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This is an Economics forum, and in Economics we deal with numbers, not anecdotal nonsense.
What Law of Economics says everyone must be employed?
Why do anything at all?
Study this very important chart on Employment to Population Ratio
Your right this idea that everyone needs to have a job is nonsense people are to stuck in thinking if I have a job every else has to. Maybe because people without a job still need money to survive unless you are suggesting letting people die in the streets.
So what are you gonna do with unemployable people??
I'd love to hear your theories.
What do we do with them? Nothing, except ask why they are truly "unemployable". If they are handicapped, then they deserve support. If they are lazy, uneducated or have acquired no skills, they can starve. Why should the folks that have become employable support them?
Maybe because people without a job still need money to survive unless you are suggesting letting people die in the streets.
All of our ancestors came here from somewhere else seeking a better life.
If people cannot add enough value (that is, earn a living) to afford NYC or SF, they should move to somewhere with a lower cost of living such as maybe Arkansas or Oklahoma.
If they are incapable of adding value in the USA, perhaps they should follow their ancestor's example and emigrate to, say, China or Rwanda or Sierra Leone or Papua New Guinea or Tuvalu.
And, of course, there are many who by their own choice refuse to add value. They make a choice to sit on a couch and do nothing, subsisting on government handouts, rather than lift a finger to add value. These people don't need a government handout -- they need a suitcase and a one-way ticket to anywhere else on Earth.
Would the real solution be gradually and slowly reducing the US population over time and encouraging a change to the one income household?
The problem isn't too many people or even too many workers, but rather people becoming obsoleted by technology. If we could magically turn the obsolete workers into computer scientists and technicians (or any other job that is still viable), it would buy us a little time, but the end result would eventually be obsolescence of most workers anyway, and the end of consumer-capitalsm.
The one income household (even if you could "encourage" it) wouldn't solve anything. It would just increase the number of zero income households.
If you want income, work for it. If you want better income, get more experience and education. And don't tell me that it's too expensive, either. There are zillions of programs out there to help those motivated enough to do it.
One thing I learned after consulting for a government agency that assists the poor? There is a small proportion of the population that will be willing to scratch by on the most meager handouts rather than get up out of bed and work. Maybe 3% of the population. But that same small percentage accounts for a huge amount of the cash that gets paid out.
Guaranteed minimum income would only serve to help those people continue bilking the taxpayers.
On 10 dollars an hour you're screwed in the Bay Area
What's your point? You can't make it on $10 per hour in Beverly Hills, either. But most of the USA is most decidedly neither Beverly Hills nor the Bay Area.
They make a choice to sit on a couch and do nothing, subsisting on government handouts, rather than lift a finger to add value. These people don't need a government handout -- they need a suitcase and a one-way ticket to anywhere else on Earth.
The nice thing about a BI is that people will no longer have an *incentive* to sit on the couch and do nothing. The way things are currently rigged, the working poor are often worse off than those who don't work.
Adding value does not equate to increased wages in this economy. That's the problem, writ large.
Sorry, I disagree with your premise. The very measure of adding value is what a willing buyer will pay for your value-add.
Quote:
Originally Posted by dysgenic
Let me give you a real life example of what I'm talking about:
I have a friend that had an idea that he thought would save the company he worked for close to a million dollars per year. He sat down with his boss and got the go ahead to design and implement his idea. He was assured they would take care of him with a large bonus if he was able to pull it off. So he did it, and his idea was even more successful than advertised. He then asked his boss for a large bonus and a large raise.
Instead of getting his large bonus and large raise, they gave him a one time token bonus with no raise. End result- company is 10 million to the good after 10 years, my friend is 1k to the good.
I realize this is an extreme example, but I believe it's relevant. Often times, none of the people that matter actually care how much money you can produce or save for the company, because they aren't going to see any of it, anyway.
This is what happens when you have too many people chasing too few jobs.
Sucks for your friend. At least he didn't get outsourced or laid off.
There is a small proportion of the population that will be willing to scratch by on the most meager handouts rather than get up out of bed and work. Maybe 3% of the population. But that same small percentage accounts for a huge amount of the cash that gets paid out. Guaranteed minimum income would only serve to help those people continue bilking the taxpayers.
At least the incentive to *not* work would be removed. 3% of the population is a pittance.
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