*** The Official MAGAposting thread ***

[wufwugy]

I know what you're getting at. It's not like the money vanishes, but it will go to a smaller and smaller percentage of the population. It will be the current situation exacerbated. If you want a visual, look at Mumbai.

Where does the money that business owners gain come from?

What about Mumbai is related?

[oskar]

Where does the money that business owners gain come from?

What about Mumbai is related?

It has one of the most picturesque divides in wealth. You have homes with heli pads and 3rd world shacks where naked children scavenge for food in the same city. It's been experiencing massive economic growth in the last 10 years, but the large majority are only spectators to it.
I'm not saying that is something we need to worry about in the next 10, 20 or even 50 years, but gradually you'll get to a point where average joe will simply not be needed. It will always be more efficient to put a machine in his place. So, you could say, since he can no longer pay, demand goes down, and prices drop. But if your income is zero, any price is too high.

What is the free market no-welfare outlook for people whose entire job sector disappears? Transportation and warehousing is a sizable sector that probably won't follow projections, but will almost certainly disappear from the job market within 20 years. Where do you see someone who has driven trucks for 25 years go after that sector dies down completely? I'll give you that in the long run maybe new sectors will open up, but what is your theory on what will happen to those individuals?

[BananaStand]

But if your income is zero, any price is too high.

If income is zero, there is no market. Which hurts buyers just as much as sellers. So there you go, now you don't have to worry about a wealth divide. Everyone's broke.

In other words, the scenario you're describing is impossible.

I'll give you that in the long run maybe new sectors will open up, but what is your theory on what will happen to those individuals?

The same thing that happened to all the workers in all the ash-tray factories over the last 100 years. they survived.

[spoonitnow]

In other words, the scenario you're describing is impossible.

There is no cure. You're trying to talk sense into zombies.

[BananaStand]

There is no cure. You're trying to talk sense into zombies.

It seems like such an obvious concept. If all the jobs are eliminated through automation....and no one can afford to buy anything.....then what are the robots gonna make, and to whom will they sell it?

How the hell do people manage to think around this??

[spoonitnow]

It seems like such an obvious concept. If all the jobs are eliminated through automation....and no one can afford to buy anything.....then what are the robots gonna make, and to whom will they sell it?

How the hell do people manage to think around this??

Brawndo has electrolytes.

[wufwugy]

It has one of the most picturesque divides in wealth. You have homes with heli pads and 3rd world shacks where naked children scavenge for food in the same city. It's been experiencing massive economic growth in the last 10 years, but the large majority are only spectators to it.

I would like to know some details. I'm not asking for you to provide them since you may not have them, just saying I would like details. If it is through market capitalism that people are getting wealthy in Mumbai, it necessarily means the consumers of the good/services of the capital owners are getting wealthy. I'm not saying this is the case in Mumbai; it could (and may) not be an example of market capitalism. Even so, when it comes to the poor scavenging food in the streets, context is needed. Thomas Sowell's fundamental question "Opposed to what?" is good here. Even if a very poor place undergoes decades of 10% real growth, there will still be poor people scavenging for food for some, most, or all of those years.

I'm not saying that is something we need to worry about in the next 10, 20 or even 50 years, but gradually you'll get to a point where average joe will simply not be needed.

If there is no work for humans due to efficiency gains and humans are still the dominant market force (which is what is being posited), it means people have everything they want. This is because it would mean that humans are consuming the goods/services produced in the markets yet humans are unable to use their human capital to make themselves better off.

Something else worth mentioning is how the concept of a "job" is simply formal and doesn't fully represent use of human capital. Human capital is essentially a human's ability to work (with hands, with mind, etc.). I'm not sure how productive discussing this now would be (unless you want to), though I figured I would mention it. There are lots of interesting things in there. Like how with enough efficiency gains, we might not think in terms of jobs, we might not use money, stuff like that.

What is the free market no-welfare outlook for people whose entire job sector disappears? Transportation and warehousing is a sizable sector that probably won't follow projections, but will almost certainly disappear from the job market within 20 years. Where do you see someone who has driven trucks for 25 years go after that sector dies down completely? I'll give you that in the long run maybe new sectors will open up, but what is your theory on what will happen to those individuals?

The changes are marginal. Most (all) industries are continually losing jobs due to efficiency gains. Because this never happens all at once and because there are marginal differences between people, an industry can go from robust to nothing over the span of several decades without causing much displacement above average. In your scenario, the most common response is along the lines of the 25 year trucker would usually keep his job just fine while new truckers would not be hired. An experienced trucker is more valuable than an inexperienced one. At first, automated trucking will only be used at the lowest level of skill. Over time that will gradually increase.

[wufwugy]

If there is no work for humans due to efficiency gains and humans are still the dominant market force (which is what is being posited), it means people have everything they want.

Actually it doesn't mean they have everything they want, but that they have everything they want that they are capable of gaining by using effort and resources.

[wufwugy]

With enough efficiency gains, people would prefer to do things and give things away for free. There are costs to putting prices on things. With enough efficiency gains, people would get more subjective benefit from not pricing something than by pricing something. We see this in action already, like with Bill Gates. It costs him more subjectively to not do all the charity work he does. This is showing us that Bill Gates gets more benefit out of helping people eradicate a disease than he does the amount of his monetary wealth it costs him. Not only does Bill Gates not want to make more monetary wealth off of eradicating disease, but the subjective benefit is so great that he prefers to spend monetary wealth for his subjective emotional-type gains.

Something I think worth thinking about.

[oskar]

Banana, if you knew what Bill Gates thinks about taxation, you'd get an aneurysm.

With enough efficiency gains, people would prefer to do things and give things away for free. There are costs to putting prices on things. With enough efficiency gains, people would get more subjective benefit from not pricing something than by pricing something. We see this in action already, like with Bill Gates. It costs him more subjectively to not do all the charity work he does. This is showing us that Bill Gates gets more benefit out of helping people eradicate a disease than he does the amount of his monetary wealth it costs him. Not only does Bill Gates not want to make more monetary wealth off of eradicating disease, but the subjective benefit is so great that he prefers to spend monetary wealth for his subjective emotional-type gains.

Something I think worth thinking about.

That system works if you look at people like Elon Musk, Bill Gates, Mark Shuttleworth, but it's not universally true that people who come to great wealth are going to put money into humanitarian aid. To go back to Mumbai where Mukesh Ambani, estimated at 41bn net worth builds himself a 1bn mansion and then decides he doesn't want to live in it because it doesn't quite meet his idea of feng shui or something along those lines. So you have this bizarre monument to wealth in a city where the per capita income is $3k. Even if you look at it purely economical, I have a hard time believing that that kind of expenditure is equal to... anything else really. The people who built it got paid, but that's where it ends. Compare that to taxing the fuck out of that guy and putting the money into humanitarian aid for the region and education. People are a resource, right? If you have more people with a higher education and practical skills, that has to be good for the economy.

The one thing I'm curious about is... you guys want welfare completely gone, right? So what would happen to people who currently rely on welfare? And let's cut that down to the those who are not gaming the system but genuinely cannot be employed. There has to be at least one, right?

[BananaStand]

The one thing I'm curious about is... you guys want welfare completely gone, right? So what would happen to people who currently rely on welfare? And let's cut that down to the those who are not gaming the system but genuinely cannot be employed. There has to be at least one, right?

I've argued many times that any humane society will provide economic safety nets for the disabled and those afflicted by hardship.

But that's been taken WAAAAAAYYYY to the extreme.

Take a guess at how much money the food stamp program spends on regular Pepsi. It's supposed to be a program to keep people from starving, instead its keeping people in cheetos.

[spoonitnow]

The one thing I'm curious about is... you guys want welfare completely gone, right?

I can only speak for myself, but no. I want welfare to be changed to a format that gives incentives to become self-sufficient for those who can instead of giving incentives to stay on welfare indefinitely.

So what would happen to people who currently rely on welfare? And let's cut that down to the those who are not gaming the system but genuinely cannot be employed. There has to be at least one, right?

Let's break people who currently rely on welfare into two groups: people who genuinely can or cannot be employed. For the first group, refer to the above. For the second group, charity is more efficient with less waste and better results than government-mandated programs. However, this second group is a tiny, tiny fraction of the current expense on welfare. I'd probably prefer some sort of combination of government and charity forms of help from the position of a fiscal conservative.

Take a guess at how much money the food stamp program spends on regular Pepsi. It's supposed to be a program to keep people from starving, instead its keeping people in cheetos.

The bold section above is a great example of what I'm talking about here. It's literally tax dollars subsidizing Pepsi in this example you're giving here.

[wufwugy]

The bold section above is a great example of what I'm talking about here. It's literally tax dollars subsidizing Pepsi in this example you're giving here.

An interesting thing here is that attempting to solve this problem suggests a real problem when there is too much centralization.

The amount of Pepsi at his expense a person thinks should be given to somebody designated in need of help that he has never met is most likely LESS than what he would give to a person he knew personally that he was trying to help.

[wufwugy]

Banana, if you knew what Bill Gates thinks about taxation, you'd get an aneurysm.


That system works if you look at people like Elon Musk, Bill Gates, Mark Shuttleworth, but it's not universally true that people who come to great wealth are going to put money into humanitarian aid.

I made the Bill Gates point in the context of the idea that there is so much prosperity that there are no jobs. Not everybody is kind-hearted or philanthropic. In a world with so much efficiency and so much prosperity that nobody can even work, any amount of philanthropy would be more than enough to make that a better off world than if it was less efficient and people had to work. But it's whatever, I don't think revisiting this will yield much so you can respond and I'll listen and leave it at that.

The people who built it got paid, but that's where it ends. Compare that to taxing the fuck out of that guy and putting the money into humanitarian aid for the region and education.

So the people get money for doing nothing? Wouldn't that reinforce their desire to do nothing while encouraging them to do more nothing and get more subisides for their more nothing? I get how this sounds too cynical to be real, yet that is how these things go down in practice. And it makes sense in theory. What that theory also says is that getting people to earn money will have the opposite effect than the above by making them want to earn and even earn more.

So, what does that mean? It means that welfare with strings attached is a better idea than with no strings attached. In general, people agree with that. But wait, you have to compare the gains of that with the cost of creating and maintaining the system. And we know that the costs are worse when done through taxation than when done competitively, so doesn't that give us our answer?

People are a resource, right? If you have more people with a higher education and practical skills, that has to be good for the economy.

Depends on what it costs to get that. If the costs are low enough, yeah it's good. How do we get the lowest costs?


We should keep in mind that a lot of what is being proposed with aid is along the lines of "people are not doing what we think they should, so let's help them so they will do what we think they should." Let me illustrate this with an anecdote. One of my good friends grew up as a missionary in Africa. He spent a tremendous amount of time there, like half of his childhood and teenage life and he ALWAYS talked about how much he loved it there. He now teaches English in Korea. Back when he was making the moves to start teaching English in Korea I asked him why he wanted to go to Korea instead of Africa since he loves Africa so much. He essentially told me that teaching in Africa is a nightmare because the native population despises education. In general, they actively believe education to be a negative thing and that subverting education (like cheating) is a virtue, according to his substantial experience. Is spending more on education gonna change that? Are people who do not like education going to start liking it when the Cultured Saviors show up to change the Unwashed Barbarians, or is it more likely that the shithole education system they already have derives from their negative values about education?

The one thing I'm curious about is... you guys want welfare completely gone, right? So what would happen to people who currently rely on welfare? And let's cut that down to the those who are not gaming the system but genuinely cannot be employed. There has to be at least one, right?

That's a great question. Before I respond to it, let's step back for a second.

Lots of words have been said on this board on the topic of government and markets. My position has always been based on only this one foundation: it is better to have a competitive system decide rather than a monopoly decide. I've always thought people who need help should be helped. What I propose is that using a competitive system rather than a monopoly is a more effective way to do that. So, here is what I believe:

Results are better when individuals, families, and communities make the decisions relevant to them than for a tax-based government to make their decisions for them. This is better because the former functions like a competitive market and the latter functions like a monopoly. That is better because economic theory teaches that competitive markets more effectively increase quantity and decrease price while also increasing quality. This theory, while used in markets of goods and services with money, applies just the same to any system where people have preferences and resources are allocated.


So, here's my answer to your very good question that needs to be answered.

What amount of money greater than what people would freely choose to give to those they think need it should the government tax and give to people the government thinks need it? My guess is that when people think upon this question, the answer is inevitably zero. If it is greater than zero then that means that somebody thinks the government that is supposed to represent the people should technically NOT represent the people. So, we can move past this, because we know the government should tax and spend zero percent more on welfare than the people think the government should.

That leaves us with an x amount of money that people think should go to welfare. So then the question is are we better off in aggregate if the government spends that as the government sees fit or if the individuals spend it as the individuals see fit. A superficial view says no we are not better off because that implies that each individual thinks that the government knows better than the individual does about the individual's preferences. A more in depth view looks to economic theory IMO, which says that results will be better if competitive rather than if non-competitive.

[oskar]

What amount of money greater than what people would freely choose to give to those they think need it should the government tax and give to people the government thinks need it? My guess is that when people think upon this question, the answer is inevitably zero. If it is greater than zero then that means that somebody thinks the government that is supposed to represent the people should technically NOT represent the people. So, we can move past this, because we know the government should tax and spend zero percent more on welfare than the people think the government should.

That leaves us with an x amount of money that people think should go to welfare. So then the question is are we better off in aggregate if the government spends that as the government sees fit or if the individuals spend it as the individuals see fit. A superficial view says no we are not better off because that implies that each individual thinks that the government knows better than the individual does about the individual's preferences. A more in depth view looks to economic theory IMO, which says that results will be better if competitive rather than if non-competitive.

The potential problem I see with this is that you essentially have a majority decide over the minority and while it's not impossible, it's definitely not self-evident that the majority will act with the best interests of the minority in mind.

I appreciate you typing all of this out. I might respond to more of it later. I take great issue with that teaching in africa anecdote but it would take an equal or greater wall of text for me to respond to that.