Switzerthreadi no.2: is UBI the 1st step towards a startrekkish world or just nonsense?

[BeBMan]

Star Trek as in "we only work to improve ourselves and use machines or reincarnations of the Voyager's holodoc as workslaves".

From those behind it (http://www.basicincome2016.org/):

Switzerland is the first country worldwide to hold a national referendum on the introduction of an Unconditional Basic Income (UBI) on 5 June 2016. Despite being arguable the most conservative country in the world, many typical Swiss factors are building a solid ground for the introduction of a UBI: Political stability, economic wealth and a strong liberal culture of self-determination.

Bibs article: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-36443512

Any strong opinions on this? Personally I haven't gone through all the arguments pro/contra yet, but what I'm wondering mostly is - would it even work?

Even when it could be financed, wouldn't there a large number of rather unpopular jobs just go away since nobody would do them? Sure it isn't a nice thought that ppl may do certain work only because they *have* to secure their income, but realistically who would do a rather bad/low paid/non-qualified job if he didn't have to?

And it will be quite some time before we can delegate everything unpleasant to the robots I think...

[loinburger]

A lot of people work longer hours or ****tier jobs because they want more money than they can get by working fewer hours or a better job, meaning that they'll need to supplement their UBI by working a (possibly ****ty) job. Even if I hypothetically loathed my job it still lets me afford things like steak and a townhouse while presumably with UBI I'd only be able to afford macaroni and cheese and a shared studio apartment; at the same time if I became incapacitated in the US and didn't have savings to fall back on then I'd be homeless until my disability paperwork got properly filed, while with UBI we wouldn't even need a disability bureaucracy.

At least that's my take on things from a quick skimming of this page

Fun fact: according to filthy cities the people in medieval London who were responsible for cleaning out cesspits made many times more than the average unskilled laborer, so the economy tends to find a way of filling ****ty (in this case literally) jobs

[Elok]

EDIT for Loin: I hear garbagemen are actually paid quite nicely relative to the pathetic skill level of their jobs.

They describe it as basically welfare without the (in the US at least) vast, wasteful and odious bureaucracy. Nobody's going to get rich on two and a half grand per month. I can't speak for the Swiss situation, but in the US most of the jobs our welfare recipients do (when they are qualified to work at all) are the kind of thing that really could be largely automated with little hassle. Fast food, for example, or grocery stores, or retail in general. We already have automated grocery checkout, where eight robots can help people move their own crap while supervised by a single employee. The main reason they aren't used more is because a lot of people resent a device that threatens human employees' (crappy, demeaning) livelihood.

And for many of those jobs, the poor still don't do them. A big chunk of our lowest class is unemployed and not even looking for work (a lot of them are homeless or ex-cons, or both, and effectively can't work anyway; while others are druggies or effectively disabled by health issues). That's part of the reason why we have swarms of readily exploitable illegals, who presumptively would not be allowed to receive this guaranteed income legally.

[ZEE]

Elok is a nerd.

[pchang]

Polls indicate failure with at least 70% against. Most consider this unaffordable. I think this will be necessary once most work can be done by machines, but we are not there yet. Many are concerned about people losing motivation to work, but once most work can be done by machine, I don't think this will be a concern.

[OneFootInTheGrave]

Great idea, but as ususal - too generous to start with, or too aggressive.

They should have proposed to set it at half current level (or third), and put it on top of current "world class" unemployment safety net, and not as a replacement of it. It would have been much more palatable to the general population and 80% of the effect would have been achieved where it needs to be. (to cover the neediest in the society with bare benefit of having some cash they can rely on), without much negative effect on state budget.

The proposal as is would cost ~25bn CHF which is about a third of Swiss federal budget, (removal of the safety net would be a saving on the other end, it is also about 30 percent, so this may also be no net cost), but the country has one of the lowest tax regimes in the world as is (~10% of GDP). If the proposal came around 8-10bn CHF, it would be an relatively easy gap to close while keeping the current safety net intact (or made slightly worse 60% cover instead of 80% if you want to keep the budget balanced/reduce rate of additional taxation to cover), whose removal will make this referendum fail, ie due to removal of current excellent social programs in lieu of 2500 CHF per month for everyone.

As is you are getting ~80% of former pay for 2 years as unemployment benefit (not bad for a country taking in only 10% of GDP in taxation!!! - shows what real efficient government can do), so I agree with the Swiss that 2500 when you in theory do not need them, does not match a good safety when you need it most. As is when you would get unemployed dropping down to 2500 CHF would bankrupt you in most circumstances; mortgages, general credit etc - impossible on 2500 CHF in Switzerland.

2500 CHF is therefore a failed proposal, and while UBI is an excellent idea, which will hopefully be accepted during my lifetime, this proposal is just flawed, and appropriately, will be voted against, by the Swiss.

[Dauphin]

I would expect income protection insurance for 80% of your salary for two years would cost far less than the CHF 2,500 per month. So I don't think it's a bad deal to exchange one for the other. You could make it mandatory for employees if you are worried people won't take it out.

[Aeson]

I think UBI would work well up to a point ... because people (in general) judge their standard of living relatively rather than absolutely, and "I need ..." can never be satiated monetarily. If you have a comfortable life but your neighbours have nicer stuff than you, there's still going to be motivation to go make more money. And once someone becomes accustomed to a higher standard of living, they're going to view it as insufficient even if that level was viewed as "rich" before obtaining it.

[OneFootInTheGrave]

I would expect income protection insurance for 80% of your salary for two years would cost far less than the CHF 2,500 per month. So I don't think it's a bad deal to exchange one for the other. You could make it mandatory for employees if you are worried people won't take it out.

The above is simplified - the safety net is not just the unemployment benefit (it was an interesting highlight) Swiss social safety net also has state pension, old-age, survivors' and invalidity insurance, protection against the consequences of illness and accidents, income compensation allowances in case of service and in case of maternity in addition to unemployment insurance. In other words it is unlikely that market would be able to provide adequate cover for the same price, given the size of the benefits. In principle it is "like for like" in terms of cost for the state from what I have read, and I highly doubt it that this would pay to cover for market providers.

If you made a proposal to cut the above by up to a third in terms of payout, cut UBI to a half or third of the proposed, you would come to a solution where you could keep both in a different capacity. The real solution should be properly examined and a balanced proposal between the two, in order to have the population accept UBI, not as a replacement of, but in addition to the existing social safety net.

As is, the plan is to crude and it just does not make sense to go ahead for the population in such "one or the other" type of proposal. Unemployment benefit is probably the biggest concern, but also people relying on state invalidity insurance would certainly suffer with such a switch. Pensioners may be OK I would imagine, as the state pension is likely small component (vs private pension that people earn) of their retirement benefits. Either way, a more sensible proposal is needed, either a balancing act, or most likely balance + tax on top of some sort, people would likely be less opposed to additional tax if it went back into everyone's pockets, even if redistribution is flat - given that it is essentially a type of a mandatory insurance for the "hard" times.

[OneFootInTheGrave]

Also to add - the social safety net in Switzerland is one which other "developed" countries should try to emulate, as the one in UK is a lot more inefficient, so an UBI may be more beneficial in UK where there is a lot more gov overhead to redistribute taxes, likewise for the US.

So out of all places Switzerland is probably one of the top 5 who need UBI the least, but if implemented well, I believe even they would benefit. I would expect that this would drastically cut low level crime for example, between UBI and making drugs + prostitution legal, you would take out most of the reasons for criminal behaviour in the society.

[Ben Kenobi]

Any strong opinions on this? Personally I haven't gone through all the arguments pro/contra yet, but what I'm wondering mostly is - would it even work?

Star trek is a post scarcity economy - where energy is cheap and plentiful. The best way to a star trek style economy is to continue to develop our nuclear power and to use it to it's full potential. Being able to produce near limitless amounts of energy for pennies and the ability to manipulate solid matter transforms the economy.

Basic personal income will be a failure, because economics does not work that way. If everyone gets a certain amount of money, this money would very quickly become worthless. The reason that Switzerland is proposing this is because of the inflationary effects such would have on the Franc. The reason being because of the massive currency inflows into the frank and their desire to weaken their currency.

Would it work the way that Switzerland hopes in reducing poverty? No. It could actually increase poverty as this would hit fixed incomes and savers.

[The Mad Monk]

I believe I've posted this here before.

[kentonio]

Basic personal income will be a failure, because economics does not work that way. If everyone gets a certain amount of money, this money would very quickly become worthless. The reason that Switzerland is proposing this is because of the deflationary effects such would have on the Franc. The reason being because of the massive currency inflows into the frank and their desire to weaken their currency.

Would it work the way that Switzerland hopes in reducing poverty? No. It could actually increase poverty as this would hit fixed incomes and savers.

This is nonsensical. They're not creating new money, they're just distributing existing money in a different way.

[Ben Kenobi]

They're not creating new money, they're just distributing existing money in a different way.

Uh, no. They are printing. Franc is strong and this is one way to weaken the Franc. The problem as with all inflationary schemes is that it reduces the purchasing power of savers and the poor.

[BlackCat]

Strange- no swiss party supports the proposal. Still some nutcases belives that it's the swiss governments evil scheme to weaken the franc.