The Long Road to a Universal Basic Income
(Breaking: On Aug. 11, Joe Biden named Kamala Harris as his Vice President. According to a Politico poll issued before the announcement, Elizabeth Warren was the public’s favorite for the office. For more on Harris, see 2020 - The Year of Bad Decisions.)
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We may be on the verge of getting a UBI (Universal Basic Income) in the United States. You may say it will never happen with Trump in charge, but look at the mess we’re in. Trump just performed an Executive Order that has the following problems:
It is probably unconstitutional for the President to appropriate the powers of the purse from Congress. There may be court suits, including injunctions, which could tie up the dispersals indefinitely, or at least until after the November election, if the Dems so choose.
His “gift” of $400 a week for those receiving unemployment benefits will drive understaffed state unemployment offices crazy. Implementation may take weeks.
Trump wants the states to pay for an unspecified share of the $400. This means 50 separate negotiations with the states, which are on the verge of laying off thousands of vital social service, medical and public safety workers.
The recess in payroll deductions is probably unworkable since it would involve hundreds of thousands of employers to alter the way in which workers are paid.
There is no stimulus payment for the self-employed, the retired, the disabled or those cut back to part time but still working. There is no stimulus payment to replenish the $1,200 voted in April, which many of us received a month or two later.
There is no reimbursement for states and local governments for the extraordinary funds they expended because of COVID-19.
There is no protection against eviction for homeowners and renters not living in a HUD or other federally financed building or who have a home with an FHA or VA mortgage loan.
The result of Trump’s ridiculous executive order may be millions of evictions, breadlines like we haven’t seen since the Great Depression, tens of thousands more layoffs of state workers, and protests that will dwarf the Black Lives Matter demonstrations.
UBI is more popular than ever
When Cori Bush toppled a political dynasty and won a Congressional seat for St. Louis and Ferguson, Missouri, she said, “UBI is my first priority in Congress.” Bush is advocating $2,000/mo, plus any other social benefits for which a person is eligible. The UBI would last for one year. A limited-term UBI may seem short-sighted to confirmed UBI supporters, but consider that once a UBI is started, it may be difficult to end.
A UBI is no longer a niche political demand. In the Democratic Primary, candidate and entrepreneur Andrew Yang made it his signature issue. His plan would provide a $1,000/mo UBI to every American. Other candidates such as Sanders, Biden and Bloomberg were negative about a UBI, while most other candidates waffled about it. Tulsi Gabbard introduced House Resolution (H.R. 897), on March 12, to provide a $1,000/mo UBI as an economic stimulus, “until COVID-19 no longer presents a public health emergency.”
The UBI is also convenient to administer. Since it is universal, everyone gets it. There is no means test, there are no social workers prying into anyone’s private life. The UBI could be sent out on a debit card to encourage people to stimulate the economy, or it could be sent by direct deposit to everyone who has a bank account (which is not everyone).
The UBI would pay for itself. The act of injecting $3 trillion a year (Yang and Gabbard’s plan) or $6 trillion a year would stimulate economic growth far beyond that amount since it would put more money in the hands of producers of commodities. Those producers would then hire more people, who with a job and a UBI would buy essential items they were denied because of poverty and/or low income.
A UBI is not the only way to save the economy. In several European countries, the government has nationalized the payroll, that is, the government picks up most, if not all, of the wage bill as businesses are forced to close their doors. Jobs are saved and businesses don’t go bankrupt. However, there is no stimulus where new money is injected into the economy via a UBI.
We cannot afford to be short-sighted about the UBI. It is not just a short-term fix while COVID rages on.
Something worse is coming
The Brookings Institute, a centrist Democratic think tank, completed a study last year called, Automation and Artificial Intelligence. The study estimates how many people are at risk of “substitution” (think tank jargon for losing their jobs). They found that 25 percent of all U.S. jobs (36 million) are at high risk of being replaced by a machine. Another 36 percent (52 million jobs) are at medium risk. That’s a total of 88 million jobs, which is well over half the work force. And this is by 2030. How long will it be before the remaining 57 million jobs disappear? That depends on how fast the technology needed for artificial intelligence improves.
Don’t think that your job could never be done by a machine. As a union negotiator, I heard workers say over and over, that they had nothing to fear from automation or low-wage replacements. Many of them ended up having to take early retirement. Non-union workers would just be tossed out on the street.
Of course, none of this might happen in 2030. It could take place by 2025. None of the Brookings conclusions are any better than the quality of their data sources. They include the Bureau of Labor Statistics, EMSI (Electronic Manufacturing Services Industry), Moody’s and McKinsey. You may remember that McKinsey got some unwanted publicity during the Democratic debates. McKinsey seems to be a cross between a cult and a Fortune 500 corporation that infiltrates other companies with their staff. Mayor Pete Buttigieg took the course, drank the Kool Aide, and was rewarded with a direct commission to another cult, Naval Intelligence.
In any case, the Automation Revolution is coming. It is going to remove humankind from the drudgery jobs that take away the joy of living from so many people. It will allow us to pursue the endeavors we really care about and in so doing add to the sum of knowledge and wealth of our species. Without the Automation Revolution, many of us will be doomed to picking up trash all day, every day, or engaging in other mind-numbing jobs. There’s just one little problem.
How will we survive without a job, no matter how repulsive? With a Universal Basic Income survival won’t be linked to a job. Our freedom from wage slavery will mean that we will have a new right: The Right to Survive with Dignity. But won’t it destroy our dignity by taking money for nothing? It’s not “money for nothing”. We, our friends, our parents, all our ancestors built everything you see, with our and their sweat and blood. The trillions and trillions of dollars of wealth was taken away from us by a small elite, known as the 1 percent (and nastier names).
Most of us would agree that Black people should receive reparations for their labor, and cultural, contributions during the past centuries of slavery and second-class citizenship. There is no way that this country can ever make up for the human suffering endured by slaves and victims of Jim Crow, and for their continuing discrimination, but we should try our damnedest.
In a broader sense, we, the human race, have never received reparations for building the Pyramids, the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, all those giant churches, fighting and dying in their wars, the Interstate Highway System, the ships, the cars, the trains, the wheelbarrows, and on and on. That is why we not only need a UBI, but are entitled to one. The time has come to present the bill for all of humanity’s toil and trouble, and it’s time for the thieves to pay up.
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