mptest

Surprising only to those who have not read literally any other study on UBI. They all come to this conclusion.

The only reason we don't have nice things like this: universal housing, healthcare, income, food security, is because a handful of dragons sit on and hoard unfathomably sized mountains of gold and convince the uneducated and those ignorant of economics and politics that the real problem is average people getting what they deserve - A dignified life where their basic needs are met and they have the dignified freedom to pursue a fulfilling life rather than spend it enriching aforementioned dragons for exploitative wages.

But it seems self-evident where constraints like markets or material conditions might demarcate usefulness and waste.

Even the learners who are as happy to hear about linguistics as they are material science I presume do some opportunity cost analysis as they learn. Personally speaking, I rarely, if ever, feel like I'm wasting time per se but I always recognize and am conscious of the other things I could be doing to better maximize alternative objectives. That omnipresent consciousness may just be anxiety though I guess...

>Baher Azmy, an attorney for Khalil, told NBC News: "These late-breaking, after-the-fact allegations, silly as they are, primarily show that the government must know the supposed 'foreign policy' grounds for Mahmoud’s removal are absurd and unconstitutional."

>Azmy said the government's new claims "cannot change the obvious fact the government has admitted — he is being punished in the most autocratic way for his constitutionally protected speech."

>the government has admitted — he is being punished in the most autocratic way for his constitutionally protected speech.

Gee, almost like we should have a legal system that sorts this stuff out before we take violent action against people here legally.

from your own source

>However, the government will have to prove to the immigration judge that Khalil willfully failed to disclose that information, and whether that disclosure would have impacted his eligibility for permanent residency.

There is a reason we have a court system, and to sort out these issues BEFORE we take violent action against people here legally is entirely the point.

The fascists are using a law from hundreds of years ago that's only been invoked thrice, all while at war, and the last time to wrongfully put the japanese in internment camps, to circumvent due process - that is the forrest you seem to be willingly missing for the trees.

Left wing positions, while they control no branches of the government and have no power is literally to raise alarms about what the fascists are doing, and how silly their propagandized reasoning is. That is exactly what I'm doing.

pushing ideology of anti fascists == calling out right wing bs using evidence (climate change, vaccine science, hell, any scientific research at this point all tick both of your boxes)

My last comment had about six sources, but I could find dozens more if you still find yourself blind and tasting fascist boot.

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2025/03/trump-el-salvad...

https://www.keranews.org/immigration/2025-03-28/dallas-man-m...

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politic...

>ice collateral arrests

https://www.reddit.com/r/law/s/GKVwaG1x1i (fox news video clip of tom Homan - trumps border czar -admitting it)

https://www.cbsnews.com/amp/boston/news/boston-ice-arrests-c...

https://newrepublic.com/post/193142/trump-border-czar-tom-ho...

https://www.wbur.org/news/2025/03/26/massachusetts-ice-colla...

Is straight from the horse's mouth enough for you? I could go on and on and on if you wanna keep getting owned by receipts.

>I'm sorry you see...next time

You're the one who can't even find sources I found in 30 sec, but I'm the one who needs a critical thinking cap? You're a joke and you would've supported the nazis because "cmon, it's just a few cherry picked millions who got caught up in that!" Perhaps your desire to lick the boot outweighs your critical thinking skills. If you knew anything about how fascist regimes work you'd know this is simply stage one, not some anomalous happenstance.

Yeah, fair point, I hadn't really thought about it that way. You're absolutely right, that is obviously a policy, and one that people don't agree with, woe unto them...

I guess it's like that author said: "It's easier to envision the end of the world than the end of capitalism." I fell in to that trap of assumption, taking that not as a policy prescription, but as a far off amorphous aspiration.

I guess because it's obvious to me that even if he had had a super-majority that "ending capitalism" would still be a decades long reconstruction of the economy, not something one could put in to a bill put to congress. Plus I always saw him more as opposed to unrestrained capitalism in segments of our life that were basic needs, rather than opposition to capitalism as an idea. I must admit I do still hold some rose colored glasses, I guess.

>I should acknowledge, they were all boomers.

haha. unsurprising. I know first hand the type you describe, as someone who campaigned for him twice and is involved in local politics.

All I have to offer this forum while I'm a student is politics, which I do know better than at least some here. There is no technology I can really offer a valuable opinion on, more than the experts here.

It's my armchair activism to at least make sure that the left's point of view is not wholly absent on this forum of affluent, insulated tech bros. Plus, my job has a lot of down time, so there are worse ways I could spend it.

Wholly agreed, and I'm unfortunately way too lazy to do that. But I did look at and cite one snapshot in time where all his policy positions had a majority support (except 15$ min wage because it was framed with "risk of job losses")

>consider how Obama...helping out enough

Yeah, agreed, which I think is more evidence that reality, unfortunately, holds less water than whatever the tv/ipad/iphone tells you to believe about the world. That plus the average american reading comprehension being at or below sixth grade level makes for a tough sell of anything but very simple language, very simple policy. And just in general, an uneducated populace tends to be more susceptible to voting against their own interests.

I agree, part of it may be his extreme language off-putting those who don't really know what socialism even means, ie the average american. Keep in mind the average american has reading comprehension at or below that of an average sixth grader. Try selling any complex idea or radical change (even for the better) to a sixth grader, it's going to be tough.

There are many things this statistic masks. How many households were dual income vs single income over that same time span? This also doesn't take in to account cost of living changes, which I'm confident have risen more than 20%. Sorry in advance if I'm wrong. Inflation erosion, how CPI is calculated to make things look better than they are (too much to get in to), but my point is that statistic is not the holy grail of progress.

>unemployment is lower

Won't argue that one

>life expectancy is higher

As would be expected with 35 years of progress in medicine? Plus, that statistic hides we've actually plateaued and even declined compared to other OECD nations.

>Air pollution... gay marriage is legal

Won't argue with those, though I wonder how much longer the air will be cleaner when the current admin has severely weakened the EPA and clean air/water regulations.

>The living standards...30-40 years.

Are you deriving that from the median real income? Even assuming it's true, why are a growing percentage of american's living paycheck to paycheck?

>Housing affordability is worse...local

That's... a pretty big one... I'd argue it could be greatly helped by federal policy against oh idk, stopping private equity from buying up homes and apartments, severe taxes on 2nd or 3rd properties, unoccupied property, etc.

All I'm saying is, there's a reason average americans aren't pickin up what you are puttin down. I don't think it's just a feeling.

I don't have all the historical polling data to say this with certainty, but his policies were pretty much always supported by a majority of the american public from a cursory perplexity search (grain of salt and all that, but seriously, can you think of one policy of his that wasn't popular?)

The more important question, to me at least, than "in 2016 did america think bernie was a crazy leftist?" is, "why, when his policies all had majority voter support, did the candidate himself carry the McCarthy era veil of 'crazy leftist' and 'communist'"?

And I think the answer is the same as in my original comment, a concerted effort from the billionaire class (who own all our media) to do anything BUT accurately portray the guy who vocally wanted to cost them money in favor of those who wanted to enrich them. I think the billionaire class almost always plays a bigger role than we think, but that might just be all the books I read about the machinations of the rich and powerful to manufacture consent. I'm no expert.

Oh and the agency already has a well documented history of arresting innocent people? Look up "ice collateral arrests" "autism awareness deportation" or "soccer coach deported for real madrid inspired tattoo" or "tourist arrested" or "tourist held at border" to get a litany of examples. I'm sorry I pay closer attention to the erasure of our civil liberties than you do.

Of course I'm not judging the situation based solely on the video. I actually read about the case, but when I searched for the video that was just the first link.

I (clearly falsely) expected six plainclothes feds tossing a PhD student in to the back of an unmarked van would resonate more with the crowd here... I figured if you cared you'd look more in to it, rather than rush to defend the regime... Silly me, I guess.

That very well may be, but considering all his policies do[0], the question must be asked, why?

Maybe we should ask ourselves why, when the american majority supported his entire policy agenda, did they not support him?

Could it be perhaps the billionaire owned media misrepresenting him and his positions? His own party conspiring to take him out of the primary running? Or just average voter ignorance? No one has ever contended that americans always vote in their best interest, after all.

[0] https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2020/feb/25/pete-butti...

>we don't know wha tthat woman did.

All she did was write a piece against israel, and either way, her due process was violated, which is the problem here. She was not charged with any crimes... How are you seriously hung up on the video source when there's a video of masked, plain clothes federal agents "arresting" a random PhD student with no warrant, and no crimes committed?

Frightening barometer reading for this community that this is what you focus on...

Everyone should at least watch this video. Taken in America. "Land of the free."

That this is only one of many such videos is terrifying if you know the history of fascist regimes.

I hope everyone here is familiar with the "first they came for the communists..." poem.

Yeah, I was a little heated, because I misunderstood what you meant by cost-gated, and thought you were being rhetorical and bad faith. My bad there.

We simply had different definitions of cost-gated, and talked past each other because of it.

>my point that healthcare in countries with universal healthcare systems (and America, if it were to adopt one), is cost gated

Sure, but... who cares? It still produces better outcomes, better coverage, better in nearly every measurable way. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

>Cost gated meaning people who need or want treatment will not be able to receive it in a timely manner in all cases.

Yeah, sure, but that really isn't the point. The point was that free at point of service (what I meant by not cost-gated) healthcare produces better outcomes, covers a larger % of citizens, and is generally simply a better way to do healthcare. Not receiving in a timely manner is miles better than not receiving at all because you can't afford it. That's a pretty worthy delineation to make, even if you could in the abstract call both "cost-gated".

The overall point is socialized medicine costs less, provides better outcomes, covers more people. All the rest is besides the point I was trying to make. Sorry again for coming in so hot, I'm clearly much too used to arguing with much more dishonest people than yourself.

Ok, I see where the misunderstanding arose. Cost-gating in this context meant, to me, preventing access to healthcare based on if the individual can pay at point of service, not if the state program can pay to see people quickly or whatever. Apologies for not giving the best faith interpretation to your comment, but you can hopefully see why I misunderstood your use of the term.

Sure, as a byproduct of systematically underfunded social health programs, you see a similar effect in countries with social healthcare, but I refuted the importance of that point pretty completely by explaining the m.o of austerity politicians and worse than gilded-age levels of wealth inequality[0] as the sources of social healthcare systems' ails and the clear fact that it's still a much better system by any measure.

The outcomes are still better, cheaper, and more have access to healthcare. So, not really relevant to the point that public healthcare > privatized healthcare? The rest is semantic word games. We're talking about which system provides better outcomes to more people for less money. And there is no question as to the answer of that.

>Disinformation about the measles

Sure, I was unaware how severe the anti vaccination rhetoric has taken root in europe too. My tongue in cheek dig at measles being back in the US was not meant to be taken that seriously, but more like a "point and laugh at the us" addendum.

But you are right, though it's besides the point completely. That we're the only country suffering from anti vax idiots is incorrect, sure. But it is not even really part of the argument here, more just a dig on the US. Idk why that tiny part of the discussion was fixated on. Probably because it's the only point I wasn't correct about.

[0] https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2025/03/02/trump-musk...

Giving $x to healthcare is almost always better than giving $x to welfare, as well funded universal healthcare reduces OOP costs for citizens, which reduces their need to consume other welfare services.[0,1]

[0] https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10733771/

[1] https://www.adb.org/sites/default/files/publication/214481/a...

I respond in good faith until the other party shows themselves not to be, and his glib rhetoric of "what do you mean, cost-gated?" while in the next sentence demonstrating he knows exactly what I'm speaking of - a public healthcare option - made it clear what type of person I was dealing with, and it wasn't a good faith commenter.

I've heard every argument that guy made and can make 1000 times over from fox news talking heads or an equivalent level person.

What strengthens my positions are, well, the truthfulness of them. All of the facts and studies support my message, playing nice with a bad faith commenter has no bearing on any of the facts I presented.

Not to mention he calls a thought out, four citation response "unhinged prattle" because he refuses to engage with any of my responses (he knows i'm right) to his dishonest comment. It's the conservative m.o, I've seen it a thousand times.

If you can't/won't accept reality because there was some extremely mild condescension, that's on you. Plus that guy deserved no good faith, I've heard his exact comment from every conservative talking head for a decade+, I know guys like him backwards to forwards (politically)

Complains I didn't answer every one of his points AND that my response was too long. Clearly a dishonest propagandist or a fool.

I mean, raise taxes on businesses (wanna guess how many walmart employees are on government aid, i.e how much we tax payers are directly subsidizing their exorbitant profits while they pay their employees below a living wage?)Tax the rich, (3 individuals hoard more wealth than 50% of the country combined) + Cut some large percentage of insurance jobs, military spending, and use that money to provide healthcare to every american, without spending time and money making sure they're poor before we deign them able to receive help. really, it's quite simple.

>Public healthcare systems in other countries have procedures they don't cover, and significant wait periods (i.e., shortages) to see doctors and specialists and have procedures done.

Agreed there. Ever wonder why?

Taking your point earnestly for a moment, can you earnestly tell me that's not still miles better than America, with more expensive outcomes, worse care outcomes, lowering life expectancy compared to poorer nations, record maternal mortality rates, and tons of medical bankruptcies?[2]

Cmon, be serious. Go fund me is one of the bigger health insurance systems in the country.[3] Btw, medicare for all saves tremendous amounts of money vs our current system.[1] Much like ubi, the science is clear, but the rich and the naive are too brainwashed or dumb by the propaganda of the oligarchy owned media to think American's deserve healthcare, housing, a dignified life.

Seriously, Compare your "worst case" to america, where people simply can't afford to see the specialists, or get the procedures at ALL. I know which one I would have and my opinion is backed by the sentiment, and empirical data of, like I said, literally every even half developed nation in the world. Your can offer nothing against this. It's simply fact.

That's not even to speak about women dying from things like birth complications because their draconian state let the theocratic fascists dictate what a women and their doctor can and can't do with their own body.[0]

>because of the cost

Drastic, brazen or glib misunderstanding of history and politics. Throughout conservative governments, from reagan to thatcher to bush to trump, the objective of these ayn rand reading dummies, (read, austerity politicians) are as follows:

1. cut funding to vital social agency.

2. point to resulting difficulties as proof it's a silly system.

3. sell it off to private corporations and get hefty kickbacks.

THAT is what causes all of the (still lesser than ours) problems you lament.

>the idea you can just let people have it and not worry about costs isn't true

Where did I say that again?

Man, if only someone had thought of that. If only we had a 1% that controls almost 40% of the wealth in this country. We could raise taxes to pay for such a program. Btw, I reiterate, every study, (even from neocon think tanks) recognize it would save us hundreds of billions.) But austerity/conservative politicians don't want to improve the lives of us, they want to enrich their fellow oligarchs.

Even thinking about this for a second will validate the notion. Instead of hundreds and thousands of employees whose job it is to give the least care to the least people for profit, maybe spend that money oh, idk, giving people healthcare? How much healthcare could've been provided from Luigi's cough victim's salary? If instead of getting paid millions to use AI to deny healthcare to those in need, that money was oh idk, spent on healthcare?

>Health is like around quarter of entire government expenditure, it's fantastically expensive.

Gee, I wonder what the cause of that is. Oh wait, I know this one too. Pretty common conservative talking point. Have you heard of the phrase "an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure?"

Do you think a system where people are afraid to go to the dr for economic reasons contribute at all to the drastic healthcare expenses? I know someone that works as an ER nurse, people do not come in til they're at deaths door, with an issue that would have been remedied for a 100th the cost had they simply been able to see a doctor when first troubled. And again, all studies point to medicare for all saving hundreds of billions vs our current system.[1]

>Around the same amount of welfare expenditure, so you could double the number of people receiving welfare or double the amount that welfare recipients get for the same price, for example, which would be lifechanging for millions of the poorest and most disadvantaged people.

Or we could idk, just stop wasting money on evil "who deserves help" jobs and just you know, give that money directly to the people our government is supposed to improve the lives of? This goes for welfare, healthcare, unemployment, etc, too. How much of our social safety nets' budgets are spent in bureaucrats meant to make it difficult to get those benefits? To subsidize billion $ corporations? To bail out banks who speculated on subprime mortgages? To fund a $9T war on terror that did nothing but make us more enemies?

[0] https://steady.substack.com/p/women-in-texas-are-dying

[1]https://www.commondreams.org/news/medicare-for-all-introduce...

[2] https://www.pnhp.org/docs/AJPHBankruptcy2019.pdf

[3] https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2024/02/gofundme-...

It's busy work, this eroding civil liberties stuff.

Nikola's convicted ceo is defended by the current AG's relative btw, and even less surprisingly, donated over a million to trumps campaign. Oh yeah and measles is back and we're not doing the flu vaccine next year. We're totally a serious country, not a rapidly waning oligarchy.

edit: Sorry, I'm pretty drunk. to answer your more complex query yes the calls I've gotten have all been obviously non commercial. I do agree with the sentiment that safeguards need be carefully considered. like some proof you're blind maybe before you can be a requester for image analysis. I hear your cynicism but the app has been around a long time and it is beyond just pure unbridled mutual aid. it feels great to help and the blind get to temporarily have an eyed friend on hand, on demand. it's a wonderful app, download it and hope you get a call!