If a universal basic income started today with the stipulation that you had to put 40 hrs/wk towards making the world a better place or solving societal problems, how would you spend your time?
If a universal basic income started today with the stipulation that you had to put 40 hrs/wk towards making the world a better place or solving societal problems, how would you spend your time?
Isn't that just a government job with extra steps? I thought the point of UBI is that it's meant to be, you know, universal.
As a side note, people have this tendency to think that government programs must be means-tested. That is, there must be a criteria that is met before someone is eligible for the program. Same with your assumption in the post - you assume that it must be better to add a stipulation. There seems to be this natural skepticism that if there is no criteria, people will take advantage of the program. I want to challenge that skepticism.
Adding criteria for eligibility inherently means the government must establish a bureaucracy for checking that the criteria is met. This has two notable downsides that people tend to not consider. First, it causes an applicant to wait longer before they can hear back from the program. With existing programs, it sometimes takes months before someone hears back. This ends up discouraging anyone from applying, even if they meet all the criteria. After all, what's the point of receiving aid in 3 months if you need the aid now?
Second, it causes the cost of the program to increase. A bureaucracy is difficult to maintain. The more money that is spent on checking for eligibility, the less money that people in need will get. And what is the work that such a bureaucracy will do anyways? How does it benefit society to hire someone to say that people's needs aren't "real enough" to get government aid?
Which leads me to a third, additional point - it's morally questionable to require people to meet a certain criteria before they can receive aid. To put it in another way, why do you feel like you need to gatekeep other people's needs? If a person says they're struggling, why should anyone say that they're not struggling enough?
Universal basic income means no requirement to do anything.
However as a worker in healthcare, I'd probably continue as I am.
The problem is you can't really define what is "good for society". Maybe I think weird abstract art is good for society, whereas most people think it's a waste of time.
Who gets to decide?
That's an extreme example, but there are many such types of cases. Is a cash advance place "good for society"? It scams poor people but also provides them a line of credit that banks will not.
What about used car dealerships that sell overpriced cars at high interest? Is that "good"? Poor people get scammed but it gets them a car they otherwise would not be able to get a higher end dealership.
As for what I would do? Probably just contribute to open source projects or something.
This is not universal basic income.
You're describing something more like civil service than ubi I think. But if I was financially independent without a full time job I would focus on hobbies like music and find some advocacy cause to help support, probably separation of church and state or ai for everyone with easier to build and use models on consumer hardware, there's a few open source projects out there I'd like to understand better and contribute to if I had more time.
Making the world a better place doesn't need to be some grandiose revolutionary affair.
All the little things you do while being alive would add up. Whether it's hanging out with a friend, giving your pet some extra pats, or cleaning up your own space, and that would put you a good deal of the way there, if not be enough on its own.
Disregarding the fallacy in your opening, and calling things for what they are:
If a conditional basic income started today with the stipulation that I had to put 40 hrs/week towards making the world a better place or solving societal problems,
I would spend them by becoming a politician and implementing true Universal Basic Income.
Sewing buttholes on teddy bears.
I was going to say something else but reading many people are right. UBI would never give a nice life so I would forgo it and work a normal job. The whole point of ubi is its there when you need it and really just gets you by. Very few people would want to subsist on it but if they had to they would.
Arguing with people on lemmy, people are wrong and the internet and the world totally needs my opinions to correct them.
Since I was a kid I've wanted to be an inventor but I don't think of marketable things and hate the idea of locking my ideas up behind legal restrictions (I prefer to license my personal software and 3D print designs under the MIT "just make sure my name stays attached" license).
So yeah, I'd just design stuff and put it into the world...
I have a few homelessness projects that I haven't had the energy to check up on in about a decade. One is a men's shelter. We haven't had a shelter for homeless men in our region in over a decade. I'd probably start working toward (re)opening one of those in my town.
Make a bunch of politically conscious punk music.
I would start a community space with a dance hall, coffee shop, bike shop, maker space, brewery, and library centered on an urban trail to show people you can go places and do worthwhile things without an automobile. I'd include parking for cargo bikes, trikes and hand bikes, along with upright bikes and chargers for electric bikes. My hope being that the model would spread to other cities and higher density residential developments would spring up around it. Obviously my UBI wouldn't cover that no matter how generous it was, so step one would be to use my extra time to get buy in from like minded neighbors.
I would do my current job for free with people who need it but couldn't afford it (massage) think seniors, sick, disabled ect. Also, spend time working with animal rescue/shelters in some way
I would not do anything, claiming that I'm preventing myself from making the world a worst place.
Haha joking. I'll start auditing open source project for free and improve the overall security of our whole infrastructure.
Teach. I already teach and I would continue to do so even if I had enough money to retire. I just love seeing young people discover the joy of programming and 3D modeling.
Free comp sci tutoring (which I often do anyway), make free courses and hold seminars, and make significant contributions to open source! That would be such fulfilling work if I didn't have to worry about money.
Grow food
If the job I already do does make the world better does that count or do I need to work 80 hours a week to get something that's 'universial'
That is just so nebulous that you could almost do anything.
I am a hobby phographer, and I consider my photos mere existance as making the world a sliiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiightly better place.
I won't pretend that I am amazing at photography, but some fantastic pictures would not exist without me, there would absolutely be almost identical photos in existance, but not mine.
I like driving, so I guess I could be a driver for road trips in Europe, not in a bus, but in an estate car, artisenal road trips as you say, that would provide more good to the world than me just going to road trips alone and keeping most photos to myself.
Where is the threshhold for what is considered good to get the money?
Convincing whoever's in charge of checking up on that sort of thing that the world is better off if I stay inside at least 40 hours a week.
I was an Ocean Lifeguard for several years after high school. I would do go back to that. Service to others fulfills that contract to make the world a better place. I loved that job, and I know I impacted several families for the better during that time.
Same as now. My 40+ hr/wk making the world what it is, pays much better than any UBI. Until there’s a better solution for affordable housing and healthcare for my family, education for my kids, and retirement for me, I’m staying in the rat race
How much is the UBI? Can I live off it comfortably? I'd probably contribute to society by spending the money thereby supporting the economy /s
I think I'd take a few years and destroy all the "grass" lawns in the country, replacing them with native plants that don't need manual watering or chemical fertilizers and pesticides. Then I'd destroy a lot of vehicle infrastructure and replace it with high-speed train, bike, and pedestrian infrastructure. Then I'd probably just jerk off and go to concerts for the rest of my life.
- Maker space / repair cafe
- Community garden
- Picking up trash (Put on some music. Get to be outside. Allowed to trespass and get thanked for it)
I'd just keep doing my job instead
I’m a mechanical engineer product designer so using that for where I can to protect coral reefs
Political organizing and education. Most problems, especially economic and societal problems are rooted in political causes: bureaucratization, consolidation of power, bottlenecking, corruption, etc.,
Only active participation in democratic organizing of mass movements along class concerns has ever been effective at combatting these social illnesses. This starts and ends with educational development. We are kept weak through confusion and ignorance; which leads to division, opportunism, fear, and alienation.
I would spend my time at my current job making more money than this program would pay.
Taking walks, meeting new people and playing games. Fuck work
Well, several of my bosses are working on a way to hire me permanently to do just that.
The issue is that they have to convince highly conservative senior management that hiring a guy for $x an hour is a lot less than contracting the same guy for $5x an hour as part of a consulting firm, where the boss of the firm gets roughly $4-4.5x for doing nothing.
I’d stay home that way I’m not adding to societal problems.
Seriously though, the ONLY stipulations that should be put on UBI are:
1.) do you make over $100,000/year? This info is easily obtained from your W-2 that you are given every year for taxes.
2.) do you own a business? Once again easily obtained via public record and filing of your taxes via 1099 forms.
3.) are you over the age of 18? Once again easily verified through birth certificate dates via public record based on your social security number/resident green card (after 5 years of documented residency in the country. )
All this info is in government databases so there would be no concern of undocumented immigrants able to receive said funds or people getting more money because of having minors in there home.
You shouldn’t have to apply for it, hence the term universal.
I’d try to find ways to use my skills as an industrial engineer to help the environmental movement, possibly trying to retrain. Then I’d also spend like 10-20 hours a week recycling bicycles
I already do, I'm a teacher. But if I could do anything to get paid, I'd run free English classes and conversation clubs for refugees
Building agriculture robots that purple can operate at home.
The goal is for everyone with land to be able to easily grow crops
Negative Income Tax as proposed by Nobel Prize winning economist Milton Friedman is a much much much better implementation than a straight up UBI.
Free tech support on lemmy
I live in a shitty neighborhood with minimal options for kids and a lot of litter. First thing I'm doing is opening a nonprofit, daycare for kids ages 7-14. We'll focus on gaming, tabletop, and casual activity as well as local activism and civil service. We'll also teach cyber responsibility and privacy, kids are going to be on the internet more than any of us were growing up and someone needs to stop them from falling into the pipelines we did.
I would just keep working. UBI should be unlocking the ability for us to pursue our passions, hobbies, and mental/physical health. If I just gotta work anyways, I choose my current job.
Im a software developer, so I guess whatever I’m told to do. I’ll do it.
I'd probably quit my job, and work as a writer, artist, game designer, and entertainer full time. I'm worried about health care, though, being in the US. Can you throw in a little Medicaid for All in there?
Volunteer at a school/daycare for poor kids. My (retired, formerly college professor) mother already does. I'm sure I could teach them some stuff. Maths or history or how to work computers. And failing that, I can always go to the baby room and help contain the chaos and fluids.
I would keep on doing my job (teaching English as a foreign language), but I could get rid of all the pointless stuff such as grades, tests etc etc
I'd probably do two things:
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Properly learn to code and spend much of that time developing open source software.
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Immediately move out to the woods to start a wildlife sanctuary.
That said, while I'm a huge proponent of UBI, I definitely don't think it could ever work this way (though I get that this was just a fun thought experiment).
In actuality I see the outcome of a UBI as working class people having a little more time and energy to properly invest in themselves, either through education, self care, etc. Studies have shown that largely people continue to work (or better yet, start their own small business), albeit not necessarily at the backbreaking and emotionally-draining pace they currently do.
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Same as I do now, working 20 hrs/week doing fun stuff. Basic income wouldn’t be enough to support what I do to make myself happy.
If I could wave a magic wand, training therapy dogs and horses. Or doing what I already do, but in a place that actually wants me to do it.
Animal shelter work, or do litter pick up in the woods or the beach.
I would start working on a cyclical algae production system that would work indoors and rely on renewable energy. It would need to be built somewhere with plenty of sun and water. The goal would be to produce dried compacted algae to use for fuel while being carbon negative.