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Re:Mark Zuckerberg Calls for a Universal Basic Income by toomuchtodo on Friday May 26, 2017 @12:08PM (#14425020)
Those are the same things, just different methods and targeting different economic cohorts.

QE vastly inflated equity and real estate values, benefiting the wealthiest (at least in the US).

Re:Mark Zuckerberg Calls for a Universal Basic Income by bogomipz on Friday May 26, 2017 @12:16PM (#14425102)
Can you explain why you believe Quantitative Easing is a redistribution of wealth?

QE is the creation of something new i.e money supply. A transfer of wealth is ex post facto(that wealth already exists somewhere.)

Re:Mark Zuckerberg Calls for a Universal Basic Income by barrkel on Friday May 26, 2017 @12:32PM (#14425272)
QE increases the supply of money, which reduces its value, just like most things that are in demand have their price lowered when supply increases.

The reduction in value of cash transfers wealth from people who are cash-rich to people who are asset-rich or have large currency-denominated debt. And because things like salaries are sticky, it also devalues salaried work; this is only partly offset by stickiness in prices, because some goods are imported.

Re:Mark Zuckerberg Calls for a Universal Basic Income by PKop on Friday May 26, 2017 @12:21PM (#14425160)
It could be described as a transfer of wealth from creditors to debtors.

Or from savers to debtors, no?

The wealth existed in the dollars saved, and the loan asset that was devalued and transferred to the debtor

Why governments love doing it so much because they are the biggest borrowers, and corporations don't mind inflation because it's a cut to real wages.

Re:Mark Zuckerberg Calls for a Universal Basic Income by bogomipz on Friday May 26, 2017 @01:25PM (#14425734)
Interesting, I hadn't thought to view it as such before. I'm glad I asked. This makes sense as the rich hold assets and the poor hold debt.

I found this article which is an interesting read on QE as a means of wealth transfer if anyone else is interested:

https://dealbook.nytimes.com/2014/10/22/how-quantitative-eas...

Re:Mark Zuckerberg Calls for a Universal Basic Income by PKop on Friday May 26, 2017 @11:45PM (#14428824)
I'm saying that large businesses, governments, banks etc. are able to borrow in large quantities, at relative lower rates.

Governments often borrow in astronomical numbers.

Anyone who does this (think of taking on massive debt to finance a real estate business, building apartment complexes for example) has incentives to prefer inflation, QE, devaluing the currency.

Over the course of lets say 30 years, they collect rents from tenants. They can increase the rents over time. Their payment on that debt will stay the same. So in "real" terms, the payments decrease over time, while the rent collected at least matches inflation.

Do you see now how those with ability to borrow large amounts to finance.. whatever.. have incentives to prefer inflation.

Think about the renter. Or the saver. Their dollars are going down in real value. The renter's monthly rent goes up.

Wages? They are sticky. They stay flat for long periods, which in real terms implies a wage cut.

"Inflation is taxation without legislation"

- Milton Friedman

“the arithmetic makes it plain that inflation is a far more devastating tax than anything that has been enacted by our legislature. The inflation tax has a fantastic ability to simply consume capital. It makes no difference to a widow with her saving in a 5 percent passbook account whether she pays 100 percent income tax on her interest income during a period of zero inflation, or pays no income taxes during years of 5 percent inflation. Either way, she is 'taxed' in a manner that leave her no real income whatsoever. Any money she spends comes right out of capital. She would find outrageous a 120 percent income tax, but doesn't seem to notice that 5 percent inflation is the economic equivalent.”

― Warren Buffett

Re:Mark Zuckerberg Calls for a Universal Basic Income by bogomipz on Saturday May 27, 2017 @04:51PM (#14431917)
>"Anyone who does this (think of taking on massive debt to finance a real estate business, building apartment complexes for example) has incentives to prefer inflation, QE, devaluing the currency."

I understand why they might prefer devaluation and QE but not why anyone would prefer inflation. Can you explain? Inflation means that I need to borrow that much more.

Re:Mark Zuckerberg Calls for a Universal Basic Income by rukittenme on Friday May 26, 2017 @12:11PM (#14425048)
They're not. QE devalues all dollars equally. Wealth redistribution targets high income people to the benefit of low or no income people.
Re:Mark Zuckerberg Calls for a Universal Basic Income by splintercell on Friday May 26, 2017 @12:44PM (#14425387)
QE devalues all dollars equally, but then who receives that wealth? Do all people receive that wealthy equally? Do poor receive that wealth? Do rich people receive that wealth?

Because that money is eventually spent by the govt, whomsoever receives that wealth gets the redistribution of wealth from everyone to them.

Re:Mark Zuckerberg Calls for a Universal Basic Income by scarmig on Friday May 26, 2017 @12:11PM (#14425047)
No. One changes the money supply, one shifts money from one group to another.