Topic: New Epic Fail Currency? 'Occcu' - page 2. (Read 8241 times)

Sure it is. You can create part of that surplus by eliminating all or much of the social benefits of today, including it's bureaucracy, but that is insufficient. Any basic income that deserves the name must allow people to actually survive on it. It must be paid from revenues (taxes, oil revenue....) it cannot be paid with debts.

It's a real bad dilemma. Increased productivity and more AI may well toss us into poorhouses without basic income (http://marshallbrain.com/manna1.htm), but basic income reduces competitiveness. In the end, the future may really not need us.

Only way out I see is to keep the economy growing until we're ready. Spacesteading and Seasteading may do the trick.

Anyway -- there is a lot you could argue about CI, but "needs a surplus" is not one of them.

And the next problem is that a lot of hoarding money will never see the money cycle again because the holder have so much money that they can't or want not spend it.

As to "not hoarding".  That's just stupid.  There's nothing wrong with "hoarding"; it is simply deferred consumption.  e.g. I would like to have a car next year instead of a bicycle this year.  Or, I'd like two hospitals next year instead of one pedestrian crossing this year.  What's wrong with letting people choose when they spend?

Basic income as a dividend requires that the state generates a surplus. Some do, such as Norway.

Just imagine how much tax revenue is required to finance this: If 300 Million Americans get $500 each (not really a sufficient income), $1.8 Trillion would be required per  year.  Financing this with a tax on land would devaluate the land to the point that most morgage loans get canceled because the backing is no longer there. The result would be a default of the house owners and a subprime crisis of unprecedented proportions. Oh, wait - we can tax the farmers. They own a lot more land.

Don't get me wrong, I like Occupy and basic incomes, but the problems inherent to this concept are more practical than ideological. For any basic income, SOMEONE has to maintain a list of recipients. You need to verify that each person only has one account. You need to update the records swiftly when an identity gets stolen. Then, we have to trust that your organization won't be corrupted by power. Every single person you employ to handle all this is paid for by a regressive "inflation/demurrage tax".

We (the left in general) need to be supporting Bitcoin because it already works well and is still undergoing major upgrades. It is resistant to corruption unlike the Fed and any centralized currency. If your problem is hoarding and a deflationary money supply, EnCoin can use your help. If you want a basic income, it has to come from your government - consumers will not opt in to paying for it.

Basic income as a dividend requires that the state generates a surplus. Some do, such as Norway.

Just imagine how much tax revenue is required to finance this: If 300 Million Americans get $500 each (not really a sufficient income), $1.8 Trillion would be required per  year.  Financing this with a tax on land would devaluate the land to the point that most morgage loans get canceled because the backing is no longer there. The result would be a default of the house owners and a subprime crisis of unprecedented proportions. Oh, wait - we can tax the farmers. They own a lot more land.

"Basic Income" is a reasonable idea.  Sometimes called citizen's income or citizen's dividend.  It goes very nicely with land value tax.

However; implementing it is a function of the state not of the currency.

But what would happen if the advantages of Bitcoin would combined with the advantages of OCCCU ?

Spoken like a true republican that has never been poor a day in his/her life.

I very much disagree.  If I only bought the absolute necessities, I could survive and save money, retiring on a modest income.

Fact is, all you need is food, clothing and shelter.  You don't need a car.  You don't need a 800 sq ft house (when 200 will do just fine).  You don't need children.  You don't need a cell phone.  You don't need cable, television, or internet.

Live in Detroit, where housing is incredibly cheap.  Sell trinkets on the internet, or get a minimum wage job.  You could get by on $300/month for all your living expenses.  The rest is money in your pocket, where you begin building wealth.

Building wealth has nothing to do with how much you make, and everything to do with how you manage the money you have.  If you believe you cannot build wealth with just about any ethical occupation, then you're not living your life in a way that facilitates building wealth.  In other words, it is YOUR fault you can't build wealth with those ethical occupations.

Democracies aggregate capital through taxation and choose progressive commons based on the best information available to improve the (theoretical) quality of life for the many. I'll defer to Maslow's hierarchy of needs to point out the usefulness of a baseline of equality. Besides, the system is broken and there are few ethical occupations where one can aggregate any personal wealth anymore. It follows then that individuals that do manage to acquire capital are not ethical and should not be trusted to make decisions for the many.

Even if there is no cheating, no corruption, no flawed human behavior I would argue that the above goal is beyond stupid.

I work hard, someone else sits around making hippie songs nobody gives a shit about.  We both should be compensated equally.  Well if that is the case, fuck the 50 hour work week, fuck the continual skill development on my part, fuck the stress of managing an enterprise database.  I will write hippie songs nobody gives a shit about (and likely do a worse job than the guy in the comparison).

Multiply that by billions and global GDP declines on a massive scale. 

People shouldn't be compensated equally because talents, skills, productive capacity vary.  Capitalism is horribly flawed but it is the best system to match the needs of the population with the talents/assets/capital of the population.

It works because it doesn't require you to look out for the common good, nor does it expect you to.   Companies engage in brutal "combat" and to emerge victorious requires a better product, or better marketing (which is another product), or better prices (= production efficiency).   The entire system is made stronger because talents, resources, and capital flow to where they have the most benefit.

Sure division of that "pie" is uneven but Capitalism makes the pie bigger.  The "poor" today have a far better quality of life than say as a poor serf in the Middle Ages.  Their slice of the pie is smaller than say Donald Trump but the pie is magnitudes larger.

TL/DR version:
You build a system (even perfect) where the "slices" are even and you have broken the linking of work/assets/capital and reward.  There is no reason to be better because even if you are your slice isn't going to get any bigger.

"None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free."
     - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Fascist dictatorship and socialism aren't mutually exclusive.  One is a system of governance and the other an economic model.  If you want to get meta then pain is the currency of hell and it will be shared equally.