> Why make sure that every non-worker in society has enough money to eat McDonalds and watch cable TV at the cost of the freedom of everyone to make and spend money as they please?

To turn this question around, why do we want only slaves to live comfortably, while denying this right to people who are free?

Yes, slaves. Our culture, out of necessity, managed to successfully hide this fact from most of the people, that we are all slaves. We need to work, or else we starve. Some of us are lucky and do the things they would have done anyway living free, but for most of us, it's just global slavery we're in denial with.

Automation may finally free us all, and this is the point most people (suprisingly, even here on HN) seem to fail to understand.