"If minimum wage goes up, the price of everything goes up."

[Zlaxer]

We will transition to a new economic system. Capitalism has run it's course. Socialism/communism doesn't work.

Part of me thinks we will end up with a universal base income....which may work if population stabilizes and/or declines....

I'm ready for my robot slave.....

*Robot does not equal Strong AI.

Enslaving a strong AI would be the same as enslaving a human IMHO.

[Speaker to Animals]

We will transition to a new economic system. Capitalism has run it's course. Socialism/communism doesn't work.

Part of me thinks we will end up with a universal base income....which may work if population stabilizes and/or declines....

I'm ready for my robot slave.....

*Robot does not equal Strong AI.

Enslaving a strong AI would be the same as enslaving a human IMHO.

I am pretty sure something like a UBI will be part of the economic system that follows.

I wonder if it will also see workers getting paid as a percentage of revenue rather than wages. If the company does well, then the workers do well. If the company is losing money, they don't get paid.

[Zlaxer]

We will transition to a new economic system. Capitalism has run it's course. Socialism/communism doesn't work.

Part of me thinks we will end up with a universal base income....which may work if population stabilizes and/or declines....

I'm ready for my robot slave.....

*Robot does not equal Strong AI.

Enslaving a strong AI would be the same as enslaving a human IMHO.

I am pretty sure something like a UBI will be part of the economic system that follows.

I wonder if it will also see workers getting paid as a percentage of revenue rather than wages. If the company does well, then the workers do well. If the company is losing money, they don't get paid.

A hybrid of the latter point would be ideal - base UBI with a percentage bonus based on revenues.


That's how my wife's and my pay is structured....provides stability with an incentive to work your ass off.

[Speaker to Animals]

Part of me thinks we will end up with a universal base income....which may work if population stabilizes and/or declines....

I'm ready for my robot slave.....

*Robot does not equal Strong AI.

Enslaving a strong AI would be the same as enslaving a human IMHO.

I am pretty sure something like a UBI will be part of the economic system that follows.

I wonder if it will also see workers getting paid as a percentage of revenue rather than wages. If the company does well, then the workers do well. If the company is losing money, they don't get paid.

A hybrid of the latter point would be ideal - base UBI with a percentage bonus based on revenues.


That's how my wife's and my pay is structured....provides stability with an incentive to work your ass off.

It also creates culling effect for poor business ideas. Workers will seek positions in the businesses that best suit their risk-reward calculus. The more stable the business, the cheaper the labor they can afford. Riskier startups would have to offer a higher percentage of the revenue (if any comes). Stupid business ideas would not very easily find people willing to take the risk and would not as likely waste capital.

It would also be nice if we got rid of banks as we know them by removing the government from usury enforcement. If a person defaults on a loan, the most the government should do is ensure the lender can get their principle back (if possible). If the person already paid that back in interest, then the government shouldn't help the lender at all. But at the business level, this would force businesses to seek funding through venture capital. Venture capitalists have an interest in the businesses succeeding in which they invest their money. If the business fails, the venture capitalist loses money. If businesses were funded in this way, in combination with the revenue sharing scheme above, you'd have two mechanisms for weeding out bad business ideas that are two more mechanisms than our current big fat ZERO mechanisms.

I suspect these things would lead to actually free markets as well. But I don't really pretend to understand all the side effects and consequences of such a change.

[Fife]

+1 (except for the UBI part; and any coercive profit-sharing as ersatz minimum wage)

Very (small-l) libertarian (gasp).

:goteam:

[Ex-California]

The important point here is that a rise in minimum wage is going to first affect the number of workers. When you increase the price for something, demand falls.

The labor market is not exempt from supply and demand.

Focusing on the impact on prices is a red herring. A rise in minimum wage could have some affect on prices, but more likely, it will only reduce economic activity. There will be less of the same goods and services being sold, but prices could easily remain the same. The primary impact is on price fixing in the labor market, not all these other markets that are only indirectly affected.

To see the impact of these laws, you need to look at the change in employment after the law went into effect. Most likely, you will see some increase in unemployment, welfare applications, etc. I have my doubts that it will affect a whole lot outside of a few industries, honestly, but it will definitely affect the poor in a negative way.

If the left wants to actually do something about stagnant wages and subsistence living, they could -- I don't know -- stop advocating for the mass flooding and glutting of the labor market through unfettered immigration??

Do you think its plausible that with rapid automation in the next few decades America will be left with the choice between some form of Fascism vs. International Communism?

Government policies have the power to increase or decrease the spread of wealth.

Unions use to be strong. The minimum wage higher. College cheap. Higher income taxes on the wealthy and on large estates reduced the concentration of wealth. And yes large numbers of undocumented workers while good for businesses is bad for other low wage earners.

Every major policy change seems to always make the bottom half poorer, shrink the middle class, and stuff unGodly amounts of money into a very few pockets.

Somehow it's always the poor, the working class, blacks, college students, you know, the 80% of Americans either fearing poverty or already there that are responsible for their misery, but not the 1% who actually run the economy and government for themselves. Funny that.


Does anyone think it is the other way around?

You just made the perfect argument for the move away from cronyism to real free market capitalism

[jbird4049]

I'm surprised you are not convinced that automation will result in an employment crisis. What makes you think otherwise?

I am not sure that automation will result in future mass unemployment (I could easily be wrong though). I believe that the current unemployment is mostly due to things other than automation, and that automation requires a better educated population to take advantage of it.

[Speaker to Animals]

I'm surprised you are not convinced that automation will result in an employment crisis. What makes you think otherwise?

I am not sure that automation will result in future mass unemployment (I could easily be wrong though). I believe that the current unemployment is mostly due to things other than automation, and that automation requires a better educated population to take advantage of it.

LMFAO

What do you think will happen when most labor is automated?

[jbird4049]

I think it should be obvious to everybody that the more there are people that can have a middle-class income, the more there is demand, which is needed for there to be economic growth. The most idiotic thing especially for some country like the US is to look at it from a general viewpoint of US labour being "too expensive" compared to some China. Fight that "expensiveness" by not raising wages or even lowering them, and you just have a negative effect on aggregate demand. And that demand actually is important for the World economy.

The very rich are basically savers as the consume far less than what they profit. In a healthy economy there is a role for them too, that should be noted also, but if you don't have those who could consume, the economy won't work. Where the goofy idea of trickle-down economics comes I don't know.

Hence a large wealthy middle class is the objective. How to get there is of course a political decision. Minimum wage, wealth transfers, etc. are one way, but there you ought to take into account of what are going to be the consequences in a World of ours were capital can move freely and quickly.

Put forward as a way to argue for tax cuts by lobbyists working for the wealthy individuals and big biz. It makes some sense in that too high an income tax would be bad, but it is always used to argue against any taxes on both income and wealth.

[jbird4049]

I'm surprised you are not convinced that automation will result in an employment crisis. What makes you think otherwise?

I am not sure that automation will result in future mass unemployment (I could easily be wrong though). I believe that the current unemployment is mostly due to things other than automation, and that automation requires a better educated population to take advantage of it.

LMFAO

What do you think will happen when most labor is automated?

That's been the argument for two hundreds. We're still waiting. Also having employment with automation requires education, which is now getting harder and harder to get.