Concerning UBI, and Why I Think We're A Ways Off
With the rise of the Globalist movement and growing automation in the tech sectors, many predict that Universal Basic Income is an impending inevitable outcome.
While I tend to agree that, barring a cataclysmic nuclear war or climate-based extinction, UBI, or Universal Basic Income, is an inevitable outcome, I don't think that we are quite as close as many believe. I will begin this short(ish) thesis with an inexperienced explanation of what UBI is and why many believe it is an inevitable global outcome. I'm not an economist, only dabbling in cryptocurrency and international economic affairs. My main concentrations are on cyber-security and Sino-American relations, so this is well out of my expertise. I had a short conversation with Steemit user @revo concerning automation in a multitude of sectors, specifically linguistics and computer science, and that inspired this post.
If you already understand UBI, feel free to skip to the section Why I Believe UBI is a Bit Further Off.
Universal Basic Income
The concept of UBI is part of the larger-scale idea of Basic Income. A quick explanation of Basic Income is that a citizen of a BI country automatically receives an unconditional deposit from the federal government. Capitalist BI would be funded via taxation, versus socialist BI being funded by state-owned enterprise (Wikipedia). Theoretically, with the advent of cryptocurrency, BI could also be funded by cryptomarkets, eliminating the need for increased taxation or a likely to fail socialist marketplace.
UBI is just the idea that every citizen globally will receive this basic income, regardless of their home country. It is important to note that, while some push for UBI that would allow citizens to live lavishly for their entire lives, most practical UBI approaches only attempt to keep those above the poverty line until they can sustain themselves. It should, then, be viewed more as a welfare system than a form of actual income.
According to Business Insider, 2017 will see a multitude of UBI experiments, ranging in location from California to Kenya. These experiments range in length, with some being one-year trials to others that will last up to five years. This means that we will get some measure of how UBI would work in practice, but it could be up to a decade until we can gauge it's effectiveness worldwide on a nation-by-nation basis, and much longer before we know how UBI would work on a global scale.
UBI Pertaining to AI and Automation
The strongest argument for the adoption of UBI comes from the technology sector. Singularity experts and futurists, as well as technology experts in other sectors, argue that with increased automation and the arguably impending singularity, UBI is the only way to avoid rampant poverty as a result of an automated market. It's true that we can already observe automation leading to a lack of blue collar jobs in industry. It has replaced low-income level jobs in the service industry as well as jobs in the automobile industry. Even white-collar jobs such as stock-trading are seeing increasing competition from machine learning algorithms.
Economically, this makes sense. While replacing a human with a machine may result in a higher initial cost, ie the cost of buying a robotic mechanism to replace a factory worker, the long-term gain from not having to pay wages to a robot or piece of software pays dividends. Robots cannot file worker's compensation claims, and until AI reaches a laughable level of human behavior, software solutions can't form worker's unions.
UBI pundits argue that this outcome is inevitable in a capitalist, tech-centric society. Corporations will continue to inherently choose the cheaper cost to decrease overhead and increase income. Singularity experts, notably Ray Kurzweil, argue that technological advancement is exponential, as proven by Moore's Law. If technological advancement continues in its exponential nature, this kind of rampant unemployment because of automation will be come unavoidable very soon.
Why I Believe UBI is a Bit Further Off
Red Scare Tactics
I'm a futurist by nature, and believe that, as stated by Ray Kurzweil, The Singularity is Near. I think that the main opponent to the UBI is not technological, nor is it economic. I believe in the thoroughly researched and all-but-proven exponential nature of technology, and economically I think that a UBI-like system is just about the only answer to rampant poverty caused by the Automation Age.
It is my belief that the biggest opposition to the a global UBI system is sociological and cultural, inherent in our human nature. I'll explain this relatively briefly, but will try to be as clear as I can.
As an American, I have observed the outcome of the Soviet-era Red Scare. The Red Scare was a propaganda tactic employed by the US and others as a reaction to perceived Communist expansion. It was aimed at recruiting the hearts and minds of citizens living under the capitalist system to root out Soviet spies and combat socialism and communism in the hearts of their neighbors. The Red Scare was, and in my opinion still is, used popularly in democratic nations to combat some perceived notion of Communist spread.
I myself am a Libertarian capitalist. I don't believe Communism is a legitimate form of economy, and note it's failures in just about every large scale attempt at employing it on a national level. That being said, the Red Scare has had a relatively harmful sociological impact in the modern era, which can be highlighted by current opposition of the UBI. The UBI has a pretty obvious socialist connotation, especially if employed as a welfare system rather than a full-scale economic system. As a capitalist, I have a great deal of concern for a growing welfare state. The burden it places on the federal government, and the ensuing increase in taxes, is a great danger to a capitalist economy. The welfare state is also a quick slide into socialism, which, as has been proven, is a quicker and deadlier slide into communism. Whether is the terror of a bustling Chinese economy or the contention between Russia and... well damn near everyone else, Red Scare tactics are very clearly still present in our society.
The Red Scare, therefore, has created a climate that denies the legitimacy of anything with the slightest wafting scent of socialism. As I stated, UBI as a welfare initiative is a socialist concept, but as an economic system resulting from an automated market, it is an inevitability.
Big Government as a Barrier to Big Data
Big Government is proving to be a pretty big opponent to technological advancement. It is very unlikely that they will win that battle, but when it comes to AI research, Government reaction tends to border on fear-mongering. Luckily this hasn't gone so far as to block economic support for AI research entirely, but typically Government representatives tend to prefer the Terminator, Ubrella Corp version of AI, rather than a more peaceful and helpful representation.
Government economic interference is also a barrier to technological advancement. Technological advancement is relatively dependent on a free economy, as it still requires innovation and a relatively large amount of capital. The startup culture is an example of this kind of economy, where the consumer base is free to economically support their favorite technological idea.
Government subsidies for the tech industry is not unheard of and is becoming more and more common, and is obviously helpful. An even bigger opponent, though, to technological advancement is Government legislation that undermines it. A prime example of this is the privacy battle, especially in the cryptography domain. Legislators argue that the use of cryptography almost directly implies a tie to illicit behavior, and some have been arguing for "backdoored encryption" that can be broken by government agencies or otherwise undermined by "the good guys". This obviously destroys the core concept of cryptography, as it's breakability cannot be mathematically or logically assigned to just the (horribly subjective) good guys. Their argument is in favor of "dumber" crpytography instead of increased research.
The intellectual property debate is another barrier to technological advancement. While I agree that ripping off another person's idea is wrong, legislative efforts to enforce IP laws have created a patent-squatter culture, as well as a lawsuit heavy domain that lessens capital in research areas due to legal fees and lawsuit claims.
The reason why these barriers are relevant to UBI is because UBI will only be made possible by technological advancement. A barrier to the latter is a barrier to the former. As a futurist/technologist, I vehemently oppose any barrier to technological advancement, but strictly concerning Universal Basic Income, I don't think that we will overcome enough of these barriers for a long time.