At 01:37 98-03-01 -0500, Tom Walker wrote:
>Andre's arithmetic doesn't follow the example that Thomas Lunde was
>referring to and it doesn't provide even the most rudimentary model of the
>economy into which and from which all those straw expenditures and revenues
>would be flowing. But more impo
Andre Gouin wrote,
>The constituency for a GAI is not powerful
>because it maybe addressing the problem too globally. When we note our
>bureaucrats gnawing away at all our "universal" systems, health, education,
>old age pensions, I get the feeling that GAI is going counter-current, even
>though
--
Hi Eva et al,
I must point out that there is a distinction between companies making
lots of money and CEOs etc. making huge salaries.
The justification for awarding the big bucks is to give an incentive
to those whose efforts lead the company towards profitability.
But I surmise that
Andre Gouin wrote,
>Let's take that number and play a little arithmetic with it. $9000. for a
>GAI for every one. That is 9 times the number that I selected as a for e.g.
>Mr. Martin's budget on tuesday predicts revenues of $151billions and
>expenses of $148billions. Now at $9000 for each of 30 m
At 08:48 98-02-27 -0800, Tom Walker wrote:
>A $1000 GAI is $30 billion IF AND ONLY IF you account for it as an
>additional cost, over and above current program spending. By the same >token,
>a bicycle may look expensive IF you already own and maintain a car and will
>continue to do so after you b
Thomas Lunde wrote:
>
> Ed Weick wrote:
>
> We have also witnessed an increasing convergence of
> the interests of our universities with the concerns of business
>
> Quoted from a Posting on gdk97 list
>
> My comment on the Private vs. Public Sector Debate:
> Bear in mind that one of the five
as Lunde <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; Future Work
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: February 26, 1998 5:55 PM
Subject: Re: FW Some hard questions about a Basic Income 1
>At 10:45 98-02-25 -0500, Thomas Lunde wrote:
>>
>>This is indeed truly exciting a perhaps a valid reason why a grass
Ed Weick wrote:
We have also witnessed an increasing convergence of
the interests of our universities with the concerns of business
Quoted from a Posting on gdk97 list
My comment on the Private vs. Public Sector Debate:
Bear in mind that one of the five principles of the market economy --
pos
I wonder how this one would fare if put to a national referendum?
FWP.
Andre Gouin wrote,
>e.g. let's say the GAI is $1000./year. In Canada, at say 30 millions of us,
>that means 30,000 million CAD. Now by the general reaction to Martin's 2.5
>billion CAD to students over ten years, I've grave doubts about the chances
>of any Basic Income soon, unless it can be show
>But if a 32 hour work week is more expensive
>than a 40 hour week, why are we surprised when no one bites?
A 32-hour work week is more expensive only because of the high component of
fixed non-wage labour costs. Most of those fixed costs arise from
legislation, not from market forces. Lars Osber
Jim Dator wrote:
> Many thanks, Tom. No need to send it now. And thanks for the other
> information, too.
>
> What in your opinion (and I ask others on the list, too) were the main
> reasons, or forces, which prevented the logic of automation moving towards
> a shorter work week and eventually
--
Hi all,
[Jim Dator wrote..]
>Many thanks, Tom. No need to send it now. And thanks for the other
>information, too.
>
>What in your opinion (and I ask others on the list, too) were the main
>reasons, or forces, which prevented the logic of automation moving towards
>a shorter work wee
More automation means more capital investment and
lower rate of profit in a time when profit is
still reasonable through financial servises,
speculation and service industries.
Also, there were still some new markets
and new low-pay workers around the globe
offering more profitable alternatives.
At 10:45 98-02-25 -0500, Thomas Lunde wrote:
>
>This is indeed truly exciting a perhaps a valid reason why a grassroots
debate come education process should take place in the medium of the
Internet on Lists like FutureWork. One of my thoughts to those who have
queried the costs of such a system o
At 13:03 98-02-25 -0800, Tom Walker wrote:
>Jim Dator expressed his interest in documenting the early debates and
>responses to automation. The termed reputedly was coined in the early 1950s
>by a guy named Diebold (can't find his first name at the moment). What to
>do about automation was a big i
Many thanks, Tom. No need to send it now. And thanks for the other
information, too.
What in your opinion (and I ask others on the list, too) were the main
reasons, or forces, which prevented the logic of automation moving towards
a shorter work week and eventually the end of work from playing o
I recall reading the report of a US Commission (presidential or Senate?)
looking at automation. Was it in the 50's? It seemed to come to the
conclusion 'nothing to worry about.'
On Wed, 25 Feb 1998, Jim Dator wrote:
> Yes, Tom, YES. That is what I was thinking about, and I would love to
I should add the historical note that the congressional committee hearings
and their sanguine conclusion happened before the 1957-58 recession, the
first really big post-war recession. Worries about automation picked up
during and after the recession.
>Arthur Cordell wrote,
>
>>I recall reading t
Arthur Cordell wrote,
>I recall reading the report of a US Commission (presidential or Senate?)
>looking at automation. Was it in the 50's? It seemed to come to the
>conclusion 'nothing to worry about.'
There were hearings of the Subcommittee on Economic Stabilization of the
Joint Economic C
Jim Dator expressed his interest in documenting the early debates and
responses to automation. The termed reputedly was coined in the early 1950s
by a guy named Diebold (can't find his first name at the moment). What to do
about automation was a big issue for the newly merged AFL-CIO in the
mid-fi
Yes, Tom, YES. That is what I was thinking about, and I would love to
know more (maybe sending it privately if onthers on this list aren't
intersted).
Here is the book you were probably thinking of: John Diebold, Automation:
the advent of the automatic factory. Van Nostrand, 1952, although he di
Dear Eva:
You seem to have an uncanny knack of directing my attention in your short
messages. You wrote:
I do not agree with mandatory voting,
if there is no democratically controlled
media and free flow of information.
Staying away reflect the reality
of the system and a valid opinion.
Eva
I
Gail Stewart wrote under the thread Basic
Income:
"In the early 1970's in Canada, with the
threat of "automation" in the offing, the social policy struggle
at departmental level was between income maintenance on the one hand and
community employment on the other. It was an unequal strugg
Unlike Thomas Lunde, the item in the following that caught my attention
was "with the threat of 'automation.'"
>Gail Stewart wrote under the thread Basic Income:
>"In the early 1970's in Canada, with the threat of
>"automation" in the offing, the social policy struggle at
>departmental level wa
Thomas Lunde wrote,
>I'm sure and so is Noam Chomsky . . .
Speaking of Chomsky, I came across an interesting quote, referring to an
anti-war demonstration at the Pentagon in 1967,
"Dan Ellsberg later told me," Chomsky recalls, "that he'd been
standing next to McNamara up in the Pentagon somewh
Eva wrote:
There is however in my opiniona fairly
conscious attempt by the mass media to trivialiseand evade all real
political issues to prolonguethe idea, that politics has no relevane to
people's lives.
The mass media is a private business. One
might even call it an oligopoly. Those
Tom Walker shared:
Instead, some of the problems of governance
today stem from the excess of democracy . . . Needed instead, is a greater
degree of moderation in democracy. . ."
I was driving my 81 year old mother around the
other days and we were listening to the radio news. Some story
And how well it works! Not just to create alienation and political
passivity, but also to keep the lower and lower-middle classes at each
other's throats via racism, sexism, etc. When things are tough, they
attack each other instead of the elite that is the source of their
problems.
On Mon, 23
I don't think there is any conscious conspiracy
in making the poor poorer etc, that is the nature
of the system. There is however in my opinion
a fairly conscious attempt by the mass media to trivialise
and evade all real political issues to prolongue
the idea, that politics has no relevane to
pe
Cc: Future Work <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; Hi Kathy & Robert
> &Chelsea & Bree <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; Gregory Roche
> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> Date: February 22, 1998 3:06 PM
> Subject: Re: FW - Some hard questions about a Basic Income 1
>
>
> >Thomas
Durant wrote:
[snip]
> "Authority" is getting discredited.
[snip]
IMO, this is the *key*. That power must be
deprived of its sting, and that "we" must cease to
respect and worship "the great" is the message of
Elias Canetti's book: _Crowds and Power_.
I've been trying to "detoxify myself" in th
Thomas Lunde wrote:
>
> Dear Brad:
>
> As usual, your scholarship awes me and I am grateful for your responses and
> the book references you quote.
The late psychoanalyst [Prince] Masud Khan
describes, in his book: _The Long Wait_,
a patient commenting on his imposing library. The patient as
Thomas Lunde wrote,
>Contrast to our society in which a number of
>writers have postulated we are governed by an elite and the electorate on
>the whole is considered the great unwashed and only consulted infrequently
>via elections. (Which is manipulated by the most creative and best financed
>pe
EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: February 22, 1998 3:06 PM
Subject: Re: FW - Some hard questions about a Basic Income 1
>Thomas Lunde wrote:
>>
>> Brad McCormick wrote:
>>
>> where as Marx wrote -- albeit about the
>> future instead of the past -- there is no longer t
Thomas Lunde wrote:
>
> Please accept this as a continuation to my response to Eva Durants
> question about my seeming avoidance of the question "who is going to
> pay?". This quote is from another list I monitor, posted by a Mr.
> John McLaren.
>
> This put me in mind of a story in one of the
Please accept this as a continuation to my
response to Eva Durants question about my seeming avoidance of the question
"who is going to pay?". This quote is from another list I
monitor, posted by a Mr. John McLaren.
This put me in mind of a story in one of the
books on my musty shelves.
> Eva Durant wrote:
>
> In the "strongest" economy, even the cut-back
> benefit system creates enormous deficits for
> public expenditure. So how do you envisage
> in our present economic structure a basic income?
>
> Thomas:
>
> Well, I don't. But that is not my concern at the moment. My co
> To trade 40 hours of drudgery for 30 hours of drudgery is
> not much of an improvement humanly and intellectually, even for the same
> income.
wow, but it is definitely a step in the
right direction.
Even a 20minutes cut per day
is heartfelt if the work is a drudgery.
Eva
> In fact, most oft
Eva Durant wrote:
I think everybody accepts, that a system with a
load ofoverworked workers and lots of unemployed/underemployedis
madness. The common argument is not philosophicalbut this "who would
pay for GAI, I don't want to" thing,at which point you have to
contemplate thecommunicati
Thomas Lunde wrote:
>
> Tom Walker wrote:
>
> Consider that "those who are benefiting from the current system" are,
> in a
> sense, hostages of the current system. Consider that it is fear rather
> than
> privilege that is the problem and that it is *our* fear, not our
> opponents'
> that is the
Thomas Lunde wrote:
>
> Brad McCormick wrote:
>
> where as Marx wrote -- albeit about the
> future instead of the past -- there is no longer the
> government of men but only the administration of things...),
> whereas we have devolved into aspiring
> to freedom *of* enterprise, i.e., to make mor
Eva Durant wrote:
In the "strongest" economy, even the cut-backbenefit system
creates enormous deficits forpublic expenditure. So how do you
envisagein our present economic structure a basic income?
Thomas:
Well, I don't. But that is not my concern
at the moment. My concern is to try
Jim Dator wrote:
Separating "work" entirely from access
to goods and services, andpermitting/enabling people to live meaningful,
satisfied lives without"working" seems one of the biggest
challenges of the present, andforeseeable future.
Thomas
Yes, I think you have made the correct
as
Arthur Cordell wrote:
One practical reason for a basic income.
Maintain effective demand in theeconomy. Maintain purchasing
power. Going to be hard to buy all thatoutput without access to
purchasing power.
Thomas
Indeed, a practical reason. It is only in
the last few months, that
Colin Stark wrote:
Because!Because IT IS
OBVIOUS!Just do it!Who cares about philosophical, hypothetical,
theorizing?
Thomas
If I was God - woops sorry I just looked in the
mirror. If it is obvious ? Obviously it isn't. Working on
the premise that no one does anything to deliber
Tom Walker wrote:
Consider that "those who are benefiting
from the current system" are, in asense, hostages of the current
system. Consider that it is fear rather thanprivilege that is the problem
and that it is *our* fear, not our opponents'that is the
obstacle.
Thomas
What a beautif
Brad McCormick wrote:
where as Marx wrote -- albeit about
thefuture instead of the past -- there is no longer thegovernment of men
but only the administration of things...), whereas we have devolved into
aspiringto freedom *of* enterprise, i.e., to make more money asthe
summum bonum.
Tom Walker wrote:
Fred Block (a social economist whose judgment I respect) estimated
thatabout 15% of the work performed in North America was necessary to
produceour standard of living. The rest goes to sustain our standards of
inequity.Even if only 1/4 of the presently wasted work effort
At 08:43 AM 2/21/98 -0800, Tom Walker wrote:
>We have the reasons, well documented. The hard question is do we have the will?
I believe that we need not only the WILL but the MEANS.
At the risk of repeating myself, I believe that the MEANS may well be Direct
Democracy:
"a system of citizen-init
AR Gouin wrote:
>
[snip]
> Seriously, I'm all for GAI - its success depends on the way of its
> introduction. I'm also for reduced work time - not on a weekly basis but on
> a lifetime basis. Of my 40 years of "work", I can very easily identify at
> least ten that I could have done without. And t
At 19:00 98-02-19 -0500, Thomas Lunde wrote:
>Given that the concept of a Basic
>Income, Guaranteed Annual Income or some other variant on this theme, what
>would the philosophy be that could justify giving every man, woman and
>child a Basic Income paid on a weekly basis with no other qualifi
In the "strongest" economy, even the cut-back
benefit system creates enormous deficits for
pubilic expenditure. So how do you envisage
in our present economic structure a basic income?
Eva
> One practical reason for a basic income. Maintain effective demand in the
> economy. Maintain purchasin
Andre Gouin wrote,
>Guaranteed Annual Income (or some such) is not about to come to be so long
>as it is not clear who's going to pay for it.
>
>Reduced working time for the same income is also not about to come into
>being so long as, again, it is not clear who is going to pay for it.
In both
We have the reasons, well documented. The hard question is do we have the will?
Regards,
Tom Walker
^^^
Vancouver, B.C.
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
(604) 669-3286
^^^
The TimeWork Web: http:/
Durant wrote:
>
> In the "strongest" economy, even the cut-back
> benefit system creates enormous deficits for
> pubilic expenditure. So how do you envisage
> in our present economic structure a basic income?
I wonder if we've seen any *strong economies* lately
(except perhaps for Norway...).
At 01:29 PM 2/20/98 -1000, Jim Dator wrote:
>The last series of interchanges have been the main reason I joined (and
>have remained lurking) on Futurework.
>
>I just don't see that there are now enough needed jobs at sufficiently
>high wages to give everyone (at least in the post-industrial world)
At 03:34 PM 2/20/98 -0500, Thomas Lunde wrote:
>Tom Walker answered:
>
>If I can try and paraphrase your answer, it would be that we should change
because "a wage system is no longer appropriate to the way that a modern
economy works." And because of this, the cost of providing a worker is
borne
On Fri, 20 Feb 1998, Colin Stark wrote:
> At 03:34 PM 2/20/98 -0500, Thomas Lunde wrote:
> >Tom Walker answered:
> >
> >If I can try and paraphrase your answer, it would be that we should change
> because "a wage system is no longer appropriate to the way that a modern
> economy works." And beca
One practical reason for a basic income. Maintain effective demand in the
economy. Maintain purchasing power. Going to be hard to buy all that
output without access to purchasing power.
arthur cordell
On Fri, 20 Feb 1998, Colin Stark wrote:
> At 03:34 PM 2/20/98 -0500, Thomas Lunde wrote:
Tom Walker answered:
I'd have a look at John Maurice Clark's writing
on labour as an overheadcost (in his _Studies in the Economics of Overhead
Costs_). Thejustification is that a wage system is no longer appropriate to
the way thata modern economy works. The wage system is a form of contr
Brad McCormick answered:
Hasn't our society already answered this
question for all thosepersons who "come into" an annual income by
accident ofbirth rather than their accountable personal efforts? (This
is obvious,but surely not irrelevant.)\brad
mccormick
Thomas
If I can paraphrase
The last series of interchanges have been the main reason I joined (and
have remained lurking) on Futurework.
I just don't see that there are now enough needed jobs at sufficiently
high wages to give everyone (at least in the post-industrial world) a
living income. Many, perhaps most, people are
Thomas Lunde wrote:
>
> Hi FWer's:
>
> Some of my recent reading has asked me to consider some serious
> questions, questions which need to be discussed and critiqued. I
> will pose some of these questions and see what kind of responses the
> questions evoke. For example:
>
> Given that the c
Hi FWer's:
Some of my recent reading has asked me to
consider some serious questions, questions which need to be discussed and
critiqued. I will pose some of these questions and see what kind of
responses the questions evoke. For example:
Given that the concept of a Basic Income,
Gua
Thomas Lunde wrote,
>Given that the concept of a Basic Income, Guaranteed Annual Income or some
other variant on this theme, what would the philosophy be that could justify
giving every man, woman and child a Basic Income paid on a weekly basis with
no other qualification other than citizenship?
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