Topic: Creating a guaranteed minimum income through crypto-coins - page 6. (Read 14970 times)

I don't think this can be solved with an altcoin.

Otherwise, if it is felt necessary at all to protect those who are not able to earn enough for their own sustenance, this is a really good argument for a minimum tax principle.

Supported by taxes, give the minimum income to everyone, rich and poor, with no conditions. This will make sure that support never stops anyone from working for betterment of their own situation.

Minimum wages, social support, unemployment support, and so on, can be seen as support on the condition that the receiver stops producing. This reduces the total wealth, including what is needed to support the poor. It is a plan for the society to implode.

*rimshot*

Reserved.

(It's too awkward to keep calling this 'the altcoin'.  I'm going to call it Mincoin until someone comes up with a better name.  Refers to both 'minting your own coins" and "minimum income".)

The main factor Mincoin has going against it, is a rapid devaluation rate.  That makes it very poor as a long term store of value.

But merchants do accept 'worthless scraps of paper' that commonly lose 2% to 10% of their value in a year.  And they accept credit cards that charge them transaction costs as high as 3%.   Those are just costs of doing business, factored into their prices. 

So it doesn't seem too incredible that they might eventually do the same with Mincoin.  As long as they can turn over their mincoins in less than a week, a 2%/week devaluation could be considered a cost of doing business. 

One other thought I had:  if Mincoin requires a public account into which coins are created (to combat fraud), one could exclude about a month's worth of coins kept in that account from decay.   So if one can generate 3 mincoin a day, 100 mincoin in the identity-tied creation account wouldn't decay.  That allows one a month to spend the free coins, and merchants can hold a small amount of "cash" on hand without loss.  The increase in the total money supply would only be about 10% from implementing this.

Clearly, as with Bitcoin, there would have to be a 'bootstrap' process for Mincoin. Mincoin has a number of strong factors going for it in that regard:

People like to get "free" stuff.  In this respect, Mincoin might prove much more attractive than Bitcoin, where by design only a few get free coins.   Mincoin embraces one of the common misconceptions about Bitcoin - Mincoin really WOULD give people free coins.

If the Mincoin concept gains wide understanding, a large fraction of the population might see it as a worthy cause and deliberately seek to spread it and give it real world value, in order to 'support the cause'.  Popular authors might write stories that can only be purchased with mincoin; school kids might organize "Walks for Mincoin" to raise awareness and get people to sign up.  Charities might get donors to donate $1 for each person signing up to accept the free Mincoin (and payment in Mincoin).

Perhaps I need to clarify.  No one would be forced to accept the altcoins.   Just as with Bitcoin, choosing to get involved is totally voluntary.  You could also trade in the coins without any obligation to accept them in the future.

But if and so long as one does choose to generate the free coins, one would be accepting an obligation to accept payments in the coin - at least up to the amount of free coins you spend.  (And this is not a hard fixed rule, it's just my current thought on how it would work.)

Instead of thinking of it as "free" coins, it's better to think of it on the same model as a government (or a bank like the Fed) printing coins and putting an equal debt on their ledger.  The entity - government, bank, or individual, "loans" the coins into existence.   Yes, it sounds like fairy magic, but that's pretty much how US dollars work...

BTW: It's awkward to keep referring to this as "the altcoin".  Suggestions for a good name?

Nobody of the capital owners will accept these altcoins IMHO.

Partially true - if accepting altcoins will be compulsory, this idea have no difference with taxation.
But assuming that main production factor will be the capital (robots) and not the labor, no people will be force to work, just bourgeoisie forced to share production means.

Accepting this altcoin would be just as voluntary as accepting Bitcoin.  So no, there's no enslaving going on.

Even if implemented, you could refrain from accepting free coins or payment in these coins, so there is no need to feel threatened by it.

What if the producers are robots

Problem with "free" income is that you are going to spend your coins to get stuff for "Free".  However, that stuff wasn't free for the person who grew it, created it, or what have you - they had to work for it.

So what you've done, essentially, is enslaved the producers for that period of time they made that item or service.

What your saying is along the lines of: lets end poverty by simply giving everyone on earth who is poor One Million Dollars!  Then the producers can work their butts off for that money that was given to the poor people.  Couldn't be simpler, why hasn't anyone thought of that before?!!!!

The real way to get un-poor is to increase your value to the world - skill sets, working harder, etc.  The only way known to man that works.  NOT hoping someone gives you money for nothing.

Maybe some sort of "proof of work by a real human"?

A job?

 

I've posted on this in another forum:  < https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/altcoin-with-a-free-minimum-income-for-everyone-429437 >  but this one may be better suited to getting discussion going.

There is a concept of guaranteeing every person a free minimum income.  
- Advantages include countering extreme poverty and providing buffering against deep recessions/depressions.
- One justification is that a capitalist economy takes some value from all, by imposing externalities on all (pollution, loss of natural beauty, loss of access to formerly unowned land, etc).
- Probably the largest objection to guaranteed income is that it has always appeared that it would have to be created by a government, which would take from some in order to give to all.

My thesis here is that it might be possible to create a crypto-currency that provides a totally voluntary, non-governmental, world-wide guaranteed minimum income.
See the link above for some discussion of some technical attributes of such a coin system.

The biggest issue appears to be how to prevent fraud by double dipping - creating multiple fake accounts to generate multiple streams of free coins.
One approach would be to somehow tie participant accounts to their real identity.  Again, I've proposed a few ways that might be done in that other post.

Can anyone see any way to make this work, without tying coin creation to true identity?  Maybe some sort of "proof of work by a real human"?