Miriam English June 20, 2017 at 7:20 am

John Kelly, you probably don’t realise how insulting to those who don’t have a “normal” job your viewpoint is. Sadly, it is held by many people, especially those in power. It’s why the current government can get away with the fraudulent “RoboDebt” attack on the most vulnerable in society and is behind the constant belittling of, and attacks on, the poor in Australia, USA and UK. Puritanical thinking permeates our society. The belief that worth is granted only through work, that suffering is deserved (especially by the poor) was very useful to keep people working when bosses were not allowed to use whips, but it is a repellent view of humanity that’s drawn from a lie: that people must be forced to take part in society. But in actual fact we are inescapably social creatures and much of our greatest pleasure is gained by helping those around us.

I know a lot of people who are on welfare payments and I am actually fairly representative. People really do like to have purpose and do good things. I know it’s difficult for people who have money and prestige to believe it, but it’s true. I can only think of a couple of people who do very little — one has a mental problem and another is physically limited. All the others I know are constantly doing things that benefit society. Compare that with some of the businesses around us which employ people in soul-destroying jobs producing often wasteful or anti-social garbage. They generally get a pass from those who think everybody should work in a paying job.

It’s not that difficult to prevent price hikes. In the past government has concentrated on stopping wages growing, to great effect. How about the government that brings in a Universal Basic Income putting a temporary price limit on goods and services until production caught up with demand? That would prevent the Universal Basic Income having to be pointlessly further increased.

Using only a Job Guarantee would be a much greater temptation to government to mess with the most vulnerable. Armed with views similar to what you’ve expressed, that people who don’t work are worthless, they could utterly gut social security. The dole has traditionally been the lifeline that our musicians, artists, writers, programmers, and other creators rely upon to survive and create our culture. With the Job Guarantee and no Universal Basic Income they’d be forced to spend their time digging ditches, pouring concrete, working office jobs, and so on. People with disabilities would likely get short shrift too.

John, Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) adherents are a diverse lot. Some, like me (I agree with MMT) feel the economy should serve society. Some are elitist and feel that those who don’t have a standard job don’t deserve to be part of society. Some feel we should serve the economy. This is just the same as people who don’t agree with MMT.

It sounds great to say that a Job Guarantee can solve unemployment by creating jobs for everyone. And maybe it can, but the problems come in its implementation. By itself the Job Guarantee could become a source of awful oppression. People can be forced to do things they are not suited to and hate doing, uprooted and compelled to move to where the government-created jobs are, obliged to waste their lives in made-up do-nothing jobs, and making their lives a complete misery.

But perhaps it won’t be like that. Perhaps people will be paid to write their book, create their music, look after their elderly neighbors, grow an amazing garden. Perhaps they’ll be given choices and allowed some self-determination. That would be great, but you can see the problem, can’t you? Given how the Work For The Dole has produced often meaningless work, and what can amount to slave labor, sometimes administered by cruel people who enjoy crushing others underfoot, I think the chances of the Job Guarantee going wildly wrong is pretty great. The Universal Basic Income would be a great safety guard precisely because it gives people choice. If the Job Guarantee works then of course they’d want get involved (who doesn’t like more money doing something they enjoy?), but if it didn’t they would have a fall-back position. It would help to keep the Job Guarantee honest.

Yes, over much of the past technology has replaced jobs, while opening new ones. But that’s no longer happening. Already! And the new automation has barely begun. Just one single application of AI — driverless vehicles — will eliminate around a quarter of jobs. Tell me again how AI doesn’t change anything. And there are many other, and increasing numbers, of AI applications. Already AIs are better at many complex jobs than people are. When an employer has the choice of having an AI do the job for minimal cost, working all day and all night, never getting sick or taking holidays, versus choosing to employ a costly human, which do you think they’ll employ?

The market will eventually employ mostly machines because they will be cheaper and generally better than humans. How meaningful will Job Guarantee work be if it’s mostly made up and administered by bureaucrats and the guilty open-secret is that machines would be more productive? This could so easily become a nightmare scenario.

Why not give people the choice to do what they want to do via the Universal Basic Income? Ninety percent of the time they will not disappoint and will create new businesses, help others, grow gardens of fresh food for the local community, organise dances and knitathons, invent new devices, produce beautiful music and paintings, look after the disabled, help teach children, and so on.

We have the choice to make the next few decades a terrible ordeal or something approaching the kind of utopia people have dreamed of since the dawn of civilisation. We need to choose wisely, not simply reinforce old prejudices.