I don't understand. What under UBI is preventing me from quitting my job and spending the rest of my life playing videogames? I know it's unpopular opinion on HN, but most people don't really learn and explore in their free time, and they don't have high requirements from life. A place to stay, food and electricity is all they need for the most part.
Nothing really. However, to get that really good TV screen, impress would be partners or just make yourself more content, you might want to get a good job.
Even if some people opt to just do nothing and get money for that, it's no big deal. I'd much rather see people spend time with their kids and get UBI than them having to work bullshit jobs that benefit no one (telemarketer or whatever).
Well, you have a natural experiment on this. People in western europe have a solid welfare net, with programs allowing them to effectively have cycles of work/welfare. Eastern Europe doesn't. Work market is open and free.
What is happening? You have lots of work migration from Romania to UK where both parties are very happy: employers would much rather hire people that are there to work and make money, as opposed to people that are just clocking their 12 months. And employees are happy to work hard and make a lot of money.
I'm not venturing to comment on what conclusions should be drawn from this, but I do caution against knee-jerk ones. On one hand the system seems to have self-balanced nicely. On another, it's basically taking advantage on the east-west difference, and that has an obvious time limit.
Actually what you say is probably what you believe to be true, but it is not: in Western Europe there is a safety net, but it does not work that simple so you work and take a break, with such a work history you can't get any credit to buy a house or a car or anything more that what you can afford in cash, not even an above average smartphone. The safety net works if you lose your job, not if you quit when you want a long vacation. In some countries the money you get are very close to the minimum wage, in others the difference is big enough that you want to work to have some money to get out with the friends once a week.
Well, that's not very different from what I'm saying. Working for a year, getting fired then coasting half a year on minimum welfare plus a bit of savings - this sounds plausible (if not very comfortable) based on what you're saying as well.
What I quite like about the UBI is that it would raise the bar for bullshit jobs- currently they’re low paid because they are not valuable to society but enough desperate people need the money to persevere with this. I think UBI would make business owners think twice about making the workers do some stupid, pointless tasks or if they insist they would have to pay handsomely for it.
Personally I don’t mind doing some tedious work as long as I’m being paid fairly for it and I’d still do it on top of UBI.
Have you, for the past several years, earned much more than minimum salary (and UBI would presumably be less than that)?
If so, what has prevented you from saving all the excess money beyond minimum salary and retiring (or taking several years off), living on minimum expenses while playing videogames?
Actually that is my current strategy. I make twice the average salary for my country and my monthly spending is around the minimum salary. Everything excess is going on a savings account, which currently has the equivalent of 100 average salaries. I plan to retire early or take few years off.
The main thing preventing that for a good part of the population is that it's quite difficult to earn enough for it to last for the rest of your life. Conservatively you need about 30-40x your yearly spending in the bank to never have to work again. Say you need about 15000€ a year for rent, food, entertainment and other expenses. You'd have to save at least half a million euros to afford that indefinitely. Most people never manage to earn that much excess income and those who do are likely in a demographic that enjoys what they do and would continue working.
>If so, what has prevented you from saving all the excess money beyond minimum salary and retiring
I don't see what this has to do with UBI, other than maybe you're trying to counter the presented hypothetical by asking if the parent poster would actually be happy to live frugally.
Not only are there plenty of people with professional success that save aggressively or have other goals (e.g. skiiers that makes six figures and still live like skibums), but they're a different category than people that would be willing to coast by minimally if given the opportunity.
By that logic nobody would want to get raises or work full time. Everyone would try to find a part time job that barely covers their expenses and then spend the rest of their time playing video games.
Lack of benefits, job security/confidence you will find 6 out of 12 months of contracts on a regular schedule. You'd need to be pretty sure you could average out 50% of your pay (more like 60-70% to cover benefits and the extra taxes) over 12 month periods and have enough buffer to cover unexpected gaps. You also have to account for the unpaid time 'working' to find those contracts and the contracts may not be the same pay rate each time. Its doable, but its certainly not as straightforward as it seems on paper.
Yep, it's true for alcoholics, drug users, and gameaholics. I knew one gameaholic, which lived in hostel, and worked only when necessary. Most of the time, he played a game on his notebook.
It's surprisingly hard to find stable long term part time jobs paying more than the hourly min wage (which isn't enough to afford rent+food in most places)
> What under UBI is preventing me from quitting my job and spending the rest of my life playing videogames?
Nothing, except that UBI is a basic income, so you don't have the money for the latest and greatest gaming PC. You have enough money to not go homeless, but not a whole lot more. If you want that PC, you have to still work for it.
If you look around, most people aren't exactly living the most basic life possible with the least work possible, they quite like their luxury goods in exchange for work.
That depends on what is the definition of basic. I assume food, electricity, water and a place to live would be covered under UBI, I think there's no arguing about that. But anything else? I can easily imagine calls for extension for things like entertainment. Should internet access be considered basic? How about TV or a game console? Mobile phone? I'd say these shouldn't fall under "basic" needs, but that might change.
Not everyone has the latest and greatest gaming PC; I know people that can afford it, but they play games that are 2-5 years old they can buy discounted ($20 instead of launch price of $60) and the average computer of the day can play with max settings. Living on UBI does not make people stupid, just lower budgeted and even encourages making some better decisions - having more sense than money.
As someone who has tried that, eventual depression. Sitting around doing nothing is awesome until it isn't
I took a over a year off from working two years ago, and it probably took less than 6 months for depression to begin setting in. By a year I recognized how awful and lethargic I felt, and when I started working again a few months later I was ecstatic to get out of bed at 6:30am to actually go do something every day. In the past this is something I would've loathed, but it was so much better than sitting around all day playing games.
I can't speak for others, but I know personally I need "work" to be happy. I don't think it has to be a job at an office, but something to make me feel like I'm contributing and striving towards something useful & bigger than myself.
There's definitely a magic number there for people who are used to being productive/creative at work. Finding the proper length for a hiatus where you feel refreshed and ready to work again without the burnout, but not so long that you become depressed/lazy/restless is tough. Especially so if it takes a while to find the next job after said hiatus the restlessness and depression can set despite the planning.
Absolutely nothing would be stopping you from living solely on UBI. You would have very basic accommodation, very basic food, and very little left over for entertainment and leisure.
I'm sure some people would be perfectly content living like that, but the vast majority want more. They want a nicer house/apartment, they want nicer food and snacks, and they want to travel, go to restaurants, go see movies, have parties, and so on.
Because most people generally want more than just the bare minimum basics, they are motivated to work for that extra comfort and ability to do things.
UBI simply provides a safety net for how far towards rock bottom you can fall.
> most people don't really learn and explore in their free time, and they don't have high requirements from life
Most people want luxuries associated with middle-class lifestyle, that is pretty clear. Reasonable UBI would be less than 1/4 of median wage, but there are not many people with median wage switching to quarter-time jobs and living ultra-frugal life while spending rest of their time playing videogames.
What kind of percentage of people that have jobs today do you think are really productive in society and benefiting it? I think having a job does not mean you are benefiting society. You can be a telemarketer, a manager in a pesticide factory or developing new ad tracking technology. In my opinion, it'd be much better for those people to stay at home with their kids and get UBI.
And like I said in my other comment, there are a bunch of incentives. People usually want to have more money to save up, buy more stuff, feel more secure, etc. so people would work to have more money than the basic income. Apart from that, people want jobs to have a higher status among their peers and some people genuinely like what they do.
If UBI was introduced, would you personally sit around all day or would you continue working? If you'd continue working, what makes you think you're the only one?
Cherry picking jobs that stir emotions doesn't count: these jobs exists purely due to supply and demand... someone wants this shitty thing done so there will be someone available to do it. That won't change.
Utopian societies don't exist but giving people free money that is paid for by the middle class (yes, the middle class will fund this, not the billionaires!) is not the answer.
UBI isn't enough money to live on for free. It's about half that.
12k is enough money to live but your standard of living is worse enough to be visibly felt.
If you look at https://www.gapminder.org/dollar-street/, 12k / yr generally the level where most essentials are visible around the world. But you're likely not going to have:
1) A car
2) A house
3) Feed a family
4) Savings
5) An expensive hobby
You'd need about another 5-10k on the UBI check to really make this argument for UBI... which you get through working.
First, you don't need savings if you have UBI forever.
Second, you ignore the basics of economics of demand and supply: if a large enough proportion of the population lies on UBI you will even find cars cheap enough for them, either second hand or purpose built. True story, Renault is a car manufacturer that sells their cars for prices very similar to everyone else, but they built for some years a model that was selling for 5000 Euro (about $6000 at that time) new, with a modern and solid engine and all the safety features mandated by law in Europe. That car was also sold in France for a lot more (8000 euro or more) just because people in France afforded to pay more. Now Renault is still selling 7000 Euro cars (Dacia Sandero) that are really good for the money, while selling Renault branded cars for around 20,000 Euro and more.
Not sure if you're a student or never had an income, but savings are not just for retirement. Savings, as opposed to a retirement plan, are for major life decisions like buying a car, getting married, supporting a family, upgrading your standard of living, taking care of emergencies, and affording expensive opportunities (like moving or traveling, for instance).
Also, no, the basics of supply and demand will not make cheap cars a thing. It's not the cost of a car that you can't afford, it's the cost of maintenance. Fuel, maintenance, and insurance (mandatory in the US btw) are all costs to use the car - the average being around $100/mth.
And also no, new cars will not become cheaper over time in the US. There's already 19% of the US families who make under 24k a year (we roughly double UBI to account for 2 adult UBI incomes and one car per household rule). That's 24 million households already out of the 130m households in the US. The market for used cars is actually quite big (17.6 million transactions / yr) which is probably why there isn't an $8200 new US car offering (which, btw, requires savings in order to purchase).
Back to my original point, if you have a budget of 1k/month, you could spend ~$400 on rent, $300 on food, $100 on your car, $100 on personal needs, and $100 on misc / emergencies in a small suburban town (like the outskirts of Pittsburgh) -> I've done this in college before. But realistically you would need an extra ~$600-1000 a month to pay for things like - internet, health insurance, furniture, clothes, laptop, phone, heating / ac bill, eating out every so often, a social life, hobbies, travel, etc. So yes, you'd still want double of your UBI income.
Not a student, but probably older than many people here. I am quite familiar with countries with very low income and the economics of it, the 19% you mentioned is too small to make an impact in pricing, wait until it goes to 60-80%. I read a study made by my employer in China on how people were living on $1/day in rural areas a few years ago, it all makes sense and it matches the examples from other countries. Just consider the car factory would be crewed by people earning $15-20k, same for suppliers of parts and you can see how a car can get cheaper. Also the cars for low income people are modestly equipped with non-essential features like displays, radio, air conditioning and people with $12k income will accept it this way.
The kind of people that live on UBI (with no other job) are not the kind of people that care about savings.
If it's not enough to live on for free then it's not an UBI. The B in UBI stands for basic, it means that it covers all the basic needs, such as housing, food, electricity. One might argue that things like entertainment or internet wouldn't be covered by UBI because it'd be really basic, but I assume few years of activism would change that with actions like "internet for everyone, let's tax the rich to pay for it".
> If it's not enough to live on for free then it's not an UBI.
This is either very poor wording or just plain wrong. UBI is a cash grant policy, nothing more. The intent is to increase overall standard of living of the poorest people in the US more efficiently, not to make everyone have the same high level of standard of living for free.
It's a policy, not an ideology.
In respect to that, I already mentioned that 12k is enough money to live but your standard of living is worse enough to be visibly felt.
it's all about education and sozialisation. people want to be recognized for their achievements. they don't want to be recognized as a couch potato. if what you say were true, then why would anyone work more than what they need to cover their expenses now?
yes, people say they don't want to work. but what they really mean is that they don't want to work bad jobs just because they have to.
why do people do volunteer work? again, what incentive to do volunteers work do people have now? lots of work without much reward. yet people still do it. UBI won't change that, but it will give more people the opportunity to do volunteer work, or do more of it.
many jobs today are not actually producutive for society. people do them because they pay. and they will continue doing them because UBI won't enable you to have expensive vacations or other luxuries that you might enjoy.
on the other hand, people stuck in bad jobs may be enabled to quit them, because it won't cost them their home or their insurance. pay will rise because people don't need to accept hard labor for minimum wage anymore.
"If people are given enough money to live on for free I would wager there is zero incentive for them to be productive within society. Zero."
Take any country with wide social safety nets. You don't really need to work in them to live.
At least in my country most people prefer working. There is a small subculture of some families that seem to pass on unemployment as a way of life to their children but those are really ,really few.
My answer is - I don't know the general answer. In my culture people prefer working to not working, even though they don't have to. But I don't know if this applies universally.
Because we want something more from life than mindless consumption.
Work can be fulfilling. If money is not a problem what is to stop you from doing something that interests you?
Being part of a community, learning some cool new skill.
The idea that everyone will become a zombie on UBI sound unfounded.
Yes there are useless destructive people out there, they thrive on misery and pain. Capitalism, UBI, Communism, neither will fix them. But why present them as a example of how system will fail.
What about next great artist that went into ad company and never took a chance to do their art.
Or a next great tinker or inventor stuck in some soul draining 5-9 in a factory buried under medical debt.
What about those who would have a chance to create something tenfold the value they create now?
There is less incentive for people to survive financially by doing unethical work on behalf of powerful and wealthy people, OK, we can agree on that.
But, is (for example) cooking and cleaning and caring for others 'productive'? We don't see that in macroeconomic figures, so it doesn't count - but most people do a huge amount of that without being motivated by pay.
My understanding of the world is that most people are even more motivated to do things for others that don't bring a financial reward.
I suppose I should clarify what I mean by productive.
I'm using it in it's lowest sense: paying back into society to fund all the other stuff that government will want money for.
So, basically, we will have more takers than producers, therefore, it cannot possibly work.
Sure, you'll get poets, artists and the like taking advantage of it and society will be better off in the long run for it... probably. I don't know, never studied that stuff before.
But the immediate problem is that you will have a shit-ton of leeches that will take the money and play video games all day long. It can't possibly be financially viable.
But to pick up a point from your comment:
> Is (for example) cooking and cleaning and caring for others 'productive'?
I'd wager that it can be for two possible reasons:
1. It perhaps allows the person being cared for to help society in some way (either directly through taxes or poetry etc.)
2. The cleaner gets paid and ultimately puts money back into society.
And yes, there are tons of "non-jobs" where nothing is ultimately created, I get it. But that won't go away with UBI: banks will still have too many employees doing nothing all day (source - worked in banks for years!)
On another note: I live in Scotland and I will bet that within 5 years we will have UBI... we're already bankrupt so, hey, what's another £50Bn a year added to the unpayable debt pile :)
Lett's start with the obvious: it doesn't matter that some people will do nothing. It doesn't matter that some people will not be working. Not only are the benefits to society great (the yearly costs for society of homeless people, or similar scenarios are much greaterthan a simple $12k.), you're looking to cut off everyone from UBI because what, 5% would not be working? So, kind of like unemployment today then.
We've come far enough as first world societies that we can ensure that everyone gets a liveable amount of money every month. And don't forget that UBI cuts off every other kind of aid. Go live a life with $1000 a month, and you'll realise that you have to be in a very particular mindset to stay at home and do nothing.
In addition, it's also a great thing for the economy, as money is actually being used to pay things, and circulating taxed away from the cash hoarding dragons that are billionaires. That makes Keynes happy.
> you're looking to cut off everyone from UBI because what, 5% would not be working
I don't believe that it would only be 5% but yes, I am.
Living in the UK means we have a welfare system. It's not fair, hopelessly bureaucratic and probably corrupt as hell but we have one.
There is no way that giving everyone (eligible?) £1000 a month will take a whole bunch of people out of poverty because managing finances is a skill that no one is taught in schools.
People who have good jobs and earn good money can't manage it as is. So by giving free money to millions of people they're likely to fritter it away or piss it away thus wasting billions.
> cash hoarding dragons
Your issue is with them. They won't pay for UBI. I will. You will. Everyone else but them will pay for it.
What if the percent of the people on UBI doing nothing will get to 60%? What if they vote themselves more money?
In half of my country (in Europe) people would be extremely satisfied to live on $1000 per month, it is triple of what they live on today. I know people in Western Europe that would be quite happy to get $1000 and not have to go to work for that (they earn more, but the difference does not make up for their time and effort).
The debate is simply our age old socialist vs. capitalist. The socialist will say that technology/society has changed to the point where extra safety nets are attainable and will tend to ignore/downplay incentives. Conversely the capitalist will ignore (potentially avoidable) human suffering and focus purely on perfecting incentives.
I tend to align with the capitalist worldview. In a democracy where 'majority' rules, politicians can end up in a precarious situation where welfare blocks feeling marginalized can create an insurmountable opportunity cost perpetuating welfare policies. This could certainly destroy an economy if pushed too far. Strangely, either if non-working individuals couldn't vote or if the government system wasn't majority rule perhaps this trend wouldn't hold true.
All of that being said, we can't turn our backs on all safety nets as responsible policy makers. As for where the line should be drawn? Who knows. Just be wary of giving politicians the authority to decrease voter elasticity (the cost an individual incurs when they vote away a political party).
We've seen that the economy can take a ~30% shock to the headline figures - I'd guess that we would have formerly agreed that was to be considered "destroyed"... and in truth people haven't risked going hungry (any more than they were at risk before).
Political welfare decisions are protecting people (or not) more than capitalist incentives are.
Wouldn't those people with non-jobs just quit and receive UBI then? If that is indeed what would happen (as you claim), why would those non-job havers at the bank keep working them?
What difference is it to you how someone chooses to live their life? I don't understand how this is an argument for anything except to prove your own intolerance.
Doesn't that article that you're commenting on address this?
The study found that the people on the UBI payments we're more likely to be employed than the reference group - Its clearly wildly incorrect to say that there's zero incentive to find work
because many would quickly find themselves not satisfied with having less than they see others with and there would be more than enough politicians lining up to tell you how unfair it is to you furthering your discontent.
UBI at levels needed to sustain your existence would not necessarily mean living alone how you choose to live but pretty much may end up in group homes or similar accommodations where many facilities are shared to make it affordable. Even then some areas of the world or even city will be inaccessible to many.
If you want to and put some effort into it you can already get a "basic income" in my country. It's €1000 per month or so and at that level you also get other support on top. Plenty to have a 'basic' life.
There's always some that are "fine" with it and don't try or intentionally screw up the mandatory search for work. But in general everything you said simply doesn't happen.
People DO have an intrinsic need for exploring, learning and feeling useful.
> What under UBI is preventing me from quitting my job and spending the rest of my life playing videogames?
You wouldn't quit your job. You would continue working. Like most people would. Why? Because if you didn't work, someone else would, and they would get way ahead of you. From my point of view, UBI would do nothing but cause inflation (at least for now anyway, story will change once lots of people have no skills that are needed in the job market).
People keep saying "inflation" with no theory for how that could happen without creating any additional money.
Alice pays $8000 in taxes and receives a $12,000 UBI. Bob pays $12,000 in taxes and receives a $12,000 UBI. Charlie pays $16,000 in taxes and receives a $12,000 UBI. $4000 is transferred from Charlie to Alice. Alice buys $4000 more stuff, Charlie buys $4000 less stuff. Where is the inflation supposed to come from?
UBI causes "inflation" because that's what it does. When you give poor people like Alice money, they spend it and create demand for consumer goods. Consumer inflation is what happens when demand for consumer goods exceeds supply. However, this is not a bad thing because increased demand also creates new job opportunities. Inflation is only bad when it cannot be balanced by increasing the supply side.
Charlie on the other hand may invest his excess income and therefore generate no demand for consumer goods. In fact it's the opposite, it's entirely possible that his investment is creating excess supply beyond a reasonable point and thereby causing deflation.
> When you give poor people like Alice money, they spend it and create demand for consumer goods. Consumer inflation is what happens when demand for consumer goods exceeds supply. However, this is not a bad thing because increased demand also creates new job opportunities.
Aren't you now arguing that it wouldn't cause inflation? Even if there was an increase in demand, prices only increase if supply can't respond.
And if there are products where supply is artificially constrained (e.g. housing through zoning), isn't that the root cause of the higher prices and not the UBI?
> Charlie on the other hand may invest his excess income and therefore generate no demand for consumer goods.
But that still creates demand. It's demand for business real estate and legal services and office supplies, but that's still demand.
Inflation is caused by printing money.
> In fact it's the opposite, it's entirely possible that his investment is creating excess supply beyond a reasonable point and thereby causing deflation.
That's not deflation. Moreover, it would require Charlie to be a chump who is investing in a loss-making business.
Inflation is a change in the value of the currency. It isn't a change in the relative demand for different types of products and services. That's something else.
Even if that is all it achieves, inflation is much better than recession or stagnation.
It forces people to think of new ways to run business to stay ahead.
That already does happen in some countries with the state financial aids to people. They just quit working and do whatever they want meanwhile the working people fund their lives with taxes.
That is a bad example. Some people do indeed choose that way to live and there will be always people like that, but the overwhelming majority wants to hold a job.
Social security will probably regress to a pretty low mean with open borders though. Within the EU are already problems with different levels of support.
Well it is an example but yeah I mainly agree with a universal basic income since a lot of jobs are being taken away. People should have their basic needs covered somehow.
That is true. The question is - can an economy sustain itself if most people do that? People living on aid are financed by working people, but that only works if most people are working. Similar to the retirement systems in which young people pay for old people's retirement money, which is under threat in developed countries because there are much fewer kids than in the past.
