I find the parallel with what we want from government help kind-of interesting. Because I’m about 99% certain that I’d rather have fixed rules about how people get help (if you’re unemployed, you get $X per week for N weeks maximum; if you’re seriously poor, you qualify for $Y per week under qualifying conditions Z, etc.) than have some government employee deciding, on a per-case basis, how much I deserved, or (worse) trying to improve me by deciding whether I should be given $X per week, or whether that might just encourage me to laze around the house for too long.
The parallel isn’t perfect—bureaucracies, like markets and legal systems, end up being more like some kind of idiot-savant AI, than like some near-omniscent one. But I think there is a parallel there—we’d probably mostly prefer consistent, understandable rules to our safety nets or whatever, rather than some well-meaning powerful person trying to shape us for our own good.
There is another alternative, and one that’s been proposed: an unconditional income for all. Everyone gets enough to survive. If you make more money on top of that, good for you.
I find the parallel with what we want from government help kind-of interesting. Because I’m about 99% certain that I’d rather have fixed rules about how people get help (if you’re unemployed, you get $X per week for N weeks maximum; if you’re seriously poor, you qualify for $Y per week under qualifying conditions Z, etc.) than have some government employee deciding, on a per-case basis, how much I deserved, or (worse) trying to improve me by deciding whether I should be given $X per week, or whether that might just encourage me to laze around the house for too long.
The parallel isn’t perfect—bureaucracies, like markets and legal systems, end up being more like some kind of idiot-savant AI, than like some near-omniscent one. But I think there is a parallel there—we’d probably mostly prefer consistent, understandable rules to our safety nets or whatever, rather than some well-meaning powerful person trying to shape us for our own good.
There is another alternative, and one that’s been proposed: an unconditional income for all. Everyone gets enough to survive. If you make more money on top of that, good for you.