Author: automata

Anthony Painter, “A universal basic income: the answer to poverty, insecurity, and health inequality?”

Anthony Painter, “A universal basic income: the answer to poverty, insecurity, and health inequality?”

Anthony Painter (credit to: RSA) Anthony Painter, Director of the Action and Research Center at the RSA, in an editorial article described an experiment in the middle of the 1970s in the small town of Dauphin, Manitoba, Canada. As Painter describes, there were “statistically significant benefits” to the physical and mental health of the participants in the experiment, which was in the British Medical Journal.

The experiment involved the provision of “a basic income—a regular, unconditional payment made to each and every citizen” of Dauphin. A complete statistical analysis was not provided for several decades because of a loss of […]

Your opinion on … universal basic income, John Wick, and the whether or not American cities are becoming indistinguishable hipster centrals.

Your opinion on ... universal basic income, John Wick, and the whether or not American cities are becoming indistinguishable hipster centrals.

I believe as automation improves and more menial tasks and jobs people don’t work for themselves are replaced by machines, the better off we will be. I believe the ideal situation will be where everyone is able to work only the careers they want, regardless of what field it’s in. With universal basic income, we could better meet the inevitable automation of much of our otherwise manual labor in fields that people work because they have to make ends meet.

The problem is you can’t just institute basic income for everyone. The problems with our economy are foundational and structural. […]

Republicans Lobby for Basic Income Payment & Carbon Tax

Republicans Lobby for Basic Income Payment & Carbon Tax

There is a certain elegance to the notion of the basic income payment. Of course, I hate it anyway. The idea is that people who can afford to pay taxes pay taxes and every single person gets a check from the government for basic necessities.

Let’s put it into numbers. Let’s say the governments of this country spend $5 trillion in redistributing wealth.

I consider much of defense spending redistributing wealth from the taxpayer to the corporations. The US spends as much on so-called defense as the rest of the world combined–that is not necessary for defense in “peacetime.” Let’s […]

Finland’s biggest trade union says a universal basic income is ‘useless’

Finland's biggest trade union says a universal basic income is 'useless'

Increases the baseline of expendable income for all. Hence, to begin with, everybody can afford more groceries, fuel, rent etc. It’s great, for that "bubble" period in which the currency retains the same strength while prices remain relatively stagnant.

Such consumer strength ultimately further strengthens the currency’s domestic power and makes imports less viable and more expensive – which in a country like Finland in particular, which doesn’t produce a great deal of its own produce, means most food staples and essentials become more expensive to import. Those costs are passed onto the consumer in the form of price rises. […]

US: eBay founder’s firm to donate up to $493,000 to basic income pilot

US: eBay founder’s firm to donate up to $493,000 to basic income pilot

Omidyar Network, a “philanthropic investment firm” created by eBay founded Pierre Omidyar, announced on February 7 that it will donate up to $493,000 to the New York based charity organization GiveDirectly . The funds will be used to support GiveDirectly’s major basic income experiment in Kenya .

In the largest and longest-running basic income trial to date, GiveDirectly will provide unconditional cash transfers to the residents of 200 villages in rural Kenya (about 26,000 people in total). The residents of 40 of these villages (about 6,000 people) will receive monthly payments for 12 years. At about $0.75 per day, […]

Universal Basic Income test next year: FM

Universal Basic Income test next year: FM

NEW DELHI: Finance Minister Arun Jaitley today hoped that the Universal Basic Income (UBI) scheme mooted by the Economic Survey will be implemented over the next one year in some parts of the country at least on experimental basis. The Economic Survey, authored by Chief Economic Advisor Arvind Subramanian, had suggested that the Centre may come out with UBI scheme under which the government should provide a minimum cash amount to poor people to meet their basic needs.
Speaking at a function to release the book ‘India 2047 Voices of the Young’, Jaitley said under the proposed system UBI […]

Janet Street-Porter: What happens when robots take over nurses’ jobs

Images of trolleys laden with suffering people in corridors, old people hooked up to drips on beds in cupboards — not pictures emerging from Syria, but the latest crisis to hit the NHS.

Waiting times in A&E are unacceptable, with hospitals operating at full capacity; dozens of beds are occupied by people who have nowhere else to go.

When even the Health Secretary — the normally unflappable Mr Positive, Jeremy Hunt — admits things are problematic, it’s probably not the best time to publish a report claiming that robots could take over nurses’ jobs.According to experts at the independent think tank […]

Before Universal Basic Income, We Must First Get Social Spending Basics Right -Anjana Thampi and Ishan Anand

-TheWire.in

The Economic Survey 2016-17 devotes a chapter to the provision of a Universal Basic Income (UBI), describing it as a “raging new idea,” a “radical new vision” and “the shortest path to eliminating poverty”. While warning that the UBI “should not become the Trojan horse that usurps the fiscal space for a well-functioning state,” the survey says a de facto UBI can be instituted in the existing “fiscal space”. It argues that winding up existing subsidies and welfare schemes could generate enough resources to institute UBI. To make this argument, the survey includes a table which lists the subsidies […]

Automation can revitalize the U.S. workforce

Automation can revitalize the U.S. workforce

In the face of growing workplace automation, a number of commentators have painted a grim future for American workers. But most human capital leaders see a much brighter future— one where automation helps revitalize U.S. manufacturing and increases the demand for skilled workers.

According to global talent management firm Randstad Sourceright’s survey of over 400 corporate HR leaders, automation and robotics are likely to have a positive impact on U.S. business growth in 2017, and will be one of the driving forces behind new hiring trends over the next several years.

Regardless of how you feel about robots, the move toward […]

How being replaced by a machine turned this graphic artist into an activist

How being replaced by a machine turned this graphic artist into an activist

Enlarge / Robots are coming for your job. Rog01 – Flickr Maybe we shouldnt allow robots to be used right away in industries whose workers are not ready to be replaced right away.
If for example a trucking company intends to replace it’s drivers, theer should be a waiting period of five years so that the truck drivers can transition to another industry and that is with assistance since once the robots come in, the company is going to save a lot of money anyway.
As for driverless cars for private use only and not commercial use, then let […]