We'll need a universal basic income (UBI) in an AI-driven world
8 mockingloris 22 8/11/2025, 4:54:47 PM
I read on windowscentral "...We'll need a universal basic income (UBI) in an AI-driven world".
Eventually, at some point. Most of industry would have been disrupted/automated.
There should be a working group of the major players/stake holders in the space working out a model of how that would work.
I work in tech and I don't see that happening for another decade and half or so.
Care to ruminate?
└── Dey well
In general though, advanced automation like AI will disrupt jobs, and unlike previous times, you cannot educate yourself out of a superior intelligence taking your job.
This is not about moving your manual work to another segment where different manual work is not viable to automate economically: its about your mental abilities being insufficient to produce value in the economy, full stop.
If that doesn't scare you, I'm not sure what will. However, its not clear to me yet if all this coding LLM hype will end up destroying coding jobs, or creating debugging jobs.
I feel it is doors losing and others opening in the interim for creatives/devs who level up.
└── Dey well; Be well
In Nigeria, I’ve seen industries like taxi services get upended by apps like Uber and Bolt, leaving union leaders/cabals scrambling for the scraps.
AI could amplify this, automating jobs faster than new ones emerge.
One idea is taxing automated systems—say, a levy on AI-driven platforms or robots replacing workers.
This could redistribute wealth without assuming zero employment. For example, Nigeria’s government already taxes digital platforms; scaling that to fund UBI isn’t unthinkable.
What do you think about targeting automation profits specifically?
└── Yarn me
I also think that if this much tax money is going to enable people to not work, the people paying taxes should have more control over how the money is used.
If health care is universal, more control over foods consumed risky health-related activities.
Even if AI automates a ton, people will still want incentives for less glamorous jobs. Maybe UBI isn’t about scrapping money but ensuring a baseline so folks aren’t stuck scrubbing metaphorical torpedo tubes.
What’s your take—could a partial UBI make “low-level” work more voluntary?
└── Yarn me
I think one other aspect of this system is that if you are getting UBI, you give up your voting rights.
Every economic system has its flaws and can be exploited. Capitalism has been responsible for lifting billions of people out of poverty. But it’s also been corrupted by cronyism.
The coming AI revolution will likely cause capitalism’s issues to be more pronounced.
Not everybody is in Star Fleet, so I assume people want the ability to travel the stars and they'd be happy enough scrubbing torpedo tubes.
TBC IMO human caused climate change and other forms of environmental damage are very real and worthy of our best solutions, but the idea that collectivism solves environment, that collectivist govts would never decide to damage the environment in pursuit of short term aims is laughable.
I think about it a lot I won't lie. I know certain jobs will be around for a while but, the general populace will be a different matter.
└── Yarn me; Lets talk, I'm genuinely interested