARV said:

you have just quoted the part about my knowing what universal means snowy

No, I quoted the bit where you said 'you get the term universal meaning universal but'.

1 hour ago, VILLAMARV said:

You honestly suggest none of this is relevant because it would render one word obsolete?

It's not about rendering one word obsolete. It's about changing what someone has suggested in to something else entirely in order to level criticisms at it.

Quote

you have just quoted the part about my knowing what universal means snowy

I'm not trying to reframe the argument - just extrapolating on whats been said and wading in on the reaction to Michelsens point. My own view on UBI is laid out in my first post. I just feel questioning the validity of someone saying it could be used as a political weapon because it would become by definition a basic income and therefore not a universal basic income may be technically correct but ignores the reality. Humans make a mess of things. Words can mean a lot, but also very little.

I am not saying universality is impossible. Or that it wouldnt/couldnt operate and have an immediate impact on the lives of the vast majority of us. What form that impact might take or what changes sociologically may happen is surely one of the points of discussion on this topic though.

Personally I feel it is a distraction. When someone starts waving 1000's of pounds at me to go away I know I'm close to something When the company I owe my bills to wants to give me the money to pay my bills......

The entire course of human history is littered with examples of sections of society be it races/religions, sexes, wealth, criminality - you name it, used as scapegoats. When the money is rolling and the problems remain where do you honestly believe the focus will be shifted to? Will the animosity towards 'different' people stop because everyone has enough to buy some things? All very well to say what you say above but what about when the paedo has done his time. Back out, living next door to Mrs Jones? What if 10 years down the line he has invested well and the rest of the street have not. Where is the animosity in the Mail headlines going to be aimed exaclty? Like blandy already touched upon, if the people in this equation are to be relied upon to spread the load of work as well as the spoils then great!, We've cracked it. But people are people and they will react in ways we cant imagine or account for in well meaning economic hypotheses. No one thinks pensions are bad do they? We would all rather one than not I'm guessing. Look at the way the welfare state is used already by those wielding the power, against the people it's designed to help. And look at the way 'Welfare' is referred to when we're basically talking about making sure our grandparents can have the heating on. You honestly suggest none of this is relevant because it would render one word obsolete? When the very point of it is to uphold the status quo?

However I also take on board your point that we are talking hypothetical scenarios and like I said I'm not saying universality of payment is unachievable.

And the vast majority of this is just riffing on the same thing that you did in the previous post.

You're not critiquing a UBI (or basic income guarantee) here. You're critiquing something else. Now you may view this something else as the inevitable end result of any introduction of a UBI but that is, again, something entirely different.

Effectively, you're criticizing what you claim to be reality, scapegoating, animosity, people, the media, &c. If those things are the barriers to success for this one idea then they're the barrier to success for any other idea unless those ideas sort out any or more than one of the people, the media, politics, reality, &c.

2 hours ago, VILLAMARV said:

What effect will it have? is surely the discussion to be had though.

Only if it can be agreed that we're talking about the same thing. Otherwise see above.

2 hours ago, VILLAMARV said:

Like I said earlier it's not about knocking 'capitalism' but regaining a large enough element of control over it. Helping people at the bottom could start in earnest at 9am on Monday morning if there was the political will and it wouldn't need UBI or a new economic system either. The idea that this is in some way a humanitarian move though is, well, lets just say, not an idea that I would personally subscribe to. Your point about getting people to pay for their own incarceration rings true here though for me. Simply throwing money at amazingly complex problems is rarely the answer.

You're coming at it from the wrong angle (i.e. that it's simply a money-throwing exercise as you keep repeating) when there are clearly thought out mechanisms for how and why it could improve the situation for people (poverty trap and so on).

Now these mechanisms may be wrong and they may not work and a UBI might not be the answer. I've never said it necessarily is; I've just considered that it's something worth seriously looking in to and investigating as, even if it isn't the answer, it might contain some answers that could be used in a different future system.

Unfortunately what we're doing in our exchanges isn't discussing (a) UBI, so I'm afraid I'll have to leave it there as there are plenty of other threads to talk about how people, the media and politics screw things up.

[VILLAMARV]

@snowychap

We have nothing to argue about as far as I can see.

All I was doing was offering up an attempted reasoning of what Michelsen may have been getting at when you asked him to clarify this statement.

On 3/2/2018 at 22:41, Michelsen said:

I fear it would clientelize the working (or non-working, in this case) and middle classes and further cement the supremacy of the capitalist class and the current economic paradigm. For me, UBI would be the ultimate surrender in the fight for a classless society.

We can disagree, fine, but I don't think it's correct to dismiss the relevancy as if I've misunderstood the point somehow. Especially in relation to the quote above. UBI if it moves from a concept to a reality will have to operate within the current political and socioeconomic paradigm. If I'm critiqueing 'something else' and not UBI specifically then is that not the why of the UBI debate? And is that not the actual point?

As I've said I'm not suggesting helping people is bad or that some people's lives couldn't benefit from it as an idea. "An interesting concept whose time may yet come" is about as definitive as I've been.

 

[El Zen]

On 3.3.2018 at 15:26, snowychap said:

Okay, that's expounding upon your fear(s) - you've failed to indicate how the UBI would lead to this. It might, I suppose, in a very extreme example but it seems like quite a leap to make this your considered reaction. You also seem to have brought other things in to the mix including something about a reduction in educational possibilities. Why?

The last is just bizarre. If there were a UBI then the only way that this would become of relevance would be if someone standing for election were to be standing on removing the UBI. It makes no real sense as an explanation for your fears.

That's all very well but that's hardly a universal 'value of work'. You've qualified it immediately by talking about productive arenas: what if the work that one is being compelled to do by circumstance at the margins of the labour market is not in any way productive, or is not seen as important or productive by society or is not given the recompense that would suggest that it is particularly productive (which would, almost by definition, be the case at the bottom end of the labour market)?

Your 'value of work' theory appears to be rooted in a concept of the present and the near past as somewhat immutable rather than likely to change or even as a mere snapshot on an ever changing path. As you're a history teacher, I do find that position quite troubling. As you've put in a claim of semi-Marxism, I find the position illogical.

I have to say I am surprised by the tone of your post. We can disagree, sure, but I didn’t think anything about my posts was of such a nature that required taking our gloves off. 

1) My ideal society is a society without economic class structures. My fear is that by giving people a UBI, that is big enough to keep you from wanting to change the system but not big enough to erase class divisions, we’re only providing the capitalist class with another tool they can use to keep their privileges. I’d rather keep working for real equality. 

2) A UBI would give tories and neo-libs a very handy excuse when they want to cut something else next. It would be a terrible excuse, but when has that ever stopped them before? 

3) The context of my initial post was the, according to some, inevitable future scenario where automatization leads us to surrender a near-monopoly on employment to the capitalist class. If we accept that in exchange for a basic income, then I can’t see how that would not cement class divisions and make the rest of us de facto clients of the capitalist class. They wouldn’t accept financing the UBI out of the kindness of their hearts, they’d be paying to keep us happy enough not to challenge their position. 

4) I can easily see questions being asked about the need for universial education if we accept permanent unemployment as the norm, rather than the exception. Many, many people have a strictly instrumental view of education. Again, they would be wrong, but again, when has that ever stopped them? 

5) I can easily see the capitalist class and their political allies using the UBI as a shield to protect them from egalitarian threats. ‘Look at the nasty socialists! They want to take our money! Since our money pays for all of your income...’ etc. 

6) I certainly didn’t attempt any theory of anything, and nothing I wrote was intended as a description of the status quo or the innate nature of all work. I was describing a belief that fair work for fair wages is a good thing and a better alternative than unemployment. It doesn’t strike me as too controversial, and I certainly don’t think having that position affects my ability to teach history, but I think you could have made your point without making such remarks anyway. 

7) I put in what I thought was obviously a self-depricating joke about semi-Marxism. I’m not sure if the lable actually applies to me, although I do find his beard impressive and believe we could probably find some common ground when it comes to, let’s call it, the potential value of work. 

Edited March 4, 2018 by Michelsen

[sidcow]

I've not read all of this thread but I was suprised to see it exists because this has been troubling me for some time. 

Artificial intelligence is apparently going to replace nearly all jobs in the not too distant future.  This is not something which is 100 years away, a good deal of it will happen in 15-20 years.  I am already worrying what my kids will do to earn money. 

The problem is for every previous technological revolution more, different jobs have been created as a result.  People keep pointing to that to provide reassurance.  But that is just plain wrong.  Any new jobs can then themselves be carried out by AI, we have already reached that tipping point according to many commentators. 

So then a Capitalists economy becomes a paradox. 

If you have millions of machines replacing people in work, who are they creating for? Who will have the money to buy the cars they make, buy the fridges they make, eat the food they prepare, buy the insurance policy they have underwritten, live in the house they have made, put money into the bank account they are controlling. 

If machines replace all jobs, no one earns money so they can't pay for what the machines are doing.  Therefore the economy has to break down. 

However, due to the expense of creating all of these machines, many many companies will fall by the wayside or sell out to another company who can afford the machines.  We will probably end up with a small number of massive global companies controlling the machines, and as we know very large global companies are extremely difficult to tax. 

If Government cannot collect tax, how do they then provide a universal income?  

I really worry about these things. 

It might seem like pie in the sky but the AI rollout is starting now and will gather pace.  Theoretically there is absolutely no job a machine will not be able to do. 

My whole thoughts around AI is just because we can, should we? 

The answer is probably not as the endgame could be total breakdown of society, but of course whilst people can get mega rich now by using machines, they most certainly will and bugger the consequences.