It’s true that inventions can create new inventions and new jobs. It’s also true that the inventions that are being created right now by companies all over the world are robots that replace your job.
When McDonalds workers protested for higher wages (a living wage) McDonalds replied that they could easily create robots to automate away their job. And they did. The article linked is written by the former president and CEO of McDonalds.
Let’s start with automation. In 2013, when the Fight for $15 was still in its growth stage, I and others warned that union demands for a much higher minimum wage would force businesses with small profit margins to replace full-service employees with costly investments in self-service alternatives.
Costly…self-service alternatives? All they did was turn the ipads around to the customer!
As for a much higher minimum wage the CEO makes $15 million a year. His workers need that money while he doesn’t. You don’t get seconds until everyone gets firsts. That’s selfish. There used to be a cap on the maximum amount a CEO could make. When that cap was there that money was reinvested into the company and usually given back to the workers in the form of higher wages.
But the cost of living does not all fall on the employers! The out of control cost of housing is a major factor in the poverty of workers. When 90–100% of your paycheck goes to rent that’s a problem! Shelter is NOT a for profit industry!!! You can have 10% luxury housing when you have housing that 90% of people can afford.
What Walmart, Panera Bread, McDonalds, Target, Starbucks, Amazon and more and more retailers are doing is replacing their workers with mobile apps, websites, self checkout lanes, delivery robots, robotic chauffeurs, robot cooks and more.
And it’s not robots taking your job, it’s companies choosing a robot to do the job instead of you. And they won’t argue that’s what they’re doing. They’ll even tell you they have to do it in order to be competitive. But at the same time some businesses give themselves the equivalent of a new Tesla every hour while they give you the equivalent of a 2 bus passes for that same hour.
Put in another perspective there are CEOs that distribute to themselves 30,000 bus tickets an hour while they distribute 2 or 3 to you.
As biological creatures who need food and shelter to live an underpaid, part time job is insufficient to provide that.
A basic income is a monthly check to every citizen that provides them with enough to pay for food and shelter.
Is a basic income something for nothing? Not any more than subsidies are. Businesses are given billions by the public every year so they can “survive”.
Businesses also use the technology paid for by the public to make money and yet they don’t pay taxes. So either they need to start paying taxes or the people need to be paid too (so they also can survive).
In Alaska, a conservative governor asked the people of Alaska if they would rather get a dividend from the oil profits or have the money go to the municipal departments who would probably waste it. The people choose to give it to themselves.
A basic income is the least amount a government can do to provide for it’s citizens. It’s the least. And it’s not a stretch to do this. They used to give people land and homes for free with subsistence farming!
And what is a government? It’s people.
We the people… form a more perfect union…to promote the general welfare.
So taking the tax money we already have and spending it on the people is what it’s for! But now, what we need to change NOW, is instead of having someone far off make paternalistic decisions with tax money, it’s now given to you for you to decide. You know what’s best to do with money you need for survival.
This crisis is not being given the attention it deserves in the airwaves because they don’t want to cause a panic or scare. But people are already scared and panicking! Families are living in minivans because they’ve been evicted. In the US the eviction rate is 4 a minute!
Norbert W says a society with a behavioral modification scheme would eventually collapse because they would be under such manipulation that they wouldn’t be able to solve real problems.
THIS IS HAPPENING RIGHT NOW! IT IS MUCH MORE HARMFUL TO OMIT THESE ISSUES THAN IT IS TO TALK ABOUT THEM!
The economy is $19 trillion a year. There is more than enough finances to pay for something that benefits everyone.
And if you choose not to, it shows you to be on the side of a group of people that would starve and make homeless it’s own neighbors and citizens. History will look back on this time as an opportunity was being made to improve everyone’s lives and not just a few.
