[yazboo]

> it is likewise righteous and just that you, who are fully capable of supporting yourself, should support yourself, rather than burdening others with your support

Righteous and just according to who? I would much rather live in a society that takes money from its wealthiest members (myself included) to make a basic allotment for living expenses so people can do as they wish.

[fennecfoxen]

According to me.

Alternatively, according to anyone who has been raised with sufficiently decent morals, religious or secular, or, quite aside from such explicit inculcation, has inferred from their circumstances, life experiences, and the condition of others who inhabit the world around them, a basic sense of humility: anyone who does not imagine that the world revolves around them, and certainly not to the extent that they believe that they deserve to be supplied by others with a lifestyle of leisure (particularly while others and other causes remain far needier than they).

Alternatively: according to anyone who has been educated with knowledge of the world economy, so as to possess a basic understanding that, even should we plunder the entire wealth of the upper classes (however you define them), the sum would be wholly inadequate to purchase unlimited leisure on demand for all who may ask of it, and moreover, that if such plunder did occur, there would in any event be many more urgent and meaningful projects for such wealth to be directed to. Or, to rephrase, according to anyone who understands that the math of what they are asking is nonsense.

Alternatively: according to King Solomon, or whoever really did write Ecclesiastes: "For a person may labor with wisdom, knowledge and skill, and then they must leave all they own to another who has not toiled for it. This too is meaningless, and a great evil."

I could probably go on, but that would be gratuitous.

[halfcat]

> should

> According to me.

> I could probably go on, but that would be gratuitous

This is a problem for your argument. You could go on indefinitely, but it would never move your argument forward by a non-zero value. Are you familiar with "is vs ought"?

In AI research we know that an AI can accumulate many "is" forms of intelligence, like "the car is red", or whatever. Other "is" conclusions can be derived from the existing collection of "is" assumptions.

But an "ought" can not be derived from "is" statements. An "ought" can only be justified if you assume some prior "ought", which is a non-trivial problem for AI, and for people making claims about what someone else ought to do.

So you can't say it "is" hot outside, so therefore I "ought" to drink some water, unless you assume some prior "ought". Like, "you ought to not want to die of dehydration, and it is hot outside, therefore you ought to drink some water". But should I ought to not want to die of dehydration? Maybe, but only if you assume another ought.

Your ought claim about what people should do if they are capable depends on other people's opinions about what ought to be, whether it's what "educated people" think ought to be, or what "moral people" think ought to be, or what King Solomon said ought to be. But those are all arbitrary opinions, which can't be justified without assuming additional arbitrary opinions.

It's ought all the way down. Meaning, each person has to decide what's important to them, and it ends up being rather arbitrary in the end.

[fennecfoxen]

> This is a problem for your argument. You could go on indefinitely, but it would never move your argument forward by a non-zero value. Are you familiar with "is vs ought"?

Are you familiar with the concept of diminishing marginal return on investment?

[CptFribble]

There is no moral imperative to toil for its own sake. If I remember correctly, the imperative for Adam to earn his food by the sweat of his brow was not a description of "moral" or "correct" life, it was in fact a punishment.

Your not-so-subtle intimation that people who want basic income are amoral is both offensive on its face and ignorant of reality. There are many, many people who are trapped in difficult, dangerous, unpleasant, or insufficient jobs for a variety of reasons and circumstances. Basic income - while complicated to implement certainly - is not about allowing us all to live a life of dotage. It's about freeing people from having to dedicate their entire lives enriching a wealthy investor, just so they can put food on the table and a roof overhead.

Work is not a valued goal in-and-of-itself. Work is just whatever it is that you do with your life. Some people are fortunate enough to make their work something they enjoy. Many are not. The Biblical perspective of "humans being made for work" doesn't mean that you must experience a visceral sensation of toil and hardship in order for it to qualify as work, it just means God made us able to experience boredom. It seems you have missed the context of the quote you pulled from Ecclesiastes. That section of Chapter 2 is in fact about the futility of making labor and work the value of your life, not about the government taking away hard-won rewards of labor and redistributing wealth.

Chapter 2 of Ecclesiastes compares a life of both pure leisure and pure labor, and declares both to be futile. The exact quote you pull about leaving all you own to another who has not toiled for it has no bearing on the question of basic income, because the author is only bemoaning the fact that regardless of how hard you work in your life, you die at the end and lose it. Where it goes is immaterial - the phrase about leaving it to someone who hasn't toiled for it is a rhetorical device to emphasize the futility of the labor, not a condemnation of welfare.

There are many other places in the Bible, both OT and NT, that describe methods and justifications for caring for the poor and destitute. While it's true that a strict "rich people" personal tax would not be enough to pay the salaries of everyone in the country in a strict mathematical sense, you are conveniently leaving out the fact that existing welfare and social security alone add up to over $2T. Evaded taxes and a tax on the %0.01 bring that number to around $2.5T, which divided among Americans over 18 is roughly $10k per year, which is close to what basic income would look like. The money is there.

And $10k per year, like all basic income schemes, isn't meant to let us lounge by a pool all day. It's merely meant to allow Americans to work where they want by freeing them from destitution and being chained to a low-wage job. When you don't have to work 60 hours a week at two part-time jobs just to make ends meet, then you can focus on studying or apprenticing at a job you actually WANT. Which in nearly all studies of direct cash payments and basic income experiments, is exactly what happens. When poor and working people get a reasonable amount of direct cash, it almost always goes straight into bills, food, and education.

I also would like to question your intimation from your higher comment that the only valid projects are

> "good risk-adjusted investments, producing measurable returns and not merely misty-eyed wish fulfillment"

Remember that we serve God and not Mammon. Framing the value of human work only in terms of its economic return is dangerously close to reducing the value of a human to their contribution to GDP.

[fennecfoxen]

> the phrase about leaving it to someone who hasn't toiled for it is a rhetorical device to emphasize the futility of the labor, not a condemnation of welfare.

I wasn't asked about welfare, that you should correct me by defending the concept. I wasn't asked about someone just scraping by on a 60-hour work week. I was asked about someone who seeks an outlet for self-expression by making indie video games on society's dime. With this in mind, I reiterate: the fact that a would-be indie video game developer reaches for a future with UBI to achieve that is a strike against UBI being an effective vehicle for effecting charitable aims.

The description of Ecclesiastes was, "this also is vanity, and a great evil." You are right that there is a rhetorical device present, and that it highlights the futility of the labor, but it is an affront to the text to say that the thing described as "a great evil" is not, in fact, evil at all. The rhetorical device here highlights the futility by demonstrating and condemning its consequence. You are right that this is different than charity; so, too, is the dream of being paid to make indie video games.

[ImprobableTruth]

I think GP is a bit overly harsh, but he's not responding to someone who is poor or being exploited working a shitty job. He even explicitly mentions that it's because the needy have more of a right to be supplied, so I'd wager that he is simply in favor of a means tested solution.

So while I agree with most of your post, you're not really addressing his point. Is it righteous for those in well paying and value generating jobs to stop working just because they'd be more interested in going after more leisurely activities? If their work has no value to others, is that righteous?

>Remember that we serve God and not Mammon. Framing the value of human work only in terms of its economic return is dangerously close to reducing the value of a human to their contribution to GDP.

Sure, but economic value often correlates at least somewhat with non-economic value to others. An indie game developer who makes no money is likely simply producing nothing of value to anyone but themselves.

[jodrellblank]

> Is it righteous for those in well paying and value generating jobs to stop working just because they'd be more interested in going after more leisurely activities?

Is it right to say that developing a video game is "leisurely"? Isn't the game development industry notorius for long hours, stress and endless crunch time? Is it righteous for those in well paying and value generating jobs to avoid going for even more well paying jobs?

> An indie game developer who makes no money is likely simply producing nothing of value to anyone but themselves.

You take the same view with all FOSS software volunteer work, and all non-profit/volunteer/charity work generally?

What about a subsistence farmer who lives to grow food and eat it, are they "simply producing nothing of value to anyone but themselves"? Yes. Is that necessarily a problem?

[ImprobableTruth]

>Is it right to say that developing a video game is "leisurely"? Isn't the game development industry notorius for long hours, stress and endless crunch time?

Game development as an industry job isn't leisurely. But indie game development that you're essentially only doing for yourself? It's like woodworking. Professional carpentering isn't leisurely, creating private pieces that you don't intend to make money with is.

>Is it righteous for those in well paying and value generating jobs to avoid going for even more well paying jobs?

Yes? It's about taking support (thus depleting resources that could be used to e.g. help the needy) when you don't need to.

>You take the same view with all FOSS software volunteer work, and all non-profit/volunteer/charity work generally?

Volunteer work is different insofar as that it absolutely has economic value (people would pay you for it if you weren't doing it for free out of your own volition), you just choose to give it away freely. An indie developer who could make money to sustain themselves but chooses not to would fall under the same category. Someone who wants to be an indie developer but doesn't because they know that they wouldn't make enough money is not in this category.

>What about a subsistence farmer who lives to grow food and eat it, are they "simply producing nothing of value to anyone but themselves"? Yes. Is that necessarily a problem?

Again, the issue is them wanting to be supported by others. Taking, but not providing when you can. If they can completely sustain themselves, that's great.

[jodrellblank]

I think I'm getting annoyed at the way you're framing it that the indie game development would be relaxing. Why assume that the commenter would want as their goal to make a game that nobody wants to play?

Why assume they are saying "I am sure I would make no money", when it could be "I can't be sure that I would make enough money"?

Assume they want to make a game that people like, then it becomes volunteer work that has economic value, in as much as people often pay for games they like.

> "Again, the issue is them wanting to be supported by others. Taking, but not providing when you can. If they can completely sustain themselves, that's great."

Curious if you also take this view about shareholders and land owners and such?