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singular_me
29th April 2017, 10:10 AM
the devil is in the details.... again.... all the roads lead to the powerful $tate

I just learned about Hayek's pro-BI view while reading a socialist website... likewise it is always good to read from every platform. What does it mean? it means that the pro-free market theories are a joke, ((they)) know that markets will always defraud/breed a bottom feeders. And that BI is meant to FAIL.

Sure what is deemed incompetence causes bankruptcies but that is how Nature's zero sum game translates. People must band together to secure their positions, so having a top 1% is unavoidable.

=====================================
Basic Income and the Left:
The Political and Economic Problems
David Bush

Should the Left and labour support a demand for a Basic Income (BI)? This simple question has provoked a fervent and confusing debate. The discussion over BI touches on real political and economic anxieties. The attack on the social welfare state, the depreciating power of organized labour and an economy producing increasingly low-wage precarious jobs have led many to search for alternative mechanisms and policies to address these problems. It is no wonder that BI with its promise of streamlined access to minimal economic security has attracted many adherents on the Left.............

Politics and the State

The major political problem with BI is that it views that state as a neutral apparatus governing relations between workers and employers. The state is, when stripped down to its core essence, a reflection of the interests of the ruling class. The state relies on the smooth functioning of capitalism and its policies aim to achieve this (balancing the competing interests of capitalists and placating any possible rising working class movement). The state, its bureaucracy and the political class, have no real interest in upending capitalist social relations and the basic functioning of the labour market.

The capitalist state is used to push policies that facilitate the continual accumulation of profits by capitalists and foment stability (there are of course differences about how best to do this). A progressive version of BI runs counter to the basic objectives of the state.
Wages and the State

Faced with a period of systemic slow economic growth it is not hard to imagine that the state could adopt a version of BI that aims to subsidize low-wage work. Indeed, in places like the United States this is the defacto situation with Walmart workers surviving only by accessing food stamps. A modest BI, of say $10,000 (which would not be enough to empower workers to stay out of the labour market for long), would essentially be a top-up of wages for low-wage employers. It would be a weapon for employers to keep wages low, as they could argue there is no need to pay workers more because of BI. In this scenario why would employers not just pay the minimum wage if there was a BI top up?

BI as a wage subsidy for employers would have the effect of distancing workers’ labour from their wages. Instead of being paid directly for their work, part of the wage of workers would come from their own tax dollars in the form of BI. Workers are powerful because of their social location in relation to production. But having the state subsidize employers’ wages clouds the relationship between workers, employers and their profits. Instead of pushing against employers in relation to their profits, workers would have to formulate their demands in terms of a social wage. This would have the effect of obscuring class division, exploitation and capitalist social relations in society. A state subsidy of wages could easily disempower workers as a class relative to employers by blunting the class struggle and turning it into a technocratic argument over the level the state should subsidize employers’ wages.

Added to this very real possibility, is likelihood that the state would use BI to attack public sector unions. Workers who staff and administer social programs could easily loose their jobs if services were cut to make way for BI, which is why public sector unions like OPSEU oppose it. Other public sector workers would also face increasing pressure of concessions to wages and benefit as the state would scramble to minimize costs to pay for BI. Governments would likely pit public sector wages and benefits against BI for the public. If BI subsidized low-wage employers this would have the effect of putting added downward pressure on all unionized workers.
Political Struggle and BI

The debate over the social usefulness of BI is largely conducted in the realm of abstraction. Policy is dreamed up, calculated, and debated with next to no appreciation of how the political struggle could and would shape the proposed policy.

By subtracting the political from the equation of BI, its proponents treat the economy as a neutral object that can be simply rearranged. This approach engages in the worst kind of academic idealism that shuns any serious political analysis. As John Clarke notes:

“I've yet to see, quite bluntly, any serious attempt to assess what stands in the way of a progressive BI and what can be done to bring it into existence. It simply isn't enough to explain how just and fair a given model would be if it could be adopted. In order to credibly advance BI as the solution, there are some questions that must be settled.”

As parts of the Left flirt with idyllic visions of BI, the right-wing is busy actually using the renewed interest to push their own political agenda. In Finland, the right-wing government is supporting BI, which is now in its testing phase, as a way to rollback the social welfare state and curb the power of trade unions.

In Ontario, the Liberal government is moving ahead with its BI pilot project. The pilot project would put a select group of low-income people on a BI. The Liberals have been using this idea to delay any meaningful action toward reducing poverty in the province. As Clarke argues:

“If the concept is being advanced in Ontario by the very provincial government that has led the way in program reduction and austerity, it is not because they want to reverse the undermining of income support, the proliferation of precarious employment and the privatizing of public services but for the very opposite reason. They are looking with great interest at the possibility of using Basic Income as a stalking horse for their regressive social agenda and it will be the version that Bay Street has in mind that will win out over notions of progressive redistribution.”

Rather than raising the rates for social assistance, increasing the minimum wage or spending more on social services the government is touting its BI experiment. The Liberal's advocacy for BI also comes at the same time as the Changing Workplaces Review, a full-scale review of all labour law in the province. By propping up BI the Liberals are looking to stoke confusion and division amongst those pushing for paid sick days, a $15 minimum wage and stronger union rights. The Liberals are not alone in this effort.

In its effort to weaken labour laws, the Ontario Chamber of Commerce has made support for BI one of its key proposals in the Changing Workplace Review. This of course is not some noble gesture, BI in reality dovetails perfectly with its worldview.

BI is not just a left-wing idea, it has also long been advocated for by parts of the right-wing, such as Milton Friedman and Friedrich Hayek. The goal is to use BI to do away with the social welfare state. Instead of social programs, citizens are given minimum cheques by the state and then purchase their social needs on the market. BI will not be used to decommodify social relations, but used to desocialize state services.

VERY LONG
http://www.socialistproject.ca/bullet/1402.php#continue
=======================


. A. Hayek: Enemy of Social Justice and Friend of a Universal Basic Income?

Until recently, I had only read the first two books of Hayek’s grand trilogy Law, Legislation and Liberty. People told me that the third book was the least interesting. The real action, they said, was in the first two books. I decided to see for myself whether they were right. After finishing the book, I admit that much of the analysis is straightforward public choice theory that others had already carried to a higher level of sophistication. Further, the conceptions of law, spontaneous order and the critique of social justice are best articulated in the first two books. However, Book III has a number of interesting elements. One of them is Hayek’s insistence on a universal basic income while vehemently rejecting the idea of social justice. On this blog, we sometimes tie the two together. So what gives?

Let’s consider the relevant passages:

The assurance of a certain minimum income for everyone, or a sort of floor below which nobody need fall even when he is unable to provide for himself, appears not only to be wholly legitimate protection against a risk common to all, but a necessary part of the Great Society in which the individual no longer has specific claims on the members of the particular small group into which he was born (55).*

So Hayek is for a minimum income. This much is clear. But notice the next passage:

It is unfortunate that the endeavor to secure a uniform minimum for all who cannot provide for themselves has become connected with the wholly different aims of securing a ‘just’ distribution of incomes (55).

What? Isn’t the point of the UBI to secure a just distribution of incomes? Isn’t the UBI legitimate because people it is owed to people in order to justify the social order as a whole?

I think Hayek’s critique of social justice does not apply to the evaluation of the rules that govern a society’s basic structure. Instead, Hayek meant to refute the idea that we can make specific claims about whether certain domains of goods and services are justly distributed

LONG
http://bleedingheartlibertarians.com/2012/05/hayek-enemy-of-social-justice-and-friend-of-a-universal-basic-income/

crimethink
29th April 2017, 04:48 PM
The rulers of the world will never permit a "basic income," except as racial warfare against the White race. White people need not apply. And after the White race is finally done for, the Guidestones "500,000,000" declaration will be implemented for the non-Whites.

monty
13th April 2020, 08:53 AM
Posted on Twitter by @EvaKBartlett
Eva Bartlett

@EvaKBartlett
(https://twitter.com/EvaKBartlett)
Imperative reading:
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Cory Morningstar is with Catte Black (https://www.facebook.com/BlackCatte?hc_ref=ARSX95S-Sld0jKbSijFskmuQ6bSdSye-8-Rmg-WVnVnonx9hDxCH8b9wxFLkyTjIclQ&ref=nf_target) and 7 others (https://www.facebook.com/cory.morningstar.5/posts/10163703422625554#).

12 hrs (https://www.facebook.com/cory.morningstar.5/posts/10163703422625554) ·







The crushing of the disposable working class by design.

The arrogance and brutality of the ruling class - is nothing less than breathtaking.
Let's begin.

Business Insider, April 9 2020: "Many Americans will not have jobs to return to after the coronavirus pandemic ends...

"We're going to see something like 10 years of change in 10 weeks"

"The fact is right now this virus is the perfect environment for companies to get rid of people, bring in robots and machines, and figure out how they can operate more efficiently."

"Universal basic income is going to become the topic, not just here in the United States, but Spain's adopting a version of a minimum income. Legislatures around Europe are all very, very much focused on this."

"We're going to see the progressive Amazonification of our economy as Amazon's one of the only businesses out there that's hiring more and more. You're seeing more robots are in grocery store aisles cleaning after we all supposedly go home..."

"One thing I've been saying is that we're going to see something like 10 years of change in 10 weeks, because businesses are being put in a position where it makes sense to speed up a lot of the automation that they were considering investing in."

"The fact is right now this virus is the perfect environment for companies to get rid of people, bring in robots and machines, and figure out how they can operate more efficiently."

"My kids are at home just like everyone else's kids and they're getting taught online...

they're going to be many, many families that actually make a different determination where they actually say, "Hey, this online thing is working well."
"If you can find a way to, frankly, make yourself useful from afar, that's going to be something that unfortunately we all have to think about more and more."

"I think at this point it's actually going to need to be a bit higher than that, because the $1,000 a month is enough for baseline needs for at least most of us, but the economy is going to become even more inhuman and punishing, both during this crisis and afterwards."
"... I'd be looking at something higher than $1,000 a mo. that would be more robust & helping people not just be able to meet their needs, but also have a real path forward."

[Let's see Klaus Schwab or Yang live well on 1k a month. The rich are dangerous and insane hypocrites.]

"we're going to be dealing with the consequences of this crisis for years to come, and we need a Marshal Plan style initiative to rebuild the country... helping create that vision for what America in 2022, 2023, is going to look like after we have a vaccine in place."

April 12 2020, Business Insider: "Pope Francis says it might be 'time to consider a universal basic wage' in Easter letter"

Feb 28 2020, Business Insider: "The pope has joined forces with Microsoft and IBM to create a doctrine for ethical AI and facial recognition. Here's how the Vatican wants to shape AI."

Oct 18 2019:

"Yang likes branding. He calls his marquee policy idea—a UBI of $1,000 a month—a "freedom dividend." ... And lately, he can’t stop talking about "the fourth industrial revolution."

"The fourth industrial revolution is the shorthand Yang now uses to describe the wave of massive technological change that he believes has decimated manufacturing employment and will soon automate away millions of American jobs."

"The fourth industrial revolution is now migrating from manufacturing workers to retail, call centers, transportation, as well as to white-collar workers like attorneys, pharmacists, and radiologists,"

"In a World Economic Forum video from 2016, experts offered up predictions such as 'Our bodies will be so high-tech we won’t really be able to distinguish between what’s natural and what’s artificial,'"

"It’s self-serious, Star Trek–style sci-fi for people who wear expensive suits and maybe have an endowed lab at Harvard. These are the intellectual waters Yang swims in, and that’s disconcerting. Aside from the fact that these conferences tend to be pretty intellectually bankrupt"—even JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon has joked that “Davos is where billionaires tell millionaires about what the middle class feels”—they by definition reflect the interests and values of the global capitalist class."

June 20 2019: "UBI would strengthen & even create financial markets, particularly for consumer credit, mortgages, & pensions. Far from [] a revolutionary route to freedom from the whip of the market, UBI may end up yoking all citizens to rentier capital through indebtedness."

Jan 31 2019: "If UBI is implemented in the current climate of austerity, economic precarity, and social entrepreneurship, you can be sure payments will be linked to digital identity to track "impact."

That $1k a month.... just enough to scrape by."

#FourthIndustrialRevolution (https://www.facebook.com/hashtag/fourthindustrialrevolution?source=feed_text&epa=HASHTAG) #UBI (https://www.facebook.com/hashtag/ubi?source=feed_text&epa=HASHTAG) #2020Reset (https://www.facebook.com/hashtag/2020reset?source=feed_text&epa=HASHTAG) #DisposableWorkingClass (https://www.facebook.com/hashtag/disposableworkingclass?source=feed_text&epa=HASHTAG)#HumanCapital (https://www.facebook.com/hashtag/humancapital?source=feed_text&epa=HASHTAG) #IoT (https://www.facebook.com/hashtag/iot?source=feed_text&epa=HASHTAG) #DigitalData (https://www.facebook.com/hashtag/digitaldata?source=feed_text&epa=HASHTAG) #Blockchain (https://www.facebook.com/hashtag/blockchain?source=feed_text&epa=HASHTAG)
March 26 2020: "Keep it quiet, but universal basic income is coming"

"You think that after six months or a year of this we will just go back tamely to the old economic rules? I rather doubt it."

The rise of fascism & the 2nd World War required the creation of the full welfare state... The current emergency may be fostering the rise of ideas previously seen as too radical to contemplate..."

July 31, 2017, World Economic Forum:
"As developments in artificial intelligence and robotics advance, there is going to be a severe and swift disruption of many working classes."
"UBI, an economic proposition in which a sum of money is regularly paid to a population, could be a vital bulwark against the unintended consequences of automation in the workforce."

"Companies will profit significantly from workforce automation, so the private sector will be able to afford shouldering this burden, while at the same time still making greater profits."

"After all, a full-time human has needs: 30 minutes for lunch each day, vacation and sick time, toilet breaks, and health benefits, to name a few. Meanwhile, an automated worker would only require an initial installation and the occasional repair or upgrade."
"The BCG report stated that a human welder today is paid around $25 an hour (including benefits) versus the equivalent operating cost of around $8 for a robot."

“In 15 years, that gap will widen even more dramatically,” the report states. “The operating cost per hour for a robot doing similar welding tasks could plunge to as little as $2 when performance improvements are factored in.”

"This trend will only continue to accelerate. McDonald’s, an early pioneer of automation, is already replacing human workers with automated kiosks. They expect a 5% to 9% return on investment in just the first year; in 2019 they expect this return to balloon to double digits."

"And this is only one sector: PricewaterhouseCoopers estimates that 38% of US jobs will be in danger of being replaced by automation by 2030."
McKinsey (in 2020) puts this number at close to 50% by 2030.

"Companies that automate their workforces should be taxed on these new massive profits, and some of the resulting capital given back to workers by the government in the form of UBI."

"While the idea of a UBI is popular—Mark Zuckerberg, Elon Musk, and Bill Gates have all championed it—how exactly would a universal basic income be engineered?

"Large swaths of laborers are going to lose their jobs, leading to unprecedented levels of unemployment."

That moment has arrived.

April 7, 2020: "Spain to become first European country to introduce Universal Basic Income"

Creating a Shared Future in a Fractured World Global Agenda, Davos, Jan 2018, World Economic Forum:
"... w/ some economists suggesting that automation could potentially replace over half of all jobs by 2055."

"the disruption to workers' lives will be significant"

June 20 2019: "UBI would strengthen & even create financial markets, particularly for consumer credit, mortgages, & pensions. Far from [] a revolutionary route to freedom from the whip of the market, UBI may end up yoking all citizens to rentier capital through indebtedness."
April 7 2020, CNN: "Grocery stores turn to robots during the coronavirus"

"Walmart, the country's largest retailer & private employer, will have Brain Corp's self-driving robots in 1,860 of its more than 4,700 US stores by the end of the year."

"Workers manually picking, bagging and delivering is costly for grocers, and employees picking orders can clog up aisles."

"Takeoff Technologies... has seen a double-digit increase in orders since the crisis began. "Robots handle a majority of the leg-work when fulfilling orders, meaning there is limited contact with grocery items... The process is "well suited" for social distancing."

"In the retail industry, "margin pressure has made automation a requirement, not a choice," according to McKinsey. 'Automation will disproportionately disrupt retail.'"

April 10, 2020: "Pandemic strengthens the case for universal basic income"

"Coronavirus hysteria provides cover for introducing UBI, a grand theft from the working class." "Notorious fraudster Johann Hari is now touting the UBI scam as an "anti-depressant."[cordeliers on twitter]

"Subsidizing low-wage work depresses wages by essentially allowing employers to pay less than a livable wage, so EITC-type benefits are at least in part a transfer to employers, rather than workers."

Henry Kissinger, The Wall Street Journal, April 3, 2020: "The Coronavirus Pandemic Will Forever Alter the World Order":

"Kissinger: Democracies need to sustain their Enlightenment values. Without balancing power with legitimacy, social contract will disintegrate. Yet the issue of legitimacy can't be settled at same time as this "plague". "Priorities must be established.""

When we all start to literally starve, perhaps then we will eat the rich. Do you still believe that these people actually care about your health?
+++

The future, now on our doorstep: The human population to be controlled "via digital identity systems tied to cashless benefit payments within the context of a militarized 5G / IoT / AR [augmented reality] environment.The billionaire class has built & is rapidly putting the finishing touches on infrastructure to run human capital social impact mkts that will securitize the lives of most people as data streams. The tech that underlies this 4IR automation will hasten the death of the planet. WEF is advancing a technocratic system of control & domination of humanity & the planet... Why should we agree to this? It is a profound sickness of Western culture. Hubris. Sick. And totally ignoring the impact our actions have on the natural world around us." - Alison Hawver McDowell

Links:
https://socialistproject.ca/2017/01/b1350/ (https://l.facebook.com/l.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fsocialistproject.ca%2F2017%2 F01%2Fb1350%2F&h=AT1KhP8EwaQP8Ev19_MczTkPTAQDffclANpllGDPz7OLv20T x5Jt9qMlBEBk56VUQMtCuRxCOQBsdSn1C2Kn9k9yXG50BFDPqM 7HKJzKFmXVNHru1nXQn2kzXg5xNC8N__x0MEy9ZT3M_IT1OOF3 n1VdheaaLtMai-nfrQ0)

[I]https://socialistproject.ca/2016/11/b1330/ (https://l.facebook.com/l.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fsocialistproject.ca%2F2016%2 F11%2Fb1330%2F&h=AT1Qk6GS-UvuXTWd9fwR_2hopV66nePkB9vuogjjGFfPmbsdQYmehN50BCd qWqLWzpo9Ipl5nXVxgke5hmobDNufZ8sT4lNMlU1t02byXRJKG l_TcTD2pi-NXTE0-GZuuitpipqeKmYhQQxuv214BswuvlBrPNeRY42nRcI)

https://www-businessinsider-com.cdn.ampproject.org/…/micros… (https://l.facebook.com/l.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww-businessinsider-com.cdn.ampproject.org%2Fc%2Fs%2Fwww.businessinsid er.com%2Fmicrosoft-ibm-pope-francis-push-for-ai-principles-2020-2%3Famp&h=AT0i_cbciSQ-MtPnr8pjk9Z_l4PbYpoUSbsSv4J38w5bjK9mUTbcjAbq79K2kv 2uaBz1Ii_Pr5Dnfuns8jXz091tZ2y9fOmlEFlGtFhXCFWfXuQe rHyXGkWmKHc5Jb7svEKgAJ-46WxNmUPdtZDHrZCSM_JhPXERA6yoWqI)

https://www.businessinsider.com/pope-francis-it-might-be-ti… (https://l.facebook.com/l.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.businessinsider.com%2Fpo pe-francis-it-might-be-time-to-consider-universal-basic-wage-2020-4&h=AT3dyjqCbULVFfe_muWg0h6ycPSeCjxWtP0m2BycSrAq7Umd 1tD8A4svCDxjQYgIbnKgh_WKt5b-0ySoZdivQldMIn-o_Grx227gYJTEn8h785CYx8P3_LzAg0aWze65E0grO5hwK6kY5 uZ1Y2JHxKciBUZ7zS-D88uuwX4)

https://www.businessinsider.com/andrew-yang-changing-job-ma… (https://www.businessinsider.com/andrew-yang-changing-job-market-need-for-universal-basic-income-2020-4)

https://lfpress.com/…/dyer-keep-it-quiet-but-universal-basi… (https://lfpress.com/opinion/columnists/dyer-keep-it-quiet-but-universal-basic-income-is-coming)

https://www.cnn.com/…/grocery-stores-robots-auto…/index.html (https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/07/business/grocery-stores-robots-automation/index.html)

https://slate.com/…/andrew-yang-fourth-industrial-revolutio… (https://slate.com/business/2019/10/andrew-yang-fourth-industrial-revolution.html)

https://wrenchinthegears.com/…/good-guy-in-davos-not-so-fa…/ (https://wrenchinthegears.com/2019/01/31/good-guy-in-davos-not-so-fast/)

https://morningstaronline.co.uk/…/spain-become-first-europe… (https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/w/spain-become-first-european-country-introduce-universal-basic-income)

https://www.newsday.com/…/pandemic-coronavirus-covid-19-uni… (https://www.newsday.com/opinion/coronavirus/pandemic-coronavirus-covid-19-universal-basic-income-ubi-1.43776695)

https://www.henryakissinger.com/…/the-coronavirus-pandemic…/ (https://www.henryakissinger.com/articles/the-coronavirus-pandemic-will-forever-alter-the-world-order/)