"How do you make a living without a job – can you receive income without working for it? Is it possible, to begin with and then, the hard part, is it ethical?"
What about retirement? social security? disability? You might not be "making a living", but you are getting an income without working for it. Same for investing money. Really "working for it" is a loaded term in and of itself. You might be "working for it" by taking risk, or putting in labor. The author obviously doesn't think any investor is "working for it" by the the tone of the article, but this is precisely what retired america is doing?
"If you were raised to believe that work is the index of your value to society – as most of us were – would it feel like cheating to get something for nothing?"
I don't think this is the right question at all. People take for granted whatever they have, and likely may feel it's cheating, until they start taking it for granted.
I think the more interesting question is, if you could live even if society didn't value what you were doing, and you could do anything (even nothing) and still be provided with everything you need to survive - what would happen to individuals and what would happen to society?
People by nature I think are very externally motivated (society, wealth, materialism), and if you didn't make people go to work, would they? If they did, would they still put up with the crappy parts of it?
I think what defines a satisfied life is doing things that matter to you, make yourself work, try hard, think, make yourself smile a few years down the road (after you've forgotten the hard parts). But even when you have all the opportunity in the world, some people just procrastinate or fall off the wagon somewhere...
>The author obviously doesn't think any investor is "working for it" by the the tone of the article, but this is precisely what retired america is doing?
Because it ain't the investor who's working there it's the capital or isn't that how the saying goes?
>People by nature I think are very externally motivated (society, wealth, materialism), and if you didn't make people go to work, would they? If they did, would they still put up with the crappy parts of it?
People by nature are also very diverse characters and as such can't be generalized in such a way. Some people need external motivation to live, others see living itself as motivation enough and loathe a high octane lifestyle focused on chasing some external motivation in the form of fulfilling arbitrary productivity quotas to measure their "progress in life".
>I think what defines a satisfied life is doing things that matter to you, make yourself work, try hard, think, make yourself smile a few years down the road (after you've forgotten the hard parts).
Which assumes there's a "happy ending" if said person just "puts in the work", sorry but that's not how reality works at all. You can endure all you want, put in all the work you want and life can still screw you over big time like it does for, the majority of, people on this planet every single day.
If "hard work" is all it would take then we'd be long there, wherever "there" is supposed to be anyway. Because I doubt that out of billions of people working the large majority are simply "slacking it" and "too lazy" to all become successful millionaires, it's far more to do with lack of opportunity and not lack of motivation.
>>People by nature I think are very externally motivated (society, wealth, materialism)and if you didn't make people go to work, would they? If they did, would they still put up with the crappy parts of it?
Is this not just a function of upbringing and experience? There are many creative types for whom motivation is completely internal, that producing the "perfect" symphony is driven by internal desires completely divorced from any acclaim (or criticism) that it may attract.
I think the other question that needs to be addressed is that we seem to be specifically talking about paid work. Some of the most difficult "work" I have done recently has been working on clearing and renovating our back yard garden. All unpaid.
You only have to look at the actions of the many very rich philanthropists who spend their time working for the greater good. I would admit that in a lot of cases they have gained their wealth through hard work (paid type), but their are many who have inherited wealth and still work (unpaid) long hours for the greater good.
I think the big difference between those who when faced with no (paid) work and given the resources to live, who will do nothing and those who will look around for something useful to do will be education.
When people are shown that there is useful fulfilling activity that can be done even when you don't have to put bread on the table, and are given the skills to work creatively, I think many, if not most will step up and take on activity (lets call it work) that will extend our society in ways we cannot now imagine.
I find it interesting that he is asking about the ethics of not working for a living, as if paid work has some moral value, or eating without having to work for it is somehow immoral. By that measure we should all be working like dogs for peanut and we would all be saints. Sorry that doesn't work for me. If your aim in life is to work harder and longer go for it. I'd prefer to work shorter and smarter to get the same result.
> I think the more interesting question is, if you could live even if society didn't value what you were doing, and you could do anything (even nothing) and still be provided with everything you need to survive - what would happen to individuals and what would happen to society?
It would be very very hard to find basic services like, a plumber. I know that because I live on an island where most people are retired and reasonably well off. Off-island services are reluctant to take the ferry over because it's too much trouble.
I kind of imagine a basic income society would become like that. I believe there are few who would do the grungier work if they didn't have to. We'd all be tired of art and poetry and stuff because we'd have loads and loads of artists. Art is valuable because of its rarity and seeming extravagance in a world pressed for time.
But please, I hope basic income happens. I'm weary of our absurd slave work ethic aesthetic. Between robots, Walmart and Amazon, I think its obvious that capitalism is reaching its end-game state. Let's evolve to a new way of living that is more about happiness and less about competing for the dollah.
> think the more interesting question is, if you could live even if society didn't value what you were doing, and you could do anything (even nothing) and still be provided with everything you need to survive - what would happen to individuals and what would happen to society
Or, as the author put it,
>How would human nature change as the aristocratic privilege of leisure becomes the birthright of all?
The article doesn't have the tone you're assuming it does.
> I think the more interesting question is, if you could live even if society didn't value what you were doing, and you could do anything (even nothing) and still be provided with everything you need to survive - what would happen to individuals and what would happen to society?
I think there are historical precedents, at least if you define "society" in a narrower sense. European royalty and nobility in the 18th century, present day natives of Dubai or Saudi Arabia, hereditary upper classes of all times an places. The common denominator being born to affluence and mainly mingling with your subsection of society.
The verdict? Seems like people turn out in surprisingly different ways when freed from toiling for basic necessities. Some become great scientists, artists, philosophers or philanthropists. Some become revolutionaries or even international terrorists. Some become insufferable whiners. Some just live a quiet life.
(retirement? social security? disability) You might not be "making a living", but you are getting an income without working for it.
We all have worked for those, but the work done to accrue them is not fairly partitioned to all those present, it is not fairly paid for by those whom could afford to, because many will say they have a life style to maintain and that life style is sloth and ignorance of the well to do.
Those entitlements you say are enough don't pay shit to live on, and they know that, and we know that. Not enough for good schools warm housing or good food. But they are enough to keep you poor, don't knock it till you try it.
Smiles are free but so are empty stomachs and cold fingers
The content is usually alright but they always have the tone of a petulant college student.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with it but no need to start writing Communist Manifesto 2.0 when all you need to say is "Robots are going to replace us, jobs are going to go away and we need basic income".
Like, for the time being, non-coal miner, educated jobs are doing fine. There is no need to be a "gangster" to live a comfortable life.
What I am trying to say is the hyperbole in these kinds of articles put me off and paint the author as immature, kneejerk-y and unknowledgable.
It's a curious fact then that the author is James Livingston, a 67-year old professor of history at Rutgers, who has also written numerous books.
> all you need to say is "Robots are going to replace us, jobs are going to go away and we need basic income"
Each of these points would need to be expanded upon for this to work. A lot of people don't believe that robots are going to replace us, or that jobs are going to go away, or that we need basic income. Also, there are a ton of issues with the process involved in this transition. How big of a change? How fast? How disruptive?
Agreed. I didn't make it too far out of the first section. "[U]nless of course you’ve landed a job as a drug dealer or a Wall Street banker, becoming a gangster either way" is a ridiculous line. His definition of "full employment" seems to shift to support his arguments in the middle of a paragraph. And when he said that "[n]o one can doubt the moral significance of the movement" and "[w]hat, exactly, is the point of earning a paycheck that isn’t a living wage", this told me that the author isn't well-versed on opposing viewpoints, which means this piece is just a wordy editorial, and a crude one at that.
I haven't read the article but this is high time we rethink "commune-ism". Not a feudal system under the politburo, but communal ownership of robot-factories, more along the lines of Kibbutzim and some anarchist ideas.
>There is absolutely nothing wrong with it but no need to start writing Communist Manifesto 2.0 when all you need to say is "Robots are going to replace us, jobs are going to go away and we need basic income".
Although the Manifesto was a product of its time, many of its ideas still hold for Communist revolutionaries, along with the rest of Marx and Engels' works.
Same here. By the second graph I was asking "Who is this moron?" which I don't like. I don't like having a poor opinion of writers after so little of their content.
I'm interested in UBI and how the economy adjusts. I'm interested in how mankind could adapt to having all basic needs provided.
I am not interested in something that sounds like a rant from a 15-year-old.
>These beliefs are no longer plausible. In fact, they’ve become ridiculous, because there’s not enough work to go around, and what there is of it won’t pay the bills
I've turned down like 40 candidates lately for a job that pays at least 80k.
It's hard as hell to find someone who is both knowledgeable and personable.
The word "shortage" pops up often in these types of conversations, but the word I'd prefer is "mismatch". Me and the people I know are hiring aggressively, all the time, for people who know about engineering, product design, data analysis, etc.
There are lots of jobs. Most of the people you walk past on the street just don't know how to do them.
> unless of course you’ve landed a job as a drug dealer or a Wall Street banker, becoming a gangster either way.
I think this kind of thing is defeatist and intellectually dishonest. In a roundabout way, it says "I have trouble finding work, and I'm a good person, so all the people with work must be bad people"
We've gotta stop otherizing successful IC-type employees and start training people to switch into those fields late stage (the current tech talent pool is overwhelmingly people who started early and stayed on board)
The article goes on to talk about things unrelated to this comment, but it really started off on the wrong foot, IMO, by needlessly polarizing a complex situation and dismissing the abundant existence of genuinely good, chronically underfilled positions.
edit: the article also bases some numbers on "official unemployment". I'm not an expert on this topic but I've heard that number to be somewhat deceiving, in part because it fails to count 1) people who have some work (like a few shifts at a retail store) but would like to be employed more of the time and 2) people who have given up actively searching for work.
edit 2:
> profits are pointless except as a way of announcing to your stockholders (and hostile takeover specialists) that your company is a going concern, a thriving business. You don’t need profits to ‘reinvest’, to finance the expansion of your company’s workforce or output, as the recent history of Apple and most other corporations has amply demonstrated.
whoa. can't just... brush past that one. That paragraph is not followed up on robustly. I'm interested in entertaining the thought, but you can't just drop that pill and expect me to swallow it.
Highly skilled technical employees cost time and money to build/train.
People who don't train for highly skilled jobs typically do not have the money or the support infrastructure required for that training.
This gets compounded when a low skilled worker finds themselves between jobs: they now have the same constraints but also need to find money quickly to service debt such as rent or home loan.
When you describe as "mismatch" what is a bona fide shortage, you are completely ignoring the structure of society which leads to this problem: education is a profit industry, at cost to the student. Industry has few apprenticeships or cadet ships available. Industry doesn't want to train the good people ("matches") to become skilled the way industry wants.
Once the inividual has been trained, industry will trip over themselves to hire or poach them.
So industry doesn't want to pay for training even though they can afford it, the individual can't afford training even though they want it.
If only there was a way to provide training for highly skilled roles in such a way that all industry pays for the training and the individual only shoulders the time costs.
80k is not a lot of money if you are talking about any of the major metro areas in the US. In fact is it definitely entry level as far as engineering salaries go. if you are in SF or NY it's laughably low. You haven't said the exact details of the job you are advertising but you probably aren't paying enough that is why you are getting bad candidates.
Why don't you pay more than 80k then and get someone to leave their other job? Employers responding to a skills shortage by complaining rather than raising wages is one major cause of the market failure.
>The word "shortage" pops up often in these types of conversations, but the word I'd prefer is "mismatch". Me and the people I know are hiring aggressively, all the time, for people who know about engineering, product design, data analysis, etc. There are lots of jobs. Most of the people you walk past on the street just don't know how to do them.
Even if they knew they'd still be a shortage, because while you might have this kind of high-end jobs, the people on the street are much more than what's needed for those open positions.
> so raising taxes on corporate income won’t affect employment
> It means that profits are pointless except as a way of announcing to your stockholders (and hostile takeover specialists) that your company is a going concern, a thriving business. You don’t need profits to ‘reinvest’, to finance the expansion of your company’s workforce or output
What is he talking about? Higher taxes prevent business owners from hiring more people and from being able to offer decent wage growth. Lower profits de-incentivize companies from taking the risk of starting and running a business and having employees.
80% of small businesses had NO employees. Incentivizing these 23M businesses to hire just 1 person would be dramatic.
Small businesses accounted for 63.3% of net new jobs from the third quarter of 1992 until the third quarter of 2013. [1]
This article acts as if Apple and other mega-corps ARE the economy.
Raising taxes is counter intuitive if we want to create more jobs, especially those that will be more rewarding to people.
> Higher taxes prevent business owners from hiring more people and from being able to offer decent wage growth.
No. I'm not in favor of high taxes but this statement is not supported at a theory level nor empirically. For one thing, employees and wages are pre-tax. Basically this type of labor economics stuff really should focus on the "elephant in the office": either an employee creates more profit than they cost or they do not. Tax levels make minimal difference here, if at all, even worse is tax topics get easily politicized, used to manipulate and distract from the real labor issues worth studying and discussing.
Also, the small business statistics you mention are misleading. I'm sure it was not on purpose but to be clear: That is 80% of ALL businesses are nonemployer (not 80% of small businesses). Does that feel right? 80% of businesses are one person businesses? Feels high, no? What percentage of people living around you are in this group?
The figure is misleading because the "23 million small businesses" counted to get 80% are not all real businesses, relatively few are. 23 million is based on the number of business tax returns filed not the number of proper going concern business businesses. There is a difference. Millions of those 23M business tax returns do not represent a "business" in the sense of an entity that would or could support hiring of an employee - it's not that type of business nor trying to be. There are various reasons for a business tax return to be filed by someone or group, including the obvious tax benefits offered right now today for small businesses. "Home office" deduction anyone? I think a business that generates somewhere around $1000 must file taxes for it but a "business" that earns nothing might also still file and be counted...
But I do agree with you 100% how small businesses are crucial to this country and they need support, legal and economic support, and they need to be able to hire new people and offer apprenticeships and compete locally and globally. Unfortunately the trend is going against this.
The corporate income tax rate is a progressive system just like the personal income tax.
At the lowest bracket (<$50,000), you pay 15%.
At the highest bracket ($18 million+), you pay 35%.
Small businesses with NO employees (e.g. the 80% of such), are typically pass-through entities not subject to corporate income tax rates, or are making far far less than 18 million dollars.
One could easily see a proposal to raise the tax on the highest bracket, or create an even higher bracket (e.g. companies earning 100 million or above), and tax that at 40%.
I'm not sure if it's the same in the US, but here in Europe most countries differentiate between corporate taxes, which you pay on profits, and employment taxes/social security contributions, which you (as a company) need to pay for each employee.
For small businesses the profits are typically what the directors 'take home' as their salary, so raising corporate taxes would impact them (however that could be countered by lowering personal income taxes), but it wouldn't cut the cash flow available for hiring employees.
I am not so sure about basic income, there is already a massive section of society which receives it. I am talking about children, of course. And there is a reason they are provided with that basic income - they are not yet ready to be "net producers". If someone proposes a scheme for basic income, they should also add some checks and balances to make sure people don't turn into net consumers. Just as you wouldn't want your society run by kids who are 16 years or less, you don't want the majority of voters/adult participants to be indistinguishable from children. If being "treated like children" is actually a desirable state, why do most people feel chafed by the thought?
But I am also curious about the contributions of factors other than automation which prevents people from being net producers. For e.g. what is the role of inflation (a moderate pace of deflation will allow people to make do with less, get off the treadmill faster, and also make part-time work much more feasible)?
Your argument would be valid in 1950 (or 1650) but it does not apply for 2050. This whole discussion is initiated by the fact that due to changing circumstances, many adults MUST be "net consumers" in your terms, that's unavoidable, and the only question is how do we handle it ?
In the coming decades, we're facing millions and millions of people for whom the market price of their labor will be lower than the market price of their bare sustenance. We're not there yet, and especially not worldwide, but that's where the trends are pointing so we're discussing it to have a perspective of what needs to be done in the future. There's no "checks and balances" possible - they will be net consumers if they are alive.
Already there are massive industries (e.g. garment and footwear manufacturing) which are not automated only because for now e.g. offshore sweatshop labor for handful of rice a day is cheaper than doing it with robots - but it's changing as automation is becoming cheaper over time.
So that is the big question, what will we do with the growing number people for whom the society has no economical need, who must be net consumers - and there really are only two options, either the society transfers resources so that they can live a reasonable life, or it does not, and they do not live a reasonable life.
The market doesn't reward "net producers". For example, try giving bread to people who are too poor to buy it. You're producing tons of net happiness, but where's your reward? Instead, the market rewards those who are "net producers" to other "net producers". It's recursive, with all the resulting inequality and feedback loops. I don't think those who get shafted by a complex dynamic system should be viewed as children. Change the system instead.
If we have full automation of basic needs fulfillment, powered by sun and carried out by robots, then everyone has more time to have fun. The definition of fun will adapt. Probably get on a new planet and die fighting local fauna will be what people will resort to. Why not? Society will keep supporting individuals, especially when people with the same interests will be discoverable so easily. Sounds like heaven to me. Humanity can do it! Don't forget that mentality will keep evolving
If you hand the necessities of life to humans with no effort required, we get weird.
It's not that "work builds character" or any of that bull, just that humans don't do well when dependent on others. We need some sense of accomplishment and achievement. We may, in time, be able to separate these things from "work" and "putting bread on the table", but it'll take a generation of messed-up people first.
The problem with automation nowadays is not that it takes away jobs. The problem is that society is not allowing automation to take away more jobs. Number of "jobs" shouldn't be the metric to measure success.
There is so much wrong with this article that I'll only address one part.
Taxing companies is illogical (ignoring that they are generally easier for politicians to tax than individuals, but that's another topic).
For instance, companies can only do four things with their profits:
1 - pay employees more
2 - pay shareholders more
3 - build/buy more (what is usually called reinvesting or R&D, but can also mean buying thicker carpets and nicer offices)
4 - build up cash (which eventually will be used to do one of the above 3 items)
Increasing taxes on companies only can reduce those 4 things. How a person can conceive that taxing them more has no impact is beyond me. In each instance there is a person that can be taxed at the end of the chain. So why do it twice?
Taxing companies merely distorts markets (witness all the money AAPL & GOOD put thru Ireland, or how GE pays so little taxes, but has armies of lawyers who do nothing but ensure money is moved to places in ways it cannot be taxed).
The author ignores reality and the many examples (I cited only 3) that disprove him in the hear and now.
His question is good - indeed, very important - but his answer is not only bad, but also misleading and incorrect.
What I've seldomly seen discussed so far is how exactly access and participation would be handled in a jobless world. Currently work (ideally) offers you the chance to influence the world, gain expert knowledge, access to areas closed off for the broad public.
The article briefly touches or by mentioning work "builds character" but doesn't discuss the consequences if those things are not available anymore or how we could keep them available.
I have a sort of fear that a world where everything is automated could start off as a paradise - but over time more and more areas could become "off-limits" for 99% of the population, since they are not needed and would just disturb operation - until in the end they have lots of leisure time (hooray) but few things to actually do except meaningless hobbies.
Full employment, if it simultaneously means having a job which pays your living, is a solution to the problem as it also contributes to redistribution of wealth. If the job market is supply driven (ie. the workforce has more power to determine the conditions) the market is required to make it more favorable for the workforce as otherwise the workforce will not work at all.
So far the theory. However, as more and more jobs become replaced my machines and robots which do not pay social taxes, there is no money to redistribute and the labor market will be supply driven by those who create the jobs.
The Future of Employment paper referenced considers chefs highly unlikely (0.1 probability) to be automated. However, we are working on that at http://8-food.com/ at least for certain classes of meal preparation. Another questionably 'safe' category of employment is travel guides (0.057 probability) though the number and quality of geospatial city guide mobile offerings is increasing rapidly.
What do you mean by this comment? I don't think many people, even the Marxists, are arguing that capitalism isn't a good thing; the disagreement is whether the capitalist mode of production is the "best" way to organise production.
> the net gain in jobs since 2000 still stands at zero
Reads surprising to me. The population of US rose since 2000, so to have net gain zero the employment ratio has to fall compared to 2000 - but it's pretty high today. Hm?
There has been something like a 10% increase in the total number of employed people since 2000, but employment ratio (labor force participation rate) has significantly fallen since that, it used to be 67% and is ~62% now.
The author's Luddism doesn't bother me as much as his communism. Luddism has a history of being wrong, but not as 100-millions-dead wrong as communism.
How can this professor call himself a historian with a straight face?
I'm sick of tax dollars funding this postmodern bilge -- opining from ivory towers, appealing to emotions, and fomenting divisions between class and race.
According to a recent report by the ITIF: "Contrary to popular perceptions, the labor market is not experiencing unprecedented technological disruption. In fact, occupational churn in the United States is at a historic low."
There is an enormous opportunity for increased productivity and wealth, and if history is any indicator there will be plenty of work to be done.
I didn't see any Luddism in this article. Marxism, for sure, but no Luddism. Saying that a future society must have different values from the present due to the nature of progress is futurism if anything.
Luddites weren't wrong about the consequences; they were wrong about who it'd affect the most. The Brits pulled out all stops to create a market for British products and destroy industries in India/China. This was done by imposing high duties on local products in India, and by making China addicted to opium.
India, China were reasonably rich with vast reserves of Gold/Silver. Who are the rich in today's world ? Yeah that's right.
Dictatorships have that history - to place the blame on communism while ignoring oppressive regimes like Pinochet and Trujillo is disingenuous. Not to mention the article says nothing about communism. Plenty of countries have pro-labor, socialist-leaning economic policies without devolving into genocidal dictatorships.
[+] [-] cbanek|8 years ago|reply
What about retirement? social security? disability? You might not be "making a living", but you are getting an income without working for it. Same for investing money. Really "working for it" is a loaded term in and of itself. You might be "working for it" by taking risk, or putting in labor. The author obviously doesn't think any investor is "working for it" by the the tone of the article, but this is precisely what retired america is doing?
"If you were raised to believe that work is the index of your value to society – as most of us were – would it feel like cheating to get something for nothing?"
I don't think this is the right question at all. People take for granted whatever they have, and likely may feel it's cheating, until they start taking it for granted.
I think the more interesting question is, if you could live even if society didn't value what you were doing, and you could do anything (even nothing) and still be provided with everything you need to survive - what would happen to individuals and what would happen to society?
People by nature I think are very externally motivated (society, wealth, materialism), and if you didn't make people go to work, would they? If they did, would they still put up with the crappy parts of it?
I think what defines a satisfied life is doing things that matter to you, make yourself work, try hard, think, make yourself smile a few years down the road (after you've forgotten the hard parts). But even when you have all the opportunity in the world, some people just procrastinate or fall off the wagon somewhere...
[+] [-] freeflight|8 years ago|reply
Because it ain't the investor who's working there it's the capital or isn't that how the saying goes?
>People by nature I think are very externally motivated (society, wealth, materialism), and if you didn't make people go to work, would they? If they did, would they still put up with the crappy parts of it?
People by nature are also very diverse characters and as such can't be generalized in such a way. Some people need external motivation to live, others see living itself as motivation enough and loathe a high octane lifestyle focused on chasing some external motivation in the form of fulfilling arbitrary productivity quotas to measure their "progress in life".
>I think what defines a satisfied life is doing things that matter to you, make yourself work, try hard, think, make yourself smile a few years down the road (after you've forgotten the hard parts).
Which assumes there's a "happy ending" if said person just "puts in the work", sorry but that's not how reality works at all. You can endure all you want, put in all the work you want and life can still screw you over big time like it does for, the majority of, people on this planet every single day.
If "hard work" is all it would take then we'd be long there, wherever "there" is supposed to be anyway. Because I doubt that out of billions of people working the large majority are simply "slacking it" and "too lazy" to all become successful millionaires, it's far more to do with lack of opportunity and not lack of motivation.
[+] [-] dragonsky67|8 years ago|reply
Is this not just a function of upbringing and experience? There are many creative types for whom motivation is completely internal, that producing the "perfect" symphony is driven by internal desires completely divorced from any acclaim (or criticism) that it may attract.
I think the other question that needs to be addressed is that we seem to be specifically talking about paid work. Some of the most difficult "work" I have done recently has been working on clearing and renovating our back yard garden. All unpaid.
You only have to look at the actions of the many very rich philanthropists who spend their time working for the greater good. I would admit that in a lot of cases they have gained their wealth through hard work (paid type), but their are many who have inherited wealth and still work (unpaid) long hours for the greater good.
I think the big difference between those who when faced with no (paid) work and given the resources to live, who will do nothing and those who will look around for something useful to do will be education.
When people are shown that there is useful fulfilling activity that can be done even when you don't have to put bread on the table, and are given the skills to work creatively, I think many, if not most will step up and take on activity (lets call it work) that will extend our society in ways we cannot now imagine.
[+] [-] dragonsky67|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] diyseguy|8 years ago|reply
It would be very very hard to find basic services like, a plumber. I know that because I live on an island where most people are retired and reasonably well off. Off-island services are reluctant to take the ferry over because it's too much trouble.
I kind of imagine a basic income society would become like that. I believe there are few who would do the grungier work if they didn't have to. We'd all be tired of art and poetry and stuff because we'd have loads and loads of artists. Art is valuable because of its rarity and seeming extravagance in a world pressed for time.
But please, I hope basic income happens. I'm weary of our absurd slave work ethic aesthetic. Between robots, Walmart and Amazon, I think its obvious that capitalism is reaching its end-game state. Let's evolve to a new way of living that is more about happiness and less about competing for the dollah.
[+] [-] boomboomsubban|8 years ago|reply
Or, as the author put it,
>How would human nature change as the aristocratic privilege of leisure becomes the birthright of all?
The article doesn't have the tone you're assuming it does.
[+] [-] mvindahl|8 years ago|reply
I think there are historical precedents, at least if you define "society" in a narrower sense. European royalty and nobility in the 18th century, present day natives of Dubai or Saudi Arabia, hereditary upper classes of all times an places. The common denominator being born to affluence and mainly mingling with your subsection of society.
The verdict? Seems like people turn out in surprisingly different ways when freed from toiling for basic necessities. Some become great scientists, artists, philosophers or philanthropists. Some become revolutionaries or even international terrorists. Some become insufferable whiners. Some just live a quiet life.
[+] [-] I_am_neo|8 years ago|reply
We all have worked for those, but the work done to accrue them is not fairly partitioned to all those present, it is not fairly paid for by those whom could afford to, because many will say they have a life style to maintain and that life style is sloth and ignorance of the well to do.
Those entitlements you say are enough don't pay shit to live on, and they know that, and we know that. Not enough for good schools warm housing or good food. But they are enough to keep you poor, don't knock it till you try it.
Smiles are free but so are empty stomachs and cold fingers
[+] [-] madamelic|8 years ago|reply
The content is usually alright but they always have the tone of a petulant college student.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with it but no need to start writing Communist Manifesto 2.0 when all you need to say is "Robots are going to replace us, jobs are going to go away and we need basic income".
Like, for the time being, non-coal miner, educated jobs are doing fine. There is no need to be a "gangster" to live a comfortable life.
What I am trying to say is the hyperbole in these kinds of articles put me off and paint the author as immature, kneejerk-y and unknowledgable.
[+] [-] vlasev|8 years ago|reply
> all you need to say is "Robots are going to replace us, jobs are going to go away and we need basic income"
Each of these points would need to be expanded upon for this to work. A lot of people don't believe that robots are going to replace us, or that jobs are going to go away, or that we need basic income. Also, there are a ton of issues with the process involved in this transition. How big of a change? How fast? How disruptive?
[+] [-] Brendinooo|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] throwaway31234|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ue_|8 years ago|reply
Although the Manifesto was a product of its time, many of its ideas still hold for Communist revolutionaries, along with the rest of Marx and Engels' works.
[+] [-] DanielBMarkham|8 years ago|reply
I'm interested in UBI and how the economy adjusts. I'm interested in how mankind could adapt to having all basic needs provided.
I am not interested in something that sounds like a rant from a 15-year-old.
[+] [-] flukus|8 years ago|reply
The problem is a large section of the population aren't cut out for "educated" jobs. People with a below median IQ need to feed themselves too.
[+] [-] RickS|8 years ago|reply
I've turned down like 40 candidates lately for a job that pays at least 80k.
It's hard as hell to find someone who is both knowledgeable and personable.
The word "shortage" pops up often in these types of conversations, but the word I'd prefer is "mismatch". Me and the people I know are hiring aggressively, all the time, for people who know about engineering, product design, data analysis, etc.
There are lots of jobs. Most of the people you walk past on the street just don't know how to do them.
> unless of course you’ve landed a job as a drug dealer or a Wall Street banker, becoming a gangster either way.
I think this kind of thing is defeatist and intellectually dishonest. In a roundabout way, it says "I have trouble finding work, and I'm a good person, so all the people with work must be bad people"
We've gotta stop otherizing successful IC-type employees and start training people to switch into those fields late stage (the current tech talent pool is overwhelmingly people who started early and stayed on board)
The article goes on to talk about things unrelated to this comment, but it really started off on the wrong foot, IMO, by needlessly polarizing a complex situation and dismissing the abundant existence of genuinely good, chronically underfilled positions.
edit: the article also bases some numbers on "official unemployment". I'm not an expert on this topic but I've heard that number to be somewhat deceiving, in part because it fails to count 1) people who have some work (like a few shifts at a retail store) but would like to be employed more of the time and 2) people who have given up actively searching for work.
edit 2:
> profits are pointless except as a way of announcing to your stockholders (and hostile takeover specialists) that your company is a going concern, a thriving business. You don’t need profits to ‘reinvest’, to finance the expansion of your company’s workforce or output, as the recent history of Apple and most other corporations has amply demonstrated.
whoa. can't just... brush past that one. That paragraph is not followed up on robustly. I'm interested in entertaining the thought, but you can't just drop that pill and expect me to swallow it.
[+] [-] manicdee|8 years ago|reply
People who don't train for highly skilled jobs typically do not have the money or the support infrastructure required for that training.
This gets compounded when a low skilled worker finds themselves between jobs: they now have the same constraints but also need to find money quickly to service debt such as rent or home loan.
When you describe as "mismatch" what is a bona fide shortage, you are completely ignoring the structure of society which leads to this problem: education is a profit industry, at cost to the student. Industry has few apprenticeships or cadet ships available. Industry doesn't want to train the good people ("matches") to become skilled the way industry wants.
Once the inividual has been trained, industry will trip over themselves to hire or poach them.
So industry doesn't want to pay for training even though they can afford it, the individual can't afford training even though they want it.
If only there was a way to provide training for highly skilled roles in such a way that all industry pays for the training and the individual only shoulders the time costs.
[+] [-] pmorici|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tibbetts|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] coldtea|8 years ago|reply
Even if they knew they'd still be a shortage, because while you might have this kind of high-end jobs, the people on the street are much more than what's needed for those open positions.
[+] [-] exclusiv|8 years ago|reply
> It means that profits are pointless except as a way of announcing to your stockholders (and hostile takeover specialists) that your company is a going concern, a thriving business. You don’t need profits to ‘reinvest’, to finance the expansion of your company’s workforce or output
What is he talking about? Higher taxes prevent business owners from hiring more people and from being able to offer decent wage growth. Lower profits de-incentivize companies from taking the risk of starting and running a business and having employees.
80% of small businesses had NO employees. Incentivizing these 23M businesses to hire just 1 person would be dramatic.
Small businesses accounted for 63.3% of net new jobs from the third quarter of 1992 until the third quarter of 2013. [1]
This article acts as if Apple and other mega-corps ARE the economy.
Raising taxes is counter intuitive if we want to create more jobs, especially those that will be more rewarding to people.
[1] https://www.sba.gov/sites/default/files/advocacy/SB-FAQ-2016...
[+] [-] hxta98596|8 years ago|reply
What are you talking about?
> Higher taxes prevent business owners from hiring more people and from being able to offer decent wage growth.
No. I'm not in favor of high taxes but this statement is not supported at a theory level nor empirically. For one thing, employees and wages are pre-tax. Basically this type of labor economics stuff really should focus on the "elephant in the office": either an employee creates more profit than they cost or they do not. Tax levels make minimal difference here, if at all, even worse is tax topics get easily politicized, used to manipulate and distract from the real labor issues worth studying and discussing.
Also, the small business statistics you mention are misleading. I'm sure it was not on purpose but to be clear: That is 80% of ALL businesses are nonemployer (not 80% of small businesses). Does that feel right? 80% of businesses are one person businesses? Feels high, no? What percentage of people living around you are in this group?
The figure is misleading because the "23 million small businesses" counted to get 80% are not all real businesses, relatively few are. 23 million is based on the number of business tax returns filed not the number of proper going concern business businesses. There is a difference. Millions of those 23M business tax returns do not represent a "business" in the sense of an entity that would or could support hiring of an employee - it's not that type of business nor trying to be. There are various reasons for a business tax return to be filed by someone or group, including the obvious tax benefits offered right now today for small businesses. "Home office" deduction anyone? I think a business that generates somewhere around $1000 must file taxes for it but a "business" that earns nothing might also still file and be counted...
But I do agree with you 100% how small businesses are crucial to this country and they need support, legal and economic support, and they need to be able to hire new people and offer apprenticeships and compete locally and globally. Unfortunately the trend is going against this.
Also here is a pew link with related info from a different angle: http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2015/10/22/three-in-ten-u-s-j...
[+] [-] dismantlethesun|8 years ago|reply
At the lowest bracket (<$50,000), you pay 15%. At the highest bracket ($18 million+), you pay 35%.
Small businesses with NO employees (e.g. the 80% of such), are typically pass-through entities not subject to corporate income tax rates, or are making far far less than 18 million dollars.
One could easily see a proposal to raise the tax on the highest bracket, or create an even higher bracket (e.g. companies earning 100 million or above), and tax that at 40%.
[+] [-] lucaspiller|8 years ago|reply
For small businesses the profits are typically what the directors 'take home' as their salary, so raising corporate taxes would impact them (however that could be countered by lowering personal income taxes), but it wouldn't cut the cash flow available for hiring employees.
[+] [-] thr0waway1239|8 years ago|reply
But I am also curious about the contributions of factors other than automation which prevents people from being net producers. For e.g. what is the role of inflation (a moderate pace of deflation will allow people to make do with less, get off the treadmill faster, and also make part-time work much more feasible)?
[+] [-] PeterisP|8 years ago|reply
In the coming decades, we're facing millions and millions of people for whom the market price of their labor will be lower than the market price of their bare sustenance. We're not there yet, and especially not worldwide, but that's where the trends are pointing so we're discussing it to have a perspective of what needs to be done in the future. There's no "checks and balances" possible - they will be net consumers if they are alive.
Already there are massive industries (e.g. garment and footwear manufacturing) which are not automated only because for now e.g. offshore sweatshop labor for handful of rice a day is cheaper than doing it with robots - but it's changing as automation is becoming cheaper over time.
So that is the big question, what will we do with the growing number people for whom the society has no economical need, who must be net consumers - and there really are only two options, either the society transfers resources so that they can live a reasonable life, or it does not, and they do not live a reasonable life.
[+] [-] cousin_it|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] influnza|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] marcus_holmes|8 years ago|reply
If you hand the necessities of life to humans with no effort required, we get weird.
It's not that "work builds character" or any of that bull, just that humans don't do well when dependent on others. We need some sense of accomplishment and achievement. We may, in time, be able to separate these things from "work" and "putting bread on the table", but it'll take a generation of messed-up people first.
[+] [-] em3rgent0rdr|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] MR4D|8 years ago|reply
Taxing companies is illogical (ignoring that they are generally easier for politicians to tax than individuals, but that's another topic).
For instance, companies can only do four things with their profits:
1 - pay employees more
2 - pay shareholders more
3 - build/buy more (what is usually called reinvesting or R&D, but can also mean buying thicker carpets and nicer offices)
4 - build up cash (which eventually will be used to do one of the above 3 items)
Increasing taxes on companies only can reduce those 4 things. How a person can conceive that taxing them more has no impact is beyond me. In each instance there is a person that can be taxed at the end of the chain. So why do it twice?
Taxing companies merely distorts markets (witness all the money AAPL & GOOD put thru Ireland, or how GE pays so little taxes, but has armies of lawyers who do nothing but ensure money is moved to places in ways it cannot be taxed).
The author ignores reality and the many examples (I cited only 3) that disprove him in the hear and now.
His question is good - indeed, very important - but his answer is not only bad, but also misleading and incorrect.
[+] [-] xg15|8 years ago|reply
The article briefly touches or by mentioning work "builds character" but doesn't discuss the consequences if those things are not available anymore or how we could keep them available.
I have a sort of fear that a world where everything is automated could start off as a paradise - but over time more and more areas could become "off-limits" for 99% of the population, since they are not needed and would just disturb operation - until in the end they have lots of leisure time (hooray) but few things to actually do except meaningless hobbies.
[+] [-] jhoechtl|8 years ago|reply
So far the theory. However, as more and more jobs become replaced my machines and robots which do not pay social taxes, there is no money to redistribute and the labor market will be supply driven by those who create the jobs.
[+] [-] contingencies|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] crdoconnor|8 years ago|reply
Not enough jobs != not enough work. It's easy to reduce the number of jobs, simply accumulate all the money in one place and don't spend it.
It puzzles me why people think that humanity has somehow just run out of things to do for one another. Just world fallacy?
[+] [-] johnnyg|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ue_|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pvnick|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] avmich|8 years ago|reply
Reads surprising to me. The population of US rose since 2000, so to have net gain zero the employment ratio has to fall compared to 2000 - but it's pretty high today. Hm?
[+] [-] PeterisP|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] greeneggs|8 years ago|reply
https://data.bls.gov/cgi-bin/surveymost?ln
[+] [-] rl3|8 years ago|reply
Title should be updated accordingly.
[+] [-] ManlyBread|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] phoenixProgram|8 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] teslaberry|8 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] pvnick|8 years ago|reply
The author is a professor at a state college. Which means taxes pay for him to think up such nonsense.
[+] [-] programmarchy|8 years ago|reply
How can this professor call himself a historian with a straight face?
I'm sick of tax dollars funding this postmodern bilge -- opining from ivory towers, appealing to emotions, and fomenting divisions between class and race.
According to a recent report by the ITIF: "Contrary to popular perceptions, the labor market is not experiencing unprecedented technological disruption. In fact, occupational churn in the United States is at a historic low."
There is an enormous opportunity for increased productivity and wealth, and if history is any indicator there will be plenty of work to be done.
[1] https://itif.org/publications/2017/05/08/false-alarmism-tech...
[+] [-] labster|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] throwaway31234|8 years ago|reply
India, China were reasonably rich with vast reserves of Gold/Silver. Who are the rich in today's world ? Yeah that's right.
[+] [-] ebola1717|8 years ago|reply