Either would be an upgrade at this point.
this post was submitted on 08 Apr 2026
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Everyone conscious has the ability to preform some type of labor so…. Let’s just skip this stupid argument and just say UBI.
UBI keeps capitalism and thus inequality. It’s a zero sum game where people’s wealth will flow towards the rich, enabling them in future to amass power to undo UBI and repeat the mistakes we have now.
Better solution is to ditch currency and focus on meeting people’s wellbeing needs directly.
You can’t ditch currency. Currency isn’t some grand invention of the state. It’s the direct result of beings valuing things at different amounts at different times. Technically current is using any stand in to ease the trade barrier but colloquially some people use love as a currency. Many kinds of social animals trade and what they trade could be deemed currency.
You can 100% ditch currency, you don’t not need a trade or barter based system. Humans have been operating on a gift economy model for hundreds of thousands of years, currency and trading is a blip in our history.
People are capable of supporting each other without profit incentives.
So let's say I really want to investigate superconducting magnets, because I really like that field and want to do research. I need processed rare earth products that only exist on the other side of the globe.
In your gift economy, how would I proceed to acquire those?
surely no other people have any benefit or incentive to find those superconductors and so no one would be willing to aid you in your research, including people who could get those minerals, right?
Is being flippant part of the economic model or an extra? Doesn't get me closer to those hard to extract materials that are in very short supply.
I suspect these policies often assume that either we live in startrek or we’re back to the woods and have no need for superconducting magnets :-/
Yup. Gets even easier once all the emancipatory technology innovations cease being classified, suppressed and secreted to maintain the corporate monopolisation rigged game of kleptarchy. When that stops, obsoleting currency/money becomes a greater viable potential, if not just removes some areas from profiteering. Such things are not cosmic fundamentals. Greedy eyes are on water, air, sunlight.
I imagine quality would improve and enshitification would cease, without corrupt fiat currency driving churn. And [as we currently are, it's an] accelerating churn at that, in a desperate race to the bottom. Unsustainable. Essential vital necessity to move beyond it.
UBI may be a stepping stone, perhaps a step away from reducing currency/money to mere resource accounting, on to greater things yet. But yes, not if left in the hands of the current oligarchs, nor in any such system that so readily gives oligarchs absolute power.
Sublimation out of their rigged game trap may come fast [, or not at all, only piecemeal placatium fakery].
You shouldn't state this as fact. It's not, archaeologists have been arguing between the formalist and substantavist theories of economic models for decades now. You seem to be favoring the formalist view, but there is a strong arguement to be made that market principles such as supply and demand existed deeper in the past as well.
While there may not have been currency, the historic economics of humanity were certainly greater than a gift economy model.
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You can absolutely do away with currency if the current mode of production got abolished. Currency itself is a necessity in a society that produces commodities for exchange, which creates rise for social constructs such as value, value forms like money, the possibility for an innate crisis and so on.
The first 2 chapters of Capital explains this, the commodity production system was a historical development rather than something coming out of nature (no chemist was able to find value through microscope), and we can certainly produce things to satisfy needs rather than exchange, with a much lower amount of work hours needed to do so.
No. Currency is convenience and convenience wins 99% of the time.
Yeah I’ll pass thanks, currency and capitalism is killing the planet and us along with it.
Nothing easier than being dead tho I guess.
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UBI will just cause inflation, it increases aggregate demand without increasing aggregate supply. More dollars chasing the same amount of goods leads to inflation.
It also doesn't really address inequality, anyone's relative position on the income hierarchy doesn't change, if I make $500 more than another guy before UBI, I'll still make $500 more than them after UBI, and your position on the income hierarchy determines your standard of living, not your absolute income. Eg. If you get a raise that matches inflation your absolute income may have gone up, but your relative income stayed the same and thus so did your standard of living.
We need to stop focusing on money and focus on the systems of production and hierarchy that actually determine our living standards. Money is just an expression of those structures, it's downstream, and changing that won't change the actual structures.
Wouldn't inflation be a good immediate signal on which systems of production need to be fixed first? E.g. housing prices spike = need more housing
Also, if someone earns 1000 and you earn 500 before an UBI of 500, they earn 2x as much as you before and 1.5x after.
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The next line should read
Liberals: "You're not who I'm trying to convince."
Followed by
Leftists: “We’re trying to convince you”
Don't let perfect be the enemy of good. There will always be a more ideal goal. If you refuse to work towards something that's actually achievable because you want more, well, that's why leftists fight each other more than fighting the fascists that have taken over the usa and are well on the way to taking over the rest of the world too.
Don’t let lesser be the enemy of what’s right. There will always be liberals seeking compromise on the right thing, and they’re wrong. That’s why the left fights and resists these right wing half measures.
That’s why the left fights and resists these right wing half measures.
But historically, leftists in the strongest age of labor agitation have supported 'half-measures' that didn't bring about full socialism.
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I'll take what I can get.
And this is the hard part for most people: I don't stop there, because I've achieved goal 1 of 99 and the road is long and hard and where is everyone going
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The top-one is soc-dems. Liberals are more like "👏 More 👏 black 👏 women 👏 CEOs!" and "👏 They 👏 go 👏 low 👏 we 👏 go 👏 high!", sometimes even "Obama proves that real christians see secularism as a christian value, because «love thy neighbor», we need a second Obama instead of meaningfully fighting the dominionist cult!".
Leftists really need to drop the "Holier than thou" ego. Like many social-democrats have their political worldview specifically because they are/have vulnerable people in their life.
Like I want stronger, higher societal floors built from recycled pieces of ceiling. I want a society that is built to support people from the bottom not control people from the top. I don't want my standard of living to be held up by the backs of other people sacrificing their lives, domestic or abroad.
Everyone trying to divide voters left of center are either misguided or misguiding.
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The constitutional right to basic living necessities; food, water, shelter, and medical treatment. Capitalism would still be there, but anyone could fall back on these "minimums" whenever they wanted ... no questions asked.
Is that "left of leftist"?
No, that's modern social democracy, which is generally considered fairly centrist. The issue with that is that capitalism still allows massive accumulation of power into the hands of individuals who can they leverage that power in an oppressive manner which is difficult to combat by ordinary folk.
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Liberals; no one working 40 hours a week should live in poverty, bit what are you gonna do?
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Proper leftist argument that glitches liberals’ material conditions:
Don't force poverty on the incapable to overperform you.
Thank god for this comm. I feel like I’m going sane in a crazy world outside of here.
Yup.
The left used to be a labor movement. It no longer is.
It still is, there just aren't more than a handful of left wing politicians in this country.
Neoliberals are NOT the left. These are the corporate Democrats that tsk at Trump's speech and actions, but ultimately agree with what he is doing because the same donors are making money.
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