Economic Utopian Plan

Economics Economics Questions
201

Mises Pieces said: “…No offense.”

None taken. Most people prefer to pay less taxes than more, prefer no poverty than 15% poverty, prefer tech to lower the cost of credit to near zero than to pay hundreds of thousands, prefer to be wealthy than not, prefer to get paid to go to university than not, prefer to get paid an extra $50k than not and prefer the freedom of lifestyle choices a basic income provides than no basic income, all of which this plan delivers.

And most people understand the difference between taxes and theft.

202

ulrichPf said: “Now you are stating something completely different. You making up new ideas as you go along.”

What am I saying that is different?

New ideas is bad?

203

Well then your idea should catch on like wildfire. Surely this is the first time since the advent of capitalism that anyone has conceived of a system of prosperity through handouts.

204

It only is a problem if you believe in positive human rights. The easiest way to refute all of them is to use the “YOU FIRST” argument, it is always easier when spending other peoples money, not when it involves your own money.

You are making an assumption that most people will want to do those things as opposed to watching porn or playing world of warcraft compare the numbers of those to all of those other “productive” things that you mentionened. Most people would want to watch movies, baseball etc. not the other way round.

So every year you will have to adjust how each person is allowed to earn, and this will be done by a magical computer that will know who counts as a worker or a student. You want to lump 126 Million Workers one big group who all get the same $30,000 no matter work they actually do. Why should a student who studies African basket weaving get the same as the Physics students ?

205

Read your manifesto, when you understand it, get back to me. Your manifesto said every worker gets $30 000, not getting $10 000 dividends for $10 000 work.

206

Capital is the most controversial topic in all of economics. Every few decades or so there is a major capital controversy. The main questions are (off the top of my head):

  • What is capital?
  • What is interest?
  • How is interest formed?
  • What is the nature of capital accumulation?
  • What is the relationship between capital and labor?

It’s not just about investment. Think about these questions, and try to answer them.

207

My first post directly addressed the idea of being able to “automatically and instantly get all the credit you need”, as stated in the manifesto as point #6. I ignored the alleged stipulations there – I wanted to speak to the attention-grabbing header (which people are more likely to remember). You then responded saying that one would not be able to get all the credit he needs. At that point, I felt obliged to point out that, although I understand that the stipulations are written under point #6 of the manifesto, it directly contradicts the first statement of that point. In other words, this part of the manifesto does not have logical coherence. It is self-contradictory. It translates into “You can automatically and instantly get all the credit you need, but you can’t.” Get it? Of course you do. Furthermore, were one to judge whether the manifesto as a whole is logically coherent, the only judgement one could make here is that it is not, since at least one point of it, namely point #6, is inherently contradictory.

At this point, if you want to continue to promote a logically incoherent manifesto, that’s up to you. The rest of us see it for what it is, so your claims to the contrary will fall on deaf ears.

I accept your implicit concession.

208

Autolykos:

While I agree with you that the manifesto is logically/economically incoherent for the most part, what you are asserting is a fallacy of composition.

209

I used the phrase “as a whole” to mean “completely”. So saying that the manifesto as a whole is not logically coherent is the same thing (to me) as saying it is not completely logically coherent.

Would it help if I always said the latter thing instead? :stuck_out_tongue:

210

Will there be any created or saved capital goods that will be forgone if people are taxed?

211

ulrich said: “It only is a problem if you believe in positive human rights. The easiest way to refute all of them is to use the “YOU FIRST” argument, it is always easier when spending other peoples money, not when it involves your own money.”

I don’t know what you mean by this. Maybe you can re-phrase.

“You are making an assumption that most people will want to do those things as opposed to watching porn or playing world of warcraft compare the numbers of those to all of those other “productive” things that you mentionened. Most people would want to watch movies, baseball etc. not the other way round.”

I do not make that assumption. Jobs that we cannot automate represent only 20% of the jobs we do. That means we can reduce the work week to 1 day per week and still make the same amount of goods and services.

Our economy is inefficient. Because people are desperate for a paycheck in order to survive, they wind up wasting their lives in jobs that we can easily automate. It is backwards and pointless.

“So every year you will have to adjust how each person is allowed to earn, and this will be done by a magical computer that will know who counts as a worker or a student.”

Computers are not magical! Determining who is a student and who is a worker is not witchcraft.

“You want to lump 126 Million Workers one big group who all get the same $30,000 no matter work they actually do. Why should a student who studies African basket weaving get the same as the Physics students ?”

The point is to make sure everyone has a high income as a minimum. Physics students will go on to make a much higher income than african basket weavers.

212

ulrich said: “Read your manifesto, when you understand it, get back to me. Your manifesto said every worker gets $30 000, not getting $10 000 dividends for $10 000 work.”

If you read through the 6 pages of answers to people’s questions you will find I have a pretty good understanding of what is in the manifesto. You will also find the answer to this question in particular.

As I wrote in another response, in order to prevent someone from getting a job that pays them $1 just to qualify for the $30k dividend, I suggested that you could just make the $30k dividend match their salary. So if you only earned $10k, the dividend would be $10k and not $30k.

214

ricarpe said: “Calvin and Hobbes”

It is sad that some people get their wisdom from comic strips.

There would be no progress if these Luddites ran the world. Fortunately, not everyone is a Luddite.

215

The people were pointing out the flaws of your manifesto, like the $30 000 worker problem. There is nothing in your original manifesto that states the things you later made up to fix those flaws, that implies your manifesto is flawed and you were correcting it as you went along. And you will need to keep on correcting it as the entire thing is fundamentally flawed. Just like the other famous manifesto is fundamentally flawed.

216

You said everyone has the right to be hired, I said that if YOU were on the receiving end of being forced to hire an idiot YOU would not like it. A positive right always needs to someone on the other end being forced to do provide it, otherwise it is not a positive right. Why else do you think the USSR constitution needed to add all those “duty” clauses that forced people to provide the “free” health care, food etc. that the other parts of the constitution provided.

20% ??? How do you know this, why not 10% or 80% what method do you use to come up with such random numbers.

So if someone is a waiter and studying on the side, which is he ? If I enrol for some course to get my free money and then do not bother to study, am I a student or not. Tell me how the computer will be able to figure out who is a real student and who is trying to get more of your free handouts.\

Like I said above if anyone can get free money for being a student, everyone will apply for the dumbest courses out there to get their free money, the entire country would become official students and official workers and get their free cash. How would prevent it ?

217

ulrichPf said: “The people were pointing out the flaws of your manifesto, like the $30 000 worker problem. There is nothing in your original manifesto that states the things you later made up to fix those flaws, that implies your manifesto is flawed and you were correcting it as you went along. And you will need to keep on correcting it as the entire thing is fundamentally flawed. Just like the other famous manifesto is fundamentally flawed.”

You are just completely misinformed. I did not make this post. Somebody else posted it. This post was a copy of an email meant to give someone an overview of the idea. The fact that the author of this post did not include a full discussion of all the details and their implications has nothing to do with me or the effectiveness of the plan.

Let me ask you, are you against the idea and just looking for reasons why it shouldn’t be implemented? Or do you like the idea but concerned about its feasibility?

218

The manifesto is flawed and as are your ideas because it not solve the calculation problem that Mises talks about, as all the counter examples show. A computer cannot determine each individuals life circumstance and their own value system they live by.

219

MeSees: You are just completely misinformed. I did not make this post. Somebody else posted it. This post was a copy of an email meant to give someone an overview of the idea. The fact that the author of this post did not include a full discussion of all the details and their implications has nothing to do with me or the effectiveness of the plan.

As I already posted at the beginning of this thread, the rest of the discussion was located at http://conservativeeconomics.blogspot.com/2008/09/why-capitalism-is-best-economics-system.html under the comments section. If you want to provide a link where your plan is discussed in more detail, feel free to do so. Otherwise, we will assume all details are including both here and in that original post.

220

ulrichPf said: “You said everyone has the right to be hired, I said that if YOU were on the receiving end of being forced to hire an idiot YOU would not like it. A positive right always needs to someone on the other end being forced to do provide it, otherwise it is not a positive right. Why else do you think the USSR constitution needed to add all those “duty” clauses that forced people to provide the “free” health care, food etc. that the other parts of the constitution provided.”

Right now, you have a duty that forces you to work in order to get health care, food, etc. just like the USSR did. If you don’t work, you die. One of the goals of this plan is to make that process more humane.

If someone deliberately sabotages his work at the employment he is given as part of his basic human rights and gets fired at every place he is given volunteer work, that person will find that they will no longer be able to volunter and receive the $30k dividend.

“20% ??? How do you know this, why not 10% or 80% what method do you use to come up with such random numbers.”

There was an informal study done to approximate the makeup of jobs. They found that 55% of all jobs were jobs that people only do because they need a paycheck and were automatable with existing technology (examples are retail sales, transportation, warehousing, commercial banking, restaurant staff, cleaning and landscaping). 20-30% of all jobs were jobs that people only do because they need a paycheck but were NOT automatable with existing technology (examples are working on a factory floor, construction, mining and maintenance). And 15% of jobs are not really jobs at all, they are what we consider productive leisure activities-activities people do in their leisure time, that they would do whether they got paid or not.

“So if someone is a waiter and studying on the side, which is he ?”

The maximum dividend you can get would be $30k. So if you were enrolled full time in school and worked, you would still only get $30k. But the point of the $30k for students is so they wouldn’t have to work as waiters.

“If I enrol for some course to get my free money and then do not bother to study, am I a student or not.”

You would be a student on his way to ruining his resume. Keep in mind that you still have to pay for your tuition.

"Tell me how the computer will be able to figure out who is a real student and who is trying to get more of your free handouts."

I don’t think it needs to see if someone is a serious student. But you can limit the dividend to a student’s primary degree or to students who don’t fail out.

“Like I said above if anyone can get free money for being a student, everyone will apply for the dumbest courses out there to get their free money, the entire country would become official students and official workers and get their free cash. How would prevent it ?”

You can only go to school for so long. There are no degrees beyond doctorate. But I would rather see 55% of the population with doctorates than working as waiters, retail salespeople, and truck drivers.