Remember, we know how to address many of the world’s problems, including poverty, homelessness, and climate change.
But those with capital in society choose not to.
Those with capital choose not to
Those with capital profit off of not doing so.
Like the one recent CEO saying the quiet part aloud by saying government should promote higher unemployment, since in the high employment environment employees aren’t desperate and have more demands costing him money. That employees arent feeling enough pain and despair in economy.
To be fair, this isn’t that far away from the economic theory underlying using interest rates to manage inflation - it’s just phrased in a different way.
That’s the problem with fractional reserve banking it’s making up money for those who lend theirs. It’s about extracting value from those who work for those who accumulate. It’s not a tbf, it’s a this is also an issue in every area of our society.
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There’s the fight club method but good people generally avoid being terrorists…
I recently heard it phrased like this:
Capitalism is built on hierarchy, which means someone fundamentally NEEDS to be at the bottom. There is no way around it, someone needs to suffer.
I don’t think that this is really true.
If someone has “more” then yes of course someone needs to have “less”, merely by definition.
The question is really whether those with less are living below the poverty line or living comfortably. I guess it’s a question of semantics whether “capitalism” requires people to be living below the poverty line but I don’t think it does. It’s just shitty regulations which allow wealth to become as concentrated as it has.
Socialism in principle sounds great, but most times it’s been implemented it’s suffered from the same problem as capitalism - the people with power are greedy and use their power to manipulate and oppress the populace.
I wish all .de instances a very get off my federation
German politics and energy consumption aside, I think they have the best base of knowledge for what your proposed economic model has in store for them and their allies. They had that model forced upon them, and fought for change and economic freedom. There was a freaking wall dividing their country over that.
Don’t shitpost on good discussion please.
The nazis were socialist
Daily reminder that Germany never underwent denazification
He’s referring to post-WW2 East Germany being controlled by the USSR you absolute gonk.
They had that model forced upon them, and fought for change and economic freedom.
East germans, especially women and lgbt people, lost a lot of practical rights during reunification
Amazing.
Socialism in principle sounds great, but most times it’s been implemented it’s suffered from the same problem as capitalism - the people with power are greedy and use their power to manipulate and oppress the populace.
This is true, the “dictatorship of the proletariat” is self-contradictory and impossible IMHO. Because as soon as a member of the proletariat is a dictator, they are now no longer a member of the proletariat.
Now you don’t need a dictator, you can enact socialist policies democratically. This is very slow and kind of difficult, because the capitalists will lobby and fight so hard against it, and you need to maintain public support.
That isnt what dictatorship of the proletariat means. It means that the former bourgeoisie are temporarily politically disenfranchised from proletarian democracy
But if we raised the bottom up enough, it wouldn’t really matter if they were on the bottom. Many people would be happy if they had a stable place to live, food, healthcare, and freedom, and many don’t really need or even want “more” all the time. The problem is the vast differences in wealth and ownership.
The problem is you can’t exploit comfortable people, so the uber rich would only be super rich, and that’s not good enough for them…
That’s a fair point. But in a world that values money above all else, that’s not just a divide in wealth and ownership but a divide in power.
Conservatism is built on hierarchy. Capitalism just says markets work and investment is gambling. You can do that and still keep everyone fed / clothed / sheltered, specifically because markets work, and can make food / clothes / shelter more plentiful. Some people having more doesn’t require private space station versus duplex cardboard box.
Conservatives only say market failure demands misery and successful gambling means unchecked power because that’s what they always say. That’s their only conclusion, applied to literally everything. That’s how conservatives think things work. The entire tribal worldview boils down to “well somebody’s gotta be king.” Just a fractal pyramid of militaries over empire, rulers over courts, owners over workers, and patriarchs over families. If you’re at the bottom you’re lucky to be alive, and how dare you question your betters.
The unspoken assumption is that change is impossible. This is genuinely how they think everything works. Like the universe itself dictates a steep gradient, and the only way things could be different is by shuffling around who goes where. So if someone is suffering, they must have fucked up to deserve it, and if you want to help them, you’re putting someone else in their place.
In most cases, yes; but in this case in particular, with UBI increasing the buying power of the poor, those with capital would actually profit off of implementing such a service. No, this one boils down to good old fashioned classism.
And make sure their propaganda gets pushed as truth and that any opposition to it will lead to genocide and prison camps
Remember that politics can be changed with votes. Tax them to finance change.
It’s difficult, but blaming billionaires takes away our agency.
If we could change politics by voting, we wouldn’t be allowed to vote.
We’re not stretched thin to finance these changes. Taxes aren’t holding us back. This is what those with true power in society and their cronies say to not do anything. This is the whole point.
No one is only blaming “billionaires.” This is you patronizing them, portraying yourself as a genius and the person you’re responding to as too naive and stupid to understand how life really works.
And no, we don’t have agency. We have a deluded sense of agency where we think we can vote and change the system from within.
There are levels. Voters don’t have agency. But if voters would coordinate they would have agency.
The difference is believing in agency.
I am aware how stupid I sound. But how else can I phrase it that there needs to be a believe in change to create change? Right now I just hope that readers ignore the stupid part.
What you’re saying can happen has literally never happened in human history though, right?
There’s a reason why the nonviolent revolution Wikipedia article is essentially empty, right?
(I’m not downvoting you BTW, I upvoted.)
Thanks for the upvote.
There hasn’t been internet for most of history, nor global warming, nor automation.
The joke is that people don’t want a fair revolution because the situation will be worse at first if resources are shared globally. People don’t want agency because they would be responsible for all problems.
I love what you said about believing in agency: knowing what power is ultimately in our hands would change the world for the better.
Thank you. Judging by the downvotes and objections, people deeply don’t believe it. I had expected some technical issues that prevent UBI but reading those replies makes me sad.
This is Lemmy. People on Reddit will feel even more disenfranchised. But it could be the other way round because Marxism states that capitalist democracy doesn’t work and that a revolution is needed.
I don’t like this logic because it’s predicated on an nondescript “they” with unlimited shadowy power. It leads to unhelpful conspiratorial thinking bordering on the magical. It obfuscates the real problems we face, and if we don’t understand them, even a violent revolution to defeat it would eventually replicate the system we destroyed because we didn’t understand how it came to be in the first place.
The reason it’s hard to change the system is because the system is self-reinforcing through individuals acting in their own immediate best interests and not acting as a class, not because “they wouldn’t let you change it, they’d just [rig the elections/not let you vote/kill you with a space laser]”. But that’s a complex answer, and it’s much easier to believe in the latter and call it a day.
Holy shit, what an anti-Semitic piece of shit you are. Absolutely classless.
It doesn’t matter that you think this sort of “logic” leads to conspiratorial thinking. There is a “they” and it’s the ruling class. The ruling class, and its defenders, is made up of a lot of people and institutions who create, dictate, and govern the systems that keep them and their power firmly in place. Sorry that society is a bit more complicated than you want it to be. Reality is a hard pill to bite sometimes for you racists.
And if you knew anything about anything, you’d know that democratically elected leaders are toppled by their ruling classes and/or outside forces (i.e. US) when something doesn’t go in the interest of the ruling class. To think somehow the US is immune from this is absolutely delusional thinking. Not surprising you’re into Western exceptionalism with your views on race.
And again, I just want to reiterate how much of a bottom barrel racist scum you are.
I have no idea who you are talking to. Did you respond to the right comment? None of this makes sense as a response to anything I just said.
It makes perfect sense. What are you confused about? Are you going to try to “it’s just an OK hand symbol” your way out of this? What else would “space lasers” mean in the way you meant it?
My entire post was warning against gesturing towards a vague power controlling everything because it leads to conspiracism. One major example of that conspiracism is antisemitism. I have literally no idea how you can read my comment and come back thinking I’m arguing in favor of antisemitism. Yes, the space laser thing was a jab at the infamous “Jewish space laser” conspiracy, and I was explicitly saying avoid that kind of thinking.
The problem with our society isn’t that there’s a nonspecific ruling class directly dictating everything. There doesn’t need to be. We proletariat as a class are fractured instead of united. There’s no need to rig elections or prevent us from voting because we don’t act as a threat against power in the first place. The system amorally chugs along unimpeded as we go about our individual lives instead of acting together. Our daily compliance is what sustains it, and the system is designed to punish noncompliance automatically.
The scary truth isn’t that there’s a puppetmaster pulling our strings, it’s that there’s nobody at the wheel at all.
The tail has been wagging the dog for quite some time now
It’s not just a matter of reversing power.
Billionaires lead. Regular citizens would massively have to change their lives if they want to change that.
Remember that politics can be changed with votes. Tax them to finance change.
I agree the wealthy need to pay a lot more in tax than they currently do.
They also have disproportionate control over the electoral process in many countries, and most political parties are not even considering taxing them to the extent that they need to be taxed. Nor are most political parties challenging our capitalist society in any significant sense.
Voting is important, but don’t expect voting alone to solve our problems.
It’s difficult, but blaming billionaires takes away our agency.
No it does not. Sod off with that. Correctly identifying a major contributor to an issue does not take away agency.
What but voting should solve the problems? You won’t stage a revolution.
Direct action.
How about direct action to make citizens vote in a coordinated way?
But you must have other direct actions in mind. Which ones?
Voting. Strikes. Mass protest. More, if ultimately required.
Why strikes and mass protests? Vote accordingly and let the law drive the change.
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Every single study on UBI finds that it is a good idea that benefits both the recipients and society as a whole, but because it contradicts the dominant ideology it can’t be allowed to happen.
If people aren’t forced to work to live then how can I get cheap labor for my shitty business that my dad gave me?
If people have UBI, you can get away with paying less though. That’s how walmart does it; just encourage your workers to get welfare so they stay alive enough to work more
And that’s honestly my proposal for it. Basically, create something like UBI (my preference is NIT) that ensures everyone is over the poverty level, eliminate minimum wage, and have benefits phase out for some reasonable definition of “living wage” (say, 2x the poverty level, maybe 3x).
Working would never make you worse off, and people wouldn’t feel obligated to take crappy jobs if the pay isn’t there.
We could also eliminate many other forms of welfare at the same time and just increase benefits accordingly.
The only benefits that I think would have to stay, are those with “unlimited” downside, like healthcare.
UBI can potentially replace specific benefits for housing or general living expenses, but it can’t really replace healthcare.
Agreed, I certainly wouldn’t touch Medicare or Medicaid. I’d also probably leave unemployment insurance as is, and this would kick in afterward.
But I think it could replace Social Security, food assistance, housing assistance, etc. And I think we could fund it by lifting the income cap on Social Security, but I’d need to run the numbers to be sure.
I’d say some disability benefits as well. Simply getting by can be more expensive when you can’t do basic tasks yourself, even if you have the best universal health care possible.
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Which we all know would happen IMMEDIATELY in lockstep with any widespread rollout of UBI, and any complaint would be met with half the country screeching “FREE MARKET REEEEEE”
Guess we better institute rent controls first then
Shut up baby I know it
Too bad 80% of the country would call us commies for suggesting it.
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Rent Control can only have one outcome. Decreased amount of available new or renovated rentals which coupled with an ever increasing demand for housing, creates some of the housing shortages we see in larger cities today.
UBI can be an effective way to fight poverty, and would be an even more effective way to combat poverty if we implemented a Negative Income tax whereby all welfare programs are rolled into the funding.
More 👏 Empty 👏 Houses 👏 Than 👏 Homeless 👏 People 👏
The maoist uprising against the landlords was the largest revolution in history and led to an almost entirely equitable distribution of land ownership
And how did that work out for the estimated 15-55 million people that died of starvation as a result of the “equitable distribution of land ownership”?
Rent Control can only have one outcome. Decreased amount of available new or renovated rentals which coupled with an ever increasing demand for housing, creates some of the housing shortages we see in larger cities today.
Only if you assume that private landlords are the only way to supply housing.
There is no reason to assume that.
How can a society built on capital work towards the betterment of society rather than the accretion of capital?
Exactly. If organisations (private, public and other) had to maximise for social betterment, they would release annual reports measuring it. There might even be entire industries dedicated to auditing measurements of social betterment.
But no, we’re stuck using a system of ‘value’ based on the prestige of owning shiny rocks and control of the areas where those shiny rocks are found. And finding new uses for things and people that aren’t the desired shiny rocks so that you may demand and acquire more shiny rocks as others in the same time duration.
If a majority of countries can successfully ditch the gold standard and allow fiat currency - as they did a century ago, that means the world is also able to redefine what fiat currencies measure. There’s nothing actually stopping us from requiring social and environmental impact to be included in the calculation of financial valuations, except the people who have a vested interest in keeping the current equations.
Stop measuring people’s networth. Start measuring their societal value.
I agree with not measuring net worth but how are you planning on measuring individual societal value? That just sounds ripe for discrimination and elitism.
There was a UBI experiment in canada that was a huge success and of course the tories axed it as soon as they had the chance. Conservatives need to [extremely long bleep] … [yeah still bleeping] … … [still going] … [leeeeep] -yeah i’m going to have to redact this in post.
I’ve yet to see a study at a scale large enough to impact the local economy. Will the results hold when everyone gets monthly cash payments, or will rent go through the roof and that’s about it?
Kind of a weird argument, isn’t it? If we did the opposite instead, it’s not as if you’d expect rents to fall – on the contrary, rent would go up in response to the added financial burden on landlords. Setting that hypothetical aside, wouldn’t a generalized inflation of rents be an acceptable tradeoff for reducing homelessness and untethering the 50+% of young adults who still live with their parents to move and work in more economically efficient environments?
While I actually consider multi-generational housing a good thing, let’s ignore that since the reason people aren’t moving out is financial and not social.
The question is whether UBI is the best way to solve that problem (and others) and I have yet to see data that can be reasonably said to actually be universal for a region. The closest thing I know of is Alaska, and their oil payments are too small and their economy too remote to say much about larger payments in a larger economy.
To me, because money has a social and psychological value to it, what works on an individual level has no guarantee to transfer to a societal level. I would be very interested to see UBI practiced on an entire economic zone, but good luck getting anyone to volunteer.
That’s about it. Why would anyone work for $20k/yr when they could get $12k for free? They wouldn’t. So those jobs would bump to $30k+, and a domino affect would occur. Nothing would be achieved other than the devaluing of the American dollar, which would lead to a loss of jobs, increased poverty, and guess what else - increased homelessness.
Similar experiments in Vancouver: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/aug/30/canada-study-homeless-money-spending
Ontario: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/hamilton/basic-income-mcmaster-report-1.5485729
Turns out, socialism ain’t that bad eh?
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That’s not true. You’re thinking of social programs. Socialism is when workers own the means of production.
If this was socialism, America would have already done a military coup in Denver.
in the US you could call anything socialism and people would automatically hate it
That isnt socialism, the proletariat doesn’t control the means of production.
I think you are confusing socialism with communism.
Are you in a political organization that is explicitly socialist? Have you read any literature by any notable socialist author?
I know the answer to both is no. Because I know you’re confusing yourself as someone who is informed about what socialism and communism are.
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It’s not like it’s that expensive to determine who’s homeless because they don’t have money. Solving homelessness isn’t a single golden bullet.
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99.999999999% of the homeless are homeless because they don’t have enough money.
Depends where you are.
Rent is only high because of artificial scarcity of real estate. The scarcity only exists because building new housing is decided neither by supply and demand nor central government planning, but by the people who accumulate more capital if housing isn’t built.
We really need to push for the feds to step in and start constructing government housing against the will of the NIMBYs and local and state governments then.
California has finally started forcing local governments to build more housing to stop the NIMBYs bit it’s still going to take so many years for housing to catch up even if they start now.
1K a month is pretty trivial compared to the cost of all the public money used to punish them (e.g cops). Even if you don’t care about the humanity aspect at all UBI makes sense just from a pure numbers perspective.
But think of all the money prisons will lose!
I know it’s a popular sentiment, because private prisons are so in-your-face evil, but they’re not as ubiquitous as the population seems to believe.
Twenty-seven states and the federal government incarcerated 96,370 people in private prisons in 2021, representing 8% of the total state and federal prison population.
Yes, that’s too many. Yes, we need to ban these things at the federal level. But let’s not forget the grift from state and local prisons, in many cases worse because they can’t be as readily audited.
$1,000/mo. is not UBI, not like it’s usually discussed. I’d go for widening this program, let’s keep the experiment rolling until it pans out or collapses.
Don’t forget healthcare and existing social security!
I think my biggest problem with these tests (not the idea of UBI) is that they go entirely based on what the recipients say. There’s not really any indication that fact checking is done to confirm they actually are living somewhere now, or they did get their cars fixed, etc.
I’m confident that the money helped, because obviously it would, but I wish we could get some actual solid data on how much it helped. The cynic in me believes that desperate people getting 1000$/mo will embellish how much it helps in order to keep getting the money, when in reality they need 1500$ or 2000$ to afford housing in Denver.
I’m not sure what definition of UBI you’re using, but not all forms of UBI need to cover the entirety of living expenses. UBI is just having income without strings attached. This very study is showing that even small amounts of money can help people get out of shitty situations.
Also as someone who lives in Dever, it’s not that expensive. Sure $1500+ is what you’ll pay around LoDo, but there are plenty of cheaper places.
Isn’t that like… Objectively wrong?
Dear Faust, even in Soviet Union idea of studio apartments were too cringe, so normal apartments were used for mass housing.
People without money mostly need money.
Somehow this is surprising and confusing… primarily to people who cannot imagine change.
Wow.
Can’t wait for this to never roll out nationwide at the Federal level.
“Those damn homeless and injuns get EVERYTHING for free”
-my racist and jaded ass coworker
OK, so you’re telling me that giving money to people who need it, is better than giving it to rich people?
I am Wage Slaves inner shocked pikachu. Same thing, just more sarcastic and massive eye brows.
the Pew Charitable Trust wrote in a recent analysis that research had “consistently found that homelessness in an area is driven by housing costs.”
Well, yeah, and we can thank investors, landlords and capital funds for that. Housing in Denver is ridiculously expensive currently… and it was bad but not to this extent a few years ago. A house next door to me that was $250k and $1000 a month a few years ago is now $450 and $2100 a month.
Houses in the Netherlands have increased on average like 33% since 2018. Not made up numbers. They’ve gotta go down this is so unaffordable for starters.
“No shit”
I wonder if rent would go up if ubi became a thing
That depends on the housing market. If you have a surplus in housing, rent will remain stable because tenants will move if their landlord increases rent.
If you have a deficit in housing and more people look for a place to stay than there are available places, then tenants cannot move. Landlords and other businesses in deficit markets like healthcare will take all additional income.
Poverty is a lack of money, that’s it. Tax the rich, help the poor, grow the middle class.
Who would pledge 10% of their income to distribute as basic income? There is no need to wait until politicians implement it. We can start immediately.
Don’t be absurd. Systemic change is needed. Not individual charity.
What’s your plan for systemic change? If you have none, why not try systemic individual charity?
The average citizen will have to pay for UBI with taxes. Why not do it voluntarily?
What’s your plan for systemic change?
Tax the rich, redistribute wealth, stop treating basic human needs such as shelter and healthcare as profit generators.
If you have none
I did. Stop making stupid assumptions.
why not try systemic individual charity?
Please learn what words mean. There is no “systemic individual” anything.
The average citizen will have to pay for UBI with taxes. Why not do it voluntarily?
Because it doesn’t work, you walnut.
You don’t have a plan, you have a wish list. How do you want to achieve your list?
Using insults doesn’t refute my points. Why not coordinate as citizens?
You don’t have a plan, you have a wish list. How do you want to achieve your list?
I’m sorry, you expect anyone who disagrees with you on social media to write you a thesis on restructuring society, or you just ignore them?
It’s obvious that you just want to disregard what people have to say.
You haven’t actually written anything of substance, but I have to effortpost for you? Lol, bite me.
Using insults doesn’t refute my points.
You don’t have any points.
Why not coordinate as citizens?
Why do you think it hasn’t already worked? Why do you think charity hasn’t already accomplished what you say it will accomplish?
Perhaps because it doesn’t actually achieve systemic change. Because the people hoarding wealth do not voluntarily distribute it.
Maybe because the people who hoard wealth are like everybody else and too few want to share? Why expect the billionaires to share if normal people don’t share?
Right now is the first time in history since city state times that the citizens can talk and vote together.
If people choose to share their income, they can do it now. The debate hasn’t happened yet.
Maybe because the people who hoard wealth are like everybody else and too few want to share?
So then why are you suggesting voluntary charity if you know it doesn’t actually work? Are you being deliberately dense?
If people choose to share their income, they can do it now. The debate hasn’t happened yet.
It has happened, just because your head is wedged so firmly up your own ass that you haven’t seen it doesn’t mean it hasn’t happened.
