Yes, there is an old slogan, "Machines
should work. People should think."<p>Or now maybe<p>"Machines should work. People should
enjoy life."<p>Or, there is the old<p>"Machines should work. People should get
a guaranteed basic income. If anyone
wants more, then they can work for more."<p>All the ballpark US national arithmetic I
did says that we can't yet afford a
guaranteed basic income.<p>E.g., for something simple, supposedly
Bezos is now worth $100 billion. But if
divide that by the US population of, say,
333 million, then get just $300 per
person, just once, and have confiscated all
of the Bezos wealth. Point: Not even
Bezos is rich enough to provide a
guaranteed annual income for everyone in
the US, not for a year and not even for
just one month just once.<p>But, maybe when computing is doing enough
of the work, then, for a simple solution
for the needed revenue, tax the computing,
processors and Internet data rates and
nothing else. Maybe.<p>Or, maybe, people should manage computers
that manage computers ... that manage
computers that do the work for everyone.
Okay -- apparently we're not there yet.<p>For the issue of housing costs, housing is
expensive close to where there are good
jobs. And there the costs are for the
limited real estate close to the jobs and
high taxes for K-12 schools, police,
roads, etc. And the high housing costs
eat up nearly all the income from the jobs
because the jobs pay just enough to cover
the most important employee expenses,
e.g., housing.<p>But if get out to rural areas, then
housing costs can be much lower. If
people are going to have a guaranteed
income, then they may want to live in
areas without much in jobs and with lower
housing costs.<p>But there is a flaw in Sam's proposal:
People will still form competing interest
groups, e.g., political parties. Then too
many of the groups would rather fight for
the interests of their group and not join
for the good of all. That is, too many
groups would rather fight for a bigger
piece of the pie they like than for bigger
pies for everyone.<p>In times past, such interest groups could
fight in the streets. Then the ancient
Greeks invented democracy: Do the
fighting at a ballot box. Since a big
winner at a ballot box would likely also
win in the streets, it's in everyone's
interests just to go with the results from
the ballot box instead of shedding blood
when the outcome is already known.<p>Basically, democracy is still important
and for the same, old reasons.