Ro Khanna’s Plan to Save Trump Country

I stopped reading at the implication that truck drivers are suffering from automation. They might in a few years, maybe, when Otto is mainstream and can actually handle "last mile" driving, but in the meantime, trucking companies are hiring rather aggressively right now from what I can tell (Swift, for example, has been breathing down my neck for weeks just because I put in an application on a whim - without even a Class A permit, mind you, let alone any experience behind the wheel of a big rig).

The reality is that driving a full-on tractor-trailer setup is way more complex than ordinary automobile driving, and carries way more safety implications. That means a much more complex (read: expensive) autopilot system is necessary to really replace the meatware behind the wheel. I'm all for automating away the simple parts, though, thus leaving the hard parts to the driver; that's doable with today's tech.

It's not going to gain traction. Basic income may have benefits but a better solution that can be pass is programs to retrain these out of work people for new jobs. Free education or trade would make us more competitive. A social safety net for those who lose jobs from automation is a reasonable solution.

Basic income is a pipe dream in term of a new idea and we can't even get universal healthcare. I rather have universal healthcare first before this concept.

How does basic income square with competitiveness. Imagine that there is a thing called an automatable job, that is a job that can be done by a robot who is going to replace a human. Imagine you tax a company based on the number of robots they have doing automatable jobs. You take this money and you give it to former workers for free as basic income. Now the question is competitiveness. Is a company any more competitive for having automated such a job rather than letting the former worker get paid for free? How does automation square with competitiveness. I don't really think it does. Competitiveness increases are only possible in cases where there are cost savings. If there are none, then how is your company any more competitive. You might as well as let the worker keep doing the job rather than automate it. This then I think has far reaching implications about how such an economy looks like and why anyone would choose to work in such an economy... other than the fact that you let companies keep more money and give less money to unemployed workers. But that then cuts into consumption. And only enriches the small minority who already hold most of the wealth further. Sooner or later you do get to a point where no one is working and everyone is getting paid and there is little point in the economy.

Automation also makes productivity into a commodity because all machines are equally as productive. Legislations such as patents make no sense in such an arena.

"One recent study found that for every one robot introduced to the workforce, six related human jobs disappear. But those six humans still need to get by. " [0]

I am not sure I agree with the definitions and impact of robots in the study. "Automation" helping with efficiency is not the same as "robots competing for human jobs".

"[...] which would roughly double the amount of money going into low-income families’ pockets. The main difference between Khanna’s plan and the Silicon Valley utopianists’ version of basic income is that for now recipients would still have to have a job to qualify. Think of it more as a basic income warm-up."

A basic income (also called basic income guarantee, Citizen's Income, unconditional basic income, universal basic income, or universal demogrant) is a form of social security in which all citizens or residents of a country regularly receive an unconditional sum of money, either from a government or some other public institution, in addition to any income received from elsewhere. [1]

Welfare is the provision of a minimal level of well-being and social support for citizens without current means to support basic needs. In most developed countries, welfare is largely provided by the government from tax income, and to a lesser extent by charities, informal social groups, religious groups, and inter-governmental organizations. [2]

It's a dog. Only, it's not. It's a fish. But it's a warm up for a dog, just give it a few billion years to evolve. /s

The problem is, next time someone talks about UBI, i'll not be certain what they mean. When too many different idea is lumped into the same word because you're trying to milk the market that invested in some concept related to the word, you just muddy the water. Like "AI" or "blockchain".

I like the idea of UBI[1] but I don't think it will be paid for by a government thats ~$15+ trillion in debt. Feels more like a publicity stunt but I am a pessimistic person in general so maybe I am wrong.

----------- [0] http://www.nber.org/papers/w23285

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_income

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welfare

Edit: Typos