Thames Water boss scoops £1.6 in pay despite giving up her bonus
Sarah Bentley (pictured) said last month she would forgo her bonus - joining the bosses of rivals Pennon Group and Yorkshire Water.
paid to fall.
Universal basic income to be trialled
- Thread starter JonRGV250
- Start date
paid to fall.
Actually this needs another reply.
What's the motive to increase productivity? Let's take manufacturing. Productivity can mean research and development, but let's just look at manufacturing.
Who is trying to increase productivity, and why?
Actually, wouldn't it be better to produce less? Since nobody gets paid to manufacture things, we can make stuff last much, much longer. Build stuff that's almost indestructible, and infinitely serviceable.
The whole world is flipped on its head in this new reality.
Soldato
Well in short term, increasing productivity would be a good thing but eventually it would plateau, if we got to a point where could create stuff that lasts a lifetime. It's step by step isn't it
Soldato
The terms are what the end goal of this stuff is. All our basic needs met, produced by machines. In that world, i'm sure most people would take that over hardship, even if it means finding a new meaning to life without work.
For sure one of the pain points with the journey, natural resources and energy equality.
So part of the roadmap must entail basically stripping the elites of their grip over the means of production. The raw materials, the intellectual property, the assets.
I'm wondering when and how that comes about, for starters. How would you democratise all of that?
Especially if, over the next few years, we see mega corps become more powerful than governments?
Soldato
Through correct taxation and regulation i imagine. If company X increases manufacturing of product A by 10x whilst reducing workforce by half. Clearly that automation needs to be taxed properly, goes back to the my post with the wealth gap. Governments realise this, it is being talked about.
Soldato
There is no even semi-plausible explanation of how we navigate that journey at the moment and we may need to make it a reality in relatively short period of time.
It would require a set of extremely controversial policies executed with a degree of international consensus that has never existed.
There will be many powerful losers who aren’t going to rollover without a fight.
All this against a backdrop of disgruntled voters that would make the Brexit negotiations held during the blitz look like a WI meeting on pudding night.
The curious thing being, if every company managed to do just that, all their products would sit unsold as nobody had any money to buy them, owing to everyone being unemployed.Through correct taxation and regulation i imagine. If company X increases manufacturing of product A by 10x whilst reducing workforce by half. Clearly that automation needs to be taxed properly, goes back to the my post with the wealth gap. Governments realise this, it is being talked about.
Add an extra tax burden for the machines, and you actually make it a lose/lose proposition to automate jobs away.
You know what's funny, is that we somewhat know where we want to be, but plotting a course from here to there seems almost impossible.
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Soldato
What type of controversial policies are you thinking of? I think we're certainly seeing more cooperation with the G20, de-globalisation and more self sufficiency. Min corp tax rates for example is a step towards that. It will be a East v West situation, or at least it seems to be playing out that way.
Or they would lower the price of the product?
Definitely, it won't be smooth. No different to the disruption that the internet did with shopping or communication.
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Soldato
Primarily the ones where we ask big tech to walk away from their investment and give their product away for free (or way bellow market rate), and that the rest of the economy needs to step in and shoulder the tax burden of UBI for the entire nation (possibly multiple nations), where the majority of people are no longer economically productive.
It's very likely to be very different to that
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Soldato
I, for one, welcome the day I get my cold portion of protein supplement 57 from Alexa
Soldato
I'm not sure exactly what you mean tbh. But why does it have to be a cliff edge type scenario? This stuff will play out over the next 50 years.
Switzerland ran a trial like this, i think from what i remember it worked alright. People that want to work did without fear of bills if they quit jobs etc
Obviously some didn't work but as another poster says, everyone does something.
I think the UBI is probably for around 2030-2040 when jobs start going AI or machine based.
Personally think we should give it a go, would stop the issues for people out of work trying to claim A to Z benefits and trying to prove information etc while we have long term receiving without questioning.
Obviously some didn't work but as another poster says, everyone does something.
I think the UBI is probably for around 2030-2040 when jobs start going AI or machine based.
Personally think we should give it a go, would stop the issues for people out of work trying to claim A to Z benefits and trying to prove information etc while we have long term receiving without questioning.
We have played this game before, not with robots and automation but with the proles, the elimination of bourgeoisie and the supposed collective ownership of the means of production.
It didn't work out well then and it won't again if tried in a more modern iteration because such necessarily totalitarian systems always fall foul of human nature. With the most ruthless and dangerous of people all to often rising to power.
The world where everyone receives UBI and is at leisure to pursue the hearts content is rather a remote possibility compared to the possibility of a world where automation makes most humans redundant and therefore targets to be liquidated by thoose controlling the machines.
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Soldato
I'm not sure why you'd be amazed?! As said, I only read the BBC article and this explanation wasn't given. It's pretty simple.
Thanks for explaining.
Soldato
I don't think we can solve every problem, but I think there is a direction of improvement that can be taken.
Worker co-ops (i.e. worker owned and controlled firms) represent a reasonable model that preserves the good stuff of market competition while removing the bad stuff of corporate dictatorships, worker alienation and small groups of elites being in control of huge powerful enterprises. These aren't some far flung utopian notion, they already exist - e.g. Suma wholefoods, outlandish and others in the UK. If you want an example of one at scale there's the Spanish company Mondragon. Arguably even the John Lewis partnership could be seen as a sort of diluted form of this model.
How you get there involves asking why these types of enterprises are not already dominant. A big issue is finance. Rich people don't start companies just to give them to their employees (Richer Sounds aside, perhaps). Many banks make it difficult for a co-op to take out a loan even though evidence suggests co-ops generally are less likely to default. So part of the solution involves making finance readily accessible for co-operative enterprise.
Another part is just awareness, people don't understand the model and don't know what it is.
It may also help if a government deliberately subsidised these kinds of companies through preferential tax rates etc. to give them a leg up competitively.
Natural monopolies should probably just be put under control of the state or maybe councils since there's a bit of a geographical component, especially e.g. water. Companies like Thames Water where there is inherently no competition don't deserve to exist. In truth they are already so highly regulated by OfWat that this is half true already.
First, we'll have to find a way to stop government policy being set by the rich and powerful... Those with the most power and share of the world's assets today, do not want to give it up. Nor their seats at the top tables, 'influencing' the political establishment.
Repeatedly electing the Tories probably doesn't help with that.
It will be seismic shift in many ways. And as you say, people will need to be prepared to contemplate very different approaches to those which are dominant today.
Maybe we'll be more ready to accept this when mass unemployment is a reality. Or maybe we get so far and then outright ban AI in a populist move to save jobs. Almost anything could happen.
Repeatedly electing the Tories probably doesn't help with that.
It will be seismic shift in many ways. And as you say, people will need to be prepared to contemplate very different approaches to those which are dominant today.
Maybe we'll be more ready to accept this when mass unemployment is a reality. Or maybe we get so far and then outright ban AI in a populist move to save jobs. Almost anything could happen.
Soldato
I was thinking this could be a good time to use the new digital currency the government was planning at some point. Pay it out it digital credit.
For years the digital credit would be limited in use. So there would still be a reason to work for regular money, while at the same time not having to worry about bills (I'd assumed utility companies would be the first to accept digital currency).
I think UBI will come in at some point due to automation pushing people out of manual jobs.
For years the digital credit would be limited in use. So there would still be a reason to work for regular money, while at the same time not having to worry about bills (I'd assumed utility companies would be the first to accept digital currency).
I think UBI will come in at some point due to automation pushing people out of manual jobs.
Soldato
It's about time, Tomorrow's World promised that we'd all be free to relax and have fun by now
I mean who lays on their deathbed wishing they'd worked more, done more overtime or recalls all those memorable times by the watercooler?
I mean who lays on their deathbed wishing they'd worked more, done more overtime or recalls all those memorable times by the watercooler?
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Soldato
I am working with a guy now who owns multiple holiday let's but just needs work to socialise, he talks football all day, pretty sure I could fill my time better (I do 30 hrs now)