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300 points pseudolus | 1 comments | | HN request time: 0s | source
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BrenBarn ◴[] No.44410806[source]
> I heard one answer more than any other: the government should introduce universal basic income. This would indeed afford artists the security to create art, but it’s also extremely fanciful.

Until we start viewing "fanciful" ideas as realistic, our problems will persist. This article is another in the long series of observations of seemingly distinct problems which are actually facets of a larger problem, namely that overall economic inequality is way too high. It's not just that musicians, or actors, or grocery store baggers, or taxi drivers, or whatever, can't make a living, it's that the set of things you can do to make a living is narrowing more and more. Broad-based solutions like basic income, wealth taxes, breaking up large market players, etc., will do far more for us than attempting piecemeal tweaks to this or that industry.

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tim333 ◴[] No.44411551[source]
Universal basic income is a bit impractical just now - give everyone free money and who will do the jobs that need doing? - but shortly will be very practical when robots/AI will do the jobs that need doing.
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graemep ◴[] No.44413048[source]
No, people always want more money.

Why do so many rich people who could afford to retire work hard to make more? Why does hardly anyone on a high hourly rate work the minimum hours they need for an adequate income?

There have been numerous trials of UBI and I have yet to heard of one that showed people worked significantly less when given it.

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1. tim333 ◴[] No.44413319[source]
I kind of figure people will work on things that don't really need doing like putting on music festivals etc. while the robots will do the essential work like grow food and take out the trash. Maybe I'm being optimistic. Although I have lived places where things worked a bit like that like when I was in South Africa a while ago with the blacks doing the less desirable jobs usually. So maybe like that but with robots?