I think the main benefit of an unconditional basic income, however small, is exactly to help us getting over the worst of protestant work ethic. Do we really need to make existential threats to people who don't accept the work that the government thinks they should be doing? If something really needs to be done, you can increase the pay until somebody does it.
>I think the main benefit of an unconditional basic income, however small, is exactly to help us getting over the worst of protestant work ethic.
Well, that presents you with a chicken/egg situation because for it to have any hope of becoming reality you will need to convince everybody (the majority of Americans) who believe that everybody should pull their weight.
>Do we really need to make existential threats to people who don't accept the work that the government thinks they should be doing?
Do we need to? No. Do I agree with you? Yes. But, most people think that it is a moral imperative that you should have to work for a living and we live in a kind of Democracy, so...
Until that part of our culture changes to accommodate we won't get basic income.
At the moment we're making existential threats to people who don't accept the work that the private sector (i.e. democratically unaccountable 1%) thinks that should be doing.
All I'm saying is that the government should provide decent jobs so that the 1% have to compete with the government and provide better jobs than they currently do.
