Elaro's musings on the whole "working" thing

[Elaro]

Hey, guys, sorry I've been away so long. I had a condition.

Anyway, I want to know what you guys think.

So, I have a problem with the concept of employment. The ideal is that :

You may sell your time and effort for money to someone other entity who intends to profit off the product of the labour that you have agreed to do for him.

Now, at first glance, this seems fair, as long as you are paid regardless of whether the entity succeeds or not at making a profit and that the chances of the entity making several many times* more money off of your work is small, aka that the chance you get underpaid for your labour is small.

However, several problems arise out of this. First of all, you are not at liberty to sell or not your time and effort. Unless you can attract investors regardless of previous performance, there are only so many times you can try to "make it", so to speak, without bankruptcy or accumulating capital by selling your T&E to whomever is willing to employ you. So at some point, if you don't start off rich, you basically have to work for a living.

Which brings us to a second problem. Because people have to work for a living, sometimes their employer wants them to do something that is contrary to the common good, or quite simply decides what the employee is going to work on for the next day, month, year, etc.

Does this strike anyone else as below the dignity of a person? I mean, shouldn't I get to decide what I want to spend my T&E on, or at least shouldn't other people attempt to woo/convince me to do something? Shouldn't my opinion as a worker be sought by the people who are going to organize my work? Shouldn't I agree with the purpose of the work that I am doing? I think, especially in this age of gross environmental destruction by economic activity, I think people should pay more attention to what they do than just how much they can make.

Because in this age of abundance and technological marvels, we shouldn't have to struggle just to survive. We should all be free. Free to work on our webcomics, free to practice smithing, free to do whatever we want. The only thing is that we need things to do those things, and so there is work that needs to be done.

Basically what grinds my gears is that our labour is ruled by the few rather than the many, which means that for 35-40 hours every week, or about half our waking adult lives, are spent in an authoritarian regime. That doesn't seem good.

So I have an idea. We pay people not to work for corporations, and we strike until we achieve Pirate Corporatism. So, two ideas. First, we give someone 30k a year on the condition they either A) work for themselves, B) get educated, C) Do volunteer work, D) do whatever hobby they're interested in. The idea is to give people the liberty to refuse to sell their T&E without ending up on the street. This opportunity will drive wages up as the working person will be in a more solid bargaining position.

Secondly, Pirate Corporatism. Why is it called that? Because by it, we organize a corporation like a pirate ship. Remember how the whole crew voted on who would be captain of a pirate ship? That, except it would be every employee, and they would vote for the entire managerial corps of a corporation. Or maybe just the CEO? Or maybe the upper brass. Or maybe the board of directors? Like they do in Germany.

Anyway, yeah. Thoughts?

[AdmiralMemo]

I'd be into doing that. I have no idea if/how it'd work, but it sounds good in theory.

[J_S_Bach]

Who's going to supply the 30k a year per person?

[JustAName]

I and several people I know are pretty into the idea of low-level socialism, which is sort of what you're on to, but a bit different. I feel that we have governments and obey them because they are supposed to be beneficial to the citizens under them, and that no citizen should be starving or working themselves to death in a good government. So by that token, everyone should get the basics: Basic housing, basic education, basic sustenance, and basic heath care. If they want better versions, or luxuries, they can work to earn money to buy them. And people will work for those things. They just won't have to work more than full-time and still not be able to support themselves under this system.

People may work fewer hours, but we can easily see that there are more people who want to work than are working anyway, so it's not like if there is work that needs doing, it will go undone. There are still flaws, like there are in anything, but I think too many governments are concerned with competing with one another, and not concerned enough with the welfare of their citizens.

My two cents.

[J_S_Bach]

... everyone should get the basics: Basic housing, basic education, basic sustenance, and basic heath care...

I like the idea but agin where are these things coming from? Do we just ask contractors to build housing? Who pays for the education of the teachers? The farmers for the food and the doctors and other health professionals for the health care?

It's beautiful on paper but I don't see how to put it into practice.

[JustAName]

The government pays for it. I thought that was somewhat clear? As it stands, we already have enough empty housing in a lot of places. I'm sure you saw the thing where they housed the homeless population of Utah, and it was actually cheaper than the medical and jail costs they incurred.

http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-utah-housing-first-20150524-story.html

Like, if we decided to be super generous and give people a base $1000 worth of food per year, and if people wanted to buy their own, tastier food that wasn't just staples, they could opt out of the program... we could probably take less than half of the current military budget to do so https://www.nationalpriorities.org/campaigns/military-spending-united-states/. As long as those cuts weren't to veterans' welfare, but were, instead, to things like all the excess gear and supplies that are just sitting around, I'd be fine with it. How about you?

[J_S_Bach]

Well, I don't live in the United States of America so I cannot say anything on how that terrifying country operates or spends their money.

[korvys]

The idea of Basic Income solves a lot of the problems.

[JustAName]

Yeah, basically that, but if you can guarantee housing and food, that solves for price fluctuations. But both are better than current systems.

[Dutch guy]

The problem with basic income is basically the same problem communism has. It doesn't work. Not even on paper.

Lets say you just GIVE people enough money to get around so they don't HAVE to do heavy manual labour to make ends meet. If you crunch the numbers, at current tax levels this barely works, but the government will already be in a tight corner. But here's the problem. If even 10% of the labour force decides that doing that heavy labour is less attractive than the meagre extra reward they get for it then those 10% are going to stop working, pursue other hobbies, drop out of the labour force and stop paying taxes. Less taxes means less income for the government and the balance suddenly veers deeply into the red. Numbers no longer meet. Research have shown that the number of people that would just stop working are even higher than 10%.

The ideas behind Basic Income and other socialist systems are great, but they just don't work in the real world with overcrowded healthcare systems, housing shortages (yes, there are a lot of areas worldwide where there are massive shortages). In order for it to work a government needs to be able to balance the sheet, income to spending. Less income means less spending.

And on the other side, why would I want to keep working and then pay nearly 50% (here in NL anyway) of my income to some lame slacker who sits around on his ass all day drinking beer "because it makes him happy". Yes, I work because I enjoy doing it and the income is much needed and very welcome but that doesn't mean I'd want to pay for certain people to just do nothing all day.

[WP&P]

The general complaint regarding having one's life controlled by a Boss for so much of one's life is because it is a matter of convenience, to implement an arrangement of selling one's T&E. It's highly impractical for the worker to wake up each day and think of what job they'd like to do that day, then go find someone willing to pay them to do it. With modern technology, though, this is starting to become more feasible - you could say that Uber works on this kind of principle, and even sites like eBay let one choose to act like a retailer at whim.

But, in general it wastes T&E to find such a trade arrangement (job), so we tend to sign on for longer periods of time (salary) in order to know that we always have something to do, somewhere to go. The trade-off is that the Boss has some control, and the needs of the workload may shift away from whatever our passions are. That is when the worker's liberty to seek other employment comes in; to the extent that the job no longer satisfies, the worker has other options (including using their gained experience to launch their own concern and step up to the role of Boss).

There are some aspects of my current job that I don't like doing. However, I work in a small firm and all employees end up needing to do things they don't exactly enjoy. Now, in a "Basic Income" type of system, I would be strongly incentivized to just refuse to do those kinds of tasks, as would everyone else. In order to get them done, then, the Boss is going to have to offer special incentives (more pay) or hire more people (who specialize in those tasks), and either option drives up the costs of doing business. Assuming that businesses can make such a transition (all businesses increase payroll), those extra costs have to translate into greater revenue, which means higher costs of whatever the businesses produce, or inflation. The end result is that the value of one's salary, or of the basic income that is their alternative, goes down.

Then you end up with a cycle of seeing this basic income drop below a floor level, to where it is no longer a "living wage" and political battles must be fought over changing its level. Meanwhile, tax revenues to the government tend downward as workers exercise their basic income option instead of earning taxable wages. What may have started out in balance on day one quickly becomes out of whack with rising benefits and diminishing revenues to the government.

[JustAName]

And on the other side, why would I want to keep working and then pay nearly 50% (here in NL anyway) of my income to some lame slacker who sits around on his ass all day drinking beer "because it makes him happy". Yes, I work because I enjoy doing it and the income is much needed and very welcome but that doesn't mean I'd want to pay for certain people to just do nothing all day.

You're not paying that person to sit around. You're paying to maintain the government you have and the way of life you enjoy. I hate this myopic, solipsistic view that most people seem to have. And if someone doesn't work because they can't, or even just don't want to, does that make them inherently worthless? Leave it up to social systems, not governments, to incentivise people to work more. (Also how is someone who doesn't work going to be able to afford beer? P. sure no system offered so far, basic income (which was only 7 or 8k) or necessities of life, covers alcohol or other such luxuries.

[Dutch guy]

And on the other side, why would I want to keep working and then pay nearly 50% (here in NL anyway) of my income to some lame slacker who sits around on his ass all day drinking beer "because it makes him happy". Yes, I work because I enjoy doing it and the income is much needed and very welcome but that doesn't mean I'd want to pay for certain people to just do nothing all day.

You're not paying that person to sit around. You're paying to maintain the government you have and the way of life you enjoy. I hate this myopic, solipsistic view that most people seem to have. And if someone doesn't work because they can't, or even just don't want to, does that make them inherently worthless?

I'd be paying to maintain a government that then pays someone to sit around. Ie, I'd have to be paying MUCH more to the government in order for it to remain more or less afloat (don't forget most countries in the world already have a massive funding shortage). In other word, albeit indirectly, I'm paying for someone to sit around.

I am also not saying we shouldn't provide for people if they CAN'T work. We SHOULD take care of the sick and elderly. I'm saying that I don't think we as a society should want to pay for people who don't WANT to work. Call me a cynic but imho someone who doesn't work when they CAN is not making any meaningful contribution to society. Do note that I count someone who does volunteer work as working but ONLY if that volunteering doesn't then push people out of paying work.

Leave it up to social systems, not governments, to incentivise people to work more. (Also how is someone who doesn't work going to be able to afford beer? P. sure no system offered so far, basic income (which was only 7 or 8k) or necessities of life, covers alcohol or other such luxuries.

I admire your faith in humanity but trust me, there are a LOT of people on this world who WOULD find a way to sit around and drink beer on an income of 7 or 8K.
The reason we as a society incentivise people to work more is because in general it improves that society for all its members. People who do not contribute to that improvement are quickly seen as freeloaders/parasites. What good does it do me for my government to pay someone to not do anything? I pay them taxes so they can build/provide roads, schools, hospitals (unfortunatly now privatized and going to shit fast), sewage works, garbare collection, etc. Not to provide for people who do nothing to contribute to those public works.

[JustAName]

Can you provide evidence that enough people would sit around and not work to be a significant drawback to the entire proposed program? Because otherwise it just sounds like the whole "wellfare queens" argument (which is very made up). Also, 7k BARELY covers rent, and doesn't even cover food. How would one manage to get alcohol in there without working? And do you really think many people who would prefer to starve while they drink themselves to death exist?

[Dutch guy]

Can you provide evidence that enough people would sit around and not work to be a significant drawback to the entire proposed program? Because otherwise it just sounds like the whole "wellfare queens" argument (which is very made up). Also, 7k BARELY covers rent, and doesn't even cover food. How would one manage to get alcohol in there without working? And do you really think many people who would prefer to starve while they drink themselves to death exist?

Look at the current state of the welfare system in the Netherlands for your answer. And the problem is that it doesn't have to be much. The entire system would be barely workable as is. Just a 5% decrease in overal tax income is enough to scuppper it entirely.
There is some research into this basic income system that makes pretty much this point, but unfortunately the only links I can find are in dutch.

[Master Gunner]

Also, 7k BARELY covers rent, and doesn't even cover food. How would one manage to get alcohol in there without working? And do you really think many people who would prefer to starve while they drink themselves to death exist?

My half of the rent for a fairly large apartment in a decent city ran about $6k a year. I know people who have lived in places for half that, and still not scraping the bottom of the barrel for what's available if your standards are low enough. So $7k plus some odd (possible illegitimate jobs) here and there could easily cover all the needs of some people.

I'm not going to weigh in on the merits of basic income in general, but you would be surprised how far some people can go on very little money. I have no doubts some could make it work.

[OccamsRazor]

I'm not going to debate the merits of basic income or not, since I don't really have the experience to discuss that. But the whole idea that working for an employer who dictates your tasks is 'beneath the dignity of a person' I find a little ridiculous.

A persons Time and Effort do not inherently have value in the market just by nature of being time and effort, but only have value in terms of what they can be applied to. Whether working for an employer or not, a certain amount of time and effort needs to be applied to a given project, and then the market decides if that project has monetary value. This is always a risk.

When you set out on your own, you assume the risk, believing that your project has value in the market. When you work for an employer, they have agreed to shoulder that risk, since they believe that their project has value. You, on the other hand, agree to work on their project in exchange for this sense of security.

Value is always dictated by the market, not by individual wants and beliefs.

I'm all for safety nets(basic income may be a good form of that, I'm not all that sure), for giving people a cushion, allowing them the freedom to get out of a bad situation and set on a new path. Those are all great things. But the idea that everyone should be able to simply pursue what they feel like, whether the market values it or not, is a little idealistic.

[CamelKnackRambleHort]

As I see it, the real argument here is if technology and society have evolved enough that we are now in a post need society (similar to a post scarcity society, but less so) without realizing it, the idea being that if we rearranged things a little we are there.

I personally think a society that transitions to post need will experience a significant economic downturn in the short term. People figuring out where they fit in the new system, people who don't want to work or be particularly productive will exit the labor market to play video games all day, and of course the sheer amount of resources that will need to be expended to maintain the program. These will all be a drain on the economy.

However, in the longer term, say a decade down the line, if the conditions are right there will be a massive upswing. People will have figured out how to use the system to their (and societies) maximum advantage, people will start working as much for a sense of fulfillment in addition to the monetary compensation, and most importantly people who formerly lacked the opportunity to be contributing members of society will have been given the chance to advance to a better and more productive position.

If I am correct, this gives two major concerns for a society attempting to transition to post need. The first is being able to absorb the initial significant economic downturn without economic collapse. I am almost certain the world economy would be incapable of doing so.

The second is being able to maintain a workforce for all the undesirable jobs out there. What keeps a person going back into the coal mine if they don't have to? The fact of the matter is that the dollars that cover the needs of a person are more valuable than the dollars that cover their wants. A person will be a coal miner because they need to. But would they be a coal miner because they want to? Some will, but in general you are going to see a massive shift from undesirable jobs towards desirable jobs, even if it means lesser compensation.

I mentioned earlier that "if the conditions are right" I think there would be a massive economic upswing. This is the biggest condition, can we fill all the necessary but undesirable jobs out there? I don't think we could and the sad fact is despite the bad conditions, danger, and health concerns we still need coal miners, along with a thousand other undesirable jobs.

The good thing is we can work towards changing this. We can develop technologies and social programs to make these jobs easier and safer or we can create technology that eliminates the need for the undesirable job altogether.

[JustAName]

I also think those sorts of jobs will get higher wages, which, given the danger or even just unpleasantness involved, is probably warranted.

[Master Gunner]

Just going to pop in here with a Star Trek reference because, well, I'm me.

From what we see of general society in Star Trek, the Federation is certainly a post-need/effectively post-scarcity society. However that was achieved through planetary-scale industrialization and the advent of replication technology and near-limitless power generation (mass industrialization in a box).

I think our current society is in sight of that kind of situation, where we could consider transitioning into a post-need society, but I also think we're still a good ways off from it yet.

[Merrymaker_Mortalis]

I just want to be able to survive if anything happens to my parents which prevents them from supporting me whilst also being inline with the teachings of Jesus.

[korvys]

And on the other side, why would I want to keep working and then pay nearly 50% (here in NL anyway) of my income to some lame slacker who sits around on his ass all day drinking beer "because it makes him happy". Yes, I work because I enjoy doing it and the income is much needed and very welcome but that doesn't mean I'd want to pay for certain people to just do nothing all day.

I would pay more tax if it meant that no one in my country had to live in poverty. It's as simple as that.

If we do want to dig into it further, if there are jobs (your examples was manual labour) for which the income would be insufficient to get people to do them, then they need to pay more. And I don't mean "they would need to pay more". I mean, if that's the situation right now, that basic income would be enough to stop people working, then they are not paying them enough right now. Unpleasantness is absolutely something that should be compensated for, as much as skill requirements.

The arguments that paying people more to do crap jobs would increase the cost of business are the same as those against raising the minimum wage. If all of your low income citizens could now afford to spend more money, that's a huge boost to the economy.

[fantôme]

A few thoughts:

There is no way any government is going to find enough money to provide a basic living expense to all of it's people - governments are controlled by the rich, and the rich love their money far too much to ever part with it.

I don't much like my job, and I grumble about lack of free time, but I am grateful that I can work and grateful that I have to work. That I can, because I'm blessed to be just about strong enough of mind and body to support my independence, and that I live in a country where my way of life is possible. That I have to, because too much free time would drive me insane - I think you have to have bad things just to remind you that the good things are good.

And CamelKnack brings up some excellent points: I don't see how the system wouldn't collapse - as wretched as it is, what we have currently is a Byzantine Jenga tower of cogs crafted by hundreds of years of (for lack of a better term) evolution, and we can't just "pause" whilst we get our wits together. I don't mean to sound defeatist with regards to revolution, but I think it is important to understand the difference between romantic and reckless.

[korvys]

A few thoughts:

There is no way any government is going to find enough money to provide a basic living expense to all of it's people - governments are controlled by the rich, and the rich love their money far too much to ever part with it.

Well, if I understand it correctly, a significant amount of the funding would come from any existing welfare system. Both in the amount paid out, and the administration, since the administration costs would be far smaller if there was only a single, simple system. Additionally, I would be completely ok with increasing taxes for it. But a lot of people seem to think it's money being stolen from them or something, rather than the price of civilisation.

And CamelKnack brings up some excellent points: I don't see how the system wouldn't collapse - as wretched as it is, what we have currently is a Byzantine Jenga tower of cogs crafted by hundreds of years of (for lack of a better term) evolution, and we can't just "pause" whilst we get our wits together. I don't mean to sound defeatist with regards to revolution, but I think it is important to understand the difference between romantic and reckless.

This is, unfortunately, probably true. While I absolutely believe Basic Income would work on paper, there are a lot of reason why it probably wouldn't work in practice.

[Elaro]

You know, this whole "providing" thing will become a lot easier once machines have displaced humans from all the... uh, "problem-solving"(?) jobs. I'm pretty sure then the owners of the means of production will have to pay people just to consume, otherwise, without means to actually produce competitively, people will be out of work, and thus out of money, and thus nobody will be able to actually buy things: which means mass starvation and, with their backs against the wall, the previously-working class will have no choice but to seize the means of production. And then either we get a Butlerian Jihad, and society regresses by 200-400 years, or we share the machine-produced wealth.

ETA:Also, if your "in practice" is much different from your "on paper", you have failed at the "on paper" part.