Wealth Gap

13,733 Views | 277 Replies | Last: 4 yr ago by aTmAg
WHOOP!'91
How long do you want to ignore this user?
Joe Boudain said:

ea1060 said:

Joe Boudain said:

DonaldJTrump said:

If you're in the lower class and you're an adult, it's because you're either disabled and cannot work, stupid, or lazy.


Nope, the deck is stacked against much of society today. You expect a person born in the ghetto to a single mother on child support who puts them watching tv all day and doesn't give a **** about them to give a damn about anything? We've got families in this country who haven't worked in generations and you expect them to intrinsically value hard work and sacrificing for future benefit? The ones who do figure it out are the American dream, but they're the exception that proves the rule


Im a Poor person of color checking in. Grew up in the ghetto, raised by a poor single Mexican mom who valued education and hard work. I'm now a millionaire in my 30's. I refuse to believe that the deck is stacked against people like me.

Take your racism elsewhere.


The deck was stacked against you, which doesn't invalidate the presence of outliers. Maybe you had a great mother, and learned a great work ethic from somewhere. For everyone of your success stories there are a million counter points.

Again this is nothing more than claiming blacks don't vote overwhelmingly democrat because your neighbor has a MAGA flag in his yard
I disagree with your assessment. Rather, I think the existence of what you call "outliers" proves the existence of the way out of poverty, just most people don't do what is necessary to travel that path. Stay out of trouble, graduate HS, show up to work and put in a fair day's labor, and you will live a comfortable middle-class life. Anything more than that can lead to better outcomes.
A & M, GIVE US ROOM!

aTmAg
How long do you want to ignore this user?
Government schools suck. No surprise there. They should be privatized. Then schools would compete with how well they prepare students for the real world. If school A teaches CRT and other BS, their graduates will be poor and stupid. If a school teaches worthy stuff, then their graduates will be prosperous. People will be more inclined to send their kids to prosperous schools than failing schools. And other schools would strive to emulate prosperous schools and they would spread everywhere.

Again.. less government is the answer.
Bag
How long do you want to ignore this user?
Champ Bailey said:

Can anyone explain to me what is bad about the wealth gap in this country? Why is it bad that we don't kneecap our most successful people? I understand there are people who live below the poverty line. But isn't it also important to consider that what we consider poverty in this country is drastically different than what practically every other country considers poverty?

My biggest issue with any proposed policy to address this is that when looking at history and at theory, the policies proposed in this country actually increase wealth disparity, not decrease it. My final comment would be that pretty much every socialist economy (not a socialist safety net, please recognize the distinction I am making) actually have the worst examples of wealth disparity in human history.

If you want a real, meaningful step to address wealth disparity, the only real answer IMO is to break up the monopolies we have in this country. But globalization policies have pretty much neutered us in enforcing this.
Wealth gaps are fine, no one argues that, the issue is that at present that gap is its biggest in history. The gap even out paces the era of the robber barons.

it is healthy to have wealth gaps, it is not healthy for a nation to have the massive gaps in wealth that we see right now, it generally leads to serious political unrest.

and with that, i will duck...
Joe Boudain
How long do you want to ignore this user?
WHOOP!'91 said:

Joe Boudain said:

ea1060 said:

Joe Boudain said:

DonaldJTrump said:

If you're in the lower class and you're an adult, it's because you're either disabled and cannot work, stupid, or lazy.


Nope, the deck is stacked against much of society today. You expect a person born in the ghetto to a single mother on child support who puts them watching tv all day and doesn't give a **** about them to give a damn about anything? We've got families in this country who haven't worked in generations and you expect them to intrinsically value hard work and sacrificing for future benefit? The ones who do figure it out are the American dream, but they're the exception that proves the rule


Im a Poor person of color checking in. Grew up in the ghetto, raised by a poor single Mexican mom who valued education and hard work. I'm now a millionaire in my 30's. I refuse to believe that the deck is stacked against people like me.

Take your racism elsewhere.


The deck was stacked against you, which doesn't invalidate the presence of outliers. Maybe you had a great mother, and learned a great work ethic from somewhere. For everyone of your success stories there are a million counter points.

Again this is nothing more than claiming blacks don't vote overwhelmingly democrat because your neighbor has a MAGA flag in his yard
I disagree with your assessment. Rather, I think the existence of what you call "outliers" proves the existence of the way out of poverty, just most people don't do what is necessary to travel that path. Stay out of trouble, graduate HS, show up to work and put in a fair day's labor, and you will live a comfortable middle-class life. Anything more than that can lead to better outcomes.

Well thank you for your disagreement and your reasoning. My assessment is based on the fact that the things you mention as recipes for success (which I agree with) are extremely dependent on the type of environment a person is raised in. Where do we expect people who have grown up in poverty without parental role models and without being taught the receipe for success you mention, to figure it out?
Joe Boudain
How long do you want to ignore this user?
aTmAg said:

Government schools suck. No surprise there. They should be privatized. Then schools would compete with how well they prepare students for the real world. If school A teaches CRT and other BS, their graduates will be poor and stupid. If a school teaches worthy stuff, then their graduates will be prosperous. People will be more inclined to send their kids to prosperous schools than failing schools. And other schools would strive to emulate prosperous schools and they would spread everywhere.

Again.. less government is the answer.
Man, I got a pretty good education at a Public university, I can see from your Ag-Tag you did too. Again you live in a vacuum where one variable influences one outcome, and you're also relying that both sides are dealing in good faith, without manipulation.

Many people have learned trades in the military that have set them on the path for greater success in life, I'm not certain why we can't do the same thing with people on welfare.
aTmAg
How long do you want to ignore this user?
Bag said:

Champ Bailey said:

Can anyone explain to me what is bad about the wealth gap in this country? Why is it bad that we don't kneecap our most successful people? I understand there are people who live below the poverty line. But isn't it also important to consider that what we consider poverty in this country is drastically different than what practically every other country considers poverty?

My biggest issue with any proposed policy to address this is that when looking at history and at theory, the policies proposed in this country actually increase wealth disparity, not decrease it. My final comment would be that pretty much every socialist economy (not a socialist safety net, please recognize the distinction I am making) actually have the worst examples of wealth disparity in human history.

If you want a real, meaningful step to address wealth disparity, the only real answer IMO is to break up the monopolies we have in this country. But globalization policies have pretty much neutered us in enforcing this.
Wealth gaps are fine, no one argues that, the issue is that at present that gap is its biggest in history. The gap even out paces the era of the robber barons.

it is healthy to have wealth gaps, it is not healthy for a nation to have the massive gaps in wealth that we see right now, it generally leads to serious political unrest.

and with that, i will duck...
Wealth gaps when the poor are kept poor are bad (which is what we have now). We have government to blame for that. Many of our poor today stay poor for generations (even though it is possible for them to rise out if they worked hard).

Wealth gaps are good when the rich simply get richer because they are are providing a ton of goods and services to society (including the poor) and the poor are able to easily rise out of poverty. That is what we had during the "robber baron" period. Most of poor back then were a rotating group of immigrants. They would immigrate here with nothing but the shirts on their backs, would then earn a comfortable living for themselves, and then get replaced with a new crop of poor immigrants wanting to earn success for themselves.
WHOOP!'91
How long do you want to ignore this user?
Joe Boudain said:

MouthBQ98 said:

There is an interesting level of neo marxist and neofascist economic rhetoric in this thread. Government control, manipulation, ordering, for various political designs.

The presumption seems to be if a person's preferred political ideology could have the power to order the economy, things would be "better."


The economy should always be tailored to a political end. The economy should serve the nation, and the family, it isn't some sacrosanct golden calf that must be left to it's own devices regardless of what issues arise.


Countries have been testing variations of the several economic theories for 100s of years. Capitalism is the best outcome for the country and its people. The question is how much to regulate it. Western Europe has done more regulation and their outcomes and opportunities are not as good as in the US. If we didn't provide them military cover and old medical tech and medicines, they would struggle even more. As it is, they live in small apartments, can't afford children and pay $8/gallon for gas. Their socialized medicine system will have them waiting months to begin cancer treatment or hobble around in pain waiting for a hip or knee replacement.
A & M, GIVE US ROOM!

aTmAg
How long do you want to ignore this user?
Joe Boudain said:

aTmAg said:

Government schools suck. No surprise there. They should be privatized. Then schools would compete with how well they prepare students for the real world. If school A teaches CRT and other BS, their graduates will be poor and stupid. If a school teaches worthy stuff, then their graduates will be prosperous. People will be more inclined to send their kids to prosperous schools than failing schools. And other schools would strive to emulate prosperous schools and they would spread everywhere.

Again.. less government is the answer.
Man, I got a pretty good education at a Public university, I can see from your Ag-Tag you did too. Again you live in a vacuum where one variable influences one outcome, and you're also relying that both sides are dealing in good faith, without manipulation.

Many people have learned trades in the military that have set them on the path for greater success in life, I'm not certain why we can't do the same thing with people on welfare.
My public education was mostly a waste. I had to get it because people don't get hired in my industry (engineering) nowadays without one, but most of what I learned and use every day was self taught. If all colleges were private then prices would go way down and people would be taught only necessary things. My daughter is as A&M right now and she's taking yoga to fill in for one of her requirements. And it costs a ton. Why in the hell is she being forced to take a class like that at a college?


And if you are talking about China "manipulating" their currency to get an unfair advantage, then that is economic nonsense. Nobody can print themselves into prosperity. We are proving that right now.
Joe Boudain
How long do you want to ignore this user?
WHOOP!'91 said:

Joe Boudain said:

MouthBQ98 said:

There is an interesting level of neo marxist and neofascist economic rhetoric in this thread. Government control, manipulation, ordering, for various political designs.

The presumption seems to be if a person's preferred political ideology could have the power to order the economy, things would be "better."


The economy should always be tailored to a political end. The economy should serve the nation, and the family, it isn't some sacrosanct golden calf that must be left to it's own devices regardless of what issues arise.


Countries have been testing variations of the several economic theories for 100s of years. Capitalism is the best outcome for the country and its people. The question is how much to regulate it. Western Europe has done more regulation and their outcomes and opportunities are not as good as in the US. If we didn't provide them military cover and old medical tech and medicines, they would struggle even more. As it is, they live in small apartments, can't afford children and pay $8/gallon for gas. Their socialized medicine system will have them waiting months to begin cancer treatment or hobble around in pain waiting for a hip or knee replacement.


Yet they typically live longer than we do and have lower rates of infant mortality. I agree with you that capitalism is the generally the best, but it is not immune from tweaking to ensure that the national interest is being taken care of.

I also think we need to realize that to get where we want to go, we are going to have to help some people there. It is foolish to expect people who haven't worked in generations to have the ability to rejoin the job force. It's also foolish to think we can restart something as complicated as our industrial base without artificial incentive
WHOOP!'91
How long do you want to ignore this user?
Kozmozag said:

Elon Musk does the back stroke in his vault full of 300 billion of gold coins every night. Like all billionaires and millionaires. Or maybe their money is invested in the economy for all the sheep to have a job.
This right here!

People who are not willing to take the risk of starting their own business shouldn't expect anything more than a job from someone who is willing to take that risk. Working for that person doesn't entitle you part ownership of their business.

We need to incentivize "rich people" to invest so the poor can have jobs, opportunities to advance, and reasonable housing prices. It's almost always government interference that impede these things. Where rich individuals exercise monopolistic power to distort the markets, the government can rightly step in.
A & M, GIVE US ROOM!

Bag
How long do you want to ignore this user?
aTmAg said:

Bag said:

Champ Bailey said:

Can anyone explain to me what is bad about the wealth gap in this country? Why is it bad that we don't kneecap our most successful people? I understand there are people who live below the poverty line. But isn't it also important to consider that what we consider poverty in this country is drastically different than what practically every other country considers poverty?

My biggest issue with any proposed policy to address this is that when looking at history and at theory, the policies proposed in this country actually increase wealth disparity, not decrease it. My final comment would be that pretty much every socialist economy (not a socialist safety net, please recognize the distinction I am making) actually have the worst examples of wealth disparity in human history.

If you want a real, meaningful step to address wealth disparity, the only real answer IMO is to break up the monopolies we have in this country. But globalization policies have pretty much neutered us in enforcing this.
Wealth gaps are fine, no one argues that, the issue is that at present that gap is its biggest in history. The gap even out paces the era of the robber barons.

it is healthy to have wealth gaps, it is not healthy for a nation to have the massive gaps in wealth that we see right now, it generally leads to serious political unrest.

and with that, i will duck...
Wealth gaps when the poor are kept poor are bad (which is what we have now). We have government to blame for that. Many of our poor today stay poor for generations (even though it is possible for them to rise out if they worked hard).

Wealth gaps are good when the rich simply get richer because they are are providing a ton of goods and services to society (including the poor) and the poor are able to easily rise out of poverty. That is what we had during the "robber baron" period. Most of poor back then were a rotating group of immigrants. They would immigrate here with nothing but the shirts on their backs, would then earn a comfortable living for themselves, and then get replaced with a new crop of poor immigrants wanting to earn success for themselves.
The only thing i will add is that, no matter the cause, the American dream is dead to a massive segment of the populace. Wage increases are non existent for the masses and we are quickly building what many call a "useless class" of people because automation will (if it has not already) will effectively make them useless. They have no skills, not guidance and no direction.

This generally leads to really bad things for the rest of us. This is the entire reason that UBI, imho, makes sense. UBI is effectively a tax on the robots to offset the political unrest that is sure to follow when large segments of the populace are made irrelevant.

Now, for UBI to work is has to be truly universal, meaning, no matter what, everyone gets the same check, no matter your current wealth, everyone gets the same amount. If we can pull it off I think it can save us from the coming war, but lets be honest, it will never work because it will become a polical football with the democrats clamoring that its not fair that billionaires should not be getting checks and the republicans will blast it as "gubment handouts"

so, bottom line, buy more ammo because the class war is coming

Tom Kazansky 2012
How long do you want to ignore this user?
Joe Boudain said:

RebelE Infantry said:

aTmAg said:

RebelE Infantry said:

Thank you for laugh by suggesting that Joe is a liberal.

You know what else we had 100 years ago? Communities that cared about each other, higher social influence of the churches, and tight knit ethnic neighborhoods.
He's pushing for welfare and subsidies. That is liberal.


If wanting to place the economic interests of your own countrymen makes you a liberal, then I am as liberal as it gets.

You are laughably wrong, of course. But tell me more about how H1B visa slavery to mega corporations is actually good and conservative.
These are the same people who FOR YEARS told us that offshoring everything to China was a genius move because they were subsidizing our economy for us. We took advantage of their cheap labor rates, unsafe working conditions and currency/commodity manipulation; and let them do all of our dirty jobs.

We're now in the situation that China can completely bring our country to its knees without firing a shot. If they shut down all exports to us, our society would break. It would hurt them more than it would hurt us, but they don't give a **** if 100,000,000 of their citizens die. Their capacity for pain is infinite times more than ours.



What the ****? This is laughably wrong.

China shutting down would hurt big businesses sure. Maybe some consumerism here. But it would ensure their destruction and we would be ok.

China is in shambles right now because of a lot of centralist policies some of the "conservatives" here are suggesting. Where do y'all get this crap?
WHOOP!'91
How long do you want to ignore this user?
Joe Boudain said:

aTmAg said:

Joe Boudain said:

aTmAg said:

Joe Boudain said:

aTmAg said:

Joe Boudain said:

DonaldJTrump said:

If you're in the lower class and you're an adult, it's because you're either disabled and cannot work, stupid, or lazy.


Nope, the deck is stacked against much of society today. You expect a person born in the ghetto to a single mother on child support who puts them watching tv all day and doesn't give a **** about them to give a damn about anything? We've got families in this country who haven't worked in generations and you expect them to intrinsically value hard work and sacrificing for future benefit? The ones who do figure it out are the American dream, but they're the exception that proves the rule
So..... Let's tax the rich even more! That will make the poor value hard work.


You guys always get so scared when confronted with the truth that challenges your 1980's view of the economy, you start throwing out sound bites. It's always about taxes. As long as taxes stay low they can bring in millions of H-1B visas, and continue offshoring our jobs to china, while ensuring Bezos is able to put every mom and pop in small town USA out of business.
Mocking dumbassery != being scared.

Your liberal policies are what is expanding the wealth gap. The people you pay to not work still need stuff, and they are going to get their stuff from those who produce stuff. Predictably, they buy stuff from producers with newly printed money and those producers get "richer". Yet since you encouraged fewer people to work, less stuff is produced overall. So we have less stuff but more demand. Who is going to get left out when there is too little stuff to spread around? The poor obviously. Even though you just gave them money fresh off the printing presses. Everything is more expensive and out of their reach.

You can give everybody a check of $1M dollars and everybody will rush to their computers to buy stuff from Amazon. Jeff Bezos will get even richer, but there will quickly be nothing left to buy and candy bars will cost $2M dollars. Only the rich could afford any of it and the poor will starve. Then people like you will spend your last breath complaining on TexAgs on how evil Jeff Bezos is and how the wealth gap is too large. Not realizing that people like you are the reason.

This is the sort of idiocy that happens when liberals control anything.


What dumbassery? You didn't address the issue just threw out a sound bite. That's why I say you're scared. You're not able to actually look at extant circumstances and admit your lens is calibrated back in the 80s, so instead you default to your programming which is to yell about taxes.

I've done nothing but say we need to subsidize our own industry, raise tariffs and form job corps so that people receiving hands outs will be able to actually learn a skill and hopefully break the generational cycle of welfare and unemployment abuse.

Does that involve raising taxes? No, it shouldn't. It would be paying people to work rather than not work.
You didn't even read my last post? I didn't say anything in it about raising taxes. And the people who always talk about raising taxes or having the "rich pay their fair share" is YOUR side, not mine. That is why I made my first post. It shows the profound economic ignorance on your side.

And the fact that you actually think subsidizing anything, whether it be industry or individuals show even more ignorance. That is how we got into this mess in the first place. We subsidize the CRAP out of education in this country already. That is why it is so ridiculously expensive (and most degrees worthless). It's idiotic to argue for MORE of it. We need fewer people with masters degrees working as bar tenders (or not working at all), not more.

What will give people incentive to get off their asses to work is the fear of starvation. We had no welfare 100+ years ago and yet the poor from all over the world came her in record numbers for generations because they were far better of here. Everything was MUCH more affordable and the poor were able to climb out of poverty like never before. And since stuff was so damn cheap, charity went MUCH further. Now that government has taken most of that over, the poor are getting screwed.
I'm on the side of the American family, you seem to be on the side of Bezos, Soros, and globalism. You can keep thinking that educated people don't understand your extremely simplistic world view "everything government does is liberalism" or take a second and realize maybe you don't know what the hell you're talking about.

As your 2nd and 3rd paragraphs show, your worldview has moved back from the 1980's to the 1880's. Globalism has changed the economy and our society. The skillsets that facilitated the move from the farms to the factories during the industrial revolution are not analogous to our current situation. People who have been on welfare for generations (many because the factories or mills they worked at shut down decades ago) lack the skills or the ability to up and move to the cities and find a job that will replace their welfare. I understand your answer is "that's their problem not mine" but it will quickly be your problem when they decide to riot.

We are going to be subsidizing people and industries, the only question is whether we subsidize people to work or not to work, and whether we subsidize America or our enemies.
This is unfortunately true. Even the Bible says the poor will always be with you. This is where "America First" right-populism comes in. It isn't capitalistic, but if you admit that the poor will always demand some sort of welfare, I prefer that come in the form of subsidized industry in the United States so they can work and experience the freedom of a paycheck. We can go back to building machinery and technology like the chips needed for cars, and producing pharmaceuticals here, even though it isn't the cheapest option.
A & M, GIVE US ROOM!

Tom Kazansky 2012
How long do you want to ignore this user?
Libertarian economic policies are undefeated except by rich corporatists who demand more power for government and then create government funded monopolies that kill all the little guys.

And some here (supposedly on the right) are deluded lol bough to think that if they get their way with their version of the correct centrally planned economy, it will be better.

Rubes.
Joe Boudain
How long do you want to ignore this user?
Tom Kazansky 2012 said:

Joe Boudain said:

RebelE Infantry said:

aTmAg said:

RebelE Infantry said:

Thank you for laugh by suggesting that Joe is a liberal.

You know what else we had 100 years ago? Communities that cared about each other, higher social influence of the churches, and tight knit ethnic neighborhoods.
He's pushing for welfare and subsidies. That is liberal.


If wanting to place the economic interests of your own countrymen makes you a liberal, then I am as liberal as it gets.

You are laughably wrong, of course. But tell me more about how H1B visa slavery to mega corporations is actually good and conservative.
These are the same people who FOR YEARS told us that offshoring everything to China was a genius move because they were subsidizing our economy for us. We took advantage of their cheap labor rates, unsafe working conditions and currency/commodity manipulation; and let them do all of our dirty jobs.

We're now in the situation that China can completely bring our country to its knees without firing a shot. If they shut down all exports to us, our society would break. It would hurt them more than it would hurt us, but they don't give a **** if 100,000,000 of their citizens die. Their capacity for pain is infinite times more than ours.



What the ****? This is laughably wrong.

China shutting down would hurt big businesses sure. Maybe some consumerism here. But it would ensure their destruction and we would be ok.

China is in shambles right now because of a lot of centralist policies some of the "conservatives" here are suggesting. Where do y'all get this crap?
I don't believe so, I believe our economy and way of life is more intertwined with China than anyone would believe. We are a very thin skinned nation without the capacity to suffer inconvenience. EBT payments get delayed by one day and half a city block is burned down. A McDonald's runs out of chicken nuggets and the drive thru worker gets attacked.
Tom Kazansky 2012
How long do you want to ignore this user?
For the record I am fine with spending to where our currency stays slightly better than everyone else's value and futures wise. I am also ok with tariffing the **** out of outsourced manufacturing/tech/economic interests that are preferably manufactured on our soil rather than overseas.

Neither of these caveats necessarily go against the libertarian economic grain since both cases are our government protecting our freedoms in the long run.
Joe Boudain
How long do you want to ignore this user?
Tom Kazansky 2012 said:

For the record I am fine with spending to where our currency stays slightly better than everyone else's value and futures wise. I am also ok with tariffing the **** out of outsourced manufacturing/tech/economic interests that are preferably manufactured on our soil rather than overseas.

Neither of these caveats necessarily go against the libertarian economic grain since both cases are our government protecting our freedoms in the long run.
dude..... you're way confused here. You said libertarian economic policies were undefeated and then advocated for a protected economy which is pretty much the antithesis.

It's funny though, because when you said it I thought "man, Tom Kazansky is a guy I've agreed with a lot on here, I didn't realize he was a libertarian".

aTmAg
How long do you want to ignore this user?
Bag said:

aTmAg said:

Bag said:

Champ Bailey said:

Can anyone explain to me what is bad about the wealth gap in this country? Why is it bad that we don't kneecap our most successful people? I understand there are people who live below the poverty line. But isn't it also important to consider that what we consider poverty in this country is drastically different than what practically every other country considers poverty?

My biggest issue with any proposed policy to address this is that when looking at history and at theory, the policies proposed in this country actually increase wealth disparity, not decrease it. My final comment would be that pretty much every socialist economy (not a socialist safety net, please recognize the distinction I am making) actually have the worst examples of wealth disparity in human history.

If you want a real, meaningful step to address wealth disparity, the only real answer IMO is to break up the monopolies we have in this country. But globalization policies have pretty much neutered us in enforcing this.
Wealth gaps are fine, no one argues that, the issue is that at present that gap is its biggest in history. The gap even out paces the era of the robber barons.

it is healthy to have wealth gaps, it is not healthy for a nation to have the massive gaps in wealth that we see right now, it generally leads to serious political unrest.

and with that, i will duck...
Wealth gaps when the poor are kept poor are bad (which is what we have now). We have government to blame for that. Many of our poor today stay poor for generations (even though it is possible for them to rise out if they worked hard).

Wealth gaps are good when the rich simply get richer because they are are providing a ton of goods and services to society (including the poor) and the poor are able to easily rise out of poverty. That is what we had during the "robber baron" period. Most of poor back then were a rotating group of immigrants. They would immigrate here with nothing but the shirts on their backs, would then earn a comfortable living for themselves, and then get replaced with a new crop of poor immigrants wanting to earn success for themselves.
The only thing i will add is that, no matter the cause, the American dream is dead to a massive segment of the populace. Wage increases are non existent for the masses and we are quickly building what many call a "useless class" of people because automation will (if it has not already) will effectively make them useless. They have no skills, not guidance and no direction.

This generally leads to really bad things for the rest of us. This is the entire reason that UBI, imho, makes sense. UBI is effectively a tax on the robots to offset the political unrest that is sure to follow when large segments of the populace are made irrelevant.

Now, for UBI to work is has to be truly universal, meaning, no matter what, everyone gets the same check, no matter your current wealth, everyone gets the same amount. If we can pull it off I think it can save us from the coming war, but lets be honest, it will never work.
Sorry, but UBI will not fix it either. UBI will always make expenses go up faster than UBI check amount. If the UBI amount is low, then it will have no apparent effect. If it were high, then it will make everything cost far more than the UBI checks provide.

If UBI checks were $1000 per month, then our expenses would increase by more than $1000/mo. If UBI checks were $10,000/mo then our expenses would increase by more than $1000/mo. If UBI checks were $1T/mo then our expenses would increase by more than $1T/mo.

No matter how much you make UBI, it will make the problems that they try to fix worse.



When people are poor and need stuff, the ONLY solution would be those that produces more stuff. No matter of money redistribution or printing would magically bring about more stuff. It's rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic. We simply need to enact policies that encourage people to produce more stuff. Any policy that encourages people to work less does the exact opposite. (Including UBI)
Tom Kazansky 2012
How long do you want to ignore this user?
You can believe whatever you want. Part of my work involves complex multinational loans and based on where money is flowing from China and where the giant corps in China are putting their money, you don't have the slightest clue what you are talking about. China needs us way more than we need them and their higher powers are doing their best to influence people to think like you are.

What you are opining about China is 100% overblown BS. They are in a way worse situation than us and we are far less dependent on them outside of consumer products and large multinational manufacturers. Of which, deserve to be **** on and go bankrupt anyway. They're being routed by our American assets anywayespecially after Trump's re ignition of our economy.

Lastly, the only way we lose to China is slowing down our growth which is exactly what will keep happening if we leave pudding brain and the band of commies at the wheel. It will also happen if we enact some of these ridiculous centralist policies being talked about in this thread by conservatives.
Joe Boudain
How long do you want to ignore this user?
Tom Kazansky 2012 said:

You can believe whatever you want. Part of my work involves complex multinational loans and based on where money is flowing from China and where the giant corps in China are putting their money, you don't have the slightest clue what you are talking about. China needs us way more than we need them and their higher powers are doing their best to influence people to think like you are.

What you are opining about China is 100% overblown BS. They are in a way worse situation than us and we are far less dependent on them outside of consumer products and large multinational manufacturers. Of which, deserve to be **** on and go bankrupt anyway. They're being routed by our American assets anywayespecially after Trump's re ignition of our economy.

Lastly, the only way we lose to China is slowing down our growth which is exactly what will keep happening if we leave pudding brain and the band of commies at the wheel. It will also happen if we enact some of these ridiculous centralist policies being talked about in this thread by conservatives.

I do not disagree with the argument that China's closing down their exports to us will hurt them more than it will hurt us, my only argument is that they are able to withstand great levels of hurt, while we are barely able to withstand inconvenience.

I was a huge fan of the Trump tariffs, but wished he had done more. I will add that those are elements of centralist policies that go against libertarian economic theory.
aTmAg
How long do you want to ignore this user?
The stupidity of tariffs is settled economics. Trump was wrong about that.
SEC-Ag
How long do you want to ignore this user?
Y'all are arguing over a false premise. We don't currently have capitalism or free markets.

We have controlled, regulated and exploited markets behind an old veneer of capitalism and free markets.

WHOOP!'91
How long do you want to ignore this user?
Joe Boudain said:

WHOOP!'91 said:

Joe Boudain said:

ea1060 said:

Joe Boudain said:

DonaldJTrump said:

If you're in the lower class and you're an adult, it's because you're either disabled and cannot work, stupid, or lazy.


Nope, the deck is stacked against much of society today. You expect a person born in the ghetto to a single mother on child support who puts them watching tv all day and doesn't give a **** about them to give a damn about anything? We've got families in this country who haven't worked in generations and you expect them to intrinsically value hard work and sacrificing for future benefit? The ones who do figure it out are the American dream, but they're the exception that proves the rule


Im a Poor person of color checking in. Grew up in the ghetto, raised by a poor single Mexican mom who valued education and hard work. I'm now a millionaire in my 30's. I refuse to believe that the deck is stacked against people like me.

Take your racism elsewhere.


The deck was stacked against you, which doesn't invalidate the presence of outliers. Maybe you had a great mother, and learned a great work ethic from somewhere. For everyone of your success stories there are a million counter points.

Again this is nothing more than claiming blacks don't vote overwhelmingly democrat because your neighbor has a MAGA flag in his yard
I disagree with your assessment. Rather, I think the existence of what you call "outliers" proves the existence of the way out of poverty, just most people don't do what is necessary to travel that path. Stay out of trouble, graduate HS, show up to work and put in a fair day's labor, and you will live a comfortable middle-class life. Anything more than that can lead to better outcomes.

Well thank you for your disagreement and your reasoning. My assessment is based on the fact that the things you mention as recipes for success (which I agree with) are extremely dependent on the type of environment a person is raised in. Where do we expect people who have grown up in poverty without parental role models and without being taught the receipe for success you mention, to figure it out?
Parents should really be responsible, but I get that a lot of them won't be. Then it falls to teachers in the public schools. If they would teach how to get out of poverty rather than that they are victims and oppressed by whitey, that would help. Since those are government funded, I would think there would be an opportunity to shape their message, but instead more teachers are gravitating towards CRT. They should be fired and replaced with people who will actually educate their students so their opportunities for success are enhanced. Again, since these schools are funded by local and federal taxes, this is a way in which the government can lead to better outcomes, if only they would.
A & M, GIVE US ROOM!

Tom Kazansky 2012
How long do you want to ignore this user?
aTmAg said:

The stupidity of tariffs is settled economics. Trump was wrong about that.
Wrong.
WHOOP!'91
How long do you want to ignore this user?
Bag said:

aTmAg said:

Bag said:

Champ Bailey said:

Can anyone explain to me what is bad about the wealth gap in this country? Why is it bad that we don't kneecap our most successful people? I understand there are people who live below the poverty line. But isn't it also important to consider that what we consider poverty in this country is drastically different than what practically every other country considers poverty?

My biggest issue with any proposed policy to address this is that when looking at history and at theory, the policies proposed in this country actually increase wealth disparity, not decrease it. My final comment would be that pretty much every socialist economy (not a socialist safety net, please recognize the distinction I am making) actually have the worst examples of wealth disparity in human history.

If you want a real, meaningful step to address wealth disparity, the only real answer IMO is to break up the monopolies we have in this country. But globalization policies have pretty much neutered us in enforcing this.
Wealth gaps are fine, no one argues that, the issue is that at present that gap is its biggest in history. The gap even out paces the era of the robber barons.

it is healthy to have wealth gaps, it is not healthy for a nation to have the massive gaps in wealth that we see right now, it generally leads to serious political unrest.

and with that, i will duck...
Wealth gaps when the poor are kept poor are bad (which is what we have now). We have government to blame for that. Many of our poor today stay poor for generations (even though it is possible for them to rise out if they worked hard).

Wealth gaps are good when the rich simply get richer because they are are providing a ton of goods and services to society (including the poor) and the poor are able to easily rise out of poverty. That is what we had during the "robber baron" period. Most of poor back then were a rotating group of immigrants. They would immigrate here with nothing but the shirts on their backs, would then earn a comfortable living for themselves, and then get replaced with a new crop of poor immigrants wanting to earn success for themselves.
The only thing i will add is that, no matter the cause, the American dream is dead to a massive segment of the populace. Wage increases are non existent for the masses and we are quickly building what many call a "useless class" of people because automation will (if it has not already) will effectively make them useless. They have no skills, not guidance and no direction.

This generally leads to really bad things for the rest of us. This is the entire reason that UBI, imho, makes sense. UBI is effectively a tax on the robots to offset the political unrest that is sure to follow when large segments of the populace are made irrelevant.

Now, for UBI to work is has to be truly universal, meaning, no matter what, everyone gets the same check, no matter your current wealth, everyone gets the same amount. If we can pull it off I think it can save us from the coming war, but lets be honest, it will never work because it will become a polical football with the democrats clamoring that its not fair that billionaires should not be getting checks and the republicans will blast it as "gubment handouts"

so, bottom line, buy more ammo because the class war is coming


If we accept that automation will displace millions of workers, we REALLY need to address our immigration policies. The old thinking that we need to grow our work force is not valid under the assumption millions of jobs will go away.

The extend to which robots are cheap or people are expensive will dictate how much and how fast automation is adopted. The left is doing all they can to make sure people are more and more expensive.
A & M, GIVE US ROOM!

aTmAg
How long do you want to ignore this user?
Tom Kazansky 2012 said:

aTmAg said:

The stupidity of tariffs is settled economics. Trump was wrong about that.
Wrong.
Wrong
WHOOP!'91
How long do you want to ignore this user?
Tom Kazansky 2012 said:

Joe Boudain said:

RebelE Infantry said:

aTmAg said:

RebelE Infantry said:

Thank you for laugh by suggesting that Joe is a liberal.

You know what else we had 100 years ago? Communities that cared about each other, higher social influence of the churches, and tight knit ethnic neighborhoods.
He's pushing for welfare and subsidies. That is liberal.


If wanting to place the economic interests of your own countrymen makes you a liberal, then I am as liberal as it gets.

You are laughably wrong, of course. But tell me more about how H1B visa slavery to mega corporations is actually good and conservative.
These are the same people who FOR YEARS told us that offshoring everything to China was a genius move because they were subsidizing our economy for us. We took advantage of their cheap labor rates, unsafe working conditions and currency/commodity manipulation; and let them do all of our dirty jobs.

We're now in the situation that China can completely bring our country to its knees without firing a shot. If they shut down all exports to us, our society would break. It would hurt them more than it would hurt us, but they don't give a **** if 100,000,000 of their citizens die. Their capacity for pain is infinite times more than ours.



What the ****? This is laughably wrong.

China shutting down would hurt big businesses sure. Maybe some consumerism here. But it would ensure their destruction and we would be ok.

China is in shambles right now because of a lot of centralist policies some of the "conservatives" here are suggesting. Where do y'all get this crap?
They threatened to cut off our pharmaceuticals during COVID after buying up a ton of PPE and PCT tests. That can't be a good position for us, right?
A & M, GIVE US ROOM!

Deputy Travis Junior
How long do you want to ignore this user?
Tom Kazansky 2012 said:



What the ****? This is laughably wrong.

China shutting down would hurt big businesses sure. Maybe some consumerism here. But it would ensure their destruction and we would be ok.

China is in shambles right now because of a lot of centralist policies some of the "conservatives" here are suggesting. Where do y'all get this crap?


God emperor Trump told them that tariffs are good and that they would rebuild the American manufacturing sector. Nevermind that tariffs also drive up the prices of goods for everybody (including the poor), and many people are just barely getting by with current prices. I guess we can subsidize them too.
aTmAg
How long do you want to ignore this user?
WHOOP!'91 said:

Bag said:

aTmAg said:

Bag said:

Champ Bailey said:

Can anyone explain to me what is bad about the wealth gap in this country? Why is it bad that we don't kneecap our most successful people? I understand there are people who live below the poverty line. But isn't it also important to consider that what we consider poverty in this country is drastically different than what practically every other country considers poverty?

My biggest issue with any proposed policy to address this is that when looking at history and at theory, the policies proposed in this country actually increase wealth disparity, not decrease it. My final comment would be that pretty much every socialist economy (not a socialist safety net, please recognize the distinction I am making) actually have the worst examples of wealth disparity in human history.

If you want a real, meaningful step to address wealth disparity, the only real answer IMO is to break up the monopolies we have in this country. But globalization policies have pretty much neutered us in enforcing this.
Wealth gaps are fine, no one argues that, the issue is that at present that gap is its biggest in history. The gap even out paces the era of the robber barons.

it is healthy to have wealth gaps, it is not healthy for a nation to have the massive gaps in wealth that we see right now, it generally leads to serious political unrest.

and with that, i will duck...
Wealth gaps when the poor are kept poor are bad (which is what we have now). We have government to blame for that. Many of our poor today stay poor for generations (even though it is possible for them to rise out if they worked hard).

Wealth gaps are good when the rich simply get richer because they are are providing a ton of goods and services to society (including the poor) and the poor are able to easily rise out of poverty. That is what we had during the "robber baron" period. Most of poor back then were a rotating group of immigrants. They would immigrate here with nothing but the shirts on their backs, would then earn a comfortable living for themselves, and then get replaced with a new crop of poor immigrants wanting to earn success for themselves.
The only thing i will add is that, no matter the cause, the American dream is dead to a massive segment of the populace. Wage increases are non existent for the masses and we are quickly building what many call a "useless class" of people because automation will (if it has not already) will effectively make them useless. They have no skills, not guidance and no direction.

This generally leads to really bad things for the rest of us. This is the entire reason that UBI, imho, makes sense. UBI is effectively a tax on the robots to offset the political unrest that is sure to follow when large segments of the populace are made irrelevant.

Now, for UBI to work is has to be truly universal, meaning, no matter what, everyone gets the same check, no matter your current wealth, everyone gets the same amount. If we can pull it off I think it can save us from the coming war, but lets be honest, it will never work because it will become a polical football with the democrats clamoring that its not fair that billionaires should not be getting checks and the republicans will blast it as "gubment handouts"

so, bottom line, buy more ammo because the class war is coming


If we accept that automation will displace millions of workers, we REALLY need to address our immigration policies. The old thinking that we need to grow our work force is not valid under the assumption millions of jobs will go away.

The extend to which robots are cheap or people are expensive will dictate how much and how fast automation is adopted. The left is doing all they can to make sure people are more and more expensive.
Automation is displacing workers today because government is pushing the cost of hiring workers too high. That kicks the workers to the curb with no options.

In the past, automation occurred because somebody developed a machine that made human labor more productive (like a bulldozer). That did not kick workers to the curb, but instead made them more productive which justified higher salaries.

So we should NOT accept that automation will displace workers. It only does so when government intrudes into the market and pushes costs up. We should eliminate the government intrusion, bring expenses (and therefore salaries) down again and reverse the recent automation trend.
TxTarpon
How long do you want to ignore this user?

Quote:

Can anyone explain to me what is bad about the wealth gap in this country?
Because when industrialized countries start looking like this:

Then you start getting more and more Bernie/Chavez/Maduro/Mao/Guevara/Castro types.

Quote:

Why is it bad that we don't kneecap our most successful people?
You mean successful people like Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, George Soros that want to artificially tip the scales their way with our tax money?

Who says poverty?
How about when the wealthy do things like Carlos Slim and Mark Zuckerberg and create barriers to market entry?
How about when the state says you have to have a license to move furniture around?
Or when the local government dings your restaurant because they require you to have a lower counter for wheelchair patrons, but the Taco Jalisco #45 three blocks away does not have that and are not harassed by county goons?
----------------------------------
Texans make the best songwriters because they are the best liars.-Rodney Crowell

We will never give up our guns Steve, we don't care if there is a mass shooting every day of the week.
-BarronVonAwesome

A man with experience is not at the mercy of another man with an opinion.
GeorgiAg
How long do you want to ignore this user?
Solution: Let me be your index. Anyone who makes more money than I do each year pays more taxes.
WHOOP!'91
How long do you want to ignore this user?
Deputy Travis Junior said:

Tom Kazansky 2012 said:



What the ****? This is laughably wrong.

China shutting down would hurt big businesses sure. Maybe some consumerism here. But it would ensure their destruction and we would be ok.

China is in shambles right now because of a lot of centralist policies some of the "conservatives" here are suggesting. Where do y'all get this crap?


God emperor Trump told them that tariffs are good and that they would rebuild the American manufacturing sector. Nevermind that tariffs also drive up the prices of goods for everybody (including the poor), and many people are just barely getting by with current prices. I guess we can subsidize them too.
Wages were increasing faster than inflation for the poor, energy prices were low, food prices were good...Trump did a great job overall on the economy.

I personally support protecting sectors of our manufacturing sectors that are important to national security, like military equipment, certain technologies and pharmaceuticals. If Vietnam cuts off our access to textiles, we can probably crack on. Pharmaceuticals, not so much.

In the end, Americans need jobs or they will be on welfare. How do you want to pay for them? Welfare, UBI, or subsidized industry?
A & M, GIVE US ROOM!

WHOOP!'91
How long do you want to ignore this user?
aTmAg said:

WHOOP!'91 said:

Bag said:

aTmAg said:

Bag said:

Champ Bailey said:

Can anyone explain to me what is bad about the wealth gap in this country? Why is it bad that we don't kneecap our most successful people? I understand there are people who live below the poverty line. But isn't it also important to consider that what we consider poverty in this country is drastically different than what practically every other country considers poverty?

My biggest issue with any proposed policy to address this is that when looking at history and at theory, the policies proposed in this country actually increase wealth disparity, not decrease it. My final comment would be that pretty much every socialist economy (not a socialist safety net, please recognize the distinction I am making) actually have the worst examples of wealth disparity in human history.

If you want a real, meaningful step to address wealth disparity, the only real answer IMO is to break up the monopolies we have in this country. But globalization policies have pretty much neutered us in enforcing this.
Wealth gaps are fine, no one argues that, the issue is that at present that gap is its biggest in history. The gap even out paces the era of the robber barons.

it is healthy to have wealth gaps, it is not healthy for a nation to have the massive gaps in wealth that we see right now, it generally leads to serious political unrest.

and with that, i will duck...
Wealth gaps when the poor are kept poor are bad (which is what we have now). We have government to blame for that. Many of our poor today stay poor for generations (even though it is possible for them to rise out if they worked hard).

Wealth gaps are good when the rich simply get richer because they are are providing a ton of goods and services to society (including the poor) and the poor are able to easily rise out of poverty. That is what we had during the "robber baron" period. Most of poor back then were a rotating group of immigrants. They would immigrate here with nothing but the shirts on their backs, would then earn a comfortable living for themselves, and then get replaced with a new crop of poor immigrants wanting to earn success for themselves.
The only thing i will add is that, no matter the cause, the American dream is dead to a massive segment of the populace. Wage increases are non existent for the masses and we are quickly building what many call a "useless class" of people because automation will (if it has not already) will effectively make them useless. They have no skills, not guidance and no direction.

This generally leads to really bad things for the rest of us. This is the entire reason that UBI, imho, makes sense. UBI is effectively a tax on the robots to offset the political unrest that is sure to follow when large segments of the populace are made irrelevant.

Now, for UBI to work is has to be truly universal, meaning, no matter what, everyone gets the same check, no matter your current wealth, everyone gets the same amount. If we can pull it off I think it can save us from the coming war, but lets be honest, it will never work because it will become a polical football with the democrats clamoring that its not fair that billionaires should not be getting checks and the republicans will blast it as "gubment handouts"

so, bottom line, buy more ammo because the class war is coming


If we accept that automation will displace millions of workers, we REALLY need to address our immigration policies. The old thinking that we need to grow our work force is not valid under the assumption millions of jobs will go away.

The extend to which robots are cheap or people are expensive will dictate how much and how fast automation is adopted. The left is doing all they can to make sure people are more and more expensive.
Automation is displacing workers today because government is pushing the cost of hiring workers too high. That kicks the workers to the curb with no options.

In the past, automation occurred because somebody developed a machine that made human labor more productive (like a bulldozer). That did not kick workers to the curb, but instead made them more productive which justified higher salaries.

So we should NOT accept that automation will displace workers. It only does so when government intrudes into the market and pushes costs up. We should eliminate the government intrusion, bring expenses (and therefore salaries) down again and reverse the recent automation trend.
I agree, but that is only one side of the equation. As robots become cheaper, that will drive automation as well. Then again, that falls more to your model of increasing a worker's value by learning to build or maintain the robot rather than fry the hamburger the robot now fries perfectly every time.

As I said earlier, government interference is almost always the cause of market distortions.
A & M, GIVE US ROOM!

aTmAg
How long do you want to ignore this user?
WHOOP!'91 said:

aTmAg said:

WHOOP!'91 said:

Bag said:

aTmAg said:

Bag said:

Champ Bailey said:

Can anyone explain to me what is bad about the wealth gap in this country? Why is it bad that we don't kneecap our most successful people? I understand there are people who live below the poverty line. But isn't it also important to consider that what we consider poverty in this country is drastically different than what practically every other country considers poverty?

My biggest issue with any proposed policy to address this is that when looking at history and at theory, the policies proposed in this country actually increase wealth disparity, not decrease it. My final comment would be that pretty much every socialist economy (not a socialist safety net, please recognize the distinction I am making) actually have the worst examples of wealth disparity in human history.

If you want a real, meaningful step to address wealth disparity, the only real answer IMO is to break up the monopolies we have in this country. But globalization policies have pretty much neutered us in enforcing this.
Wealth gaps are fine, no one argues that, the issue is that at present that gap is its biggest in history. The gap even out paces the era of the robber barons.

it is healthy to have wealth gaps, it is not healthy for a nation to have the massive gaps in wealth that we see right now, it generally leads to serious political unrest.

and with that, i will duck...
Wealth gaps when the poor are kept poor are bad (which is what we have now). We have government to blame for that. Many of our poor today stay poor for generations (even though it is possible for them to rise out if they worked hard).

Wealth gaps are good when the rich simply get richer because they are are providing a ton of goods and services to society (including the poor) and the poor are able to easily rise out of poverty. That is what we had during the "robber baron" period. Most of poor back then were a rotating group of immigrants. They would immigrate here with nothing but the shirts on their backs, would then earn a comfortable living for themselves, and then get replaced with a new crop of poor immigrants wanting to earn success for themselves.
The only thing i will add is that, no matter the cause, the American dream is dead to a massive segment of the populace. Wage increases are non existent for the masses and we are quickly building what many call a "useless class" of people because automation will (if it has not already) will effectively make them useless. They have no skills, not guidance and no direction.

This generally leads to really bad things for the rest of us. This is the entire reason that UBI, imho, makes sense. UBI is effectively a tax on the robots to offset the political unrest that is sure to follow when large segments of the populace are made irrelevant.

Now, for UBI to work is has to be truly universal, meaning, no matter what, everyone gets the same check, no matter your current wealth, everyone gets the same amount. If we can pull it off I think it can save us from the coming war, but lets be honest, it will never work because it will become a polical football with the democrats clamoring that its not fair that billionaires should not be getting checks and the republicans will blast it as "gubment handouts"

so, bottom line, buy more ammo because the class war is coming


If we accept that automation will displace millions of workers, we REALLY need to address our immigration policies. The old thinking that we need to grow our work force is not valid under the assumption millions of jobs will go away.

The extend to which robots are cheap or people are expensive will dictate how much and how fast automation is adopted. The left is doing all they can to make sure people are more and more expensive.
Automation is displacing workers today because government is pushing the cost of hiring workers too high. That kicks the workers to the curb with no options.

In the past, automation occurred because somebody developed a machine that made human labor more productive (like a bulldozer). That did not kick workers to the curb, but instead made them more productive which justified higher salaries.

So we should NOT accept that automation will displace workers. It only does so when government intrudes into the market and pushes costs up. We should eliminate the government intrusion, bring expenses (and therefore salaries) down again and reverse the recent automation trend.
I agree, but that is only one side of the equation. As robots become cheaper, that will drive automation as well. Then again, that falls more to your model of increasing a worker's value by learning to build or maintain the robot rather than fry the hamburger the robot now fries perfectly every time.

As I said earlier, government interference is almost always the cause of market distortions.
Agreed 100%. I have to push back on people who think "all automation is bad" or "UBI is necessary because of automation". Both are wrong.
Bag
How long do you want to ignore this user?
aTmAg said:

Bag said:

aTmAg said:

Bag said:

Champ Bailey said:

Can anyone explain to me what is bad about the wealth gap in this country? Why is it bad that we don't kneecap our most successful people? I understand there are people who live below the poverty line. But isn't it also important to consider that what we consider poverty in this country is drastically different than what practically every other country considers poverty?

My biggest issue with any proposed policy to address this is that when looking at history and at theory, the policies proposed in this country actually increase wealth disparity, not decrease it. My final comment would be that pretty much every socialist economy (not a socialist safety net, please recognize the distinction I am making) actually have the worst examples of wealth disparity in human history.

If you want a real, meaningful step to address wealth disparity, the only real answer IMO is to break up the monopolies we have in this country. But globalization policies have pretty much neutered us in enforcing this.
Wealth gaps are fine, no one argues that, the issue is that at present that gap is its biggest in history. The gap even out paces the era of the robber barons.

it is healthy to have wealth gaps, it is not healthy for a nation to have the massive gaps in wealth that we see right now, it generally leads to serious political unrest.

and with that, i will duck...
Wealth gaps when the poor are kept poor are bad (which is what we have now). We have government to blame for that. Many of our poor today stay poor for generations (even though it is possible for them to rise out if they worked hard).

Wealth gaps are good when the rich simply get richer because they are are providing a ton of goods and services to society (including the poor) and the poor are able to easily rise out of poverty. That is what we had during the "robber baron" period. Most of poor back then were a rotating group of immigrants. They would immigrate here with nothing but the shirts on their backs, would then earn a comfortable living for themselves, and then get replaced with a new crop of poor immigrants wanting to earn success for themselves.
The only thing i will add is that, no matter the cause, the American dream is dead to a massive segment of the populace. Wage increases are non existent for the masses and we are quickly building what many call a "useless class" of people because automation will (if it has not already) will effectively make them useless. They have no skills, not guidance and no direction.

This generally leads to really bad things for the rest of us. This is the entire reason that UBI, imho, makes sense. UBI is effectively a tax on the robots to offset the political unrest that is sure to follow when large segments of the populace are made irrelevant.

Now, for UBI to work is has to be truly universal, meaning, no matter what, everyone gets the same check, no matter your current wealth, everyone gets the same amount. If we can pull it off I think it can save us from the coming war, but lets be honest, it will never work.
Sorry, but UBI will not fix it either. UBI will always make expenses go up faster than UBI check amount. If the UBI amount is low, then it will have no apparent effect. If it were high, then it will make everything cost far more than the UBI checks provide.

If UBI checks were $1000 per month, then our expenses would increase by more than $1000/mo. If UBI checks were $10,000/mo then our expenses would increase by more than $1000/mo. If UBI checks were $1T/mo then our expenses would increase by more than $1T/mo.

No matter how much you make UBI, it will make the problems that they try to fix worse.



When people are poor and need stuff, the ONLY solution would be those that produces more stuff. No matter of money redistribution or printing would magically bring about more stuff. It's rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic. We simply need to enact policies that encourage people to produce more stuff. Any policy that encourages people to work less does the exact opposite. (Including UBI)
People that deal only in absolutes are a massive part of the problem, imo. The world is gray, these issues are massively complex.

UBI is not a silver bullet, nor is it the entire solution, but it is necessary as we go into / through this 4th industrial revolution.

Stating simpleton arguments as gospel like "the ONLY answer is we must all produce more" simply does not scale, there is a reason why the smartest people around support UBI. The robber barons of today make more than a million dollars a year per employee and that number is only going to grow. They are able to produce exponentially more each year, and with less and less human capital. Robots don't commit sexual misconduct, they dont come to work high, they work 24 hours a day and they dont get tired.

This useless class isn't just unskilled labor, soon it will be doctors, lawyers, truck drivers, hell at some point soon the computers will be writing the code themselves and in many cases already are.

Trying to blame this crisis on the "gubment" or simply telling people to get over it and "produce more" is only making the problem worse.
 
×
subscribe Verify your student status
See Subscription Benefits
Trial only available to users who have never subscribed or participated in a previous trial.