Progress & ConservationšŸ”°
2 min readFeb 17, 2025

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I strongly disagree with the thesis here. For one thing, we have countless UBI pilots and know, as a fact, that UBI has mostly positive results, not having the negative consequences which you assume it does. I'd recommend looking into the works of Scott Santens and Guy Standing in regard to that.

I also don't think we can refer to a system where government preserves wage-slavery by preventing AI from taking over human work as "utopian." AI should be harnessed in order to eliminate the necessity of human labor. People would, if deprived of the need to work AND GRANTED BASIC INCOME, turn to artistic and intellectual pursuits that don't currently fit into their schedule because they lack the leisure time to cultivate them. People would spend more time with friends, play more games, take up sports and hobbies, generally replace "work" with "play." The works of Paul Lafargue and Bob Black on the abolition of work might be worth checking out.

A more realistic path towards utopia would be something like "the RICH economy" proposal where government implements a minimum income guarantee while actively promoting and encouraging more automation, eventually replacing the minimum income guarantee with a universal basic income as automation becomes more widespread, and eventually expanding the UBI into a social dividend. (Cf. https://c4ss.org/content/54156) I think that James Meadeā€™s ā€œliberal-socialismā€ and the idea of ā€œfully-automated luxury communismā€ (FALC) are also worth looking at.

The idea that fair-use law should not apply to AI is also bad imo. AI is a mechanism for empowering and informing people, so it should generally be allowed access to anything a human can access. If someone is doing research on a topic, itā€™s good for AI to be able to know everything thatā€™s been written on that topic and be able to have an intelligent conversation about it. We donā€™t need to restrict AI as much as we need to mitigate the negative consequences it might have. Also, we should drastically reform IP law by implementing a Harberger Tax on IP and using the revenue to fund part of the basic income.

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Progress & ConservationšŸ”°
Progress & ConservationšŸ”°

Written by Progress & ConservationšŸ”°

Buddhist; Daoist, Atheist; Mystic, Darwinist; Critical Rationalist. Fan of basic income, land value tax, universal healthcare, and nominal GDP targeting.

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