Entitlement
Mar. 26th, 2006 08:19 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rowynOver a decade ago, I was entertaining the idea of writing a story set on a long-term colony ship. The ship would travel at sublight speeds and would take decades to move from its origin planet to the one its colonists planned to settle.
What would life be like aboard that generation ship? How would you guarantee that enough trained personnel were available for any given job? How would you handle a shortage, or a surplus of labor? How does the government treat the unemployed?
That last is a particularly interesting question, because on a starship, everything has a human cost. Everything is made and ultimately maintained by human hands. Not just food and clothing, but the ship that shelters you, the air you breathe, the water you drink. On Earth, the basics of human life exist even without human intervention. There was water and air and ground to walk on before there were any people to use it, and it'll all still be there when humans are extinct. We regard them as entitlements. No one manufactures the air I breathe, and no one charges me for it, either.
Now, to some degree, homelessness in this country *is* a crime: it's called "loitering". All of the land in America is owned by someone, whether individual, business, or government. None of it is free, no strings attached. But in practice, if I give up working and renounce money, I'm not going to be immediately executed. I might starve to death, but that's not quite the same as being shoved out an airlock.
What about being on a spaceship, where space and air are at a premium? There's no place to go where your presence is merely neutral, of no help or hinderance to anyone. You are taking up valuable and limited resources just by existing. How should society treat you if you don't give anything back?
"Shove them out an airlock" is one possibility. But I think that would only be implemented if the cost of air or space is comparatively high. If the ship just can't afford to have non-productive people around -- if the strain on the system from a non-contributor is so great that it threatens the whole -- then society might grit its teeth and execute anyone that couldn't provide for themselves.
But that's an unlikely scenario for a colony ship. I'd expect sufficiently advanced technology that the marginal cost of basics would be low. Not non-zero; everything would still need occassional maintenance and other human intervention. But most of the work would be done by machines; one man's labor would provide air for thousands if not millions. Food would likely also be inexpensive. These things are too important to be costly, because the costlier they are, the more
likely the whole venture would be to fail. How many people would get on a colony ship if they thought there was a good chance the food would run out or the air would fail?
Once I made the decision that these the basics of life should be comparatively low, it became harder to argue that the basics of life shouldn't be an entitlement. If it's cheap, am I really going to shove the bankrupt out an airlock? And if I'm already supplying the impoverished with air, water, and space to occupy, I might as well supply food too. Medical care? Well, maybe. But the question had become not "Are the colonists entitled to get anything for free?" but "how much are they entitled to get for free?"
The truth is, it's the same way on a planet, too. We all benefit from entitlements: "The right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." No one seriously argues that we need to earn the right to breathe, or that homeless people shouldn't be allowed to take up space on land. The harshest of penalties imposed against the homeless is prison -- and that's actually providing them with a far more expensive form of shelter than a park bench. You get fed in prison, too! Minors net the largest range of entitlements: free education through high school, and the state will provide free room and board if the parents do not (or cannot).
My point in saying all of this is to explain why I'm not opposed to the concept of "an existance wage", of government providing a certain amount of money and/or necessities to all citizens. I don't think getting a handout is intrinsically bad; the world and our country offers a lot of handouts already, and getting free air and water doesn't seem to be harmful to me. What I like about Charles Murray's plan better than traditional welfare is its simplicity, and its comparative lack of disincentives to work. Yes, all forms of entitlements offer disincentives to work, but one that provides the same benefits to all citizens does so less than one that only benefits non-workers.
What I am concerned about is that such a handout would be too expensive for our society. My hypothetical colonists could provide everyone with free room and board on the assumption that the marginal cost of these things was low.
Mr. Murray proposes a $10,000 entitlement per adult citizen. Is that amount too high? Would it be too burdensome for the collective of those paying more tax than they're receiving in entitlement to cover? Would the disincentive it offered to work be too powerful, and lowering the number of net taxpayers to a point where it couldn't be sustained?
Is it too low? Are there beneficiaries of our current entitlement programs who need a higher level of assistance due to medical conditions, and would they be unable to receive it under Mr. Murray's flat-rate plan? (Perhaps the mandatory health insurance would cover such costs long-term, but I'm not sure how well the transition would or could be managed.)
It's all hypothetical for now; political resistance to such a notion will be much too strong for decades to come.
But as America becomes wealthier and technology more advanced, I think the answer to the question "Is it too expensive?" will one day become a clear "No." But whether that's true today or not, I truly don't know.
What would life be like aboard that generation ship? How would you guarantee that enough trained personnel were available for any given job? How would you handle a shortage, or a surplus of labor? How does the government treat the unemployed?
That last is a particularly interesting question, because on a starship, everything has a human cost. Everything is made and ultimately maintained by human hands. Not just food and clothing, but the ship that shelters you, the air you breathe, the water you drink. On Earth, the basics of human life exist even without human intervention. There was water and air and ground to walk on before there were any people to use it, and it'll all still be there when humans are extinct. We regard them as entitlements. No one manufactures the air I breathe, and no one charges me for it, either.
Now, to some degree, homelessness in this country *is* a crime: it's called "loitering". All of the land in America is owned by someone, whether individual, business, or government. None of it is free, no strings attached. But in practice, if I give up working and renounce money, I'm not going to be immediately executed. I might starve to death, but that's not quite the same as being shoved out an airlock.
What about being on a spaceship, where space and air are at a premium? There's no place to go where your presence is merely neutral, of no help or hinderance to anyone. You are taking up valuable and limited resources just by existing. How should society treat you if you don't give anything back?
"Shove them out an airlock" is one possibility. But I think that would only be implemented if the cost of air or space is comparatively high. If the ship just can't afford to have non-productive people around -- if the strain on the system from a non-contributor is so great that it threatens the whole -- then society might grit its teeth and execute anyone that couldn't provide for themselves.
But that's an unlikely scenario for a colony ship. I'd expect sufficiently advanced technology that the marginal cost of basics would be low. Not non-zero; everything would still need occassional maintenance and other human intervention. But most of the work would be done by machines; one man's labor would provide air for thousands if not millions. Food would likely also be inexpensive. These things are too important to be costly, because the costlier they are, the more
likely the whole venture would be to fail. How many people would get on a colony ship if they thought there was a good chance the food would run out or the air would fail?
Once I made the decision that these the basics of life should be comparatively low, it became harder to argue that the basics of life shouldn't be an entitlement. If it's cheap, am I really going to shove the bankrupt out an airlock? And if I'm already supplying the impoverished with air, water, and space to occupy, I might as well supply food too. Medical care? Well, maybe. But the question had become not "Are the colonists entitled to get anything for free?" but "how much are they entitled to get for free?"
The truth is, it's the same way on a planet, too. We all benefit from entitlements: "The right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." No one seriously argues that we need to earn the right to breathe, or that homeless people shouldn't be allowed to take up space on land. The harshest of penalties imposed against the homeless is prison -- and that's actually providing them with a far more expensive form of shelter than a park bench. You get fed in prison, too! Minors net the largest range of entitlements: free education through high school, and the state will provide free room and board if the parents do not (or cannot).
My point in saying all of this is to explain why I'm not opposed to the concept of "an existance wage", of government providing a certain amount of money and/or necessities to all citizens. I don't think getting a handout is intrinsically bad; the world and our country offers a lot of handouts already, and getting free air and water doesn't seem to be harmful to me. What I like about Charles Murray's plan better than traditional welfare is its simplicity, and its comparative lack of disincentives to work. Yes, all forms of entitlements offer disincentives to work, but one that provides the same benefits to all citizens does so less than one that only benefits non-workers.
What I am concerned about is that such a handout would be too expensive for our society. My hypothetical colonists could provide everyone with free room and board on the assumption that the marginal cost of these things was low.
Mr. Murray proposes a $10,000 entitlement per adult citizen. Is that amount too high? Would it be too burdensome for the collective of those paying more tax than they're receiving in entitlement to cover? Would the disincentive it offered to work be too powerful, and lowering the number of net taxpayers to a point where it couldn't be sustained?
Is it too low? Are there beneficiaries of our current entitlement programs who need a higher level of assistance due to medical conditions, and would they be unable to receive it under Mr. Murray's flat-rate plan? (Perhaps the mandatory health insurance would cover such costs long-term, but I'm not sure how well the transition would or could be managed.)
It's all hypothetical for now; political resistance to such a notion will be much too strong for decades to come.
But as America becomes wealthier and technology more advanced, I think the answer to the question "Is it too expensive?" will one day become a clear "No." But whether that's true today or not, I truly don't know.
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no subject
Date: 2006-03-26 04:48 pm (UTC)The proper cost of food for one person is somewhere under $40/week, assuming refrigeration is available. I come out near $40/week on my "core plan" when purchasing 6oz packs of canned juice; a more unbalanced diet (still retaining adequate protein from block cheese and winter sausage) can be managed for about $25/week by substituting saltines for the juice. This is for 3,500 calories/day. I lose weight when sedentary on 3,000 calories/day. Assumption: access to Walmart, or a non-advertising grocery store that doesn't pack groceries (Kansas City examples: Food4Less, Aldi.)
And there are economies of scale when feeding 2-4 people. I believe the USDA low-cost plan still comes in at $160/week for four people, and is somewhat more diverse than my "core plan".
So food cost is controllable to somewhere between $1300 and $2080, assuming no use of food charities. If food charity is available (e.g., Harvester's in the KC area), only protein (meat and cheese) need be purchased.
The real problem with his proposed existence wage ($10,000/year i.e. $833/month) is that it precludes renting an apartment. The only option would be living in a used minivan or suitably large car (Cadillac). I'm not sure what the going car loan for that would be, but I know that the car loan (KC area) for more conventional cars is $80/week for those with a hellish credit record. Driving the value of the car low enough to not require replacement insurance would be far less...probably would need to finance only $2,000.
That's at most $320/month for housing, and at most $160/month for food. So we need a 24-hour parking lot to put the minivan or Cadillac in. For downtown KC, I've heard $2.50/day...which comes out to a bit under $195/month.
So yes, it's theoretically possible to live in a downtown urban area on even less than the proposed existence wage.
Health care coverage is more problematic...that $50/month for a competent $5,000-deductible catastrophic health insurance plan is going to hurt, but won't break the limit.
[HUD projects have a reputation of being a disaster in progress...forget that]
Incidentally: I really should check the prices for parking at the Plaza when discussing this. That would be really surreal: living in walking range of just about every luxury store of interest...
What constitutes "necessity"?
Date: 2006-03-27 12:53 am (UTC)But that's all right, because I think even in downtown KC you can rent a studio for less than $515 per month (utilities included). Eight years ago, I rented a studio in midtown KC for $365 per month, utilities included. I don't think rents have gone up that much. Monthly parking is lower than your estimate, too -- there are lots for $100 or less.
Moreover: you don't have to live alone. American estimates on housing almost always assume "you live by yourself". If you share a home, then you must have your own room. The assumption that privacy is a basic need for adults is a curious one, but it's there. Along with the assumption that plumbing and electricity are "needs". I'm willing to concede the latter as a "need", but I think if you want to live on your government handout, you can break down and share a room with another person if necessary.
Or you can move to somewhere with low rents, Or you can find some other source of income. The existance wage should function as a safety net or a launching pad, not a guaranteed comfortable life. You wouldn't necessarily be able to live in the area of your choice without getting another income.
Re: What constitutes "necessity"?
Date: 2006-03-27 01:36 am (UTC)As I mentioned, he didn't go without plumbing. (Shower alternative: a gym membership with shower. Nothing oddball with a light workout before work.)
I didn't say you couldn't drive the van or car during the day. [You should, to keep it from breaking down prematurely.] But you need a place to park it while you sleep, preferably with some security.
I wouldn't have thought of this otherwise.
Phone service is more interesting (many employers need a contact phone number). Nowadays, I'd probably go with cell phone.
Agreed, America is culturally weird on "need for privacy" and "live by yourself" as base case.
A more conventional alternative might be a motel/hotel, but it should have a kitchenette. One of my RL friends' brothers bankrupted himself (after his home was condemned for dry rot) by moving his family of four into a hotel...for a year. It worked out to about $600 a month in rent (without a kitchenette). Which would have been fine if he had known how to properly shop for nonperishable food.
It was his family eating out lunch and dinner every day that did him in fiscally, not the hotel bill or the car bills.
Re: What constitutes "necessity"?
Date: 2006-03-27 01:38 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-03-27 08:34 am (UTC)This lack of space means that when you set out on such a mission a decision has to be made about the crew that you're going to harbour, are you going to start with a relatively small crew and let biological reproduction inflate your crew size? Or start with a full crew and ban biological reproduction? And if you're prepared to ban something so personal, how much control are you willing to exert to get the point across. A developing child takes up a -great- deal more resources than an adult does, and is incapable of producing anything to offset this cost, but its an investment into the future health of the community, because that child will, with careful nurturing, develop into a productive member of society.
The bigger question that hasn't been asked in this scenario, is how much control are you willing to exert on the populace, are you willing to make work mandatory, make reproduction illegal if uncertified, make the rearing of children carefull supervised. And what about people who simply consume more resources by their nature, people who keep their spaces unclean or are socially abrasive, or who eat more food.
The problem becomes that once you start looking at the -real- situation of taking a pre-determined number of people from one place to the next in such a manner, is who do you take? Its not honest to assume that everyone will have a skill that will enrich the lives of others on the ship, should people have to learn such a skill before they're allowed to be part of the crew? And what about the diversity of tasks, is an engineer worth more than a bartender? Are bartenders unimportant in their entirety?
So many questions would have to be asked, and this is the problem when we try to contain so large an issue as the world, its very difficult to bottle it up into a small space and try to keep it from exploding. Its fine in the strict, millitary environment that Star Trek revolves around, where everyone is either part of the crew or they're transitory, but when everyone must have a purpose (because why would you include anyone on such a vessel who couldn't provide for themselves) things become complex, over-pressurized. We either have a system of totalitarian control in which participation is enforced for the good of the ship and the mission, or a loose system where the honor of people would either compel them to work towards the common goal... or they would -have- to be pitched out the airlock.
Because if the guy one block down from me is living the same life I am, but not working like I am, what's my motivation?
People are inherrently lazy.
no subject
Date: 2006-03-27 04:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-03-27 05:26 pm (UTC)Unfortunately, I have too many issues with the welfare-state concept to really run them all down without writing an article on it. As it stands, we have a tremendous percentage of people on welfare who are deliberately abusing it. I'd have no qualms at all about welfare if part of your qualification to receive it involved time on 'labor gangs', unless precluded by medical qualification.
You might say that I don't believe in 'entitlement'. IMNSHO, if you don't contribute to the state and the community around you, the state has no real cause to contribute to you beyond 'feel good' programs...Which is what we have, make no mistake. If you won't work, can't feed or shelter yourself and are so odious that no friend will shelter or feed you, I don't see why my tax dollars should be applied. If you literally can't work in the normal labor pool, it's in society's best interest to spend some time finding a job you can do, or training you if training is an issue...But in both cases, if you expect to receive continuing societal support you must do said job, or attempt to excel at said training until you're ready to go on to a job that deserves support, then proceed on to said job.
no subject
Date: 2006-03-28 07:54 am (UTC)Granted, but that doesn't remove the additional flaws from the analogy. And those flaws 'do' make it a more difficult platform from which to laud the idea of entitlement, because it draws a much sharper line between the spaceship and the real world.
On the spaceship, entitelment would work because there is a critical mission and a system of control that must be upheld for the mission to come to fruition. On the earth, it 'doesn't' work because no one can agree on what we should be able to force people into doing without harming their unalienable rights and freedoms.
no subject
Date: 2006-03-28 11:55 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-03-28 08:01 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-03-29 06:52 am (UTC)That is the main reason why I think alcohol should be basically unrestricted in any rational legal framework, regardless of its functionality as a minor tranquilizer (which normally is worth FDA class II). It's the only low-technology water preservation technique we have, culturally.
no subject
Date: 2006-03-31 12:29 pm (UTC)Plus there is the Roman trick, using half and half with water.
And agreed. If alcohol was new on the scene it'd be ban-listed within a couple months. Probably tobacco too. Yay grandfathering.
no subject
Date: 2006-03-27 08:48 am (UTC)The problem that we run into in an entitlement scenario of this nature, is that our society isn't controlled by a pure democracy, our society is controlled by a puppet democracy that is bought and sold quietly behind the scenes. Supported and controled by the rich, even the democracies of our world are a complete joke when you try to line them up accurately with the views of the people within them.
If every person in society were to be entitedly to $10K as a yearly stipend to live their lives, where would all of the money come from? Our governments are already running at a deficit -now- and they're taking in money from every tax payer to manage what they're doing currently. If you were to try and reverse the system entirely and force the government to pay out 10K to everyone within society, and then encourage them to collect enough taxes to offset the difference, the tax hike for the upper class would be -gargantuan- and $10,000 wouldn't even come close to making a dent in it for many of the truly wealthy. And since its the truly wealthy that run our countries, it would never be passed into law, it would be crushed under the weight of an avalanch of money, people would fire up the political spin machine, feed money into one side of it, and a dozen news broadcasts and cover stories would spew out the other side, declaring that this method of social wellfare would destroy the economy within the first year...
And even if it was approached carefully, even if everyone came to the polls with the idea that they don't care about the economy (because people, as a general rule as long as they don't have a vested intrest and workable ammount of accounting knowledge, would believe exactly what the news was telling them. People will believe some of the most pathetic, worthless drivel imaginable if its poured into their heads through the media) and are there to vote for 'their $10,000', it would be crushed going into the senate, because despite the fact that our senators are supposed to represent their electorates, what they really represent is their own personal agendas. We elect them based on these agendas, but we don't get a careful look into their heads to find out how truthful they're being. We see the polished, carefully worded, public front of their 'policies' and decide based on that, only in many cases to have what we thought were the ethics and policies fade rapidly the moment they sit down in the house.
no subject
Date: 2006-03-27 05:03 pm (UTC)You're rather missing the point. It's not "The government takes all the money from everyone and then redistributes $10k to each person." That'd be simple socialism. Neither my hypothetical colony ship nor Charles Murray's plan suggests that everyone should live exactly the same life regardless of work done. The point is "Everyone gets $X from the government, whether they work or not." If you work, you will still get your check from the government as well as an income from your job that the guy who doesn't work won't get. You will have a better lifestyle than the people who don't work. The people who don't work won't be starving and homeless, no. But you live in Canada: how many people do you know who don't work but aren't homeless because they get checks from the government? Last I heard, most Canadians still felt motivated to work anyway.
Your government (and mine) are already running deficits in part because we already provide massive entitlements. Here's the 2004 Social Security budget: http://www.ssa.gov/budget/2004bud.html . Total outlay for 2002 was $489.9 billion. That's enough money to give 48.9 million American $10,000 each. There are 217 million citizens over 18 (I don't know how many over 21, which is Murray's proposed cutoff) in the US, so obviously Soc Sec alone isn't spending enough to cover it. But Soc Sec isn't the only entitlement program in the US; there's Medicare and Medicaid, not to mention countless state and local food stamp and welfare programs. <a href="http://rowyn.livejournal.com/234446.html>Murray's numbers</a> said that his Plan would be more expensive than the current system of entitlements from 2006 to 2011, but afterwards it would start to be cheaper. Presumably the savings come in large part from cutting smaller checks to current recipients of entitlements. But they also come from administrative savings; administrating a plan that you have to qualify for and that you get certain benefits based on how much you've put in and that you get certain benefits depending on negotiations with insurance companies and hospitals, etc., ad nauseum, is considerably more expensive than direct-depositing $X to the accounts of everyone over the age of 21. You don't need hundreds of thousands of social workers to evaluate cases and make decisions on disability claims, welfare claims, etc. You just need an accurate database of citizenship, birth and death records and bank accounts. Yes, the money is going to come from taxes. It's efectively a $10,000 tax credit that everyone over 21 gets. If you pay less than $10,000, you get a net benefit, and if you pay more you get a net loss. But that's a much lower psychological obstacle than welfare or unemployment, where virtually every dollar you earn gets you one less dollar in benefits. Here, we'd still be paying 15%-40% in taxes on earned income ... but we already do that, and it doesn't stop most of us from working to get more than $10,000 a year currently.
no subject
Date: 2006-03-28 08:29 am (UTC)Total Current Outlay = $489 Billion
Total Demand = $2.17 Trillion
Additional revenue required = $1.68 Trillion
Additional revenue required per capita = $7741
The immeadiate place that this breaks down is that you cannot take a single cent from the very lowest income earners, and you have to scale that ammount upwards. People with no income couldn't pay into the $7741 that they owe. Every pensioner, welfare reciepient, disability recipient, and unemployed labourer is incapable of paying for this.
Hypothetically (I would have to actually dig up some accurate census data for last year's taxation year to have solid numbers to work with, and I don't quite have that kind of time this evening, as I'm at work) the payment curve could look like:
Under 15,000 income
(50% of populace)
-$6000
15-30,000 income bracket
(25% of populace)
-$12,000
30-60,000 income bracket
(15% of populace)
-$18,000
60-100,000 income bracket
(6.5% of populace)
-$36,000
100,000+ income bracket
-$72,000
These statistics are very rough, but they illustrate the problem. As you rise slowly upwards because you have a smaller margain of people trying to catch up to the ammount of money lost on the lowest tax braket, more weight must be shouldered per capita.
Basically, in the end it ammounts to a huge increase in income tax percentages for the rich, and a diminishing raise of the income tax percentages spiraling downwards. Basically if you cut the $10,000 number out of it like the arbitrary dead wood that it is, is ammounts to reverse tax reform, a diameterically opposed change to the system of taxation that would -NEVER- pass the house, it would never get past the senators, it would never even get past the city council... Because as you rise upwards into the different teirs of governement, you raise upwards in terms of personal wealth.
As for how many people I know who don't work but aren't homeless?
I would suggest that less than 5% of the people in this city who don't work are homeless, realisitically if you remove from the equation the people who's money goes directly to finance an expensive drug addiction, that number probably shrinks to less than ONE percent.
I'll agree with you that most people feel motivated to work. But there are a lot of people who are being entitled in our system that really shouldn't be. I was sitting next to a woman on the bus a week ago May, complaining bitterly to the man next to her about how wellfare just doesn't cover all of her necessary expenses, and how she was having to borrow money to get her car out of impound, and how she was worried she wasn't going to make this month's payment on her big screen TV or her rent. Which she told the gentleman beside her was about $271, utilities included, for a four bedroom house for herself and her three children. (Subsidized housing)
I live with a roommate in a two bedroom appartment, I pay $325 for my half of the rent, and that rises as high as $400 once you take into account the utilities. We don't have a TV in our livingroom, let alone a 'big screen' TV, and my car is waiting in the parking lot because I don't have the finances to fix what's wrong with it currently.
Personally, some of these people are being 'entitled' to a little more than they should be.
no subject
Date: 2006-03-28 12:03 pm (UTC)I'm not saying it would work. I have no idea if it would work; his book could well make assumptions about the economy that wouldn't be true if his plan were implemented, because of the effect it would or wouldn't have. I'm just saying that dismissing it based on a back-of-envelope calculation is unfair.
no subject
Date: 2006-03-31 02:51 am (UTC)Its the knowledge that it comes down, in the end, to a massive lateral tax hike, in this case perhaps even a quintupling of the current tax rates. The US government can't even get on the ball about free medical coverage, how do you expect them to get on the ball on something three times as large financially?
no subject
Date: 2006-04-01 01:29 am (UTC)