Posted on 04/15/2014 3:42:42 AM PDT by kingattax
First, the bad news: Even if the economy improves, middle-class career paths will continue to disappear as globalization and technological innovation render more jobs obsolete.
Now, the good news: The fear, stress and humiliation caused by unemployment (and underemployment) can be alleviated with a simple solution.
And now, the even-better news: This simple solution is starting to find backers on both sides of the political spectrum.
A monthly cash payment to every American, no questions asked, would solve several of our most daunting challenges.
It's called a basic income, and it's cheaper and much more effective than our current malfunctioning safety net, which costs nearly $1 trillion per year.
(Excerpt) Read more at cnn.com ...
You put your finger on it right there. While we are at it, we can simply have the Fed print the money. In fact the Fed already prints plenty of money for the politicians to spend. All we need to do is fire up the presses and print up the floor for everyone. What could possibly go wrong?
Ammendment to my previous post: Fed prints up the money and sends it to China. What could possibly go wrong??
There are basically two choices when printing up money and handing it out: cronyism and rich getting much richer, or rampant inflation.
You can be sure that once the “poor” turn in their chits to get a free loaf of bread, the price will rise by a buck a day for the rest of us if we are lucky enough to get any.
“There is a defacto 30 hour week for many as a result of Obamacare.
The phenomenon has migrated to corporate America where Domino’s Pizza is touting the art work done during the day off in their commercials. In keeping with the manifesto of the wicked witch Nancy, Domino’s is trolling for artists to make pizza. One guy claims to be an artist who’s art is just pizza.
One wonders if he is a full timer, 40 hours.”
I have been posting since the first of the year about the new mini traffic re vehicles increasing from about 1:30 to 2:30 pm.
The vehicles for the most part have only the driver. There are no kids in the cars as the schools are still in session.
My wife and I came to the conclusion that these are the new less than 30 hours per week working Americans.
The normal traffic buildups from 3:30 to about 6 pm are much less. We have two younger relatives living in different parts of the bay area with different commute routes. Their morning commutes still run from 45 to 60 minutes depending on the day. However, their return commutes are running shorter re time from 30 to 45 minutes.
A large % of salaried people, we know, who used to work 40 hours per week are now working less than 30 hours per week.
I assume you're talking about a "family" of welfare recipients, not an individual.
It would be interesting to know how many of the taker class are doing just that; 2, 3, 5 identities.
“No the taxpayers have that money forced from them to support all that. This guaranteed income would be no different. Where else does the money come from?”
Of course, that’s where the money will always come from. The question is “who will be the taxpayers?” We are moving towards an automated global economy where population increases and fewer workers are required.
Even in places like China where many people are willing to work for “3 hots and a cot”, they are being replaced by machines.
Someday the only people doing work will be those who develop new machines. They and a small group of elite owners/investors/regulators/financiers will be the only ones capable of producing anything or paying taxes.
So what will be done with all the workers and descendants of workers that have no work? You can only kill them or give a guaranteed income by forcing the wealthy to share (welfare). A few would be selected for natural technical skills and leave the ghetto but the majority would basically live in a communist welfare state with no work required for the bare necessities.
“This could end up being more costly because it would never be enough to please the masses. Especially those who want a raise for doing nothing.”
Eventually the majority of the elite will also be doing “nothing” besides counting money from inherited automated businesses and property. It will basically be a system of Royalty with machines instead of human serfs. Few people will become wealthy unless they inherit it. The majority will turn against the elite because they would be seen as taking the majority of wealth created by their machines/property that they simply inherited (same as how the majority sees royalty). The elite are ready for this and are slowly crafting an electronic surveillance prison to detect and eliminate dissent.
Household.
Part of the reason food prices are going up so fast now is the number of people getting food stamps.
They are buying what people that pay their own way wont buy.
People that pay their own way wont throw their money away on crap or simply choose not to eat high on the hog every day.
People that are getting food for free can eat high on the hog and don’t worry about the cost.
You can only come up with those two options?
The Government used to do just that back in the ‘50s and ‘60s.
“You can only come up with those two options?”
The third weak option I mentioned is to have the workers do meaningless work to “earn” their welfare. This is a waste of physical resources and the rebellion will be even stronger.
If you have another option for our vast population of physical workers when they are no longer needed, I’m all ears.
Send them to the country, there’s always lots to do out here.
“Send them to the country, there’s always lots to do out here.”
Not for hundreds of millions of idle workers.
The elite will also continue to impose greater restrictions on land and farming.
Sure, but that's a different problem. You are presuming a scifi world of elite versus future soylent green. In the current reality we have a spectrum of elite, tradesmen and various others. The elite will always need tradesmen and the latter will wield some actual power. The elite can get a lot of what they need from automated factories, but there will be non-elite knowledge workers to run those and come up with new products, new production techniques, etc.
While my rural area is very uncrowded, it contains a very diverse set of hereditary landonwers, various tradesnen, service workers, and factory workers along with the obvious farmers and hunters. Virtually all of them can make a living doing what they are doing. Add a million people from the city and it would not be so easy, so my solution has its challenges.
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