If a universal basic income started today with the stipulation that you had to put 40 hrs/wk towards making the world a better place or solving societal problems, how would you spend your time?
If a universal basic income started today with the stipulation...
Let me stop you right there. If there are any "stipulations," it ceases to be "universal" by definition.
Yep. That’s literally what a minimum wage job is
Except some minimum wage jobs involve making the world worse.
Lmao...a minimum wage job is not 40 hours a week of making the world a better place, and where I live, it cannot provide for the basic necessities of life.
The point of UBI is that it has no stipulations. It’s guaranteed no matter what.
Exactly. Its value becomes evident when a version gets to the stage where they can’t work. Very different from those that choose not to work.
And even more evident when you need to decide how to set up a bureaucracy, paperwork, and verification to judge whether someone else could be working more, or just not
Can that actually work in the real world though? If we all take the money and do nothing. Would that actually be sustainable?
Unclear. But eventually, people would work. People get bored, it's nice to have something to do, and get paid extra on top of it.
UBI just ensures that if they don't like a job, they can just quit, rather than be forced to keep working on pain of starvation.
Tests so far seem to be fairly positive about it working. People who get UBI aren't likely to sit on that money, they'll just go and spend it either paying back debts, or buying something nice for themselves, so the money will keep going around (just look at the COVID economic stimulus packages). They might even spend more than they might otherwise have, if they're not just scraping by.
It's a hypothetical question, read the room 🙄. He's just asking what you would do if you were tasked with making the world a better place.
You heard what I meant and I appreciate that. It was poorly phrased and I wish I had explained the theoretical better.
I qualified it with the "naturally industrious" thing because I wanted people to talk about what they'd do after they slept off the drudgery of current capitalism not immediately upon finding out they don't have to go to work anymore just to survive and have basic amenities. As you stated, I could have also phrased in an equally bad way where everyone just pointed at their job and said "I have no time or energy". That's the problem. I was trying to filter out the "If I had UBI, I would smoke weed and eat potato chips all day" answers.
If I had phrased my question as, "if you had a guaranteed income and were able to use 40hrs a week of your time to make the world a better place, what would you do?" That would have been better.
It’s just a job at that point, though.
At least you're doing something productive instead of just making Chris Kempczinski richer.
You are indeed, but it points to a fallacy in the original question. It's not universal basic income if it is stipulated that you have to do something to receive it.
Isn't that just a government job with extra steps? I thought the point of UBI is that it's meant to be, you know, universal.
As a side note, people have this tendency to think that government programs must be means-tested. That is, there must be a criteria that is met before someone is eligible for the program. Same with your assumption in the post - you assume that it must be better to add a stipulation. There seems to be this natural skepticism that if there is no criteria, people will take advantage of the program. I want to challenge that skepticism.
Adding criteria for eligibility inherently means the government must establish a bureaucracy for checking that the criteria is met. This has two notable downsides that people tend to not consider. First, it causes an applicant to wait longer before they can hear back from the program. With existing programs, it sometimes takes months before someone hears back. This ends up discouraging anyone from applying, even if they meet all the criteria. After all, what's the point of receiving aid in 3 months if you need the aid now?
Second, it causes the cost of the program to increase. A bureaucracy is difficult to maintain. The more money that is spent on checking for eligibility, the less money that people in need will get. And what is the work that such a bureaucracy will do anyways? How does it benefit society to hire someone to say that people's needs aren't "real enough" to get government aid?
Which leads me to a third, additional point - it's morally questionable to require people to meet a certain criteria before they can receive aid. To put it in another way, why do you feel like you need to gatekeep other people's needs? If a person says they're struggling, why should anyone say that they're not struggling enough?
I believe that people are naturally industrious and my goal in asking was to hear how peoples priorities would change without the threat of starvation and the like being weaponized by corporations to extract value from the working class. I know many of us would probably sleep for 2 months straight before starting anything. :-D
Perhaps the better question would have been:
If you had your basic needs guaranteed, how would you spend your time?
You should repost with that question.
I believe that people are naturally industrious
Universal basic income means no requirement to do anything.
However as a worker in healthcare, I'd probably continue as I am.
The problem is you can't really define what is "good for society". Maybe I think weird abstract art is good for society, whereas most people think it's a waste of time.
Who gets to decide?
That's an extreme example, but there are many such types of cases. Is a cash advance place "good for society"? It scams poor people but also provides them a line of credit that banks will not.
What about used car dealerships that sell overpriced cars at high interest? Is that "good"? Poor people get scammed but it gets them a car they otherwise would not be able to get a higher end dealership.
As for what I would do? Probably just contribute to open source projects or something.
disabled people (or others who cannot work) would be more fucked than they already are, raising the income floor for everyone except them, - this is why universal basic income is supposed to be universal
I left it open ended specifically so they could target their time how they wish. I know several disabled people who all contribute to my communities in various impactful ways, some without ever leaving the home. Having said that, my question could have been phrased better.
I’d sit at the end of my driveway and offer free hugs. That’s making the world better, imo
Hell yeah! I wish you could do that instead of going to work.
This is not universal basic income.
Making the world a better place doesn't need to be some grandiose revolutionary affair.
All the little things you do while being alive would add up. Whether it's hanging out with a friend, giving your pet some extra pats, or cleaning up your own space, and that would put you a good deal of the way there, if not be enough on its own.
You're describing something more like civil service than ubi I think. But if I was financially independent without a full time job I would focus on hobbies like music and find some advocacy cause to help support, probably separation of church and state or ai for everyone with easier to build and use models on consumer hardware, there's a few open source projects out there I'd like to understand better and contribute to if I had more time.
My union has me working 37 hours a week. Its not basic income if you have to work for it especially if you have to work more than a full time employment!
8hrs a day 5 days a week is normal employment. Some companies don't count lunches, so you stay there for 8.5 hrs.
Normal is subjective
37 hour workweek is normal here
https://businessindenmark.virk.dk/guidance/employment-and-dismissal/working-hours/
Are we counting raising kids? Because I feel like that would be the answer for the supermajority of people. It's super necessary work that society is utterly dependent on, yet we insist on not compensating.
Shit, we could just do UBI for parents and we'd be 80% there.
Assuming you actually are raising the kids. Plenty of utterly useless parents out there who end up raising other psychos.
Because they are forced to spend 50% of their awake time working to make other people rich. I'm sure this would get much better when people get the time to properly concentrate on raising a child and maybe even have time to visit a course on how to be a better parent
Germany does Kindergeld which translates to "kid money". Of course Germans don't want to have kids as much. Many Americans don't know what birth control is or how to use it (someone else on this thread is solving that issue). I absolutely believe that you should be able to take as much time as you need to ensure your kids grow up well. Plus, some kids are harder than others.
My current job is receiving/dispatching IT equipment to keep hospitals running, so I think I'd keep doing what I'm doing. It's a modest contribution, but someone has to make sure the people working on cures for cancer can get their email.
One of the unsung heros... no sarcasm. I chose not to imagine my dentist drilling around or my surgeon slicing me up without all their fancy tools and software. Why, because it's horrifying. Thank you for your contributions.
Disregarding the fallacy in your opening, and calling things for what they are:
If a conditional basic income started today with the stipulation that I had to put 40 hrs/week towards making the world a better place or solving societal problems,
I would spend them by becoming a politician and implementing true Universal Basic Income.
Sewing buttholes on teddy bears.
I would create "smart home" things for disabled people.
I had enough time then, to go, ask them and find out what is really helpful - without the need to make a profit.
For example, one has asked me why there isn't a washing machine for a wheelchair's wheels. A real problem. The wheels get dirty when he is outside, and then he enters the home and they are still dirty. The machine would have to work without him leaving the chair and it needs to be installed inside the home - not in a garage or so.
I guess I'd keep doing my current job and enjoy the extra income by spending it on luxurious things like grounded electrical outlets and updated plumbing that isn't falling apart.
Its funny that basis things like working plumbing, or access go clean water could be considered luxurious.
I would keep my current job as well but take a day off each week (instead of one of my weekend days) to cleanup my surrounding neighbourhood. I would probably use the extra income to repair some wood benches, buy paint to cleanup graffiti on walls, and throw down grass seeds along local trails.
Look at Money Bags over here
I'm a developer, I have some open source projects I don't have the time to invest in... I'd probably shift like 40% of my time to that open source projects.
I'm with you on the 40% thing. If I didn't need to put in 40hrs to get my health insurance, I would absolutely work on several smaller tasks instead of 1 big job, just to avoid the burnout that comes with doing the same thing for those long stretches of time. It also gives us context and allows us to make connections that we may not otherwise make.
Honestly, I would go back to being a park ranger. I loved the job and helping people in nature, I just couldn't survive on the pay. If that wasn't an issue, I would go back in an instant
Spreading awareness and availability of birth control and family planning. We've been above global carrying capacity for a long time now, and it will end badly. I'd try to soften the blow.
Good point, if people are inclined to be child-free, we should celebrate that and support them, not nag them every Christmas and ask when they're gonna have kids, also it's what allows others to have kids without contributing as much to overpopulation. It also means kids end up with parents who actually wanted kids. I'm totally on board with this.
Thanks, I appreciate that.
How the hell would one define "making the world a better place?' 😂
I'd imagine about 600 pages of beaurocratic law which has several addendums that nullify the definition entirely.
I think that's the entire point of this exercise. Thinking about what making the world better would actually mean and entail.
I think I’d keep my current job. 40/wk is the grind I worked to get away from.
Sick. What MLM are you a part of?
Telling people that think there can only ever be two viable political parties that they are 100% wrong.
You might be better off trying to change the US voting system. The first part the post system there is now will always result in two dominant parties https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=s7tWHJfhiyo
I was going to say something else but reading many people are right. UBI would never give a nice life so I would forgo it and work a normal job. The whole point of ubi is its there when you need it and really just gets you by. Very few people would want to subsist on it but if they had to they would.
I believe OP was referring to a utopian Star Trek style UBI where all things are provided with matter replication. Essential life at that point is the betterment of ones self and evwyone around them.
But you are correct in our world currently UBI would work more as a cushion or buffer. It would ideally allow individuals that are stuck in jobs they hate, to move to jobs they actually enjoy and are good at.
It would mean less fear of loosing a job and give workers more power. You would not be able to live on the wage at your current life style, but it would allow you to at least survive in someway if you lost your job.
I believe the best way for something like this to get implemented is by taxation of businesses that have automated they workforces. For example a car production line has removed human roles and replaced them with machines, or a store removed cashiers and replaced them with self checkouts.
I disagree on automation taxation as that is exactly what we want for post scarcity. What we really need to do is tax all forms of income progressively. No lower corp or capital gains or such. land tax possibly to. if it was like star trek that is a bit hard to handle as many of the things I might work out would theoretically already be solved.
I would do my current job for free with people who need it but couldn't afford it (massage) think seniors, sick, disabled ect. Also, spend time working with animal rescue/shelters in some way
I would not do anything, claiming that I'm preventing myself from making the world a worst place.
Haha joking. I'll start auditing open source project for free and improve the overall security of our whole infrastructure.
Deleting my socials (i spread misinformation)
What comes to mind:
Let's stack the trash on the lawns of the billionaires who own the companies that made it. My city council meetings are often at noon or one. Guess what I'm doing that time of day?
I have a few homelessness projects that I haven't had the energy to check up on in about a decade. One is a men's shelter. We haven't had a shelter for homeless men in our region in over a decade. I'd probably start working toward (re)opening one of those in my town.
I would lobby for our government to take Invasive Plants seriously. Sales of invasive plants needs to be banned from nurseries, and Highways/gov land owning entities need more money invested towards habitat restoration.
I'm with you, from the urban design perspective. Our cities should be fitting into nature as best they can, not steamrolling thousands of acres of ecosystems. You'd also free up the labor of all the people who will have to fix this mismanagement down the road.
Welp. I don't know if I'm capable of working to begin with my chronic illness. I'm unemployed currently and it's not even manageable at home, I've been in hospital twice in a month. And I've been having a flare up of it since January. So most two seasons so far.
I wish the system gave you more space to easily do this. I know people who are pinched between recovery and work and it's inhumane not to let them take a break. The system doesn't recognize that we have to take care of our own health and basic needs before we can maximize our helpfulness to others.
Honestly I make well above what the UBI would pay, so I’d keep doing what I do. But I have dreams of investing in garbage-burning power plants in the US, and having some of you able to help with this makes it much more obtainable.
Wouldn't that be absolutely terrible for air quality? It already feels like I'm sucking on a car exhaust in half the cities I visit.
I'd probably just roam around and look for problems, fixing them as I go.
Chaotic good handyman. I like it.
Make a bunch of politically conscious punk music.
I would argue with racists on the Internet
Someone has to educate those people, right?
I would start a community space with a dance hall, coffee shop, bike shop, maker space, brewery, and library centered on an urban trail to show people you can go places and do worthwhile things without an automobile. I'd include parking for cargo bikes, trikes and hand bikes, along with upright bikes and chargers for electric bikes. My hope being that the model would spread to other cities and higher density residential developments would spring up around it. Obviously my UBI wouldn't cover that no matter how generous it was, so step one would be to use my extra time to get buy in from like minded neighbors.
Since I was a kid I've wanted to be an inventor but I don't think of marketable things and hate the idea of locking my ideas up behind legal restrictions (I prefer to license my personal software and 3D print designs under the MIT "just make sure my name stays attached" license).
So yeah, I'd just design stuff and put it into the world...
Nice! I imagine this would do a lot to break down some of the ways intellectual property slows down progress. If we could freely borrow and build on other peoples designs with credit given, we'd be driving repairable, eco-friendly, car-planes by now.
Grow food
Teach. I already teach and I would continue to do so even if I had enough money to retire. I just love seeing young people discover the joy of programming and 3D modeling.
Free comp sci tutoring (which I often do anyway), make free courses and hold seminars, and make significant contributions to open source! That would be such fulfilling work if I didn't have to worry about money.
Convincing whoever's in charge of checking up on that sort of thing that the world is better off if I stay inside at least 40 hours a week.
To be completely honest, my life wouldn't change at all.
That is just so nebulous that you could almost do anything.
I am a hobby phographer, and I consider my photos mere existance as making the world a sliiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiightly better place.
I won't pretend that I am amazing at photography, but some fantastic pictures would not exist without me, there would absolutely be almost identical photos in existance, but not mine.
I like driving, so I guess I could be a driver for road trips in Europe, not in a bus, but in an estate car, artisenal road trips as you say, that would provide more good to the world than me just going to road trips alone and keeping most photos to myself.
Where is the threshhold for what is considered good to get the money?
I think that's reasonable. If your motivation is not to get some corporate chump to pay you enough to avoid starvation, I think its a good answer. Authentic culture is a "good" thing for the world and art is culture.
I would work as Chef in a communal restaurant where we cook the rich. Freshly served and hunted by ourselves.
Edgy
Taking freely licensed photos in the summer. Open source software development in the winter.
Probably just spend more time contributing to foss projects. Maybe write technical documentation.
That would be awesome. I know many of those projects need the help and some are more widely used than many proprietary corporate products.
Arguing with people on lemmy, people are wrong and the internet and the world totally needs my opinions to correct them.
I was an Ocean Lifeguard for several years after high school. I would do go back to that. Service to others fulfills that contract to make the world a better place. I loved that job, and I know I impacted several families for the better during that time.
If the job I already do does make the world better does that count or do I need to work 80 hours a week to get something that's 'universial'
Picking up trash
I'd join you and strap a broom to the bottom of my bike to sweep gutters and sidewalks!
I'd just keep doing my job instead
I already do, I'm a teacher. But if I could do anything to get paid, I'd run free English classes and conversation clubs for refugees
Same thing I do now but with a fatter bank account