I don’t honestly think it will happen in a way that is genuinely good for people. It will happen in a way where the rich and powerful are in control and can use it as a method for maintaining control.

UBI is a bandaid to keep capitalism propped up by neo-liberals. It’s contingent on the idea that society is dependent on people spending money, rather than getting essential services and enough free time to maintain mental stability.

It will never happen.

Not because it is a bad idea; it is an AWESOME idea. Work used to be something you do for the collectivity; you do something for the group, in exchange of something from the group. Today, a work is a mean to earn money, regardless of the collectivity. We do meaningless jobs, which often gives nothing to the collectivity, just because we have a rent to pay, we want vacations and a new car. A universal basic income would completely break this; I would work to bring something to the group, not to reach a stupid objective for the company.

However, there is a fringe of people which will not gain anything from this, even lose leverage and power over the masses: the 1%, the millionaires and billionaires. They will do whatever they can to kill it, saying only freeloaders and foreigners will benefits from it. And the masses will vote against it, and it will be a big victory for capitalism. Until global warming accelerate, we will have nothing to eat anymore and earth will be inhospitable for humans. The end.

UBI has to have a lot of folks wanting it and theres contingents that would rather starve then see those people get a thin dime, with “those people” having various meanings. Then there’s the temporarily embarassed millionaires, and of course the Fox news crew who think socio-commu-trans folk are going to dye their kids hair blue and make them worship Satan.

We’re 30% there already, between long term unemployed and people on social security. I support more. Human rights include food, shelter, healthcare, but not everyone has figured that out yet.

I don’t think so.

No UBI proponent has given me a convincing argument that inflation greedy bastards won’t eventually increase prices to the extent that the extra money would be effectively wiped out. Which would be especially bad because people often propose UBI as a replacement for welfare - so those on a benefit get what little spending power they have eliminated, and only those with jobs can absorb the increased costs.

Also, governments don’t tend to go around handing out money (well, to those who actually need it) willy-nilly. Most social welfare/workers’ rights gains in the 20th century were because western governments were afraid that the October Revolution might give their citizens ideas. As of now, there’s no longer threat of an alternative to Capitalism.

We have to kill or tax all billionaires out of existence first. Their choice. And I don’t mean that with any sentiment of hyperbole.

Taxing (or burying at sea, or grilling on a spit, or force feeding them like foie gras to consume their livers) billionaires out of existence isn’t an issue of generating enough tax revenue. You can consider it a part of why such a thing is important, but it should not be considered the primary point.

The primary point is to reduce the distance between the wealthiest among us and the least wealthy among us. For all it matters, the money re-possessed could be burned. Its utilization is secondary to reducing the disparity.

If being a billionaire was an illegal act punishable by immediate execution, the need for UBI would be dramatically reduced. It would also be dramatically easier to implement.

The rich will probably just try to kill us all before that happens. We should get rid of the wealthy

UBI is the future if we are allowed peace.

WW3 in an apocalyptic scale is much more likely. Don’t need to feed the obsolete peasants if they’re all dead.

I want to believe that progress is inevitable. The living conditions for the working class are better now than they were 100 years ago. Hopefully, by the time another 100 years have passed they will have drastically improved some more.

Unfortunately, the reasons they have improved in the last 100 years are due to constant fighting against the lazy non-working class. Not some evolved sense of society.

If we replaced all of our current welfare systems with a simple UBI, it would save us money. In terms of running the system, and simplifying taxes. Don’t need to take 5 different taxes out of your paycheck, just one. Earn over a certain amount? You don’t get it. The majority of people won’t, because they’ll be earning enough to pay in but not collect. This would have to be done alongside universal healthcare, as tying healthcare to employment wouldn’t work much anymore, which would also save us a massive amount of money.

The result of which, is an absolute explosion of creative genius and new businesses. People no longer hindered by the threat of starving in the street, or losing their healthcare, would finally be able to start that business they always wanted to. They’d be able to create their long-overdue masterpiece. Literature, art, new inventions. There’s a guy out there right now that, if given the space and a bit of assistance, could create the first prototype of a warp drive. There’s someone else who has a pretty good idea about how to cure dementia, and halt the aging process.

Just imagine the possibilities of actually investing in our people, and in our society, instead of handing all of our money to billionaires, and letting those evil mentally handicapped fuckwits steer the course of humanity straight into a climate change-driven mass-extinction event.

Just Imagine.

No because corps and oligarchs will campaign against it, inexplicably win, and destroy one of the country’s greatest achievements with cheers and applause

Its cynical, but its happened to many social programs thay way.

UBI will only come as a response to a new economic depression. The idea that our society will proactively fix itself has been proven wrong time after time.

Humans only learn the hard way.

No. Wealthy people don’t feel like they’re winning unless poor people are losing.

UBI to me is a leftist pipe dream of how a post-scarcity society could work. When you actually look at the financials and how greedy humanity is, it all falls apart and will either bankrupt entire nations or pay an absolute pittance.

The UK’s voluntary living wage is £13.45 an hour, which translates to £26,227.50 for someone working full time 37.5 hours a week. If we replaced our entire welfare system (state pensions, Universal Credit, child benefit, Personal Independence Payments, Disability Living Allowance, etc) and paid our approx 58.1 million population of working age people and retirees the living wage, it would cost us over £1.5 trillion, or roughly half our annual GDP. Our current welfare expenditure by comparison is at an estimated £333.7 billion.

I am using the Living Wage as a comparison since it’s an agreed metric calculated by a non-profit organisation for how much a worker would need to earn to live on their wage in the UK. To pay a living wage to every adult in the country we would need to spend nearly three times as much as what the USA spends on its military.

The question then becomes “How the fuck will we pay for it?” We can’t even get the rich to pay their fair share of tax as things stand. They are going to flat-out refuse to foot the bill once AI leads to mass unemployment.

What I think is a more likely scenario is societal collapse. People starve, leading to widespread civil unrest and then a brutal and violent crackdown, made easier than ever by armed drones and humanoid robots that have no sense of morals. This is exactly the kind of doomsday scenario that a lot of billionaires are prepping for.

The only way I can see humanity not ripping itself apart is if automation somehow makes the cost of living so cheap that UBI could viably exist.