Capital pays you for being rich in proportion to how rich you are. Elon can't hide behind my 401k, he doesn't fit. Also: most Americans and most people are far poorer than you and I and get paid even less for being rich than you and I.
> OK, I'll bite - what would a failure of UBI look like?
Higher taxes for anyone earning over $100k
Higher cost of living, and lower quality of life for anyone earning below $60k
Politicians and corporations earn billions in profits on UBI distribution fees, and incentive spending/automatic deposit programs (contribute your UBI directly to health insurance and it’s tax exempt!)
Correct me if I'm wrong, but my understanding of the economy is that money is earned when someone creates value. Just "giving people money" without having the corresponding value be created increases demand for valuable things without increasing supply, leading to inflation and the costs of said things going up.
Money is earned either by extracting rents/profits/taxes, through borrowing or by selling something. None of these have to actually create value.
You can advertise something without value and “earn” money selling it. The perceived value was created by advertising, but didn’t actually exist.
You can raise funds, sell at a loss, buy out the competition and later drive up prices without creating any value. This is how Amazon got started.
You can go to the bank, borrow money(increasing the money supply, driving inflation, thanks to fractional reserve banking), buy up houses (driving housing inflation), and extract rent without doing anything useful for your community.
In fact, cloud computing is largely that: buying up all the compute and renting it out to those without the capital to buy themselves.
A person can create value without earning money (parenthood, volunteering), and one can earn money without creating value (rent extraction), although the word “earn” is under a lot of strain.
You're wrong. People have inherent value whether they "create value" or not. UBI is not about rewarding people for some economic contribution but rather provides everyone with a reasonable amount of money so they can survive (hopefully) and stay healthy and have a shot at the prerequisites for "freedom" to exist.
Money has been completely manufactured in financial markets already and doesn't seem to be screwing us over too badly. I hardly think UBI paid from taxing the largest economic surpluses and wealth in the history of the world will have a significant impact on inflation.
Any inflationary impact would happen if you print the money supply to pay UBI rather than using existing dollars in the supply.
You're also completely writing off the additional surpluses that people receiving UBI could provide if they're confident they can get by on a daily basis and also ensure they stayed healthy and working rather than spiraling any time one or two things go sideways.
In, say, the Netherlands we already have something that's very close to free money. I know many, many folks perusing said mechanism(s). Sure, it's not UBI and there is some stigma involved but I think it's the closest you'll get. I won't be snarky about this, but let's just say I need some.. convincing this reliably addresses the primary obstacles in economically disadvantaged folks. In my experience our economic situation is downstream from other more urgent issues that we find hard to talk about. Culture, ethics, behavioral and cognitive differences, etc. Thorny, nasty things, but .. real and more importantly they don't respond to dollar bills. In fact, it may make it worse.
But anyway, I'm not too worried about inflation mainly because of the points you raised, but I am worried about resource constrained markets like housing. If nothing is done to stop this, and I don't know how, I'm sure they'll just raise the prices to completely cancel out any UBI you'll pass around. It's not just housing either, but that's an obvious one.
So far in Croatia any kind of stimulus from the government just makes the market compensate. For example, an increase in public spending made the prices of goods and services more expensive and providing subsidies for first time home buyers caused prices of real estate to increase by that amount.
> our economic situation is downstream from other more urgent issues that we find hard to talk about. Culture, ethics, behavioral and cognitive differences
I see it as exactly the opposite - culture, ethics, behavior differences etc are downstream of financial inequality. When people are financially insecure it becomes much harder to tolerate disagreement, and much easier to blame [insert whatever populist notion of enemy]. I think it would be easier to engage with people with opposing ideas, not seeing them as an existential threat, if you are not worried about housing, income or health insurance.
Cultural polarization is a deflection mechanism (both in the subconscious psychological sense as well as a politcal/propaganda technique) meant to mask the real deeper structural inequalities. It's the lie we tell ourselves and the powers that be tell us to prevent to change the direction of the "wealth redistribution" we've been witnessing for 20+ years.
The real problem during the pandemic is most of the stimulus money went to the already wealthy. Higher cost of living is because we keep printing money, that money goes to banks, and inflation ends up being an implicit tax on the poor who aren't invested in the markets.
What I can definitely tell you is that the people that currently can't even afford basic things are somehow causing higher cost of living. The economy is not jacked up right now because we gave people laughably small amounts like a thousand dollars. The real problem is people like Sergei Brin spending 57 million dollars to fight a one-time 5% tax.
Pandemic checks were from expanding the money supply IIRC rather than distributed taxes on the already very wealthy. These are very different mechanisms. What they did (expanding the money supply) drove inflation way more than the actual money in people’s pockets. Otherwise you’d have argue people shouldn’t get paid because it causes too much inflation.
Caring with no significant action in prevention doesn’t really signal caring. Sure, it sucks, headlines get printed for a couple of months, then people forget and move on.
To put it in the most disrespectful and sad way, it looks like more people have been on the streets for Knicks games than most (any?) school shootings of the past decades.
It's just harder to get the average joe charged up to fight a battle with anything meaningful on the line. Americans are used to living relatively cushy lives where they don't sacrifice their QOL to make the lives of their countrymen better. The closest thing to that are people in the military, and it's probably been a while since the US military is improving QOL, on average.
People will continue to be complacent on multiple fronts until it absolutely comes to a violent boil. I don't really see half measures or peaceful protests changing anything. And maybe I'm pessimistic, but I think the upcoming elections will either not change enough or be strongly manipulated to maintain the status quo.
>harder to get the average joe charged up to fight a battle with anything meaningful on the line
Doesn't this imply that on average people just don't care? So, school shooting preventions are just way down in the list of "things I care about", when you have "cushy lives where nobody wants to sacrifice their QOL".
It means they don't care enough to meaningfully make sacrifices for change. To deal with school shootings is to change the constitution. The American constitution is basically wired for school shootings. To change the constitution is basically a civil war.
Things aren't binary. Many people care deeply about school shootings. But they don't have the means or power to organize to stop them and, individually, they are powerless.
They’re not binary, but when an issue persists for decades, over the course of multiple administrations, and political landscape… it shows either the country is incompetent in terms of solving an issue, or the issue is not a priority.
I wholeheartedly believe US can solve issues when it’s an important one. And thus, I think, for an average American it’s not an issue.
Decades is a very long timeframe. Countries have achieved more in shorter periods.
My post was not disrespectful. It was matter of fact. And if the Petro Dollar only persists by use of force or perceived force, it's probably not a sustainable system for humanity. So hopefully we can go back to a soft power maintained Petro Dollar?
I think your assumption of lack of caring is misplaced. The citizens clearly care, but have no power to do anything about it. Those in power are the ones that do not care or are paid not to care.
I get what you’re saying but in the last 20 years can you think of any mass protest that accomplished anything substantial? I don’t really blame people for giving up on it as a tool for change. TBH only truly effective one I can think of would be Jan 6
I can, just not in the US [0]. I always presumed this is linked to the health care being provided by employers rather than having a more robust safety net that allows for civil disobedience without having to fear existential risks. However, I also can’t forget that the French have their safety net not as a God given right, but because they fought for it via (often not just civil) protest. Reference also the statements MLK JR made concerning the willingness of white moderates to engage in actually effective disobedience, even when their financial situation allows for such.
I just checked and it's 54% in the US [0] vs 0% in France (cause basic public healthcare isn't tied to employment). So, unless you are referring to absolute numbers (not very helpful when comparing countries of different sizes), I'm not sure what you are referring to.
I will admit that my purely personal thesis on this front goes a bit beyond healthcare. I feel that a robust safety net, iron clad right to protest and a large, at least reasonably financially stable (meaning no existential financial fears for at least the majority of citizenry, i.e. above roughly 60% middle class for a given economy) are needed to allow for protests in such a manner that the citizenry are both capable, willing and informed sufficiently to protect their own interests and democracy as a whole. Having the right and ability to protests is needed, just as much as being comfortable enough to have the time to actually stay politically engaged (consistent financial strain being a reasonable cause for why one doesn't stay informed in my book). France or my home country of Austria (imperfect countries like any other, I will (un)happily admit) on that front are in the 65%-75% range, whereas the US appears to barely get above 50% purely by income along with higher health care costs in general and employer linked plans for as stated above the majority, so these are somewhat interlinked in my view.
Same reason, albeit less extreme, why in war-torn countries, long standing brutal dictatorships and the like, the citizenry rarely is able to create any proper action agains their oppressors, not because they are accepting of the status quo, weak, or anything of the sort, but because when one is starving and trying to help their family unit survive, even beyond the risk that action can pose, their often isn't any time to actually consider it. "A republic, if you can keep it", in my opinion is a high demand from the public. They need to have the tools, rights and resources to actively defend it. Not saying France is perfect here, but I will say that it is easy to just raise our finger at the US populous without considering the whole picture.
January Sixth was not a protest, it was an attempt to interfere with government processes to prevent Biden from being elected - so a really shitty attempt at a coup.
Well they happen in schools and children don’t vote. If this had been a wave of senior center shootings, something would have been done a long, long time ago.
I see what you're saying, but I don't agree that it works this way. Parents' concerns for their children are far more self-serving than most parents claim. Consider that every "for the children" political agenda ever has nakedly ulterior motives--name one truly pro-child policy where children are directly prioritized at the expense of their parents? Consider the way that school schedules are oriented around their parents' convenience in spite of decades of studies showing the harmful health effects they have. During COVID we saw dramatic efforts to protect the elderly coupled with a push to reopen schools by parents tired of having to take care of them all day. Whatever you think of the restrictions one way or another, the prioritization of elderly was apparent throughout. These are the same parents who have repeated voted benefits for themselves at the direct expense of their children, saddling them with trillions of dollars of debt to support their own present consumption. I promise you, if seniors were regularly being gunned down like this they would have found a solution already.
Because it has moved way beyond protests. Everyone agrees that school shootings are bad. Legislation has been passed. Policies have changed. Schools have changed their security tactics. There have been years and years of meetings across the country with school administrators and boards talking about how to improve safety and navigate these issues, and then the schools themselves implementing new practices.
If you are looking around and saying that because people aren't waving sign on street corners, then nobody cares, then you have utterly missed a couple decades of dedicated efforts by many people working around these issues.
The fact that shootings still happen is tragic. But it is not because people are just shrugging and saying they don't care.
The author said nothing of the people but of the government itself. 12 years ago, elementary school children were slaughtered and even that wasn’t enough to ban guns.
People are doing something, the issue with you two's extremely poor thinking is that lack of inaction means no one cares. What it actually represents is the massive growing disparity between the political class and average Americans.
There is >70% public support universal background checks for all firearm transactions, safe storage laws, and crisis intervention. Just the same that there is also large public support for things like public jobs programs, medicare for all, universal childcare, or free university; there is a very real obstacle that the political class in this country are adamant about stopping all progress towards better lives and not strictly caring that the elites extract more wealth or corporations get more welfare.
I'm very sorry, but I've heard that "there's large public support for X, Y, Z" for decades. If there's no real action in achieving such things, my assumption is people don't actually care about it.
Personally, when I "care about something", I try to act on it. My list is not long, and I'm very grateful that I don't have to spend a single minute of my life to think about school shootings.
You clearly missed the part about the divide between the political class and everyone else.
Most people in the US are just trying to pay rent and maybe one day save up for a house by the time they are 40-50.
If you don't see this you are either 1) making enough money you are part of the problem 2) don't actually live in the US so have a completely unmoored understanding of reality on the ground here
I obviously don’t live in the US. My entire point was that people say that care about school shootings and etc., but unless they do anything about it, those are just words.
Given the voting record of the majority of the population, I tend to believe that an average American cares more about SPX. Which, honestly, is fine by me. Every nation and culture is different, freedom and etc. etc.. But it would be hard to convince me that an average citizen cares about it, because, once again, nothing has changed in decades.
For the record, I have nothing against Americans, you guys are a lovely bunch. But it is what it is.
We literally can't do anything dude, what are you advocating for? That we have an armed rebellion to legislate the people's laws under a workers tribunal?
I'm really curious what country you live in because it's one that's clearly not a democracy. Not saying it as an insult either, but surely even in countries run by authoritarians there is an understanding that leadership is sometimes completely divorced from the people?
I also personally have a hard time blaming voters for anything, in America we have two corporate powers that have been neglecting the material needs of workers for nearly 40 years now; when you have two corporate parties power tends to be unstable for any meaningful legislation which tends to only benefit the elites + corporations whereas workers require constant legislation to help them and guide the country to benefit them.
When you see very little material outcomes you will vote for more extreme candidates. I honestly believe this is the real lesson how fascism can flourish, and I think this is something that can easily be predicted with extreme accuracy too. You look at the Weimar Republic, it was one of the most advanced and democratic governments on Earth; yet it failed to stop the threat of Nazis, mostly due to the ineptitude of politicians that also rejected the material needs of a nation.
I know this is a huge tangent but I think it's useful to write, because I'm really curios on your upbringing. I'd think understanding power, corruption, and out of touch governments to be universal human experiences but maybe not. D:
Indeed, the more accurate way to say it is that people in the US don't care enough about mass school shootings to do something about it besides thought and prayers.
If you're not American, one thing that you have to keep in mind whenever you hear "there's large public support in the US for [insert vaguely left-wing thing here] but nothing gets done about it" is that the US's system of government is really only vaguely a democracy. It gives a disproportionate amount of power to conservative rural voters at the expense of everybody else.
This is exemplified in the Senate, which is the least representative legislative body of any democracy I am aware of. Each state gets 2 votes regardless of population, so Wyoming (population ~550,000) is given the same amount of votes as California (population ~39,000,000). Any remotely controversial piece of legislation needs to pass the Senate with a 60% majority. This means that 21 Republican states making up ~20% of the population can block any bill they don't want to pass. Senators are also elected for 6 year terms, which limits how accountable they are to their constituents.
If a bill gets past the Senate, it makes its way to the president, who has veto power over all legislation. The president is elected by electors selected by the states rather than individual voters, and the number of electors is not fairly apportioned either. For example, there are ~728,000 people per elector in California, but ~196,000 people per elector in Wyoming.
In effect, this means that public opinion has essentially no impact on the legislation the US government passes. A 2014 Princeton study ( https://archive.org/details/gilens_and_page_2014_-testing_th... ) found that "When the preferences of economic elites and the stands of organized interest groups are controlled for, the preferences of the average American appear to have only a minuscule, near-zero, statistically non-significant impact upon public policy."
If you're interested in why the system was designed this way, I highly recommend the book "The Framers' Coup" by Michael Klarman.
I draw the line at things that directly impact my net worth.
> Do you not care about global warming because you're probably not going to experience an unsurvivable wet bulb temperature where you happen to live in your lifetime?
Correct. I don’t care about global warming or climate change.
If I decide you're having a negative impact on my net worth, can I come to your home and shoot you in the head?
It seems we need a remedial class in morality here, where we work up to you understanding the golden rule. But perhaps you're not capable of understanding that. Is euthanizing you then the only option?
Nothing worse than a person who takes for granted all the hard work others put into society while smugly bragging about how they don't care about anyone but themselves.
Imagine a super intelligent speed reading human in a library. If they read all the books and are able to understand, conceptualize and summarize that knowledge for others, is it theft? The books weren't stolen, after all, just read. The knowledge in the books wasn't taken away; it's still there for others to read.
I personally do not believe knowledge can be stolen.
> Imagine a super intelligent speed reading human in a library.
If human abilities were different then human laws would be different. We don't have speed limits for joggers but we do for cars because their abilities are materially different.
Is that super speed reading human going to then make itself available to instantly-ish answer any and every possible question from anyone with a paid subscription?
I'm spiritually sympathetic to your final sentence, but intellectual property law is not.
There are already a bunch of replies pointing out ways in which your metaphor breaks down, but here's another: the super intelligent speed reading human is not a "work" (in the sense of "derivative work").
Also, if I'm understanding your position, why wasn't your scenario about the human pirating the books and then reading them? It should make no difference if you really believe knowledge can't be stolen; both situations should be equivalent.
I hear you on IP law, but how it applies to AI training is far from settled.
I don't believe we should have software patents, and I am highly skeptical of the US copyright system in general.
As for why I didn't use a piracy analogy: humans don't need to pirate books to access them for free. They can just go to the library. That is exactly my point. Reading books isn't a crime. Why would we stop an AI from reading publicly available material just because it's automated and upsets the commercial status quo?
You can read up anything and everything about a patent, but still not be allowed to reproduce it.
The moment the LLMs ingested any code under GNU General Public License or similar licenses and reuse it without making the produced product available under the same terms...
Imagine a super greedy company putting every bit information they can, willingly and maliciously hiding the origin of training data, into a computer and reselling that data.
Such wow. Much shittie metaphor.
That various companies such as Google are working to kill. They're an advertising company that is making it increasingly clear they no longer want to link to their competition. Competition being defined as any source of information that is not Google.
> if the person has such an amount of money to burn, don't there exist much more fun opportunities to burn buckets of money than doing such experiments on LLMs?
Yes, that is objectively a lot of money. The only people who wouldn't consider that a lot of money are the small percentage of people with incomes high enough to recover that very quickly -- the top roughly 10% or 20% of income earners in the US. For more or less everyone else, that is a lot of money.
And by a lot of money, I mean that being forced to unexpectedly spend that would be anywhere from stressful to very stressful to blowing away savings and impacting health, housing, and safety. (Remember, half the US has no savings and/or no ability to absorb an unexpected expense greater than $500.)
I live in the United States. I write software for a living. My wife is a physician.
If I had a need to spend $2k, I could do so easily, but I still think it’s a lot of money to burn. I wouldn’t spend it on a whim; I would not spend it without carefully, considering the value of what I get.
I would not even spend that much money in the businesses that I own, or recommended that my well capitalized employer spend that much money without being reasonably confident that the business would get good value for its money.
$2000 is a lot of money, but so are the tech budgets of most places I've worked. Money can be a funny thing in corporate environments. They'll spend freely on some things, and be stingy on others.
$2000 as a test case that you can present to the rest of the company as a "this is what I learned and how best to use it" can be "cheap" in the sense that it produced real results that allow others to take advantage of the gained knowledge, thereby allowing the company to be more productive. If the $2000 produced an ROI that pays for itself within a reasonable time frame, then it's "cheap".
$2000 can be expensive if it's a college kid trying to complete an assignment.
I'll bite. Yes, it's a lot of money. It's several months worth of nice healthy groceries for a family of 4. It's my annual deductible on my health insurance. It's slightly lower than my annual property taxes.
Now that we have trillionaires running around, it may not seem like it, but it is a considerable amount of money in most of the USA. In many parts of the world it would be considered an unfathomable amount.
Perhaps not for you and me (though I'm certainly not going to light $2k on fire in an LLM for shits and giggles; I have plenty of significantly better uses for that), but $2k for the vast majority of people in the US is a super big deal amount of money. Many people in the US don't even have that much to spare for an emergency, let alone for something fun.
Driving everyone's QoL to be as bad as possible will lead to increasing enshittiffication in the entire market.
Consumers will be spoiled for choice between deeply mediocre options.
Besides, what's the point of adopting new technologies if it's not to increase the quality of life? If everyone just exists in service of the product development lifecycle, who and what are the products actually for?
In my experience, for every customer support agent that really wants to help people and cares about their problems, there are at least ten who don't even read what you wrote and answer with prefabricated blocks of text that have little to do with what you asked. If AI customer support actually tries to understand what I ask of it and help me, and there are still (motivated) humans available for the more tricky cases that AI can't handle, that might be a win...
Your 401k/pension’s passive index ETF at Vanguard, Fidelity, Schwab definitely went up in value.
There’s your trickle down.
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