I feel that a universal basic income would only work in a society where
there was sufficient mutual trust and undestanding to make it work. The
problem with those who propose such ideas can be that they think that
everyone else is like them. I suspect that if that was the case then
the scheme would work. You dont have to see much news to realise that
we are not there yet, which means the scheme would fail (PInker's "The
Angels of our better nature" provides some background)
I wonder whether a more workable/realistic alternative is to introduce
artificial inefficiencies into society such that more people need to
work. Ideally the inefficiencies are ones which mean that fewer
resources, but more people are needed to do what needs to be done. It
might be cheaper to buy new rather than repair, but with the appropriate
inefficiencies we can make it cheaper to repair (using the repair shop
round the corner) rather than buy new.
However, I cant work out what the inefficiencies would need to be, and
how they could be introduced.
Nigel
On 09/09/2014 16:58, H Veeder wrote:
America is running out of jobs. It's time for a universal basic income.
http://theweek.com/article/index/267720/america-is-running-out-of-jobs-its-time-for-a-universal-basic-income
quotes
<< The idea that work is a bedrock of society, that absolutely
everyone who is not too old, too young, or disabled must have a job,
was not handed down on tablets from Mount Sinai. It is the result of a
historical development, one which may not continue forever. On the
contrary, based on current trends, it is already breaking down.
The history of nearly universal labor participation is only about a
century and a half old. Back in the early days of capitalism, demand
for labor was so strong that all the ancient arrangements of society
and family were shredded to accommodate it. Marx's Capital famously
described how women and very young children were press-ganged into the
textile mills and coal mines, how the nighttime was colonized for
additional shifts, and how capitalists fought to extend the working
day to the very limits of human endurance (and often beyond).
The resulting misery, abuse, and wretchedness were so staggering, and
the resulting class conflicts so intense, that various hard-won
reforms were instituted: the eight-hour day, the weekend, the
abolition of child labor, and so forth.
But this process of drawing more people into the labor force peaked in
the late 1990s, when women finally finished joining the labor force
(after having been forced out to make room for returning veterans
after World War II). The valorization of work as the source of all
that is good in life is to a great degree the result of the need to
legitimate capital's voracious demand for labor.
>>
<< As someone with a nice, stimulating job, I agree that work can help
people flourish. But in an economy that is flatly failing to produce
enough jobs to satisfy the need, a universal basic income will start
to seem more plausible — even necessary.>>
