Hi Jason, What about a UBI tied to a percentage of total wealth in the system? The works program you mention is popular with my younger liberal friends. It retains the "work or die" mentality that I hope we can transcend in the future, but it is certainly preferable to the prison funnel system we have currently. -Chance On Thu, May 31, 2018 at 8:13 PM, nysa71 < [log in to unmask]> wrote: > > Dave & Chance, > > Actually, a UBI --- or at least *a standalone UBI* --- is problematic > because it adds net dollars to the economy without any corresponding real > output, and hence would most certainly be inflationary, thus leaving those > at the socioeconomic bottom in the same place that they are now, relatively > speaking, (i.e., more income, but higher general prices). > > A superior proposal, (and one strongly advocated by MMT economists) is > The Federal Job Guarantee, (i.e., a federal policy of full employment). > The basic idea is that it's federally funded, but locally managed. > > So if someone is unemployed, (or even under-employed), they can go down to > the local Job Guarantee (JG) office, and work with the administrator to > find something to do in the community. Maybe the person likes gardening. > He/she could plant some flowers along a local hiking trail. Maybe he/she > loves animals. Head over to the animal shelter. Has a passion for abused > women? Head over to the domestic abuse shelter. Love reading? Go help out > at the library. And so forth. > > It doesn't really matter. Just do something in the community that has > value to the community. > > And since it's federally funded, it's adding dollars to the local economy > with a corresponding real output, and hence insuring *price stability*. > > So what do JG employees do with their paycheck? They spend it. And that > spending becomes income for someone else --- a significant amount being > income for local businesses. (And local businesses spend their income, > which becomes income for someone else, who, in turn, spends it, and so > forth.) > > So business income increases, meaning business and business income goes up > in the local private sector, meaning they have both the need and the > dollars to hire more people...and they can hire people from the JG, (which > essentially functions as a buffer stock of publicly *employed* people, > unlike the current state of affairs where we have a buffer stock of > *unemployed* people). > > So some JG employees transfer from the public sector to the private > sector, meaning less federal dollars will be injected in the local economy, > but it's not needed since the economy is now on the upswing. (Hence why the > JG is what economists refer to as an "automatic stabilizer"...more dollars > added to the economy in a downturn, less dollars added to the the economy > in an upturn.) > > And whatever the wage is for JG employees effectively becomes the floor on > what workers in our society will be paid. So if the JG is $15 per hour (for > example) then that effectively becomes the minimum wage since no one in > their right mind is going to go work in the private sector for less than > $15 per hour when they can make $15 in the JG program. It effectively > empowers labor. > > And that's why the likes of Zuckerberg and Musk advocate for a UBI. It is > no threat to them. And they know it. > > The Federal Job Guarantee, on the other hand, *is* a threat to them. > > In short, a standalone UBI is just another neoliberal proposal that only > *appears* to make progress. In reality, it does no such thing. > > Don't fall for it. > > ~ Jason Bessey > > On Thursday, May 31, 2018, 1:57:49 PM EDT, Chance McDermott < > [log in to unmask]> wrote: > > > Hi all, > > First, thank you Joe for some of the insider baseball perspective on > Peterson and a wonderful sociological and administrative analysis. Gregg, > your encouragement to travel as a group into the weeds and develop > principle-based solutions is inspiring during a time of intense micro > ingroup/outgroup formation. Jason, I appreciate that you offer an > economically populist perspective. > > More on the point that Jason and Dave are suggesting is a consideration of > proportionality. The functional option from my humble perspective is a > Universal Basic Income that is *tethered to a percentage of total wealth*. > Healthcare, education, food, shelter, and safety should be guaranteed > *non-conditionally*. Essentially we are covering the first two levels of > Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs. It takes nothing substantively from > industrial geniuses like Elon Musk, Donald Trump, or Mark Zuckerberg (they > retain status at the top of hierarchies), and instead improves the lived > experience of *everyone.* > > There are obstacles from the conservative and liberal side both that boil > down to this particular justification: > > *Work hard or die.* > > > How do we get around that one? > > > -Chance > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > On Thu, May 31, 2018 at 10:31 AM, nysa71 <000000c289d6ba14-dmarc- > [log in to unmask]> wrote: > > > Dave, > > I'm beyond delighted to see someone else here understand MMT. It can not > be emphasized enough, IMO, that the general public needs to understand it. > > On one technical note, it's not even as complicated as "printing" money. > Most money is just created via keystrokes ---- marking up accounts in bank > computers. > > Even paper money doesn't add net financial assets to the economy. It > simply transfers numbers from a balance sheet at the central bank to > numbers on pieces of paper you can carry around in your pocket. > > Money is a unit of account. It's the numbers that's the money, not the > paper, (anymore than it's a spreadsheet or a computer screen). > > Also, (in finding a way to connect MMT to psychology), "money", in a lot > of ways, is analogous to a Token Economy in applied behavioral analysis. > > Again, I was delighted to read your comments! > > ~ Jason Bessey > On Thursday, May 31, 2018, 9:34:15 AM EDT, Dave Pruett < > [log in to unmask]> wrote: > > > Dear All, > > I've not weighed in much on the conversation because much of the > discussion, in psychological terms, is beyond my ken. But I would like to > weigh in on the current economic thread. > > Jason has very succinctly pointed out the inherent instability in > capitalism, it's innate tendency to make the rich richer and the poor > poorer. When the old Soviet Union existed as a counterweight to laissez > faire capitalism, capitalism had to maintain a kinder, gentler facade. > After the collapse, no holds have been barred with the result that the > world's oligarchs have increased their wealth and power to the detriment of > nearly everyone else, here and elsewhere. So, as Jason points out, > governments should intervene, to stabilize the system. Unfortunately, > ours, by "neoliberal economics" and in decisions like "Citizen's United" > and the recent tax law, has intervened decidedly on the side of the wealthy > and the oligarchs. Inequality in the US is at a level that often triggers > revolution. > > There is a missing piece to the economic landscape, however, that offers a > legitimate way for monetarily sovereign nations to intervene in > economically beneficent ways. The notion is counterintuitive, because most > of us are under the mistaken impression that federal budgets are analogous > to family budgets. Expenditures must be balanced by income. Families, > however, cannot legitimately print money. Sovereign governments can. The > argument against this is that printing money is inflationary, Weimar > Germany being the oft-cited example. > > Modern monetary theory (MMT) holds that the printing of money is allowed > and is inflationary only when the country is at full production and full > employment. Abe Lincoln financed the Civil War by printing "greenbacks" and > Hitler built his war machine with fiat money. Indeed, recently, the US has > printed trillions of dollars for the Afghan and Iraq wars and the 2008 > bailout, yet inflation remains low. > > MMT sees the federal budget as essentially the inverse of the family > budget. Taxation is necessary not to generate revenue but to slow the > economy if it becomes overheated. MMT proponents would say that we always > have enough money for our priorities, which in an ideal world would include > infrastructure, universal education, universal health care, and many other > common goods. In this light, austerity measures should be seen for what > they are: political tools not fiscal responsibility. And the recent tax > overhaul, which will increase the national debt by $1.9T exposes, voted for > those who previously touted "fiscal responsibility," exposes the sham. > > -- > C. David ("Dave") Pruett > Professor Emeritus > Department of Mathematics & Statistics > James Madison University > 540-246-3087 (Home) > ------------------------------ ------------------------------ ------- > Author of *Reason and Wonder* (Praeger, 2012) > https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__reasonandwonder.org&d=DwIFaQ&c=eLbWYnpnzycBCgmb7vCI4uqNEB9RSjOdn_5nBEmmeq0&r=HPo1IXYDhKClogP-UOpybo6Cfxxz-jIYBgjO2gOz4-A&m=wEmzC1gTZ4_KNcO4DV_FCHI_XlkPimM1kRdUG0Si1F0&s=TAoz7B2tgZLuMZZa-9qwTtTtVXC0DJTKWuzfaD2HPWs&e= > <https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__reasonandwonder.org&d=DwMFaQ&c=eLbWYnpnzycBCgmb7vCI4uqNEB9RSjOdn_5nBEmmeq0&r=HPo1IXYDhKClogP-UOpybo6Cfxxz-jIYBgjO2gOz4-A&m=5ZTed4uTCuG9Jzta-ei5WGSmHLRH1pXlJBeUvsOvPyQ&s=g4qV-i5WCislTnY1vDkDzXk0PyaKSZwXUusYf9yJTqg&e=> > and/or https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__www.amazon.com_&d=DwIFaQ&c=eLbWYnpnzycBCgmb7vCI4uqNEB9RSjOdn_5nBEmmeq0&r=HPo1IXYDhKClogP-UOpybo6Cfxxz-jIYBgjO2gOz4-A&m=wEmzC1gTZ4_KNcO4DV_FCHI_XlkPimM1kRdUG0Si1F0&s=Ee2z6Fz8Tq-gPt_yxsWKFinUxXKuI49NWiFD3YUtiK8&e= author/woksape > <https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__www.amazon.com_author_woksape&d=DwMFaQ&c=eLbWYnpnzycBCgmb7vCI4uqNEB9RSjOdn_5nBEmmeq0&r=HPo1IXYDhKClogP-UOpybo6Cfxxz-jIYBgjO2gOz4-A&m=5ZTed4uTCuG9Jzta-ei5WGSmHLRH1pXlJBeUvsOvPyQ&s=SrUtK2c4MqMd6qlcKZfGQx17HFPHCHctAWcEGW3-ocQ&e=> > ############################ > > To unsubscribe from the TOK-SOCIETY-L list: write to: mailto:TOK-SOCIETY-L-SIGNOFF- > [log in to unmask] > <mailto:[log in to unmask]> or click the > following link: http://listserv.jmu.edu/cgi- > bin/wa?SUBED1=TOK-SOCIETY-L&A= 1 > <http://listserv.jmu.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=TOK-SOCIETY-L&A=1> > ############################ > > To unsubscribe from the TOK-SOCIETY-L list: write to: mailto:TOK-SOCIETY-L-SIGNOFF- > [log in to unmask] > <mailto:[log in to unmask]> or click the > following link: http://listserv.jmu.edu/cgi- > bin/wa?SUBED1=TOK-SOCIETY-L&A= 1 > <http://listserv.jmu.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=TOK-SOCIETY-L&A=1> > > > ############################ > > To unsubscribe from the TOK-SOCIETY-L list: write to: > mailto:[log in to unmask] or click the > following link: http://listserv.jmu.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=TOK-SOCIETY-L&A= > 1 > ############################ > > To unsubscribe from the TOK-SOCIETY-L list: write to: > mailto:[log in to unmask] or click the > following link: http://listserv.jmu.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=TOK-SOCIETY-L&A= > 1 > ############################ To unsubscribe from the TOK-SOCIETY-L list: write to: mailto:[log in to unmask] or click the following link: http://listserv.jmu.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=TOK-SOCIETY-L&A=1