Why do people HATE Basic Income idea?

[mediumaevum]

http://www.globalresearch.ca/swiss-in-f ... al/5353952

If the Swiss can, the rest of Europe can too!

They don't have oil. They don't have some precious ressources elsewhere. That means if they can do it, everyone can do so!

I've been a proponent of Basic Income for many years, and I've always come across people who are so strongly against it.
As the Social Democrats in my country puts it:

"Getting money for not working is disgusting!!!"
(Mette Frederiksen, Minister of Labor).

I think the real reasons behind not wanting to establish Basic Income for everyone, is because you can't control the population any longer.
With religious fundamentalist stupidity out, and Basic Income in, we are truly free!

But people hate freedom!

[Plu]

I'm hugely in favor of trying this idea. It would solve so many problems with modern economies.

[mediumaevum]

I'm hugely in favor of trying this idea. It would solve so many problems with modern economies.

At LAST we agree on something :)

[hillbillyatheist]

I'm for it in the future when robots do most if not all the work, but if we did that now I think the economy would fall apart.

there's lots of crappy jobs that still need doing and robots aren't ready to take all our jobs yet.
Take cleaning the sewer for instance. ain't nobody gonna do that shit if they can just set on their ass and get free money. free hand outs to all and many jobs that need doing, like that, will go undone.

When robots happily do all that work for us, sure. but until then I don't see how it could work.

I do however think in the mean time we can fight for shorter work weeks and longer vacation times and spreading the work around, and requiring the elite to pay living wages. This way we have more people employed for shorter hours at higher pay, rather than now where its some people working two jobs for shit pay while others can't find any work, while the rich make obscene amounts of money.

[Plu]

Take cleaning the sewer for instance. ain't nobody gonna do that shit if they can just set on their ass and get free money.

I'm guessing wages would go up until we could find somebody who was willing to do it. We'd have to change a few jobs from "you must do this shit job for shit pay because otherwise you'll starve unemployed" to "please do this shit job, we'll reward you handsomely" but if the job needs to be done and the pay is good, you will find somebody who will do it.

(I mean fuck; if you give me $10,000 a month I'll come round and clean your damn sewers. But I'm sure you can find people willing to do it for less.)

The only people who are really willing to sit on their ass and get free money... are the people who are already sitting on their ass collecting unemployment and government aid. So the only change for them is that now their neighbours who work their ass off suddenly have twice as much cash as before and while they continue to be as poor as they always were.

[AllPurposeAtheist]

So it's a matter of principle is it? We KNOW we have billionaires (with a B) who can't possibly work 10 million times harder than anyone picking fruit or cleaning sewers so flip it and say why is anyone permitted to amass such fortunes and do nothing? If someone can be idle rich then certainly anyone can be idle poor, but still have a minimum standard society must support.

[Plu]

I'm hugely in favor of trying this idea. It would solve so many problems with modern economies.

How?

It would fix, among others:

- Costs of getting an education, students with huge loans, etc. Suddenly, anyone can learn without being crippled by debt.
- The whole problem that the difference between unemployment and a minimum wage jobs is a few bucks a week, which will be a huge incentive for getting people motivated to find work
- The massive bureaucracy and policing around who gets government aid and who doesn't (early tests showed that simply giving everyone money is much cheaper than only giving money to the needy, because you can cut huge numbers of government officials)
- The whole minimum-wage extortion job economy. You offer shit conditions and next to no pay? Nobody will take your job just to avoid starvation. You'll just have to offer something valuable in return now.
- The danger is starting a new and expertimental company. Now anyone can try anything, which will be a boost to innovative sciences and industries.

We have a lot of economic issues that revolve around the idea that people need upkeep to survive and that if you have a lot of wealth, you can grab people by the balls and extort them. Taking away that required upkeep instantly ends the powerhold that the wealthy have on the poor right now, because suddenly the poor don't need the tablescraps they are offered. They can just say "no" to shitty jobs and shitty conditions.

[Jack89]

I think the real reasons behind not wanting to establish Basic Income for everyone, is because you can't control the population any longer.
With religious fundamentalist stupidity out, and Basic Income in, we are truly free!

But people hate freedom!

It would just mean those controlling the distribution of Basic Income would have control rather than the fundies.  Not exactly my idea of freedom.

[Plu]

What kind of control would people have over Basic Income? It would be kinda obvious if someone got more or less than someone else. Pretty hard system to cheat. You can't lose basic income and the amount is the same for everyone.

[AllPurposeAtheist]

The shitty jobs need to be available and quite often no jobs at even shitty pay are available. Ever been somewhere with 25% unemployment? Then the 'scarce resources' are allocated to protecting the haves from the have nots and then the resources become allocated to prisons where the shitty jobs become exponentially shittier.

[Plu]

All of the costs of supporting the unemployed and disabled and other groups in those other, larger countries are also proportionally higher. There aren't as many Swiss, but their GDP isn't as high as that of other countries either. In the end, all you need is for your country to be wealthy enough to support all of its inhabitants, which is definately the case for all of Europe and the US.

Also tests showed that giving the whole country a basic income actually costs a smaller portion of the GDP than supporting things like unemployment and disability aid and other such targeted forms of support, simply because of the huge cost involved in bureaucratic control to ensure the system isn't abused. Rather than spending billions on making sure that certain people don't get income; just spend half that giving everyone the same income, get rid off most government control on the subject of aid, and save a lot of money. (As well as relocating huge numbers of people from government oversight with a productivity of effectively zero back into the general workforce.)

It initially seemed utopian to me as well, but every time you look up the researches and tests done on the subject, they seem to be greatly succesful, so apparently it can work. Even the test they did with giving homeless people an envelope with cash and the promise that they could do whatever they wanted with the money and nobody would check on them resulted in all those homeless people finally being able to get back on their feet, instead of them drinking it away (as so often happens when you give them money and then try to make sure they spend it wisely.)

Apparently people are inclined to make something of their life if you give them the choice and the knowledge that it's their own to make.

[Solitary]

There's an old story that says if all the money was divided evenly the rich would still be rich and the poor would still be poor after awhile. Not sure how it would work out.  :-|  Solitary

[Jason78]

I think that a minimum wage is fixing the wrong end of the problem.

[Plu]

I think that a minimum wage is fixing the wrong end of the problem.

I think I agree with this, but there isn't much context to go on :P

[Plu]

Then why don't they do it?

This is also highly a cultural issue.

I think you answered your own question. A combination of cultural issues, people not liking change, and rich and powerful people probably being aware that this will take power away from them. Change come from people in power, and they usually don't like sacrificing that power. (Possibly also some more complicated economical issues in the end; but you never hear those so I can't be sure... most of the arguments against it are just people using their own opinions and bias I think)

Still; the Swiss are going to try it, which in the end will be the best test possible. If an entire country can pull it off and succeed...