Universal Income.

Hercules56 said:
I too hate that we have such poverty and yet lots of money.

But I also don't like the idea of just giving money to people who dont need it, or dont want to work.
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Neither do I, but the idea isn't about a few people sitting on their asses on government money. We already have those anyway. The idea is to make life better for everyone.

And by the way, I'm a middle-class worker, who would probably not benefit much from UBI, when all is said and done.
 
Belz... said:
Neither do I, but the idea isn't about a few people sitting on their asses on government money. We already have those anyway. The idea is to make life better for everyone.

And by the way, I'm a middle-class worker, who would probably not benefit much from UBI, when all is said and done.
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Except that you probably would benefit indirectly by reducing the ranks of the poor in you locality. Quality of life has to mean something.
 
I think we're making a dangerous assumption that if the Bezos and Gates and other multi-billionaires are no longer keeping all of their money they will just keep working as hard and making as much.
 
JoeMorgue said:
I think we're making a dangerous assumption that if the Bezos and Gates and other multi-billionaires are no longer keeping all of their money they will just keep working as hard and making as much.
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I think you're making a dangerous assumption that either are working very hard right now.
 
JoeMorgue said:
Fine then "making the money."
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Both could retire to a VR existence and continue making money. That is how capitalism works.

Bill gates has been retired for some time and yet his wealth is growing quicker than he can give it away. Well, until Melinda takes her portion.
 
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Belz... said:
Sure, I meant directly.
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I know, I just thought I would point out the indirect benefits of not living in a city overrun with homelessness and petty crime that is primarily driven by poverty. That **** adds up in stress to other citizens and stress on the system and infrastructure of the city.
 
Belz... said:
Can you elaborate? I don't quite get your point.
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Okay.

The money from UBI has to come from somewhere and people are being super-vague to the point that it's annoying as to where it is going to come from, with vague allusions to people who are too rich being the best answer we've got.

Generic Super Rich Person X gets paid Y amount at the company he runs. His company makes 100 dollars and he gets 99 of it, and the remaining dollar gets split to pay his... 15,000 workers let's say.

I agree this is bad, nobody @ me.

But we set up a system; be it taxes, be it UBI, be it whatever, where he only gets... 50 dollars and the remaining 50 dollars go either directly to his employees or to society or to whatever.

He's not going to keep making 100 dollars. At least not all of them in every scenario.

Again that's my problem with the whole "It's okay the super rich won't miss it." rationalization for everything. Yeah they might.

The same people who make money way past the point they need it aren't just going to not notice when they have less of it.
 
JoeMorgue said:
Okay.

The money from UBI has to come from somewhere and people are being super-vague to the point that it's annoying as to where it is going to come from
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I thought the answers were rather precise, myself: cut redundant programs and close tax loopholes while increasing marginal tax rates on the very rich.

But we set up a system; be it taxes, be it UBI, be it whatever, where he only gets... 50 dollars and the remaining 50 dollars go either directly to his employees or to society or to whatever.
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Which means he's still as rich as the 50 employees who each get 1 buck each. Taxes used to be much higher and businesses didn't close shop.
 
Belz... said:
Which means he's still as rich as the 50 employees who each get 1 buck each. Taxes used to be much higher and businesses didn't close shop.
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That was then, this is now. Everything is ideological. They will let businesses die out of spite.

Basically I'm just aghast at this new super-progressive idea being "Let's just trust rich people to not find a new way to be greedy and/or play the system somehow."

You can't order Billionaires to keep making money. We do this and we give them a tremendous amount of leverage over us.

It's risky is all I'm saying. I'm not naysaying the core concept or denying the problem it is intended to solve.
 
It's sort like my problem with sin taxes. We fund things using money from lotteries and cigarette sales or car pollution and when time comes to think about getting rid of them we can't because their funding things we can't lose.
 
JoeMorgue said:
That was then, this is now. Everything is ideological. They will let businesses die out of spite.
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No they won't. Greed is stronger than ideology.

Basically I'm just aghast at this new super-progressive idea being "Let's just trust rich people to not find a new way to be greedy and/or play the system somehow."
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I don't see how this relates to this discussion in any way.

It's risky is all I'm saying.
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We'll never know until we try. No risk no progress.
 
JoeMorgue said:
That was then, this is now. Everything is ideological. They will let businesses die out of spite.

Basically I'm just aghast at this new super-progressive idea being "Let's just trust rich people to not find a new way to be greedy and/or play the system somehow."

You can't order Billionaires to keep making money. We do this and we give them a tremendous amount of leverage over us.

It's risky is all I'm saying. I'm not naysaying the core concept or denying the problem it is intended to solve.
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But the examples you picked are people who literally can not stop making money. They don’t make money from work they make money from stock appreciation.

Look, I make money off investments and I make money from work. If my taxes increase it could change how I allocate my investments but it sure won’t cause me to work less. If anything it means I may work more to cover the new taxes and still reach my retirement goals.

We are nit talking about 80% tax rates here. We are talking about fiddling at the edges. That is all it would take to bring in lots more revenue. But those details have all been provided with numbers and none of them align with your example.
 
But again my point is isn't all of this supposed to be wrong?

It doesn't matter if they have 90 gazillion dollars because of tax dividends or 90 gazillion dollars because of inheritance or 90 gazillion dollars because they family owns a oil well. Having the 90 Gazillion dollars was the problem I thought.

You can't fix unfairness by making money off of the unfairness, that just entrenches the unfairness.
 
JoeMorgue said:
But again my point is isn't all of this supposed to be wrong?

It doesn't matter if they have 90 gazillion dollars because of tax dividends or 90 gazillion dollars because of inheritance or 90 gazillion dollars because they family owns a oil well. Having the 90 Gazillion dollars was the problem I thought.

You can't fix unfairness by making money off of the unfairness, that just entrenches the unfairness.
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The unfairness is so vast that this will barely put a dent in it from the top side, while it will massively help those on the bottom end.
 
JoeMorgue said:
But again my point is isn't all of this supposed to be wrong?

It doesn't matter if they have 90 gazillion dollars because of tax dividends or 90 gazillion dollars because of inheritance or 90 gazillion dollars because they family owns a oil well. Having the 90 Gazillion dollars was the problem I thought.

You can't fix unfairness by making money off of the unfairness, that just entrenches the unfairness.
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I don't see that UBI necessarily requires a fix for wealth inequality. The point of UBI is to establish and hold a minimum baseline, not to enforce a maximum.
 
JoeMorgue said:
But again my point is isn't all of this supposed to be wrong?

It doesn't matter if they have 90 gazillion dollars because of tax dividends or 90 gazillion dollars because of inheritance or 90 gazillion dollars because they family owns a oil well. Having the 90 Gazillion dollars was the problem I thought.

You can't fix unfairness by making money off of the unfairness, that just entrenches the unfairness.
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UBI isn't about income inequality.
 
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