Income Inequality

[Speaker to Animals]

Maybe that's your short-coming and not ours.

[Martin Hash]

Maybe that's your short-coming and not ours.

As long as you're working to support me, I'm okay with it.

[Fife]

Notice we never see threads on work ethic inequality, motivation inequality, self discipline inequality or personal responsibility inequality.

Furthermore, (2) does not comport to historical evidence in which aristocratic or otherwise very privileged classes still chose to work on their own pursuits, increasing culture, science, and even medicine on their own. Most of the Enlightenment aristocracy, for example, devoted themselves to intellectual pursuits. Jefferson, who lived off the labor of slaves, spent his time in political, scientific, and philosophical pursuits.

Whether one sustains themselves by the work of slaves or by Section 8 housing and government cheese, they remain equally free to innovate. Furthermore, Thomas Jefferson was far from the only slaveholder of his time - yet where is this cultural, scientific, and social Renaissance of Southern plantation owners who likewise lived off the labor of slaves. According to your theory they, like Jefferson, should've devoted their lives to intellectual pursuits and innovation.

But it didn't happen.

Ergo the entire premise is flawed.

Yes, the premise is flawed. People who believe that "income inequality" is a problem suppose that income is a metric of "equality."

If I took all of DB's property away from him, and even his family, and gave him $2,500 a month from now on as his allowance, and at the same time found a penniless bum on the street and gave him $2,500 a month from now on as his allowance, would the bum be equal to DB?

[JohnDonne]

Maybe that's your short-coming and not ours.

As long as you're working to support me, I'm okay with it.

But Hash, you have money, much more than a basic income would allow, and yet you're running for political office, writing books and running forums? Shouldn't both you and Trump be on the beach relaxing like sloths according to the naysayer theory?

Trump, who was given millions on starting out, is a billionaire that chooses to work his whole life. His children, who were given everything, choose to work. Celebrities that have more money than most could imagine, choose to work.

I suppose these are all "exceptions." Never mind that allowing for that dubious claim, the "exceptions" would be exponentially increased by orders of magnitude with a basic income, allowing for unprecedented innovation, you know in case the prospect of ending physical toil wasn't enough of an incentive.

The real mystery is why some humans would almost seem to prefer the vast majority of humanity to be stuck performing repetitive manual labor tasks like cleaning toilets and digging for potatoes while being told how good it is for them. Do they see themselves as exceptions, or do they welcome the mindless tasks as being good for their character? It's uncannily similar to the mentality of a slave. Interesting.

[Speaker to Animals]

People like Hash have no clue what people trapped in these systems face. It's not that he's an ass. He just doesn't understand.

Most people would choose to do things in life if they could. Pointing to the state of humanity of those trapped in the welfare system as evidence against a universal income is about as meaningful as arguing slaves are incapable of higher functioning because they didn't produce art and science.

If you want to compare apples to apples, compare people living on a universal income to the people who were privileged in the past who didn't have to work. Humans naturally want to discover things, to create, and to explore. If you deprive them of an education as we do in the inner cities, and you trap them in welfare systems that discourage work, then sure, they aren't going to do shit. But that's not because people would normally behave like that.

[Martin Hash]

Hash Dictionary:
Work - something you don't want to do
Play - something you do

p.s. I do lay around on the beach & drink margaritas, it's just not you paying for them.

[Speaker to Animals]

LOL, okay, pal. The rest of us will continue to discuss reality, then.

[Ex-California]

Hash Dictionary:
Work - something you don't want to do
Play - something you do

p.s. I do lay around on the beach & drink margaritas, it's just not you paying for them.

So is my job Play in the Hash dictionary?

I want to do it, I enjoy doing it, and I enjoy the time hanging out with my buddies at work.

[Martin Hash]

Cool, keep doing it! Why the fuck are you talking about a UBI?

[Okeefenokee]

Cool, keep doing it! Why the fuck are you talking about a UBI?

Because recognizing that certain jobs are going away does not require that one be employed in said certain jobs?