NOTE: I have been posting excerpts from my book World After Capital. Today’s section looks at the effects a Universal Basic Income (UBI) might have on the labor market. Impact of UBI on the Labor MarketOne of the many attractive features of a UBI is that it doesn’t do away with people’s ability to sell their labor. Suppose someone offers you $5/hour to watch her dog. Under a UBI system you are completely free to accept or reject that proposal. There is no distortion from a minimum wage. The r...

NOTE: I have been posting excerpts from my book World After Capital. Today’s section looks at the effects a Universal Basic Income (UBI) might have on the labor market. Impact of UBI on the Labor MarketOne of the many attractive features of a UBI is that it doesn’t do away with people’s ability to sell their labor. Suppose someone offers you $5/hour to watch her dog. Under a UBI system you are completely free to accept or reject that proposal. There is no distortion from a minimum wage. The r...

NOTE: I have been posting excerpts from my book World After Capital. Today’s section provides some back of the envelope calculations to show we can afford UBI to provide economic freedom for all. UBI is AffordableSo with all of this as background, your might wonder what a Universal Basic Income should pay. My working proposal for the United States is $1,000/month for everyone over age 18, $400/month for everyone over 12 years old, $200/month for every child. These numbers might seem extremely...

NOTE: I have been posting excerpts from my book World After Capital. Today’s section provides some back of the envelope calculations to show we can afford UBI to provide economic freedom for all. UBI is AffordableSo with all of this as background, your might wonder what a Universal Basic Income should pay. My working proposal for the United States is $1,000/month for everyone over age 18, $400/month for everyone over 12 years old, $200/month for every child. These numbers might seem extremely...

This is an Uncertainty Wednesday post on a Thursday. By going over the Wednesdays from the last couple of years you could try to quantify the probability that I will not write an Uncertainty Wednesday post at all, or that I will write one, but a day late. You could graph this historic probability and most likely would find it to be rising over the last few months. You could then use that to predict what the next few weeks will look like. What would that be useful for? For instance, for decidi...

This is an Uncertainty Wednesday post on a Thursday. By going over the Wednesdays from the last couple of years you could try to quantify the probability that I will not write an Uncertainty Wednesday post at all, or that I will write one, but a day late. You could graph this historic probability and most likely would find it to be rising over the last few months. You could then use that to predict what the next few weeks will look like. What would that be useful for? For instance, for decidi...

I have not been blogging a lot, other than the occasional updated excerpt from World After Capital and a few posts in my Uncertainty Wednesday series. The reason is that I am struggling with the relevance of much of what I would have said, when contrasted with the current political and social developments in the US and abroad. The positive longterm vision that I am laying out in World After Capital stands in stark contrast with where we are currently headed. As I write in the book, I am optim...

I have not been blogging a lot, other than the occasional updated excerpt from World After Capital and a few posts in my Uncertainty Wednesday series. The reason is that I am struggling with the relevance of much of what I would have said, when contrasted with the current political and social developments in the US and abroad. The positive longterm vision that I am laying out in World After Capital stands in stark contrast with where we are currently headed. As I write in the book, I am optim...

NOTE: I have been posting excerpts from my book World After Capital. Today’s section is about technological deflation and how its interaction with UBI enhances economic freedom. Technological DeflationIf you are currently struggling to pay for your basic needs, the world will seem like an expensive place to you. Yet the data shows that a lot of things have become cheaper, and that this trend has been gathering steam for some time now. In the U.S., as the following chart shows, the prices for ...

NOTE: I have been posting excerpts from my book World After Capital. Today’s section is about technological deflation and how its interaction with UBI enhances economic freedom. Technological DeflationIf you are currently struggling to pay for your basic needs, the world will seem like an expensive place to you. Yet the data shows that a lot of things have become cheaper, and that this trend has been gathering steam for some time now. In the U.S., as the following chart shows, the prices for ...

Nouriel Roubini has done the crypto ecosystem a great service by pulling together pretty much all issues and criticisms in a single document. While he is prone to hyperbole (not unlike some people in crypto) and plays fast and loose with technical issues, everyone who cares about crypto should read the testimony in its entirety. Longterm success will require overcoming all of these objections. While I believe that is doable (at least in principle), it will not be easy and it will take a long ...

Nouriel Roubini has done the crypto ecosystem a great service by pulling together pretty much all issues and criticisms in a single document. While he is prone to hyperbole (not unlike some people in crypto) and plays fast and loose with technical issues, everyone who cares about crypto should read the testimony in its entirety. Longterm success will require overcoming all of these objections. While I believe that is doable (at least in principle), it will not be easy and it will take a long ...

NOTE: I am resuming posting excerpts from my book World After Capital. The last post was the beginning of Part Three of the book. Today’s post is the the introduction to the concept of economic freedom and how universal basic income makes this freedom possible. Unfortunately the current online version is out of sync as I am experiencing issues with gitbook.Economic FreedomIf you were to quit your job right now, could you still afford to take care of your basic needs? Could you pay for food, s...

NOTE: I am resuming posting excerpts from my book World After Capital. The last post was the beginning of Part Three of the book. Today’s post is the the introduction to the concept of economic freedom and how universal basic income makes this freedom possible. Unfortunately the current online version is out of sync as I am experiencing issues with gitbook.Economic FreedomIf you were to quit your job right now, could you still afford to take care of your basic needs? Could you pay for food, s...

People worry about many risks, but generally about the wrong ones. We tend to be obsessed with personal and societal risk that is “fast.” What will the Fed Reserve announce next? Should I trust Tesla’s auto steering? These are risks where outcomes are realized quickly. That’s why I call them fast risks. As it turns out though some of the biggest risks today are slow. Outcomes will not be realized for decades or longer. The impact of nutrition and exercise on health is an example of a slow ris...

People worry about many risks, but generally about the wrong ones. We tend to be obsessed with personal and societal risk that is “fast.” What will the Fed Reserve announce next? Should I trust Tesla’s auto steering? These are risks where outcomes are realized quickly. That’s why I call them fast risks. As it turns out though some of the biggest risks today are slow. Outcomes will not be realized for decades or longer. The impact of nutrition and exercise on health is an example of a slow ris...

Our most recent read for the USV book club was the Immortalists by Chloe Benjamin. The book chronicles the lives of siblings who as adolescents were foretold the dates of their deaths. One of the key questions we talked about when discussing the book was whether or not one would to know such information. While the case in the book is intentionally extreme, we face similar decisions when it comes to our health. For instance, some people do not want their DNA sequenced for fear of discovering a...

Our most recent read for the USV book club was the Immortalists by Chloe Benjamin. The book chronicles the lives of siblings who as adolescents were foretold the dates of their deaths. One of the key questions we talked about when discussing the book was whether or not one would to know such information. While the case in the book is intentionally extreme, we face similar decisions when it comes to our health. For instance, some people do not want their DNA sequenced for fear of discovering a...

I was in Berlin a couple of weeks ago and there appear to be at least half a dozen bicycle and scooter networks in the city. This makes for a terrible experience because you have to sort of guess which network you might want to use and if that one doesn’t have equipment nearby try another one. It also means that usage of equipment on any one network is far below what it could be resulting in lots of bikes and scooters sitting around on sidewalks. What should be done instead? Cities should get...

I was in Berlin a couple of weeks ago and there appear to be at least half a dozen bicycle and scooter networks in the city. This makes for a terrible experience because you have to sort of guess which network you might want to use and if that one doesn’t have equipment nearby try another one. It also means that usage of equipment on any one network is far below what it could be resulting in lots of bikes and scooters sitting around on sidewalks. What should be done instead? Cities should get...