[ericd]

I'm not convinced that letting everyone do what they want/feel passionate about is a good thing for the economy, and I'm quite sure that it's not the way it is because of a conspiracy of the people in power. Many, many people feel most passionate about things with nearly 0 economic value, and if they all had jobs doing those things, the economies that followed this kind of thinking would probably not be doing so well.

There are many things that need to be done to keep something as complicated as a world economy of specialists running, and many of them are not fun or intellectually stimulating. Maybe when robots have replaced us in all those roles, and programmers can wield the labor of a thousand workers.

[michaelochurch]

I'm advocating basic income, not "everyone does what they feel passionate about". After this one very important socialist reform, we'd still have an essentially free market. In fact, we'd have a freer market because people would be free, not forced by poverty to work. A lot of people don't have much vision or passion and would prefer doing things for money over not doing anything and settling for a lower-middle-class lifestyle. So the toilets would still be scrubbed, because people would pay others to do it.

On the other hand, the people who follow their passions would be merely living on not-very-much, but not at risk of starvation, long-term underemployment, medical bankruptcy, et cetera.