Re:Universal basic income to be tested in Wales
by jokethrowaway on Saturday May 15, 2021 @09:21AM
(#27164960)
It's not up to you to decide what to do with other people's money.
Feel free to donate all your money to the poor who deserve better; if you will use threat of violence to get someone else money (no matter the cause) I'll call you immoral.
Re:Universal basic income to be tested in Wales
by turbinerneiter on Saturday May 15, 2021 @12:37PM
(#27166692)
I'm not deciding what to do with other peoples money and I am not threatening anyone with violence.
We decide these things together through the democratic process.
I know it is hard for people like you, who reject democracy and any kind of power anyone could have over them, it must feel terrible to not be able to escape a system you disagree with. But I also think that on the spectrum of systems we had, it is not really fair so scream "taxation is theft" and "social security is immoral" at democracy, if you consider what we had before.
Re:Universal basic income to be tested in Wales
by moshmosh on Saturday May 15, 2021 @09:35AM
(#27165080)
The threat of violence enforced the system that let them get the money (with a democratic government's name printed on it, mind you) to begin with. Was violence immoral when it enforced a system that shaped wages and the returns of capital in such-and-such way?
Re:Universal basic income to be tested in Wales
by chii on Saturday May 15, 2021 @10:26AM
(#27165512)
violence only enforces contracts, which are formal promises. Violence doesn't enforce market rates for wages, demand and supply and other market forces.
The answers to this are:
provocative: work is already optional for holders of large capital - if it works for them, why not the rest of us?
humanitarian: everyone deserves decency (and we have enough to go around)
utopian: we are/will be rich in everything we need, so we do not need to work for basics - we will only need to work for the betterment of ourselves, our culture and civilization
practical pessimist: if we don't give the poor enough to keep them on board of the system, they will oppose it and we will have civil war
practical optimist: if we give the poor what they need to live without a fight, they can focus on working on themselves to lift themselves up - it will be a win-win situation
practical realist: taxes (and exemptions) and benefits are so complex, it would be cheaper to use UBI and probably fairer as well
I'm in the practical optimism/realism camp, although my lizard brain sometimes gets angry at some of the "the poor deserve no better, it's a fair system - they just have to work"-people and will use the provocative argument.