this post was submitted on 28 Jan 2026
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We need UBI (Universal Basic Income). People should have the choice to work, if they want more money or love their job. Not being forced: a choice.
If someone wants to follow a path that is not financial viable - be it art or just a hobby - that should be possible, too.
Life would become better for nearly everyone. Art would get a new golden age, people would no longer fear financial ruin, happiness and personal fulfillment all around.
Also paying people starvation wages or treating them badly would no longer work. Employees would have to be treated well or they would simply leave. Great wages and good conditions more or less guaranteed. People could support a big family and a nice house on a single wage again.
The only persons not happy would be the ultra rich, the exploiter, the CEOs. Because this would only work if everyone pays their due and the 1% no longer hoard the wealth.
I think this could create the best possible future, an utopia - if only our politicians were not bought and paid for. But sadly they are - and wealth only goes towards the rich, while we get poorer every generation.
I hope I live to see the day when the people notice that the rich rigged the game and react accordingly.
Paying people starvation wages, healthcare tied to employment; treating people badly- these are the type of thing that people fighting against UBI really actually like. Like enthusiastically want.
Yeah, to get a bunch of the working class to vote against their interests you need to give them somebody to look down on.
They don't just want to look down on someone, they're so propagandized to by the ultra wealthy they do it for free.
Ultimately getting people to vote against their best interest is quite common, maybe even more common that voting in their best interest because of all the compromise with capitalists stuff. Wanting to address affordability but not addressing capitalism is like bargaining with a virus.
UBI is not the solution, ending the capitalist system is.
All UBI does is lessen the suffering slightly, why not just directly meet people’s needs without the middleman.
Ubi would never happen, and if it did they would constantly remove people from the roles until it was a subsidy to their supporters, a patronage.
Looking at medicaid and food assistance, I do not see how anyone could think it would not be ratfucked if it got through in the first place.
UBI is not the solution, but a great first step towards a better system.
To make it work well, you need strong regulations on a lot of systems: banks, utilities, corporations.
At some point it will be easier to just give the state control of everything concerning basic needs. Then to control institutions that 'fight back' the most against regulations, like banks and mega corporations.
You see where this might lead?
It's a slow way towards a better economic system without the need for a revolution.
Your analysis is too light. The state isn't some magical benevolent entity which is somehow "on the wrong path". The state is an instrument of domination driven by the dominating class: the bourgeoisie. The bourgeoisie is against everything you cited. It will not slowly act against its own interest, willingly lose power and dominance. It will always fight for, at the minimum, keeping power.
That is why historically the only way to have changes that contradict the dominating entity's interest is for the dominated entity to band together. It's the only way anything ever changes: the balance of forces moves in the interest of the dominated. Women didn't earn the right to vote because men were nice, but because women fought for it. Social progress never happens because the bourgeoisie is nice (that's a very nice propaganda trick) but because the bourgeoisie has to compromise.
Waiting/wishing/hoping for the state to be nice, which is what asking for ubi is, and the "revolution without violence" the socdem has pushed about, never works. As long as the people who are legitimate are dominated, it will not happen.
Let's stop dreaming in idealistic what-ifs and act in materialist actions. The material conditions define our existence. Let's set our material conditions of existence, without asking nicely, and the balance of power will force the dominating power to compromise.
We've had 100 years of unopposed reformism, and look where we are 🥀
The state isn't some friend that exists for the public good, it literally dances to bourgeois private interests by design. There will be no UBI or better healthcare or whatever unless material conditions and bourgeois interests necessitate it (to prevent a proletariat revolution is one example). There's a reason why it's called a dictatorship of the bourgeois.
If we got UBI today, the majority of people would stop pushing for the better system and would be content with "better than they had".
Effectively setting back liberation by centuries and perpetuating suffering, meanwhile it would always be a sword of damocles dangling above the peoples head with fear of it being withdrawn or diminished by future conservative governments at any minutes notice.
And frankly arguing for it is a terrible idea on principle, it's like haggling and starting from the middle instead of the lowest.
I'd argue humanity can't end Capitalism without UBI first though. UBI is a stepping stone necessary to continue down that road. Likewise, we can't just jump into something like Anarchism without going through Socialism first. Humanity's progression has not only slowed, it's being dragged backwards. Unfortunately even if we could make 1 nice big step forward, there's a vocal minority that requires we take 10 or 20 baby steps instead.
I totally agree. There needs to be some financial mechanisms for keeping people from becoming insanely wealthy coupled with financial mechanisms preventing people from becoming impoverished. The obvious solutions are taxes that increase with income and wealth along with UBI that someone can reasonably live off of. All of this requires regulation and strict enforcement of tax laws, especially for the most wealthy. The rich know this and actively work against it. Probably the most effective method has been for them to buy up all the mass media and pump out capitalist and anti-intelectualist propaganda. We can't change anything if half the people drank the coolaid and actively fight against their own interests and for the interests of the rich. I don't know how bad things will have to get for those people to wake up. Hopefully not much worse but at this point I'm afraid it might take a real civil war for things to change, at least in the USA. Possibly even a world war with how things are going. We're already barreling towards that cliff with the federal governments foot on the gas... I just hope I live through it.
All we have to do is make better kool aid to give them.. Electric kool aid acid.
I would implement an Universal Wage Cap, and Universal Basic Products and Services.
The first doesn't allow to earn above certain point, everything beyond that gets taxed.
The second one ensures that people don't need to pay for their most basic needs.
I have been workshopping a similar concept, though it goes a bit further. Income is ranked - the lowest rank being UBI. When you are being educated or hold a job, your UBI income is replaced with a greater amount of money. Education has sub-ranks based on your grades, to help encourage people to take a job once they have acquired the credentials to do so. Jobs come as five ranks, based on the Effort, Risk, and Knowledge they require. $10k for UBI. $10k to $20k for education. $40k a year for the lowest jobs, such as clerks or waiters. $60k for more strenuous or educated tasks, such as warehouse workers, police, or librarians. $80k for firemen, and $100k for the last rank. Astronauts are an example of the highest grade.
Leadership roles don't automatically receive a pay grade. Workers have to vote for the income of leadership, which is taken from the company after normal employees are paid. Earning retirement pay is 1:1, with each day worked, earning a day of retirement income. As AI automation becomes more common, displaced workers can enter a lotto to receive an job-based income. Companies using AI have to pay into the lotto, because they have wealth caps based on the amount of jobs they are paying for. So a company with lots of employees or job sponsorships has a larger amount of money it can contain. Sponsored jobs can vote on leadership pay and actions, just like employees.
There is a bunch of other details, but the intent is to create a system of absolute limits on wealth and income from all sources. This helps limits corruption and excessive wealth, plus it fights inflation because everything's cost will be based on how much income society receives.
That still uses money as incentive.
I would give as incentive more free time.
I also like the idea of reducing as much as possible the need for having to pay for basic stuff, so instead a basic income I would guarantee basic housing, food, electricity, etc. for free and use wages to get those improved however you want.
The first one creates job availability and the second one makes them less like a need.
I would try to avoid as much as possible having higher wage caps, instead I think it would be better to give better perks that give the opportunity to save money.
It's very hard for me to express myself, specially in another language.
That is fine about the expression. Time and practice will improve it.
Anyhow, I think free time comes from limiting the amount of hours people can work each week, and making it so that doing more time doesn't make more money. Income is given as a lump sum each month, and that a company is obligated to pay a month's income if someone is fired. This makes it so that companies genuinely choose who works for them and incentivizes the retention of trained workers, all the while emphasizing genuine efficiency at the workplace.
Also, naturalization should be a nearly automatic process, with acceptance of the naturalization by the worker being the part with friction.
Anyhow, I will toss out my slide deck. I built it several months ago to explain my economic concepts.
You support UBI because it would create an utopia
I support UBI because it would literally destroy the economy
We are not the same
It wouldn't destroy the economy, just the shareholders profit.
And that is the risk they signed up for.
It wouldn't decrease profits in any way, in fact it'd bolster them temporarily given how everyone has more money to spend. Companies will respond in turn to bump up their prices, negating any kind of increase in purchasing power (what happens every time minimum wages get increased), and once everything catches up and it becomes the new "normal", profit rates will continue to drop as they always have.
Meanwhile the states will bleed money paying everyone UBI and go in debt even faster which would result in austerity, abolishment of UBI, or more excuses to cut other welfare programs. There's a reason why there are pretty much no welfare states anymore.