Don't Let Universal Basic Income Become a Scam

--While universal basic income will likely be a necessity in the new economic status quo, we shouldn't allow it to become a scam to mostly benefit the ultra-rich, oligarchs, and huge corporations

-Donate via Bitcoin: 15evMNUN1g4qdRxywbHFCKNfdCTjxtztfj

-Donate via Ethereum: 0xe3E6b538E1CD21D48Ff1Ddf2D744ea8B95Ba1930

-Donate via Litecoin: LhNVT9j5gQj8U1AbwLzwfoc5okDoiFn4Mt

-Call the 24/7 Voicemail Line: (219)-2DAVIDP

-Timely news is important! We upload new clips every day, 6-8 stories! Make sure to subscribe!

Broadcast on April 3, 2018

[neonlost]

More companies need to be owned by their employees. It would give people more of a sense of purpose and they'd care about the future of the company and country instead of their bottom line.

[adcyuumi]

There came a day when people who had a strong work ethic could no longer find enough work to make ends meet. They began to live in poverty despite working two jobs and splitting their bills with another person (a spouse or roommate of some kind). This group in our society began to grow... and grow. And now we are finally talking about the natural solution -- UBI. I for one am glad to see the days of people crying about communism, socialism, and lazy welfare recipients begin to die. The world is changing, and people are suffering because what work they can find kills them without paying the bills. It's time for UBI to become a thing.

If the customer pool for low-end goods (those someone on a minimum income can afford as long as they have some income to spend) increases, those goods probably won't see much price inflation. Prices may in fact go DOWN for some of those goods, similar to the price of bread -- the increased volume of sales will allow a lower price. Keep in mind that all of these non-essential goods are now competing for this money, also. While pricing on goods might be unstable at first with a UBI in place, it would stabilize after a while. We'd have a less volatile economy in the long term, since businesses would know their customers had a steady income to continue buying. (Gum sales would decline; people buy that instead of food when money is extremely tight, to help ward off hunger pangs. Gum sales spike in times of hardship.)

Automation saves money for businesses, but at the expense of worker numbers. Taxing said businesses and using that money to grant a UBI to those ex-workers who now have no job is the only real solution, given that automation cannot be stopped. Why would you waste EVERYONE'S time doing things by hand, when a machine could do it and give us all free time? UBI is the future.

[crazytosh]

We should consider Universal Basic Services, not just UBI. This means free public services, such as health, education, transport, internet, electricity, etc. for everyone.

[Ian_sothejokeworks]

Perhaps if UBI were funded through higher corporate taxes, as a punishment for necessitating it in the first place? It seems like you'd NEED that corporate tax money, simply to afford it.

[jessdota]

One of the main reasons I am a proponent of ubi is because of the fact that it is far more likely to happen compared to something like fundamentally dealing with wealth inequality. As long as our government serves capital instead of the people wealth inequality won't even be in the range of acceptable political discourse . Also, preventing poverty now > theoretically replacing the entire system with something that isn't dogshit unless you're rich as sin.

[ronwisegamgee]

If the choice was between increasing minimum wages and implementing UBI at just below the poverty line (like at $12000/year), I'd rather have UBI than an increased minimum wage. One, increased minimum wages do nothing for the unemployed, which will be drastically increasing as automation becomes more prevalent. Two, not every company is a Wal-Mart/Starbucks/McDonald's or some other giant corporation that pays its employees a near-minimum wage job; small businesses often have a very hard time breaking even, and pushing for a higher minimum wage would force them to fire employees and/or prevent them from hiring new employees at a greater rate than by providing a government program like UBI.

Also, this point of view of "I'd rather not have the top 1% not benefit so bad that the bottom 60% lose out on UBI" is essentially shooting yourself in the foot out of spite. UBI is not a permanent solution, but it is a great stepping stone to help us transition to something like an NLRBE as opposed to a cyberpunk dystopia. UBI was on the table at congress during Nixon's administration and the Democrats fucked it up with their dissatisfaction of the proposed amount not being enough; let's not commit the same mistake again if we get a presidential candidate running with UBI as one of their policies for the 2020 election *cough* Andrew Yang *cough*

[SiisKolkytEuroo]

The point of the UBI is exactly to help get rid of minimum wage altogether. There is absolutely no point in having a minimum wage or other strict employment laws, when everyone is guaranteed a basic income and are free to choose whatever part-time or full time work they want for as little or as much wage as they are happy with.

[wvu]

Yang is opposed to increasing the minimum wage. Please remember this the next time he comes on your show.

[jpoeng]

Good points on this.

I think I prefer living wage as a starting point to make sure businesses aren't transferring their payroll costs to taxpayers via safety net mechanisms. That also incentivizes full time employment.

Then, perhaps some kind of negative income tax or UBI as a simpler means to provide for people who can't work for whatever reason.

[dribrom]

In Finland they are doing an experiment of the effect universal basic income. The study population consist of 2, 000 persons selected at random in December 2016.
They will be paid a basic income for a period of two years (1 January 2017 - 31 December 2018). Set at €560 per month, the basic income is paid unconditionally and without means testing. Recipients get it automatically once a month. Will be interesting what the outcome of this study will be.

[DahlenDummies]

David's reasons for being critical of UBI. "I'm a shill, I'm a sellout, I want to be on CNN."

[bogartchichi]

This guy supports Sanders he needs to support Yang 2020.

[p.bamygdala]

First time here. (Edit: Liked and) subscribed. Excellent points and cautionary advice on a very important topic.

It occurred to me that unfortunately, UBI will likely be introduced not as a necessary and progressive solution to protect society from job loss due to AI and automation, but rather as a “tax break” or some other easily-digestible and familiar concept that will have other back-door techniques to still serve business interests at the expense of the average worker.

However, I am of the hopeful opinion that progressive Billionaires like Musk genuinely want to do good through UBI. For example, if the demand for low wage or undesirable jobs drops (since it would be economically equal or comparable to staying at home with UBI) then it will result in a labor shortage, which will be solved either by increased wages, more attractive working conditions, or illegal immigrant labor increase. Either way, it will improve the life of the worker, not big business.

[alecryan]

The subject was lightly touched on, but the largest concern with UBI is that it artificially drives up demand. By dropping $9-10, 000 in every poor person's lap, you encourage them to go out and buy goods. That demand spike would need to be met with an appropriate spike in supply in order to keep prices level, which some economists predict businesses are likely to do in order to sell more goods. But now we're also supposed to slap regulations and wage hikes on businesses on top of UBI? So we're supposed to prevent the UBI from being used to hurt the poor by.. instating policies that hurt the businesses making the goods for poor people to buy? The economics don't parse, all that will be accomplished is raising prices and effective wages being stagnant or declining.

[TheBlarggle]

Guaranteed if UBI became a thing, prices would inflate to reflect that and the poor would maintain that status.

There will never be reliable standards of living when unchecked, unregulated capitalism is allowed to wrap its greed around everything.

[IizUname]

Probably because there's a good chance that AI can steal basic programming jobs, circuit design, etc.

[RandomJHK]

We need to reframe the economic objective: How do we increase entrepreneurship and small businesses? Increasing the minimum wage and making the employer responsible for health insurance is too expensive for most startups and small businesses. Also there are too many Americans who lack skills. They need to be trained and college does not train them.

[TiagoMorbusSa]

Have you noticed how all of a sudden there's a lot of bitcoin companies trying to make a profit off of bitcoin?
It's crashing hard. It doesn't seem to be stopping.
Make the connection.
All I want is the fucking graphics card prices to come back down, the fucking leeches.

[MCLastUsername]

Employers don't pay what you need, they pay what you are worth i.e. the lowest they can get away with. Poor people are cheaper to hire than rich people. That's why e.g. everything you own is made in China. If UBI makes us less poor and desperate, then wages will go up. However, prices will also go up, so it's a double-edged sword.

[nyx]

I think in order for a UBI to be a reality, housing and medical costs would need to drop. If we assume that only 18+ citizens should have access to a $10k/yr UBI then it would've cost over $2.4 trillion in 2017. Only $3.3 trillion was collected in federal taxes for fiscal year 2017. Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid cost $2.4 trillion. There's simply not enough money to have a UBI and SS and Medicare/Medicaid.

Many poor people spend most of their paychecks on rent. If housing costs were lower, then you could have a more affordable UBI after making adjustments to tax rates and military spending.