A work or die mentality doesn't work. Why we deserve a basic income.

originally posted by: JimmyJones63
"Healthcare should be free, lets vote for that!" So they got what they voted for and now they are saying "I am not paying for that! I don't need it!"

I don't know where you got your information from but Healthcare and Insurance Reform started with Healthcare and Insurance Lobbyists, not the people, because they were running out of other peoples money so they wanted everyone to pitch in.

Globalism has cut into the wages of many Americans but the Healthcare and and Insurance Industry did not want to take a paycut. It is the most expensive sector in our economy with the top selling stocks for the wealthy.

Obamacare started with Lobbyists

Those special snowflakes with no money always had free healthcare when they went to the emergency room instead of the clinic.

www.opensecrets.org...

Pharmaceuticals/Health Products $3,320,985,764
Insurance $2,311,528,533
Electric Utilities $2,102,937,662
Electronics Mfg & Equip $1,913,656,622
Business Associations $1,907,834,617
Oil & Gas $1,813,270,242
Misc Manufacturing & Distributing $1,489,185,394
Education $1,458,583,146
Hospitals/Nursing Homes $1,379,005,524
Securities & Investment $1,341,223,018
Telecom Services $1,339,438,696
Real Estate $1,278,111,878
Civil Servants/Public Officials $1,272,955,461
Health Professionals $1,250,743,066
Air Transport $1,186,699,642
Misc Issues $968,758,243
Defense Aerospace $941,048,518
Automotive $937,310,790
Health Services/HMOs $924,824,890
TV/Movies/Music $898,873,684

With the exeption of the right s you hired me to kill for ,you get what you earn or you don't eat ...not die.
WE ALL figure it out and get fed.
NOT easy in this employment world,they have a back up plan you can milk .

originally posted by: Masterjaden
a reply to: Benicealways

An idiotic entitlement attitude... No one deserves ANYTHING... I don't care if there are machines that can do everything and everyone could have anything they wanted. You still don't DESERVE to have anything just because you exist..the exception being unalienable rights. You most assuredly don't deserve anything at the cost of depravation of others' rights.

Jaden

That goes against the Constitution and the Founding Fathers wishes where the ability to be self sufficient should be available for everyone

a reply to: jacobe001

WHAT??? no I'm sorry there is NOTHING in the constitution that comes any where NEAR to supporting that assertion.

You have the right to pursue happiness and the govt cannot deprive you of life and liberty. There is NOTHING about the govt supporting you in ANY WAY...

Jaden

a reply to: Benicealways

WEll that goes to the old saying that nothing is assured but death and taxes... Nope...the only thing assured is living until you die. The only thing you deserve is to live until you die. How you go about doing that is up to you, and I and govt should not be allowed to deprive you of that without due cause.

Jaden

a reply to: Masterjaden

Well, the proof is in the pudding.
The more equal countries do better in pretty much every social aspect in their society:

originally posted by: Masterjaden
a reply to: jacobe001

WHAT??? no I'm sorry there is NOTHING in the constitution that comes any where NEAR to supporting that assertion.

You have the right to pursue happiness and the govt cannot deprive you of life and liberty. There is NOTHING about the govt supporting you in ANY WAY...

Jaden

It is supposed to be done through policies IF the politicians represent the people as they are supposed to be doing, but instead, politicians answer only to Globalists and Deep Pocket Banks and Corporations

Corporate and Banking Lobbyists need to be thrown out of the government.

www.washingtonsblog.com...


The primary author of the Constitution – and later president – James Madison wrote on the inequalities:

The great object [of political parties] should be to combat the evil: 1. By establishing a political equality among all. 2. By withholding unnecessary opportunities from a few, to increase the inequality of property, by an immoderate, and especially an unmerited, accumulation of riches. 3. By the silent operation of laws, which, without violating the rights of property, reduce extreme wealth towards a state of mediocrity, and raise extreme indigence towards a state of comfort.

And Thomas Jefferson Wrote that the unemployed and poor should have first dibs on property in order to provide them their livelihood

I am conscious that an equal division of property is impracticable.

But the consequences of this enormous inequality producing so much misery to the bulk of mankind, legislators cannot invent too many devices for subdividing property, only taking care to let their subdivisions go hand in hand with the natural affections of the human mind.

The descent of property of every kind therefore to all the children, or to all the brothers and sisters, or other relations in equal degree is a politic measure, and a practicable one.

Another means of silently lessening the inequality of property is to exempt all from taxation below a certain point, and to tax the higher portions of property in geometrical progression as they rise.

Whenever there is in any country, uncultivated lands and unemployed poor, it is clear that the laws of property have been so far extended as to violate natural right. The earth is given as a common stock for man to labour and live on. If, for the encouragement of industry we allow it to be appropriated, we must take care that other employment be furnished to those excluded from the appropriation. If we do not the fundamental right to labour the earth returns to the unemployed.

It is too soon yet in our country to say that every man who cannot find employment but who can find uncultivated land, shall be at liberty to cultivate it, paying a moderate rent. But it is not too soon to provide by every possible means that as few as possible shall be without a little portion of land.

John Adams feared that “monopolies of land” would destroy the nation and that an oligarchy arising out of inequality would manipulate voters, creating “a system of subordination to all… The capricious will of one or a very few” dominating the rest.

When he was elderly, Adams wrote that the goal of the democratic government was not to help the wealthy and powerful but to achieve “the greatest happiness for the greatest number.”

originally posted by: Masterjaden
a reply to: Benicealways

WEll that goes to the old saying that nothing is assured but death and taxes... Nope...the only thing assured is living until you die. The only thing you deserve is to live until you die. How you go about doing that is up to you, and I and govt should not be allowed to deprive you of that without due cause.

Jaden

What we have right now is a Plutocratic Oligarch serving only the wealthy and they need to be thrown out of the government

a reply to: Benicealways

Then feel free to move to those societies...

Don't tread on my liberties to try and shift our system.

Jaden

a reply to: jacobe001

Absolutely, givng # to people who aren't making their own way isn't the answer to that, you do what you have to, in order to rid the system of corruption...

Jaden

a reply to: SprocketUK


People on the left oppose a flat tax because it raises taxes on the poor while lowering taxes on the rich.

originally posted by: anotheramethyst
a reply to: SprocketUK


People on the left oppose a flat tax because it raises taxes on the poor while lowering taxes on the rich.

I think a flat tax would be a good idea
Do away with loop holes, special credits, mortgage deductions and so on
It has been said that taxes are passed onto the consumer anyways right?
So those poor people pay for it anyhow

We should also consider that that all consumers pay for lobbying costs

a reply to: Benicealways

I work my ass off all day in this sticky southeast Texas heat For a measly $10/hr. Depending on the bids, I do general labor, maintenance, construction, and metal fabrication. Some days my crew and I feel sick as all get out by the end of the day. We come home covered in dirt and grime and sometimes blood. Sometimes I hate it, but it always feels good to see what we accomplished together.

Go outside and look around. Most everything you see was put there by men who work hard. Everyone can't just stop working. People have to manufacture those self-driving tractors. People have to build and maintain those roads to drive food to various locations. People have to run grocery stores and restaurants. People have to work.

People won't stop working, people have an innate drive to create, participate, help, play, work together.
Just like children are filled with, but that gets pushed out of them generally because of a horrible school system (that is also still focused on the work or die paradigm).

Not to mention that most people like more than the basics.

Countries that have a social welfare system do way better in virtually all social economic aspects. However, welfare discourages working, which breeds frustration in the people as well (i.e. people working part time may make less or the same amount to people who don't work or can't find work).

We have the chance to create true freedom without sacrificing true freedom, yet most people here seem to still be stuck in the 'but I suffered so you need to suffer for it too' (not saying work has to be suffering, it can be quite the contrary, but saying that everyone must go through the same thing even if they didn't want to implies you didn't do it for the joy of it etiher).

originally posted by: anotheramethyst
a reply to: SprocketUK


People on the left oppose a flat tax because it raises taxes on the poor while lowering taxes on the rich.

Sure, that's how it appears, but the shortfalls in current tax takes are made up by sales taxes (VAT) which hits the poor disproportionately. Arguments for a flat tax include reducing or eliminating many of the sales taxes which would probably more than make up for any loss of income a flat tax would impose on the poor.

a reply to: jacobe001

We are nowhere near 90% automation. We're nowhere near 9% automation.

a reply to: stolencar18

Back that less than 9% automation up please. Should be hard to do I'm guessing, since is kinda complex to quantify.

Less than 9% automation compared to what? When? Where?

Which jobs are we including which aren't we. How are you defining automated.

If a factory had say a worker for various parts in assembly, but now machines do most of that work, turning many workers into babysitters touching only the stuff the machine can't, and now most of those workers that used to individually do all those parts of assembly are now out of a job, leaving one "babysitter" where once there were 30 workers. Is that automation to you, or does the babysitter make it not count?

Tell me how your defining automation, because when many people jobs are replaced by one machine, regardless of whether someone is operating that machine, I'd say that's an example of what people are talking about with automation.

Hey OP,

Your title contains the phrase "We deserve a basic income."

"Deserve" can be a dangerous word. We shouldn't all be in a rush to get what we "deserve."

So, if we "deserve" a basic income, what does society deserve back from us? What to we owe the group, in exchange for free money?"

There's an old document that explains why governments are instituted among men. I don't remember if "Get free Ship" was one of the reasons....

a reply to: redempsh
Our true response-ability is to be ourselves, to follow our passions, to be who we are created to be.
But it is specifically the case because we have come to a point where supplying the basic goods require almost no work and everyone is forced to perpetuate this endless growth economy that disregards freedom over the pursuit of more and more luxury

Here is a good lecture

a reply to: Benicealways

A work or die mentality is inhumane.

Except, nobody has that attitude because it is not necessary for you to work to live.

If person A labors to produce X, and you find value in X and want it--if person A wants something in exchange for X, he deserves the respect of being compensated for what his labor created, YOU'RE the one who wants X. A currency is just a tool that solves a problem, nothing more. It gives people the means with which to be able to value resources in a way that makes sense, a currency affectively acts as a guarantee. If person A just gave you X, he would have zero guarantee that others would reciprocate such an action. Using a currency means that person A knows that trading X to you will result in him also being able to trade with others.

A currency also gets over the issues of pure bartering. If you tend sheep, and you want corn from the corn grower, how much corn is equivalent to X quantity of sheep? What if the corn grower doesn't want sheep?

We don't work to live. We work to earn a medium of exchange that can be used to trade with others in the market. You work because person A labored to create X and you desire X, and person A wants an equivalent exchange in value.

It is not required that you interact in the market to live. You can very well provide everything you need to survive by utilizing your labor, and your labor alone. The quality of what you can produce is irrelevant, the fact remains that you have the ability to survive utilizing your labor outside of the market.