[logicchains]

>One could read as many books as they like. Learn to play an assortment of musical instruments. Learn woodworking. Sailing. Write novels. Compose songs. Complete their magnum opuses. Master languages. Study art. Create art. Improve their athleticism. And so on.

Those would all be very fun things to do, but very self-focused. I'd love to spend my life writing a novel, except it'd probably be a pretty shitty novel, and it'd be hard for me to find satisfaction in having spent my life on something that contributed very little value to anybody else in society. At least with work I know somebody values what I'm doing.

[eggsmediumrare]

Spend more time raising your kids. Volunteer in your community. Restore the environment. Take care of the elderly. Grow healthy food for your neighbours. These all sound much more valuable than my job, but no one is gonna pay me to do it.

And you're making the argument that the effort of aspiring novelists is wasted. It's not. Or else we would have no novels.

[dbsmith83]

There are jobs for all the things you mentioned. There are people who are paid to take care of the elderly, to grow healthy food, and there are even jobs for taking care of the environment.

Also, I think you missed the point about novelists. It is more about if you suck at writing novels, sitting around and writing one for yourself isn't very valuable for society. There are some people who have natural talent, but the average Joe sitting around not working and instead writing a novel for fun will likely not be producing much value--at least, not as much as if he were working.

[eggsmediumrare]

Most jobs like this pay minimum wage and are seasonal or part-time. At least with UBI, you can do it on your terms.

How do you know you suck at writing novels until you try?

[dbsmith83]

Sure they might pay low, but you dont get to just decide the value of your work on your own. At least in a market you get paid for your time put in and there is pressure to deliver value vs. you just deciding to get off of your couch once in a while and still getting paid ubi.

For the writers, I didnt say dont try. There is a difference between trying during spare time while off work vs. doing it as a hobby while not working and thus not contributing to society yet taking money from it.

[eggsmediumrare]

I think we just disagree about what value means. I'm of the opinion that you can easily find a job to be paid to create no value, or even destroy value, and you can easily create value that no one is willing to pay a living wage for. I have no trust in the market to determine what is or is not actually good for society... Because the activities I listed in an earlier comment would be paid well in that case.

[dbsmith83]

If they are so valuable then why are they not paid well? Markets are just people deciding what value is with their money. Perhaps you think a service is valuable, and you can pay for it. But if no one else wants it and will not pay for it, then it is by definition not valuable to society.

Sure there are issues with the rules of the markets like anything--but markets in general are pretty good for determining value.

[robertpateii]

I don’t understand how UBI forces you to stop working at your job. Wouldn’t you potentially be paid even more if everyone who does that job but hates it stops? And the compensation to do it increases to compensate?

[nickff]

UBI means that the empathetic people subsidize the vain and the selfish.

[eggsmediumrare]

In my experience, empathy has an inverse relationship to your position on the org chart.

[robertpateii]

Vain and selfish people probably aren’t going to sit around and live on the basic level. It’s more about providing for the ignored, the sick, and enabling people to take risks in the market without putting their family’s lives at stake.

[throwawaygh]

> At least with work I know somebody values what I'm doing.

...have you talked to your sales guys?

[kamaal]

You will have option to do what you want. That's the whole point.

They won't pay you enough to buy a Ferrari. But it will be enough money to spare time to cook well, exercise and spend time on relationships. Or do whatever you want to do.

Different people want different things. Surely your choice of tech work will be very different when you know losing your job won't starve you to death.

[albatruss]

Suppose that automation has greatly advanced, and our material needs are fulfilled as a given, as if Earth were now our own Eden, tended to by robots. About the only work left for humans to do, that is to say producing goods and services that other humans deem valuable, is researching and developing heroin. The robots don't do this because they know that heroin use is quite harmful to human well-being, but of course we find great value in being high and are willing to pay for the experience, thus creating a market.

In such a scenario, to what extent does working involve the creation of value? Would you, and should you, find satisfaction in performing this labor? And in what ways is it different from working on the next big social media app to dethrone TikTok?

[dbsmith83]

That is a very weirdly specific scenario that won't ever happen, so why bother asking about it? Humans will always find new things to be valuable. There will never be a time when there is no work left except for producing heroin. People will always want what something no one else has, or something that someone else has that they do not. Humans will strive to create new things, thus creating value. I can see you are trying to pigeon-hole the conversation in a social media vs. heroin comparison, but that just isn't a good representation of the issue.