Placeholder Image

Subtitles section Play video

  • So I have this radical leftist idea that nobody should die just because they can't get a job.

  • I know, it's really out there, wild stuff that could just never be accepted in the mainstream,

  • but hear me out.

  • What if we just guaranteed everyone a base standard of living?

  • Food, water, shelter -- that sort of thing.

  • That way, people wouldn't have to be homeless and wouldn't have to starve.

  • Because whatever we're doing right now, it's not working.

  • So many people are homeless or face food insecurity.

  • It's time to try something new.

  • And maybe our best way of ensuring that everybody has a base level standard of living is just

  • to give them a monthly income, no strings attached.

  • This is called the Universal Basic Income, or UBI, and it's been gaining traction for

  • a while now.

  • Small trials have been put into place in various cities, and more and more people are seeing

  • it as a viable way to ensure that everyone has a base standard of living.

  • The basic idea behind UBI is simple: every person deserves to survive, and in our current

  • system, that means they need money for food and shelter and basic necessities.

  • It's a simplified version of the welfare system where every month, the government just

  • writes a check to every resident -- regardless of their income or job status or anything

  • like that.

  • What this does is it guarantees everyone has their basic needs met.

  • Everyone can survive.

  • As it stands in our current system, if you don't have money for rent, you get evicted

  • and become homeless.

  • If you don't have money for food, you starve.

  • And obviously, we have some measures in place to counteract this.

  • The US runs a bunch of various welfare programs, private organizations and nonprofits often

  • work to help homeless people in various cities, and we have things like food banks to help

  • people who face food insecurity.

  • And while all these programs can help some people, they can't help everyone, and that

  • means that many people still live in poverty, still can't find a stable place to live,

  • or still can't reliably put food on the table.

  • And that's a problem, because as a society, we should want everyone to be doing okay.

  • We should want everyone, at the very least, to be able to survive.

  • If you don't want that, ehhhh I think you have bigger issues to work through than I

  • can really address in this video.

  • But, assuming you want everyone to be doing okay, UBI could be one really good method

  • for doing that.

  • Because for one, our current systems have too many strings attached.

  • To be accepted into one of the US government's many welfare programs, you need to go through

  • a lot of bureaucracy and meet a lot of specific requirements.

  • And the government will be watching you closely to make sure you don't ever slip up, because

  • if you do, they're taking those benefits right back.

  • This is bad because not everyone can meet those requirements, and sometimes people are

  • going to make mistakes or do things that would disqualify them from those programs.

  • That shouldn't mean their entire livelihood is revoked.

  • If you give everyone a basic income, it can't be revoked for any reason.

  • If you exist in the country, you get a basic income.

  • No matter the mistakes you made.

  • No matter how bad you are at dealing with bureaucracy.

  • You get a basic income so you can survive.

  • No matter what.

  • Now one of the things that people often worry about when it comes to UBI is the incentive

  • to work.

  • A lot of people have this idea that work is something people only do because it allows

  • them to survive, and they believe that if you take away that incentive, people will

  • stop working.

  • I just don't think that's true.

  • Working isn't always just about earning money to survive.

  • Many people work because it's something to do, because it gives them a sense of accomplishment,

  • because of the status it brings them, because it allows them to socialize with coworkers,

  • because it's a creative outlet, or it's just something they enjoy.

  • There are a lot of reasons that people work beyond money, and I think there's no way

  • that if you gave everyone a basic income that they would all just stop working.

  • Would you?

  • I wouldn't.

  • I mean, you can see an example of this in the world today that lots of rich people who

  • have enough money to sit on for the rest of their lives, they continue working.

  • And clearly, at that point it isn't about the money.

  • Some folks who have retired still continue to work in some form.

  • Sure, some people might stop working, but that's not the end of the world.

  • They would definitely be a small minority of people, and we always have a small percentage

  • of folks who aren't working, that's what the unemployment rate is.

  • But actually this brings me to a related point which is that: not everyone needs to work.

  • I might do a whole video on this eventually, but I'll give you the short version.

  • We seem to have this idea that an ideal society is one where 100% of the population is working,

  • but, there's no need for that.

  • For society to function, we don't need 100% of the population to be working.

  • This isn't the olden days where everyone had to raise their own crops.

  • Today, wealth is concentrated in the hands of a relatively small percentage of the population.

  • So all we have to do is redistribute that wealth to everyone else, and we have enough

  • to get by.

  • You don't need to make people do pointless jobs just because you think everyone needs

  • a job -- because the truth is, they don't.

  • And if they want a job, which I'm betting a lot of people will, they can find something

  • that they enjoy doing, like something creative, or something that helps other people -- instead

  • of some repetitive boring task created just for the sake of there being an officialjob

  • for the person.

  • And the need for us to recognize that jobs aren't essential is growing fast, because

  • of automation.

  • Robots are taking over a lot of the more dangerous and tedious jobs, and that's really good

  • for keeping people safe and freeing up people's time, but that also means that if nothing

  • changes, those newly-unemployed folks are gonna be in a lot of trouble.

  • That's where UBI comes in.

  • Automation is already taking people's jobs, but instead of fighting that and keeping people

  • in boring repetitive jobs -- a solution that wouldn't work for very long -- we could

  • instead embrace automation and give everyone a basic income.

  • We could get people out of those dangerous meaningless jobs and free up their time to

  • do other stuff.

  • Right now, lots of people have a hard time being creative or entrepreneurial because

  • they're just fighting to make rent month by month.

  • With that burden lifted off of them, imagine all of the new amazing art and literature

  • and other projects that people could come up with.

  • They could create beautiful amazing things, or they could start organizations that help

  • people, or any other number of things.

  • The potential is out there -- a lot of people just don't have the time or energy to do

  • it when they're trying to survive.

  • And, in some cases, there will be dangerous or gross jobs that can't be done by robots,

  • and in those cases, a UBI would give workers the ability to demand safer worker conditions

  • and higher pay.

  • Because right now, a lot of jobs have unsafe working conditions and low pay simply because

  • employers know that people will take these jobs because they need them to survive.

  • But if people no longer need your job to survive, you've gotta sweeten the deal.

  • So people would still take those jobs, but they'd be much safer and better paid.

  • Because under this system, people would still have jobs and be paid.

  • So if money is a huge motivator for you, you can still work to earn above the amount you

  • get from UBI.

  • So maybe you're wondering, how do we pay for all of this?

  • Giving everyone a livable income every month sounds expensive, and it is.

  • But it's definitely possible.

  • And the main solution is to tax the rich.

  • They have so much money they hardly know what to do with it, and income inequality has been

  • rising for years.

  • So that would be the main funding source.

  • But also, if a UBI were to be put into place, it would make a lot of welfare programs redundant.

  • There might still need to be some much smaller programs for certain things, but the vast

  • majority of money going to current welfare systems could be redirected into the UBI.

  • That means that we're not just making money appear out of nowhere, we're just taking

  • it from the rich and from the programs that we're replacing with the basic income.

  • This is something we could afford.

  • And, it would actually be good for the economy because people who had been too poor to really

  • buy much would suddenly have disposable income, and that means they'd be spending more.

  • More spending and more demand would result in a better-functioning economy.

  • So yeah, that's the idea behind UBI.

  • Give everyone money.

  • Allow everyone to survive.

  • Raise the standard of living for everyone.

  • And improve the economy.

  • It might be awhile before we can get there, but I have to believe that we can do it.

  • Anyway, that's all I had for you today.

  • If you'd like to support me on Patreon, you can click over here, and if you'd like

  • to subscribe, you can click up here.

  • Thanks for watching, and I'll see you next time.

So I have this radical leftist idea that nobody should die just because they can't get a job.

Subtitles and vocabulary

Click the word to look it up Click the word to find further inforamtion about it