Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

SoylentNews is people

posted by janrinok on Monday September 12 2016, @03:31AM   Printer-friendly
from the here,-take-my-money dept.

The idea of giving people free money is so radical, even some recipients think it's too good to be true.

Later this year, roughly 6,000 people in Kenya will receive regular monthly payments of about a dollar a day, no strings attached, as part of a policy experiment commonly known as basic income.

People will get to use the money for whatever they want: food, clothing, shelter, gambling, alcohol — anything — all in an effort to reduce poverty.
...
But instead of accepting the cash transfers with open arms, many Kenyans have recently been saying "No, thank you." It's a legitimate concern: As GiveDirectly moves into its larger basic income experiment, the last thing it wants is for people to turn down the money.

Basic Income is a concept often mentioned on SN, and this is an experiment to do exactly that. Many potential recipients of the basic income are skeptical about the goals of the experiment, though, and rumors have arisen that it's tied to a cult or devil worship.

Opponents of such wealth transfers argue they lead to indolence, while another school of thought believes they would reduce poverty and directly produce economic stimulus because the poor would immediately spend the money.


Original Submission

 
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Display Options Threshold/Breakthrough Mark All as Read Mark All as Unread
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
  • (Score: 2) by Zinho on Monday September 12 2016, @08:10PM

    by Zinho (759) on Monday September 12 2016, @08:10PM (#400907)

    Totalitarianism is a GOVERNMENTAL form. . .
    Communism is Socialism perfected. . .
    Socialism is an ECONOMIC system which overlaps into governmental forms.

    Sorry, I'm still having trouble seeing how what you've said leads to Communism and Totalitarianism as being opposites on the same continuum. If anything, you seem to be supporting my 2-axis proposition, just using different words.

    I don't see how totalitarianism requires Captialism (although it's definitely an option there; see King George III + British East India Company), nor how it would preclude a Communist economy (e.g. DPRK). In a totalitarian regime the citizens/subjects have little choice about what mode of economy to engage in, the ruler dictates that by fiat. If the dictate is "from each according to ability, to each according to need" then I'm hard pressed to not call them Communist.

    I think where a lot of people get confused here is the way communist nations have attempted their implementation. When you're dealing with a few hundred million people that you're trying to bring together in an all-or-nothing enterprise like implementing a new economy it's far easier to simply use force to silence dissent than persuade, negotiate, and accommodate. Especially if you're starting with a violent revolution and murdering the old ruling class - nothing says "put up/shut up or you have no place here" like a firing squad or hangman's gibbet. It just seems to lend itself to setting up a totalitarian system afterwards, as has been the trend historically.

    While I'd agree that the anarcho-communist hippies in the 60's are a much closer match to the economic system Marx intended, saying that the DPRK isn't Communist because the Best Koreans are being forced into the economic model against their will sounds like a "No true Scotsman" [logicallyfallacious.com] fallacy.

    --
    "Space Exploration is not endless circles in low earth orbit." -Buzz Aldrin
    Starting Score:    1  point
    Karma-Bonus Modifier   +1  

    Total Score:   2  
  • (Score: 2) by Scruffy Beard 2 on Monday September 12 2016, @09:06PM

    by Scruffy Beard 2 (6030) on Monday September 12 2016, @09:06PM (#400926)

    Communists call such top-down state-directed economies "State capitalism."

    They are considering the whole economy to be like a business. In more capitalist countries, businesses rarely take direction from the workers.

    • (Score: 2) by Zinho on Monday September 12 2016, @09:56PM

      by Zinho (759) on Monday September 12 2016, @09:56PM (#400961)

      To be clear, are you asserting that the USSR, Communist China, and the DPRK were all models of "State capitalism" immediately post-revolution?

      My understanding was that each of those countries was, in their own way, attempting to implement the uprising of the proletariat and establishment of a Communist system as recommended by Marx.

      --
      "Space Exploration is not endless circles in low earth orbit." -Buzz Aldrin
      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 12 2016, @10:53PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 12 2016, @10:53PM (#400992)

        There are still a few remaining pockets of collectivized farmers in "Red" China, so, yeah, there was some lip service paid to The Proletariat.

        The thing is that the central gov't can overrule any decisions made at the local level.
        This is the TOP-DOWN thing again.
        ...and to get a "voice"[1] in nation decisions, you had to swear fealty to the "communist" party.

        [1] A voice which, again, could be ignored.

        .
        If you were to investigate what happened in Ukraine in the 1930s, you'd discover forced collectivization.
        After the State Capitalist gov't did that at gunpoint, they came back at harvest time and stole ALL of the harvest--not even leaving them seed grain.
        Tens of millions of collectivized farm workers starved.
        Clearly, The Workers had no power.
        That's against everything that Marx wrote.

        Hint: Propaganda is meant to convince you of things that aren't true and propaganda always puts the most positive spin on everything.

        -- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 12 2016, @10:30PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 12 2016, @10:30PM (#400980)

    you seem to be supporting my 2-axis proposition

    Yup. Trying to describe the human condition with only 1 dimension is a bad idea.

    Communist economy (e.g. DPRK)
    [...]
    the way communist nations have attempted their implementation

    Ah. I see your problem.
    You think that State Capitalism [wikipedia.org] is Communism.
    Again, in North Korea, everything belongs to the dictatorship and NOTHING belongs to The Workers.
    Again, this is a TOP-DOWN system where the opinions of the Workers matters not at all.
    That has NOTHING in common with Marxism|Socialism|Communism.

    To even vote in their fake elections, you have to belong to the single ("communist") party.

    The point of mentioning DPRK is to show that a country that calls itself Democratic People's Republic of Korea is NOT democratic and NOT about the people, so, calling yourself one thing and being another isn't informative; it's just dishonest.

    In the same way, we could mention that the National Socialist German Workers Party (Nazis) were Fascist (Plantation Capitalists, not "socialist" as well as anti-labor union, so, clearly not about The Workers).

    from each according to ability, to each according to need

    That is a -goal-, NOT a METHOD.

    -- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]