The term "child labour" is often defined as:
"work that deprives children of their childhood, their potential and their dignity, and that is harmful to physical and mental development."
Revue "Échos Finances" du Ministère des Finances et du Budget du Sénégal
Vous pouvez consulter ce numéro trimestriel sur le site du Ministère des Finances et du Budget.
www.finances.gouv.sn
https://twitter.com/mfb_sn
Not sure of how much you need for your retirement or if you can really afford the dream house. Then have quick look at these thumb rules, just to know if you are on right track.
La consommation d’agneau en France chute depuis des années, à la fois du fait
d’une baisse des importations de viande ovine mais aussi d’une offre en points
de vente moins adaptée aux nouvelles générations de consommateurs. L’agneau
est une viande chère et son prix augmente encore depuis quelques années alors
qu’une nouvelle crise économique sévit depuis mars 2022 : quelles conséquences
pour la filière ?
A General awareness session designed to give participants a better understanding about savings and various investment options available in the Indian context.
The term "child labour" is often defined as:
"work that deprives children of their childhood, their potential and their dignity, and that is harmful to physical and mental development."
Revue "Échos Finances" du Ministère des Finances et du Budget du Sénégal
Vous pouvez consulter ce numéro trimestriel sur le site du Ministère des Finances et du Budget.
www.finances.gouv.sn
https://twitter.com/mfb_sn
Not sure of how much you need for your retirement or if you can really afford the dream house. Then have quick look at these thumb rules, just to know if you are on right track.
La consommation d’agneau en France chute depuis des années, à la fois du fait
d’une baisse des importations de viande ovine mais aussi d’une offre en points
de vente moins adaptée aux nouvelles générations de consommateurs. L’agneau
est une viande chère et son prix augmente encore depuis quelques années alors
qu’une nouvelle crise économique sévit depuis mars 2022 : quelles conséquences
pour la filière ?
A General awareness session designed to give participants a better understanding about savings and various investment options available in the Indian context.
The Affordable Care Act: What Independent Consultants Need to KnowMBO Partners
Gene Zaino and Dave Putt, both experts on the independent workforce, provide essential information on the ACA basics with a special focus on the independent worker.
Find more resources for independent professionals at www2.mbopartners.com/ic-resources
GuideStar Webinar 10.02.14 Best Practices in Nonprofit CompensationGuideStar
Presenters: Karl E. Emerson, Of Counsel, Montgomery McCracken, and Chuck McLean, Vice President of Research, GuideStar USA
Do you know what a “rebuttable presumption” is? Can you name the “disqualified persons” in your organization? Do you know why these things are important? If you answered, “No,” to any of these questions, this free Webinar is for you. Join attorney (and former state charity official) Karl Emerson and GuideStar’s Chuck McLean to find out what are best practices in nonprofit compensation. The IRS, Congress, and donors are all taking hard looks at what nonprofits pay their leaders. Make sure you can justify your organization’s compensation practices to these important audiences.
Will si bschangepolicyforthebetter-dangregory-commoncapitalOECD CFE
Social Impact Bonds: Promises and Pitfalls - Expert Seminar
- Expert seminar with the financial support of the European Commission - 15 April 2015, Paris, France
An up-to-date review of the Affordable Care Act, sometimes called ObamaCare. I will be presenting this tomorrow at the Crowne Plaza in White Plains, NY.
Like Uber, But For Slavery: The Power Of Fiat MoneySteve Waldman
Crypto types often write off fiat money as weak money, but that's not its problem. Despite the fact governments can and do print it at will, fiat is powerful, it runs the world. This talk tries to explain how that works.
Decentralization is often held up as an ideal, but often proves unstable. This presentation explores the relationship between and different virtues of decentralized and centralized elements, considers randomness, democracy, and the problem of how to manage centralized elements, and finally thinks about how we might use blockchains like Ethereum to experiment with these ideas.
sbt-ethereum: a terminal for the world computerSteve Waldman
An introduction to sbt-ethereum, a high-level command line for interacting directly and powerfully with the Ethereum blockchain, as well as developing smart contracts and integrating with Scala apps.
Agency — a perspective on social affairsSteve Waldman
Thinking about social affairs through a lens of human agency, and contemporary social problems as a result of a stratification of human agency, may be fruitful.
Lots of people have an intuition that "fiat money" -- money based on government paper with no commodity like gold to "back" it -- is something of a scam, weak and doomed to failure. That intuition is wrong. Fiat money runs the world, obviously, and that isn't an accident. Here's how (I think) it works.
Could tools like Ethereum and "distributed autonomous organizations" be used to mitigate the risks of economic life? This talk looks back to the private fraternal organizations that were important risk-mitigators in the late 19th and early 20th Century for inspiration in designing smart contracts and distributed organizations in the 21st Century.
It is increasingly possible to represent all kinds of assets as cryptographic tokens, but how should we understand what they are worth? As a designer of a cryptographic token, how should you think about the value of what you are defining? This talk offers some tools that will hopefully be of help to creators and eventually users of cryptographic assets.
Existing blockchain apps (e.g. Bitcoin, Ethereum) are mostly "antidiscretionary". Ideally nodes merely verify changes of state initiated by users. Discretion by the nodes themselves is a form of attack. An alternative vision, a "discretionary" blockchain, would recognize each nodes of a consensus networks as representatives of people with diverse preferences, and embody the process of consensus formation as a kind of politics. Discretionary blockchains, "made of people".
If you are looking for a pi coin investor. Then look no further because I have the right one he is a pi vendor (he buy and resell to whales in China). I met him on a crypto conference and ever since I and my friends have sold more than 10k pi coins to him And he bought all and still want more. I will drop his telegram handle below just send him a message.
@Pi_vendor_247
how to sell pi coins in South Korea profitably.DOT TECH
Yes. You can sell your pi network coins in South Korea or any other country, by finding a verified pi merchant
What is a verified pi merchant?
Since pi network is not launched yet on any exchange, the only way you can sell pi coins is by selling to a verified pi merchant, and this is because pi network is not launched yet on any exchange and no pre-sale or ico offerings Is done on pi.
Since there is no pre-sale, the only way exchanges can get pi is by buying from miners. So a pi merchant facilitates these transactions by acting as a bridge for both transactions.
How can i find a pi vendor/merchant?
Well for those who haven't traded with a pi merchant or who don't already have one. I will leave the telegram id of my personal pi merchant who i trade pi with.
Tele gram: @Pi_vendor_247
#pi #sell #nigeria #pinetwork #picoins #sellpi #Nigerian #tradepi #pinetworkcoins #sellmypi
BYD SWOT Analysis and In-Depth Insights 2024.pptxmikemetalprod
Indepth analysis of the BYD 2024
BYD (Build Your Dreams) is a Chinese automaker and battery manufacturer that has snowballed over the past two decades to become a significant player in electric vehicles and global clean energy technology.
This SWOT analysis examines BYD's strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats as it competes in the fast-changing automotive and energy storage industries.
Founded in 1995 and headquartered in Shenzhen, BYD started as a battery company before expanding into automobiles in the early 2000s.
Initially manufacturing gasoline-powered vehicles, BYD focused on plug-in hybrid and fully electric vehicles, leveraging its expertise in battery technology.
Today, BYD is the world’s largest electric vehicle manufacturer, delivering over 1.2 million electric cars globally. The company also produces electric buses, trucks, forklifts, and rail transit.
On the energy side, BYD is a major supplier of rechargeable batteries for cell phones, laptops, electric vehicles, and energy storage systems.
Falcon stands out as a top-tier P2P Invoice Discounting platform in India, bridging esteemed blue-chip companies and eager investors. Our goal is to transform the investment landscape in India by establishing a comprehensive destination for borrowers and investors with diverse profiles and needs, all while minimizing risk. What sets Falcon apart is the elimination of intermediaries such as commercial banks and depository institutions, allowing investors to enjoy higher yields.
how to swap pi coins to foreign currency withdrawable.DOT TECH
As of my last update, Pi is still in the testing phase and is not tradable on any exchanges.
However, Pi Network has announced plans to launch its Testnet and Mainnet in the future, which may include listing Pi on exchanges.
The current method for selling pi coins involves exchanging them with a pi vendor who purchases pi coins for investment reasons.
If you want to sell your pi coins, reach out to a pi vendor and sell them to anyone looking to sell pi coins from any country around the globe.
Below is the contact information for my personal pi vendor.
Telegram: @Pi_vendor_247
US Economic Outlook - Being Decided - M Capital Group August 2021.pdfpchutichetpong
The U.S. economy is continuing its impressive recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic and not slowing down despite re-occurring bumps. The U.S. savings rate reached its highest ever recorded level at 34% in April 2020 and Americans seem ready to spend. The sectors that had been hurt the most by the pandemic specifically reduced consumer spending, like retail, leisure, hospitality, and travel, are now experiencing massive growth in revenue and job openings.
Could this growth lead to a “Roaring Twenties”? As quickly as the U.S. economy contracted, experiencing a 9.1% drop in economic output relative to the business cycle in Q2 2020, the largest in recorded history, it has rebounded beyond expectations. This surprising growth seems to be fueled by the U.S. government’s aggressive fiscal and monetary policies, and an increase in consumer spending as mobility restrictions are lifted. Unemployment rates between June 2020 and June 2021 decreased by 5.2%, while the demand for labor is increasing, coupled with increasing wages to incentivize Americans to rejoin the labor force. Schools and businesses are expected to fully reopen soon. In parallel, vaccination rates across the country and the world continue to rise, with full vaccination rates of 50% and 14.8% respectively.
However, it is not completely smooth sailing from here. According to M Capital Group, the main risks that threaten the continued growth of the U.S. economy are inflation, unsettled trade relations, and another wave of Covid-19 mutations that could shut down the world again. Have we learned from the past year of COVID-19 and adapted our economy accordingly?
“In order for the U.S. economy to continue growing, whether there is another wave or not, the U.S. needs to focus on diversifying supply chains, supporting business investment, and maintaining consumer spending,” says Grace Feeley, a research analyst at M Capital Group.
While the economic indicators are positive, the risks are coming closer to manifesting and threatening such growth. The new variants spreading throughout the world, Delta, Lambda, and Gamma, are vaccine-resistant and muddy the predictions made about the economy and health of the country. These variants bring back the feeling of uncertainty that has wreaked havoc not only on the stock market but the mindset of people around the world. MCG provides unique insight on how to mitigate these risks to possibly ensure a bright economic future.
what is the best method to sell pi coins in 2024DOT TECH
The best way to sell your pi coins safely is trading with an exchange..but since pi is not launched in any exchange, and second option is through a VERIFIED pi merchant.
Who is a pi merchant?
A pi merchant is someone who buys pi coins from miners and pioneers and resell them to Investors looking forward to hold massive amounts before mainnet launch in 2026.
I will leave the telegram contact of my personal pi merchant to trade pi coins with.
@Pi_vendor_247
Abhay Bhutada Leads Poonawalla Fincorp To Record Low NPA And Unprecedented Gr...Vighnesh Shashtri
Under the leadership of Abhay Bhutada, Poonawalla Fincorp has achieved record-low Non-Performing Assets (NPA) and witnessed unprecedented growth. Bhutada's strategic vision and effective management have significantly enhanced the company's financial health, showcasing a robust performance in the financial sector. This achievement underscores the company's resilience and ability to thrive in a competitive market, setting a new benchmark for operational excellence in the industry.
how to sell pi coins at high rate quickly.DOT TECH
Where can I sell my pi coins at a high rate.
Pi is not launched yet on any exchange. But one can easily sell his or her pi coins to investors who want to hold pi till mainnet launch.
This means crypto whales want to hold pi. And you can get a good rate for selling pi to them. I will leave the telegram contact of my personal pi vendor below.
A vendor is someone who buys from a miner and resell it to a holder or crypto whale.
Here is the telegram contact of my vendor:
@Pi_vendor_247
Lecture slide titled Fraud Risk Mitigation, Webinar Lecture Delivered at the Society for West African Internal Audit Practitioners (SWAIAP) on Wednesday, November 8, 2023.
how to sell pi coins in all Africa Countries.DOT TECH
Yes. You can sell your pi network for other cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, usdt , Ethereum and other currencies And this is done easily with the help from a pi merchant.
What is a pi merchant ?
Since pi is not launched yet in any exchange. The only way you can sell right now is through merchants.
A verified Pi merchant is someone who buys pi network coins from miners and resell them to investors looking forward to hold massive quantities of pi coins before mainnet launch in 2026.
I will leave the telegram contact of my personal pi merchant to trade with.
@Pi_vendor_247
how to sell pi coins effectively (from 50 - 100k pi)DOT TECH
Anywhere in the world, including Africa, America, and Europe, you can sell Pi Network Coins online and receive cash through online payment options.
Pi has not yet been launched on any exchange because we are currently using the confined Mainnet. The planned launch date for Pi is June 28, 2026.
Reselling to investors who want to hold until the mainnet launch in 2026 is currently the sole way to sell.
Consequently, right now. All you need to do is select the right pi network provider.
Who is a pi merchant?
An individual who buys coins from miners on the pi network and resells them to investors hoping to hang onto them until the mainnet is launched is known as a pi merchant.
debuts.
I'll provide you the Telegram username
@Pi_vendor_247
2. What is a Universal Basic Income (UBI)?
• The simplest thing…
- everybody gets a regular check, in identical amounts,
just for breathing.
• Nothing is that simple…
- “everybody” demands a definition. kids? dogs?
citizens? legal residents? felons? and who’s paying
for all this?
• Sure…
- those are important questions, on which more later.
but really, this is pretty simple.
3. Things related that are not UBI
• Negative Income Tax
- In theory, a negative income tax can replicate the net
cashflows of a tax-financed universal basic income
- In practice, negative income tax proposals typically imply
much steeper reductions in net payments at low incomes
than a UBI funded from general revenues
• Guaranteed Minimum Income “Topoff”
- Government would enforce an income floor by “topping
off” incomes that fall beneath a poverty threshold to that
threshold.
- Implies a 100% marginal tax rate at low incomes
4. Perspectives on a UBI
- Fixed/floating swap on highly variable income
- Improved worker bargaining power without restricting
flexibility
- A better antipoverty program
- A sociotechnological dividend
- VC for the people
- Hayekian investment subsidy
- Escaping the macroeconomic floor to prevent “secular
stagnation”
- An instrument of socioeconomic cohesion
5. Side note: Paying for a UBI
• In monetary terms, a UBI, like any other form of government
expenditure, would be paid for by some mix of taxation,
borrowing, monetization, and reduction of other spending.
• Thinking in terms of “dollars & cents” is misleading and
incomplete with respect to government finance.
- Actual constraints on government finance are
+Uncomfortable tradeoffs between inflation and high
interest rates
+Valuation uncertainty associated with the possibility of
“runs” on cash and government debt
- These constraints depend on the target, scale, source of
finance, and distribution of expenditure
6. Side note: Paying for a UBI
• It is conventional to declare a program “funded” if new
dollars taxed or recovered through reduction of other
expenditures matches the cost of a program, implying no
need for new borrowing or monetization.
• Like most conventions, this one is adopted because it is
simple, not because it is true.
Example: Consider a 4% surtax on incomes over $5M per year.
20% of the proceeds are used to pay off debt while 80% is used
to fund school construction. This program would most likely be
inflationary at the margin, despite reducing the Federal debt,
because much of the income taxed would otherwise have been
saved in financial instruments very loosely coupled to real
spending, while the 80% spent would all bid for real goods and
services.
7. Side note: Paying for a UBI
• A dollar of UBI spending is likely to be less inflationary than
a dollar’s worth of direct government spending, but more
inflationary than a dollar’s worth of foregone Federal
Income Tax revenue or foregone “tax
expenditures” (embedded in tax deductions for mortgage
interest, charitable donations, etc).
• A dollar of UBI spending is likely to be similarly inflationary
to spending on government transfer programs like social
security.
• A UBI “fully funded” from Federal Income Tax alone would
likely be net inflationary.
• A UBI “fully funded” in large part by replacement of other
transfer programs would likely be close to neutral.
8. Side note: Paying for a UBI
• A “fully funded” UBI would likely to reduce valuation
uncertainty / vulnerability to runs of currency and
government debt.
• Unless otherwise noted, we will assume a UBI “fully funded”
by reductions of alternative transfer programs and increased
taxation, and presume this will be neither inflationary nor
deflationary.
• However, sometimes “net inflationary” is a desideratum
rather than a constraint.
• In disinflationary times, adjustments of the level and source
of finance of a UBI can provide “fiscal stimulus” with unusual
transparency and fairness, i.e. with little potential for
corruption or “make work”. (More on this later.)
9. Fixed/floating swap on variable income
• UBI is often understood as a form of redistribution.
Everybody gets the same “basic income”, but the poor pay
very little for that in taxes while the rich pay much more in
taxes than they receive.
• But UBI is first and foremost an insurance program. It would
be desirable even in a world where all individuals start-off
with identical but uncertain prospects for future wealth and
income.
• In financial terms, in a world with ex ante identical agents,
UBI would be a pure fixed/floating swap. Each individual’s
future income (from labor earnings, investment, etc) is
uncertain and variable, much more variable than aggregate
production of the entire economy.
10. Fixed/floating swap on variable income
• In such a world, risk-averse humans would universally agree to
forego some percentage of their uncertain earnings for a
guaranteed proportion of the more stable aggregate economy.
• This arrangement is replicated by a tax-financed UBI in an
NGDP-stabilized macroeconomy.
• Like any insurance scheme, the universality of voluntary
participation is inversely related to the amount of (real or
perceived) information about the future among individual
participants.
• Purely self-interested agents who know or believe their future
incomes will be above average would opt out, potentially
leaving too small a pool of expected income for participation to
be desirable for agents who are less certain, or who expect
below average earnings.
11. Fixed/floating swap on variable income
• Even in a world with identical agents, each of whom have no
ex ante information, a UBI is a more efficient and effective
arrangement than “self-insurance” via savings cushions and/or
individual borrowing against future earnings.
- In a (realistic) world in which borrowing is limited and returns
on low-risk savings are smaller than the cost of borrowing,
self-insurance is capital inefficient: Each agent has to save a
significant personal nest egg, or take much smaller fixed
payments each period than could be supported by a UBI.
- Self-insurance breaks much more frequently due to “tail risk”
— repeated bad income realizations — than pooled insurance,
which is vulnerable only to systematic (not idiosyncratic) bad
runs.
12. Improved worker bargaining power
• In the United States, labor’s share of income has fallen quite
dramatically over the past few decades.
13. Improved worker bargaining power
• This decline understates the falling fortunes of typical
workers, since aggregate labor income includes much of the
income of CEOs, asset managers, doctors, lawyers, and
other groups of professions that have taken a strikingly
disproportionate fraction of wage growth since in early
1970s.
• Worker productivity has outpaced wages of the median
worker since the early 1970s.
• These changes are likely to be due in large part not to
change in behavior or ability of workers, but simply due to a
decline of labor bargaining power due to the decline of
trade unions, globalization, and the threat of potential
automation.
14. Improved worker bargaining power
• Many of us consider the declining relative fortunes of the
perfectly hardworking people who could once afford middle
class lives and now cannot (without dodgy borrowing) to be a
compelling social problem.
• Reversing the decline of union power, or the degree to which
middle class workers are now in competition with counterparts
in lower-wage countries, or the potential for automation seems
unlikely and arguably undesirable.
- Globalization of the real goods and services economy offers lots of
benefits in terms of competition and specialization
- Bargaining power via unions arguably limits flexibility valuable to both
firms and workers due to complicated, one-size-fits-all collective
bargaining arrangements.
- If we can resolve distributive concerns, technology makes us richer.
15. Improved worker bargaining power
• Bargaining power is largely about the propensity and ability
of workers to say “no” to a bad deal (in terms of wages or
working conditions)
- Really about the distribution of offers that would be accepted among populations of
similar workers. One individual’s propensity to refuse does not amount to bargaining
power unless other individuals with similar skills also refuse the same deal. Bargaining
power is diminished by competition.
• Unions create bargaining power by establishing labor
cartels
- Everyone agrees to say no to deals less than that which is collectively agreed.
• Minimum wage laws also create bargaining power by
enforcing labor cartels
- Everyone is required to say no to deals less than that which is collectively agreed.
16. Improved worker bargaining power
• A universal basic income creates bargaining power by
increasing all workers’ capacity to refuse a raw deal.
- A UBI increases workers’ “reserve price” — the minimum each worker
must be paid before she is willing to accept a given job with particular
working conditions
• A UBI is a much more flexible means of enhancing labor
bargaining power than unionization or a minimum wage.
- All workers are able to drive a harder bargain with a UBI than without,
shifting the distribution of behavior and effectively augmenting
bargaining power.
- Firms and individuals retain complete freedom to negotiate the terms of
their own engagement, and to take into account unusually pleasant
working conditions or nonpecuniary benefits of certain kinds of jobs
that might be made untenable by a minimum wage.
17. Advanced: UBI and labor supply
• Universal basic income proposals are often criticized because
“money for nothing” reduces incentives to work created by the
urgent necessity to hold a job in order to feed ones children or
make rent.
• That’s a weak criticism, since much of the point of a universal
basic income is to reduce incentives to work in a particular and
benign way. In the language of economists, a core purpose of a
UBI is to shift the labor supply curve upwards.
• Reducing incentives to work need not imply that fewer people
work, reducing aggregate production. It can instead imply
higher wages for the same quantity of work. The quantity of
labor supplied is a function of the demand curve for labor as
well as labor supply, and the demand curve for labor is largely a
public policy choice.
18. Advanced: UBI and labor supply
W1
Q1
Quantity
Wage
Demand
Supply
• Labor supply and demand, before any UBI.
19. Advanced: UBI and labor supply
W1
Q2 Q1
Quantity
Wage
UBI
UBI
• A UBI shifts the labor supply curve upwards by increasing
workers’ reservation wage
• This effect, on its own, leads to an increase in wages and a
reduction in quantity of labor supplied
20. Advanced: UBI and labor supply
W1
W2
Q2 Q1
Quantity
Wage
UBI
UBI
Demand Shift
Demand Shift
• An increase in labor demand (as a policy choice, or
potentially as a direct effect of the UBI if demand is
unmanaged) restores the original quantity of work provided,
but at significantly higher wages
21. Advanced: UBI and labor supply
• Unlike many other interventions that reduce labor supply, UBI
leaves the marginal supply of labor effectively unchanged.
• In simple terms, this means that firms have to pay a fixed amount
more (in wages or better work conditions) to inspire the same
quantity of work, but once this increment is paid, it is not more
difficult for firms to inspire greater effort with further incentives.
• Unlike many other interventions that contract labor supply, the
upshift in the labor supply curve translates directly to increased
take-home pay for workers. None of it represents effective
taxation captured by the state.
• The net effect of the upshift of labor supply is an increase in labor
bargaining power. Workers (as a group) hold out for a better
deals than they would without, and capture all the benefit of
those better deals.
22. A better antipoverty program
• Many existing antipoverty programs, like food stamps or
what’s left of traditional welfare, are targeted or means-
tested.
• Universal programs are superior to means-tested programs
on economic, political, and social grounds.
• The sine qua non of a means-tested program is that the
amount of support individuals receive decreases as their
income increases.
• This functions as an tax on increases in labor effort. In the
lingo of economics, means-tested programs impose high
effective marginal tax rates on lower income workers. For
some proposed programs (a topoff minimum income), the
effective tax rate can be as high as 100%!
23. A better antipoverty program
• Like a UBI, means tested programs reduce incentives to
work, but means-tested programs do so in a malign and
harmful way.
• Firms find it hard to motivate individuals to work harder, and
individuals have little reason to be ambitious, when much of
any increase in income will be captured by the state.
• Since much of any pay increase due to high demand would
be captured by the state, combining means-tested
programs with expansionary macro policy is not an effective
way of enhancing labor bargaining power.
• Means-tested programs are sometimes described as
creating “poverty traps”, and not without good reason.
• A generous UBI could replace many (but not all) existing
means-tested programs.
24. A better antipoverty program
• Despite their flaws, means-tested programs are often appealing
to politicians because their “sticker price” is lower than similar
universal programs.
• This apparent cost difference is illusory. Any means-tested
program can be decomposed into a universal program plus a
financing scheme. Viewed this way, the difference between
means-tested and universal programs is startlingly clear. Means-
tested programs force the near-poor to pay much of the cost of
the program, in order to shelter the not remotely poor from
bearing higher costs.
• Although the superficial politics of “sticker shock” militates
against adoption of universal programs, once enacted they are
politically more durable than means-tested programs. Compare
the popularity of near-universal Social Security or Medicare in
the US to the frequent disparaging of food stamps and “welfare”.
25. A better antipoverty program
• Means-tested programs invariably create complex, demeaning
bureaucracies to administer them, as the state has to invent and
apply necessarily complicated and arbitrary procedures to
distinguish the eligible and “worthy” from the ineligible and
“unworthy”.
• Universal programs take the state out of the moral judging
business, and are typically administered easily and efficiently.
• Means-tested programs are invariably associated with
demeaning social stigma for recipients. They create social
cleavages between “upstanding citizens” who pull their own
weight and “welfare queens”, “makers” vs “takers”.
• Universal programs do not carry social stigma or provoke a
politics of demonization. No one calls an elderly person, rich or
poor, a “taker” for receiving Social Security. Nearly every elderly
person, rich and poor, receives social security!
26. A sociotechnological dividend
• One nickname given to a universal basic income is “social
dividend”. The intuition is that we all own some claim on the
productive economy, and should receive payouts based on
that claim like a shareholder receives dividends on her stock
portfolio.
• The economic case for a “social dividend” is buttressed by
technological development. Technological advancement is
in general a public good. No one “owns” the incremental
aggregate know-how between now and the 19th Century
(despite ridiculously expansive patent and copyright claims).
• Yet economies of scale and network effects have rendered
markets in a high-tech world more prone to “winner-take-
all” dynamics than ever existed in the low-tech distant past.
27. A sociotechnological dividend
• There is no evidence that today’s “winners” work harder or
need to work harder than the extraordinary innovators or
businessmen of the past. The vast increase in wealth that
comes from a relatively few getting an ever greater share of
an ever larger pie is not “economically efficient” (i.e.
necessary to inspire production and growth), but simply a
matter of happenstance.
• If this is right, then the economic case for changing our
institutions to alter this happenstance, not-so-great outcome
is strong.
• Giving everybody a “property right” on an equal share of
some portion of aggregate output is a facially fair way to
change our institutions in a way that resonates and is
consistent with our practice of modern capitalism.
28. A sociotechnological dividend
• The dividend stream generated by such a universal
shareholding would look identical to a universal basic
income.
29. VC for the people
• Humans engage in lots of useful activity that does not
generate short-term positive cashflows, but has the
possibility of creating a great deal of real value over the
medium to long-term.
• Here in Silicon Valley, an ecosystem of VCs exists to fund a
small sliver of those sorts of activities by the very small sliver
of humanity capable of networking to access it.
• Even for those people, the range of activities that are
amenable to VC financing is very limited. VCs cannot fund
activities that will create huge swaths of value for which no
means of monetization is forseeable (e.g. “public goods”).
VCs cannot fund activities that are potentially worthwhile
but small scale.
30. VC for the people
• Examples of activities that may, if successful, create clear
economic value but that cannot be funded by venture
capital or most other sources of finance include:
- Prestigious unpaid internships for individuals without
family support to keep them fed;
- Music, film, and cultural projects;
- Scientific research outside of traditional academic
contexts;
- Caregiving to a parent or child;
- Independent development of “startup ideas” prior to
readiness to pitch even to seed finance, by people
without a pedigree sufficient to overcome the skepticism
surrounding an entirely unimplemented pipe-dream.
31. VC for the people
• A universal basic income could give to nearly everyone the
luxury associated now with a fortunate few, who by virtue of
savings or family support, can “opt out” of providing market
labor for a while to pursue often more ambitious things.
• For now, a disproportionate share of technological and
cultural innovation comes from this fortunate few, but there’s
no reason to think that’s due to a correlation between wealth
and ability. The pace of development of wonderful new things
could increase dramatically if nearly everyone had the option
to sacrifice the comforts of a good market income when an
idea or opportunity truly merits making sacrifices in order to
pursue it.
32. Hayekian investment subsidy
• Successful developed economies nearly all subsidize business
investment in a variety of often very opaque ways.
• These range from explicit tax preferences for capital income to
the incredible range of tacit and overt state guarantees that
underlie modern banking systems.
• However, all of these are subsidies of “external finance”,
encouraging outside investors (banks, lenders, shareholders)
to make funds available for business investment.
• But external finance may be low quality finance, uninformed
and poorly targeted.
• The most effective and informationally rich source of funding
for new business investment is retained earnings by
businesses.
33. Hayekian investment subsidy
• Due to increasing perceptions of corruption and low quality
project selection, many of us would like to see subsidy of
investment laundered through the banking system and tax
breaks enjoyed disproportionately by the wealthy curtailed.
• Merely ending subsidies to investment, without offering any
kind of replacement, would likely further reduce already
anemic (and very badly targeted) real capital formation.
• A universal basic income provides an unusually
informationally rich source of retained earnings for firms, as
expenditures of UBI flows of real goods and services do not
reflect politically directed government priorities but the
decentralized patterns of demand determined by the
preferences of the entire citizenry.
34. Hayekian investment subsidy
• Since a UBI is intended to be sustained indefinitely, these
demand flows present durable information that businesses
can use to choose effective investments from expanded
pools of retained earnings.
• From a real economic perspective, replacing subsidies of
external investment with UBI-funded retained earnings is
likely to yield higher quality capital formation with much less
room for corrupt targeting and rent extraction by financial
intermediaries.
• A universal basic income and serious banking/financial
reform are highly complementary policies.
35. Escaping the macroeconomic floor
• A perceived economic problem throughout the developed
world is “secular stagnation”.
• In very simple terms, modern developed economies typically
use central bank interest rate policy to ensure that aggregate
demand is sufficiently strong to “fully employ” available
economic resources (including especially humans) in
production.
- (“Full employment” implies sustainable employment, not some ecocatastrophe
where we exhaust all of our resources in a destructive one-shot supernova of
overproduction.)
• Typically, central banks lower interest rates when they expect
demand shortfalls. By a variety of mechanisms, this is thought
to increase near-term demand for goods and services.
36. Escaping the macroeconomic floor
• “Secular stagnation” refers to a situation in which despite zero
or near-zero central bank policy rates, aggregate demand
remains insufficient to fully employ the resources of the
economy in production.
• “Secular stagnation” is attributed to a variety of factors:
demographic change, technological stagnation, growing
inequality, etc.
• At or near the zero bound, central banks must resort to
controversial “unconventional monetary policy” (like
quantitative easing) that seem to require very large doses to
be effective, and may have undesirable effects on financial
stability or exacerbate wealth inequality.
37. Escaping the macroeconomic floor
• Alternatively, fiscal policy (increased government expenditure
on goods and services) can be used to create demand very
directly, but there is a danger that politically directed,
macroeconomically motivated spending will be targeted
corruptly, or towards wasteful make-work projects and
“bridges to nowhere”.
• An increase in the UBI is a form of fiscal policy that delegates
the direction of expenditure to the citizenry as a whole in a
facially fair way. Almost by definition, the direction of
expenditure will not be corrupt. By providing direct
information to business about the preferences of the public,
UBI expenditures are likely to lead to high quality real capital
formation. (See “Hayekian investment subsidy”)
38. Escaping the macroeconomic floor
• If an increase in UBI is fully funded by new revenues from a
progressive income tax (but not by replacing other programs),
it is likely to be expansionary of demand even without
increasing the total indebtedness of the Federal government.
- (This is because the average UBI recipient is much more likely than the payer of the
average income tax dollar to spend rather than save an additional dollar of income. An
income-tax financed UBI transfers purchasing power from people with a low marginal
propensity to consume to people with a high propensity to consume)
• A UBI produced spur in aggregate demand can be made large
enough so that nonzero interest rates are required to control
inflation or (much better) the path of nominal expenditure.
• Thus increases in UBI can be used to “lift the economy off the
floor” whenever secular stagnation threatens a prolonged
depression or “shampoo economy”.
39. Instrument of socioeconomic cohesion
• This is the most controversial perspective on the virtues of a
universal basic income. For people who see the world entirely
though an individualistic lens, “socioeconomic cohesion” will
not be a legitimate goal.
• “Socioeconomic cohesion” refers to the idea that, in very real
and tangible ways, “we are all in it together”.
• Extreme degrees of inequality in wealth and income reduce
socioeconomic cohesion, as the very rich are much better
protected against a wide variety of risks than the very poor.
• Wealthy communities have dramatically different preferences
than more modest communities over the degree to which
resources should be devoted to the production of shared,
inferior but inexpensive public goods, versus private goods.
40. Instrument of socioeconomic cohesion
• The level of a UBI provides a very cleanly tunable instrument for
making tradeoffs between socioeconomic cohesion and private
incentives to produce.
• A UBI funded by tax on 100% of production would yield a perfectly
egalitarian socialism, and would also be perfectly destructive of
private incentives to produce. This would be “pure Communism” in
a bad way.
• A UBI funded by a tax on 0% of production — what we have now —
leaves private incentives to produce (or game the system for
wealth) extremely strong, but lets socioeconomic cohesion fray
arbitrarily.
• Between these two extremes are a continuous range of mixed
economies, straightforward and corruption-resistant choices about
how strong private incentives should be versus how much we value
social cohesion, a “middle class society”, lack of poverty.
41. Not a panacea
• Does anybody actually ever claim that anything is a panacea?!?
• UBI is a policy that devolves much of the work of a social
democratic state to private sector markets. Complex
government action is replaced with simple transfers of
purchasing power, and private markets are expected to
convert that purchasing power into social goods.
• This obviously won’t work when serious market failures are
present:
- Medical care
- Monopoly power in the face of inelastic demand
+ For example in San Francisco, much of the benefit of a UBI might be
captured by property owners as recipients use their augmented
incomes to even further bid-up rents.
42. Not a panacea
• With a UBI in place, governments would need to continue to
take an active role in ensuring a competitive marketplace and
encouraging elasticity of supply (including supplying goods
and services directly when private markets cannot be made to
do so competitively).
• UBI can replace many, but not all transfer programs. In
particular, programs like unemployment insurance which are
intended to insure market incomes for some period of time
(and whose payouts must therefore be pegged to market
incomes rather than uniform) would still be necessary.
43. Nonhypothecable
• It is very important that a UBI be nonhypothecable, that is to
say, contracts pledging future UBI income as collateral for
loans should be unenforceable, and UBI income should not be
garnishable for the repayment of debts.
• Otherwise, the core social purpose of a UBI — providing a
reliable, last-resort “fallback income” to all — can be undone by
opportunistic lenders who capture individuals’ future UBI in
exchange for a quick, near-term expenditure.
• The state would be left having to deal with and invent new
welfare institutions for these destitute people who would have
a “basic income” they never see and cannot rely upon.
44. Generalization
• The foregoing has presumed that a universal basic income
would be implemented by a traditional state.
• Can we generalize the idea for communities defined by
relationships reified in smart contracts, with a UBI paid in
terms of some cryptographic token?
Perhaps!
(Stay tuned for Martin and Greg!)
45. Generalization
• All we require is…
(1) A community of people who agree to pool resource in order to
finance a UBI across its membership.
(2) Capacity and willingness of members of that community to
generate exchange value (perhaps by performing work) in
exchange for the tokens managed by the cryptographic
application.
- This exchange value would need to be recognized by
members outside the community, as well as reciprocally
among members, so that people can purchase goods and
services not produced within the community.
(3) Willingness of members of the community who expect to
produce disproportionately much exchange value to see some
of the tokens received as a result of their work “taxed” (or
devalued by dilution) to fund other peoples’ basic incomes.
46. Generalization
• All we require is…
(1) A community of people who agree to pool resource in order to
finance a UBI across its membership.
(2) Capacity and willingness of members of that community to
generate exchange value (perhaps by performing work) in
exchange for the tokens managed by the cryptographic
application.
- This exchange value would need to be recognized by
members outside the community, as well as reciprocally
among members, so that people can purchase goods and
services not produced within the community.
(3) Willingness of members of the community who expect to
produce disproportionately much exchange value to see some
of the tokens received as a result of their work “taxed” (or
devalued by dilution) to fund other peoples’ basic incomes.
Thisisthehardestpart!—>
<— Scale is important!
47. Generalization
• UBI is first and foremost an insurance arrangement.
• Insurance arrangements function best when there is complete
ignorance about who is likely to experience relatively good or
relatively bad outcomes.
• From under a “veil of ignorance”, nearly all risk-averse humans
voluntarily enter insurance arrangements to pool risk.
• But knowledge poisons insurance pools!
• If outcomes can be predicted, (selfish) people for whom good
outcomes are likely opt out of insurance schemes they would
gladly have joined were they ignorant. This renders the
insurance schemes untenable, as people likely to net-pay into
the programs opt out, while people likely to make claims
against the insurance have insufficient funds to draw on.
48. Generalization
• Regardless of knowledge, distributive outcomes are often
better (from a variety of social perspectives) when an entire
community participates in an insurance arrangement.
• States can “coercively” enforce this participation, by extracting
premia in taxes or imposing an “individual mandate”. They can
enforce “as-if” ignorance to ensure viability of an insurance
pool by limiting the information on the basis of which insurers
are permitted to differentially price.
- For example, health insurers may be permitted to charge higher premia to
smokers, but not to individuals with a genetic propensity for a cancer. This
reflects political judgments about the risks it is socially desirable to let
individuals bear (smoking) vs those that should be redistributively insured
(genetic risk). In a free and competitive insurance market, people without the
genetic propensity would pay lower premia, while people with would find
insurance (that does not exclude the condition) prohibitively expensive. State
regulation “coercively” prevents this free-market outcome from obtaining.
49. Generalization
• The main challenge for cryptocurrency-based UBI schemes, as
I see it, is how to persuade people who know or believe their
ability to generate exchange value is unusually high, not to
“drop out” and exchange their labor for old-fashioned money
they get to keep.
• If only people who generate unusually little exchange value in
trade for the UBI-implementing tokens participate in the
arrangement, the value of the basic income will be very low,
much like a health insurance pool in which everybody is sick.
• There may well be creative solutions to these problems!
- Social norms and interpersonal relationships might persuade people to look past
narrow economic self-interest in order to support a deep community.
- Funds might be held in escrow by the application, which would be forfeited as
punishment of individuals who defect and work “off the books”.
50. Conclusion
• A universal basic income would be an exceptionally useful
addition to the conventional social-democratic state policy
mix, from a variety of different perspectives.
• I look forward — with both skepticism and hope — to
experiments in the cryptocurrency community that try to
replicate some of the benefits of a conventional UBI in the
context of voluntary-participation-based distributed apps!