Schedule from 4-16-4-23
4-16 Should Community College be Free? Develop an argumentative thesis that addresses the claim that community college should be free.
4-18 Peer Edit for Essay 3 and Portfolio Grading Part 1
4-23 Essay #3 Due
Essay #3 Due 4-23-19
In the context of Annie Lowry’s Give People Money, support, refute, or complicate the argument that Universal Basic Income is a necessary implementation for human rights, social order, and permanent unemployment.
For other sources:
Read Oren Cass’ “Why a Universal Basic Income Is a Terrible Idea” and write an essay that supports, defends, or complicates the author’s position that UBI will do more harm than good. For sources, I refer you to Universal Basic Income explained, UBI being used in other countries, UBI explained by Jordan Peterson as a life-purpose problem.
Option B (New Addition): Should Community College be Free?
Develop an argumentative thesis that addresses the claim that community college should be free.
Look at pros and cons from Forbes article.
Recent Atlantic article argues for free community college.
Option C: Read "In admissions scandal, the students should be expelled" by Michael Hiltzik and support or defend the author's assertion. Should rich students whose parents paid their way illegally into top-tier colleges be expelled? Are all these students equal? Some are not even taking classes seriously evidenced by their YouTube videos. Others may be performing well. Should their performance make a difference?
Also see Atlantic essay about "Real Scandal" and how there is no way to prevent the next college scandal.
See Clint Smith essay "Elite Colleges Constantly Tell Low-Income Students That They Don't Belong."
Steve Dunning's Forbes essay "The 'Jobless Future' Is a Myth"
Yuval Noah Harari's "The Rise of the Useless Class"
Study Questions
What is Universal Basic Income?
You get a check, perhaps $1,000, every month with no questions asked and no questions. The money can help you barely survive and essentially protect you from destitution. You could live in a shared apartment, buy food, and have money for public transportation. That’s it. Everything above that would require some kind of job or side hustle.
Not all the details are ironed out. Countries haven’t agreed upon an age or a policy for recently settled immigrants.
UBI is response to shrinking middle class, shrinking real wages, unaffordable housing, overpriced education, technological-fueled unemployment, and an over complicated welfare system. Countries all over the world are seriously considering UBI. Some are already implementing it.
UBI will give workers more leverage with their employers. They won’t feel as desperate to work for a horrible boss and/or a horrible job.
UBI will give an escape route to abused spouse who needs to get out of a hellish marriage or relationship.
UBI may give protection to over 3 million jobs lost due to self-driving cars in the next 10-20 years.
Concerns
Some are concerned that UBI would motivate people to permanently drop out of job market and reduce productivity.
Lowry estimates the cost of UBI to be $3.9 trillion to US government every year.
Two. What is appealing to Annie Lowrey about UBI?
Lowrey writes that she is less interested in policy and more interested in the ethical foundation. She writes:
“What I came to believe is this: A UBI is an ethos as much as it is a technocratic policy proposal.” It contains within it the principles of universality, unconditionality, inclusion, and simplicity, and it insists that every person is deserving of participation in the economy, freedom of choice, and a life without deprivation.”
In other words, there is an ethical message: Deprivation and starvation are morally unacceptable. A fundamental safety net, no questions asked, must be made available to the citizenry. This is the least decent thing a society can and must do.
The above is Lowrey’s central argument.
Three. How is shifting employment affecting the UBI debate?
Lowrey shows evidence that more and more jobs are being permanently lost even during recoveries as AI is becoming more and more self-regulating and less dependent on human engineers.
At the same time, what job growth there is exists in the “crummy jobs” department with fast food and temporary work being the new boom. Over 40% of fast food workers are over 25; in other words, adults are supporting their families with “crummy jobs.”
American workers are becoming more and more part of the odious, dreadful gig economy, a life of hustle without good pay, stability, or benefits.
We have a “good jobs crisis.” That crummy jobs are on the rise gives employers leverage to punk people with those jobs. But UBI will take some of that leverage away.
On page 49, we read of growing economic disparity between 1979 and 2014 in a major study.
Bottom half of earners in 1979 had 20% of income; in 2014, they had gone down to 13%.
In contrast, the 1% top earners jumped from 11% to 20% in that same time period.
Hysteresis
We have a new class of unemployed who suffer from long-term unemployment, about 2-3 years or more. They suffer from hysteresis: They lag behind in every category and has permanent lower earnings even after a recession.
Temporary Jobs on Vice News Video
Four. Why is not working so hard for Americans?
Let us set aside the economic need for work for a second and imagine being economically independent of work. Americans have a psychological dependence on work that does not exist in other countries.
Believe it or not, America has a relationship with work that is unique in the world. In other countries, people work for money, but the job does not define them.
Not so in America. We have cultivated a work ethic that makes one’s personal identity and spiritual virtue synonymous with the kind of work one does.
We see work, or industriousness, as a “social obligation and a foundation of the good life” (70).
This mindset makes us vulnerable for a variety of reasons.
One, should we make any job define who we are? Why is industriousness a “national religion”? Why do we have this mentality but other countries do not?
Two, is this a healthy mindset when crummy jobs are on the rise and desirable jobs are on the decline?
Three, is this a wise mindset in a world where technology could lead to massive permanent unemployment?
Four, have we been brainwashed to our detriment?
Consider the ancient Greeks and Romans argued that the highest quality of life was based on leisure and philosophical contemplation, not industriousness.
But Americans are under the spell of the Puritan work ethic which says idleness leads to the work of the devil.
Therefore, always be busy. Always strive for more. Always incorporate a side hustle.
While European countries see our social and economic class as a matter of fate and circumstance, Americans subscribe to the myth of the self-made man who lifts himself out of his bootstraps.
Unlike Europeans who see poverty as a trap from an unfair system, Americans see poverty as a matter of self-blame, the result of one’s character defects.
Social Validation
Unlike others, Americans are dependent on social validation that results from their job. Identity, self-reliance, moral and social obligation, and social validation connected with job status.
Social Stigma from Joblessness
Being jobless in America leads to shame, social stigma, ignominy, and chronic depression. It becomes a sort of death.
Americans recover from death of loved one, divorce, catastrophe. But they do not recovery from joblessness.
This mental state presents a challenge to UBI and future world of mass unemployment.
Freeloaders?
There is a work mindset in America that would resist UBI: Why should people get money for free? What kind of sick morally bankrupt system would allow such a thing?
However, Lowrey points to program in Iran that is similar to UBI, and it did not result in increased unemployment as a result of making people too lazy to work (82).
Going to School, Caring for Ailing Parent, Parenthood
Another argument for UBI is that rather than make people lazy, people will have more freedom to attend college, care for a sick parent, or do the duties of parenting.
Perhaps it is too extreme to argue that UBI would destroy the labor force.
Four. Why is the question about how UBI will affect our relationship with work “scary”?
Lowrey writes that this question is “scary” because employers won’t have as much leverage over their employees.
People wouldn’t have to do work they don’t want to do and they could gravitate to work they do want to perform.
Study Questions for Chapters 4 & 5
One. What is the Hammock Argument?
UBI is dangerous. Why? Because when you give people a safety net, society will quickly fall asleep on a giant hammock. Handouts are the beginning of laziness and death to the soul. Drugs and a life of addiction will ensue. People need work and purpose. In their absence, people will become zombies.
But so far, UBI in Kenya and elsewhere is not having the Hammock Effect.
Lowrey says the opposite occurs: Less work abuse, less child labor, less starvation, more medical care, more school attendance (95).
Guaranteed money means less stress and a higher IQ.
Cash is superior to helping people than goods and services (108). Having villages make shoes, for example, leads to a shoe glut in the area, which hurts villages.
Two. What could be a harmful consequence of UBI to the poor?
Streamlining welfare into UBI will save the government money in various costs, including bureaucratic ones, but for many poor people, the UBI payment will be LESS than what they were making on welfare.
As we see in this Guardian article, UBI, while loved by the Left, is also loved by the Right as part of a campaign to get rid of welfare.
Some Critiques of Lowrey
Statistical Analysis Lacking?
Financial Times argues Lowrey hasn’t used the data in depth enough to be convincing in her argument for UBI.
Does Lowrey Contradict Herself and the Very Premise of UBI?
Writing in the New York Times, Robert B. Reich makes this observation:
But how could America possibly afford a U.B.I.? A $1,000-a-month grant to every American would cost about $3.9 trillion a year. That’s about $1.3 trillion on top of existing welfare programs — roughly the equivalent of the entire federal budget, or about a fifth of the entire United States economy. Both Yang and Lowrey come up with laundry lists of potential funding sources — from soaking the rich (raising the top tax bracket to 55 percent, enlarging the estate tax and implementing new taxes on wealth, financial transactions and perhaps even the owners of the robots and related devices that are displacing jobs), to instituting a carbon tax or a value-added tax.
Whatever the source of funds, it seems a safe bet that increased automation will allow the economy to continue to grow, making a U.B.I. more affordable. A U.B.I. would itself generate more consumer spending, stimulating additional economic activity. And less poverty would mean less crime, incarceration and other social costs associated with deprivation. “You know what’s really expensive?” Yang asks. “Dysfunction. Revolution.”
If these measures still aren’t enough to foot the bill, Lowrey suggests making a U.B.I. less universal by taxing away U.B.I. payments to high-income earners and reducing other forms of social insurance (for example, eliminating food stamps and welfare programs). As a last resort, she writes, a U.B.I. could be implemented as a kind of negative income tax, by which government simply ensures that every person or household has a certain minimum yearly income. This is what Richard Nixon and Milton Friedman had in mind. Lowrey figures that the cost of such a guarantee would approximate the current total costs of the earned-income tax credit, supplemental security income, housing assistance, food stamps and school lunches. She notes that the simplest way to achieve this would be to transform existing antipoverty programs into unconditional cash transfers.
But there’s a logical flaw in her argument. Once a U.B.I. is no longer universal or even basic (what if the poor are worse off when other forms of assistance are stripped away?), it’s hard to see the point of having it in the first place. More troubling is Lowrey’s blurring of the distinction between a U.B.I. that redistributes resources from the superrich to the growing number of vulnerable lower-income Americans and one that merely turns programs for the poor into cash assistance. The latter may be warranted, but it wouldn’t touch America’s growing scourge of inequality and economic insecurity, which will be made worse as robots take over good jobs.
Is UBI a bad idea?
So says Josh Barro in Business Insider.
Post-Work Future a Nightmare?
Josh Barro rebukes UBI in his Business Insider article.
Annie Lowrey presents UBI on The Daily Show.
Study Questions Chapters 6 & 7
One. How does Lowrey argue that UBI may be superior to current welfare safety net?
We read that current safety net doesn’t catch many poor people who are left starving and destitute.
Part of the problem is a deeply rooted prejudice against the poor that says there is the deserving and the undeserving poor and this line is not clear.
She argues that the “safety net holes are not defects but design flaws but intentional features” (142).
Part of the “intentional feature” that punishes the poor are work requirements.
UBI Pro Argument: UBI is better than current welfare system, which includes work requirements.
Washington Post article addresses work requirements directly.
Economist article addresses how work requirements hurt poor children.
The Atlantic article also addresses the shortcomings of work requirements.
We see similar claim in this Washington Post article.
We see similar support of UBI in New Yorker synthesis of various UBI arguments.
Two. What is the racism problem in addressing America’s needs of the poor?
Lowrey observes that monoracial countries have healthy welfare safety nets but a multiracial country like America has hostility toward the poor class, largely people of color (161).
She cites evidence that racism collapsed attempts to deliver Universal Health Care (165).
essay that identifies 3 possible objections to his argument.
Study Questions Chapter 8 to the End
One. What is the Uncompensated Work Argument?
Care workers, who don’t get paid through parenting or other types of care, account for 15-65% of GDP.
Two. What is the Class Division Argument?
In Chapter 9, Lowrey makes the claim that class divisions and our divisive country could find the tensions lessening with UBI. Could UBI reduce the momentum of neo fascist populists?
Is Lowrey making too much of a panacea of UBI?
Three. How could UBI instill racism?
On page 216, we see that UBI would be designed for Americans, and Americans would be hostile to seeing immigrants come to America to collect UBI.
We also read that UBI could develop a two-tiered labor market with lower pay for immigrants who would not have UBI for bargaining leverage as the rest of American population.
Universal Basic Income: For and Against by Robert Murphy and Dominic Frisby
Review Supports or “For” Arguments for UBI
One. UBI is better than welfare because UBI avoids the Cliff Effect in which people get trapped in cycle of poverty because welfare benefits add up to more than a job promotion or full-time job. Within ten years, we may lose one-third of the workforce.
Two. UBI would give employees more leverage to avoid hellish jobs and hellish bosses.
Three. Volunteer workers could now be compensated and be free to do their volunteer work.
Four. UBI would simplify welfare benefit labyrinth. By eliminating welfare, we can save about a trillion dollars, according to Ryan Rogers, author of The Citizens’ Dividend: A Case for Universal Basic Income (87).
Five. UBI would take a chunk out of poverty-induced stress, which is considered a huge health hazard.
Six. UBI would help people pursue higher education.
Seven. UBI would give people time and resources to pursue entrepreneurship, going into self-made business.
Eight. UBI would be necessary for future with permanent unemployment due to AI and technological advances. Engineers are developing software that will replace workers.
Nine. UBI would reduce or outright eliminate the stigma of those who get aid as “parasites.”
Ten. UBI is a moral response to people who have fallen through the welfare net’s holes and are suffering from starvation and destitution. According to United Nations, out of 10 developed countries America ranks last in creating a viable safety net for the poor. In any affluent society, many argue, abolishing poverty is a moral obligation and UBI is a necessary step in that direction.
Eleven. The tech economy is created a stratified economic world with 15-20% of Americans enjoying comfortable income while the rest slog in penury, according to Tyler Cowen of George Mason University. In the new economy, there can be economic growth while 80% of Americans suffer decline in real wages.
Cons
One. Those who are doing “necessary” work will subsidize people who are doing “optional” work and living more casual, laid-back lifestyles. You’re working in a coal mine and your tax dollars are going to a guy who is training to be a yoga instructor. How does that feel?
Two. Millions of people will make decent money and won’t need Universal Basic Income, a waste of tax dollars.
Three. Many will find UBI is a work disincentive. As a result, work productivity will go down creating less goods and services, resulting in inflation.
Four. UBI may encourage people to a life of the hammock, entertainment addiction, laziness, and spiritual emptiness. But according to Ryan Rogers, the opposite is true. Studies show people work more and have less children (89).
Five. UBI doesn’t target specific poverty and health needs the way the current welfare does and in fact UBI will result in less aid to the poor.
Six. UBI cannot address the complexities of immigration; in fact, UBI may cause more anti-immigration sentiment.
Seven. No one has a clear explanation of how society will pay for UBI.
Eight. UBI is the precursor to communism.
Vox Counterarguments Against Two Main Objections to UBI
Excellent article: Critique of UBI: “A Universal Basic Income Is a Poor Tool to Fight Poverty” by Eduardo Porter in The New York Times.
Liberal leaning Huffpost critiques UBI in “Don’t Buy the Hype.”
Argument that says Universal Basic Assets program is superior to UBI.
Should community college be free?
Inside Higher Ed argues for free community college
Why Free College is necessary
Gustavo A argues in LA times for free college
Washington Post rebukes idea that community college should be free.
Case Against Free Community College in Forbes
PBS video on free college for 8 minutes
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