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Author Topic: The Concept of Money  (Read 16084 times)

Angle

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Re: The Concept of Money
« Reply #75 on: August 13, 2014, 03:13:32 pm »

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It doesn't strictly prevent solutions, it just makes them exceedingly difficult, because you'd need to legislate to solve any of those, and that legislation would have to go through a political system dominated by lobbyists and campaign finance, where it would die the slow death of being postponed, filibustered, blockaded, used as a bargaining chip, and eventually amended into irrelevance. My solution, on the other hand, wouldn't need to go through said political system. Indeed, any opposition to it would have to go through said system instead. And it's a lot easier to stop said system from doing things than it is to make said system do things.

As for corrupting people, it should be slightly harder, as there are no campaigns to finance. More importantly, though, you'd need to corrupt a lot more people to get the same effect. This, coupled with proper transparency, should make it much less useful to do things like pollute- you'd get caught at it really quickly. The underpaid migrant labor is a whole nother issue to tackle- that one gets tied up with national policy and a mess of other things. This system would have very different hiring practices, because here providing jobs is a good thing, and they technically receive their "pay" from the rest of the people involved in the L.E., and instead how many you hire and for what determines whether the L.E. decides that your business is worth promoting. So you have two different impulses- One to get more done with less people, and one to hire more people in order to provide jobs. the relative value of these two things depends on the rest of that particular L.E.'s system- if they've got an abundance of consumer goods, food, housing, etc. then they might swing more towards the second impulse, otherwise the first would come more into play.

There are plenty of reasons to run a enterprise in this system- because you want to see it done, because you want the challenge of doing it well, because you want the respect that comes with managing an enterprise, because you have to make a living somehow and like this idea the best. It'd also be one of the more high paying jobs. (Yes, not all jobs would pay the same.)

I should also point out, I don't expect to have a country switch to this system wholesale. Rather, it's start as a sort of counter culture/counter society, and expand from there.
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BFEL

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Re: The Concept of Money
« Reply #76 on: August 13, 2014, 06:23:44 pm »

Having one big stockpile to take whatever you need will lead to everybody taking and nobody putting it, which is obviously non-sustainable.

http://www.thingiverse.com/

And if people keep "taking" from it they start consuming significant quantities of plastic to be moulded into poor quality plastic figurines.

I can't be sure, but I think Lordbucket's point is we already "put in" resources into the silliest things, and the fact that we do this instead of everyone working to make food or energy or y'know, USEFUL things hasn't resulted in something unsustainable, so why would the people who make these poor quality plastic figurines not doing so suddenly destroy society?
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Re: The Concept of Money
« Reply #77 on: August 13, 2014, 07:33:45 pm »

I think Lordbucket's point is we already "put in" resources into the silliest things, and the fact that we do this instead of everyone working to make food or energy or y'know, USEFUL things hasn't resulted in something unsustainable, so why would the people who make these poor quality plastic figurines not doing so suddenly destroy society?

...not exactly. But looking back over the post chain, I think I might have misunderstood BlindKitty's post:

My intent was to give Thingiverse as an example of a "stuff pile" that people put into that doesn't get "used up" up people taking from it. Obviously more people downloading than uploading doesn't make thingiverse unsustainable. And if we already have examples of people being sufficiently altruistic to make things available to humanity, there isn't particularly any reason to think people as a whole will suddenly became vastly more selfish as technology improves. Other (metaphorical) "stuff piles" can and likely will exist, with or without money changing hands, and they won't need to be unsustainable.

...but in retrospect I think BlindKitty wasn't actually suggesting that this "stuff pile" way of thinking was a useful model in the first place. I think he was actually suggesting the opposite:

The problem with this thinking is that unemployment is only a problem if you need money earned working to buy stuff. Having one big stockpile to take whatever you need will lead to everybody taking and nobody putting it, which is obviously non-sustainable.


Yes, having a stuff pile that people put individual items into and take individual items from...is not a sustainable model for a world economy. But...it's a silly model. And if I'm now correctly reading the intent of BlindKitty's post, the point of his post was that this way of thinking doesn't make sense, and isn't particularly relevant.

"Unemployment is only a problem" ...if you have that kind of backwards, silly system.

We don't.

Unemployment doesn't need to be a problem.

alexandertnt

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Re: The Concept of Money
« Reply #78 on: August 13, 2014, 08:01:51 pm »

Unemployment will be a problem at least until we have completely automated methods of aquiring resources needed to survive. Or perhaps until you can get everybody in the production chain to do these things altruistically (that includes machinery manufacturers, metallurgy etc) and somehow ensure that a minimum of people actually have any interest in doing these things.

We don't have that yet, and we won't for the forseeable fututre.

So unemployment will continue to be a problem until this happenes.

I would imagine as automation is phased in, it would be best to reduce the working hours of everyone, rather than have some people work full time and others completely unemployed.
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LordBucket

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Re: The Concept of Money
« Reply #79 on: August 13, 2014, 08:23:48 pm »

Unemployment will be a problem at least until we have completely automated methods of aquiring resources needed to survive.

...well, it probably will be a problem, but it doesn't need to be a problem. We can fix it. Whether or not we'll choose to remains to be seen.

Quote
Or perhaps until you can get everybody in the production chain to do these things altruistically

Wouldn't need to be everyone. It doesn't need to be an all-or-nothing proposition. Unfortunately I suspect there might need to be a generational transition as much as a technological one.

Just one possible example: if we're talking about the end of work, then that means getting rid of things like cashiers and wait staff. We easily have the technical ability to do that, and we can do it cost effectively. There are already restaurants that have no waiters and even in the US there are restaurants with automated ordering and payment. But an awful lot of people are simply uncomfortable with these things. I was talking to a grocery store clerk just this past week about how frustrating automated checkout is, because even though we've had it for years there are still people who don't understand it, can't use it, get stuck and need help all the time.

Technical ability to render the human element obsolete seems to be outpacing cultural acceptance and training for the alternatives. Right now, I'm sure there are large portion of people who find the idea of ordering food from a machine strange, and would vastly prefer a human server. Once we've had a generation that's grown up with these things, it will become ridiculous to think that humans did such mundane tasks. That sort of resistance is more likely to slow the transition than technical limitations.

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it would be best to reduce the working hours of everyone,

That's certainly a valid solution. It would work. There are other solutions that would probably also work. For example, somebody mentioned basic income schemes earlier in the thread.

BFEL

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Re: The Concept of Money
« Reply #80 on: August 13, 2014, 08:47:48 pm »

I wouldn't mind those automated checkout things if they EVER FREAKING WORKED RIGHT. Seriously, EVERY time I've tried one of them they fail to weigh something properly or whatever and a employee has to come over and tell the machine to ignore its own stupidity.

Not QUITE there yet Bucket :P
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mainiac

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Re: The Concept of Money
« Reply #81 on: August 13, 2014, 10:41:36 pm »

Weird I haven't had a problem with one in years and I always use them when available.

Of course the real goal is no checkout at all, just have an inventory system which keeps track of stuff as you remove it from the stocks.
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alexandertnt

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Re: The Concept of Money
« Reply #82 on: August 13, 2014, 10:47:28 pm »

If the farmers work altruistically, and the mechanics that build the tractors don't, then there is a problem. How do the farmers pay the mechanics? I suppose they could work without some of these tools, but considerably less efficiently.

I'm all for automation, but we are simply not there yet. Many of the supermarkets around here have automated checkout things, and they end up (ironically) having to hire people to fix the problems and quirks they have. It's generally not the users fault either, these things sometimes don't weigh things properly, they sometimes have problems reading barcodes, delay spikes make people think they have screwed up (this is a very common UI design problem, not a problem of the users). A few times I have used them and they outright diddn't have one of the products I was buying in their database.

They are horrid. It's a good idea, but they are terrable at the moment.

I don't think many people find the idea of ordering food from a machine particularly strange. Vending machines, for example, are ubiquitous, but they are also quite robust and reliable, which is probably a reason why they are more accepted than the above technology.

I don't know how basic income works. I do want people to work less and I think that's something automation is going to help with, but barring complete automation most people should do some work. I want the working time to be lower for everybody, not lower the mean working time of everybody.

Regardless, these changes to how employment works should come after automation, not before it. We are on our way though.
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Cthulhu

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Re: The Concept of Money
« Reply #83 on: August 13, 2014, 10:56:56 pm »

Getting there!  I feel like we could probably be in the beginnings of low working hours already, I think Keynes predicted 15-hour work weeks by now, but we're clearly not getting there.  One look at the kinds of jobs a lot of people do and it makes more sense.  I like automated checkouts because automated checkouts never try to make awkward conversation out of the things I buy.

A couple weeks ago I saw the ultimate in reverse-pyramid unnecessary job bullshit.  Outside the local dollar store, they were having some corporate meeting.  About ten people, touching base, workshopping, brainstorming new market strategies, other stupid words.  I came by a few hours later and they were still there, and it was pretty clear that whatever they were doing probably could've been accomplished by one or two dudes coming by, doing an inventory, requesting records, and having a quick chat with the manager about policies and the like.

There were about as many corporate reps there as there are actual employees at that dollar store, and they were there for the entire working day.

I used to think the problems with our system could be solved, but I'm beginning to suspect that they're not even "problems" within the logic of the system, that it's working as intended in the same way that tapeworms aren't cheating at nature by living inside another organism and eating its food but have in fact won the game.  If you could invent for yourself a completely vestigial administrative job and leech money from a corporation, why wouldn't you?  Tapeworms have it made.

Here's something else from the guy who wrote that book I mentioned earlier.
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alexandertnt

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Re: The Concept of Money
« Reply #84 on: August 13, 2014, 11:12:45 pm »

That sort of thing is necessary though. If you can't outpromote the other guy then you end up going under, so you end up having to investing a significant ammount of manpower in comming up with fancy slogans and glossy fliers. People are going to buy things from familier places.

It shouldnt be necessary, glossy fliers doesn't make it any easier to produce food etc, but the current system basically makes it necessary.

It's like if everybody was infected by a tapeworm that gave off a deadly disease, but also made you immune to it. You shouldn't need the tapeworm to live at all, and could be far better off without it, but because everybody else is infected too you actually do need to to survive. Or something.
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Playergamer

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Re: The Concept of Money
« Reply #85 on: August 13, 2014, 11:19:55 pm »

3. Revised plan, use sterling to acquire wenches of appropriately varied gender to bribe future pirates.
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Cthulhu

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Re: The Concept of Money
« Reply #86 on: August 13, 2014, 11:23:31 pm »

If we go back to the idealized depictions of the beginning of the thread (remember back when we all traded by directly exchanging goods and finally agreed to exchange metal disks as a convenience?) then I think the situation there would be "the one who succeeds is the one whose industry and innovation creates the best product for the lowest price, not the one whose marketing team is the best."

But that's silly, of course.  That article rings true to me because I'm in a non-bullshit career field.  As in, I'm looking at a 40-50 hour work week doing something that society would not be able to function without.  And I'm also looking at a salary that a lot of people acknowledge as shameful for the necessity of what I'm doing (the rest tend to think of us as overpaid union pigs, lol).  I could've gone for marketing or administration and made much, much more but I would end up killing myself and then I wouldn't be making any money at all.
« Last Edit: August 13, 2014, 11:33:18 pm by Cthulhu »
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Re: The Concept of Money
« Reply #87 on: August 13, 2014, 11:30:31 pm »

Why has no one mentioned scarcity yet? Lord Bucket was talking about a single person pressing a single button to make 340 hamburgers but the intrinsic cost of gathering the ingredients means there's way more than one person pressing a button. Same thing goes for keyboards, or anything made of plastic. They all require resources. In a closed system, these things will always have a base worth because there is a physical cap on what we can make out of them; You can only have so many keyboards made from plastic irrevocably made from crude oil, which could have been used for gasoline.

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Re: The Concept of Money
« Reply #88 on: August 14, 2014, 12:02:50 am »

If anyone is intristed their is a nice crashcorse history on this topic on YouTube.
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LordBucket

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Re: The Concept of Money
« Reply #89 on: August 14, 2014, 12:24:16 pm »

If the farmers work altruistically, and the mechanics that build the tractors don't, then there is a problem. How do the farmers pay the mechanics? I suppose they could work without some of these tools, but considerably less efficiently.

Tractors? What, are we in the 1900s?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vertical_farming

For example:



Quote
I don't know how basic income works.

The basic premise is that every citizen receives a check whether or not they're working and regardless of other factors. If you have a job, the basic income check is unaffected, and your income from the job is unaffected by basic income.

First question is usually "who pays for it?" To which the answer is: we cannibalize existing benefits programs, and eliminate all the bureaucracy and means testing associated with them. Welfare, unemployment, social security, medicare....you get rid of all of those, divide the money spent on them by the number of people over age of majority in the country and write checks.

In the US, that number works out to about $5000/yr. If you want more, get a job, you still get the $5000/yr, and without the tax disincentive to work that currently exists with welfare systems: as is, if you're collecting welfare then get a job...you lose the welfare income. So, the number is high enough that nobody needs to starve, but low enough that people still would probably for the most part choose to work if they can. But the point is mostly to address the inevitable shortage of work due to technological obsolescence, and the smooth the transition to an eventual post scarcity economy. Yes, we can reduce work hours like you suggested, but for example...what happens when driverless cars and delivery drones destroy the taxi, shipping, bus and trucking industries?That's going to be quite a few million people rather suddenly out of work. And unlike previous instances of technological unemployment, there's not necessarily going to be a new factory job created by it for those people to transition to. Even if you reduce work hours to compensate, there would be a transition period while people retrain for new positions during which they still need to eat. Basic income is a possible solution that smooths out those bumps.



Why has no one mentioned scarcity yet?

Largely because scarcity is an illusion. This isn't high school economics, and we're not playing Starcaft where there's only X crystal on the map and once you mine it, it's gone. For almost everything we care about resource scarcity isn't a meaningful concern. Unless you simply want to be pedantic and talk about entropy, the vast majority of all materials we use will last longer than we can reasonably expect humans to exist as a species.

Most obvious example being oil.

When "peak oil" was originally theorized in the 1950s, it was predicted that we'd reach peak oil sometime between 1965 and 1971. Yet, here we are ~60 years later and known oil reserves are still being predicted to last decades. Part of this is a very basic misunderstanding of what "known oil reserves" are. They're oil...that we know where it is...and that is economically viable to process under current market and technological conditions. So we right now know where decades worth of oil are. And for decades we've known where decades worth of oil are. Why? Because when you already know where decades worth of oil there there's no reason to keep looking for more.

So let's go looking for an actual numbner. Here we go:

http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/business/2014/06/28/the-world-was-533-years-of-oil-left/11528999/

"enough oil to last the world 53.3 years at the current production rates. "


Right now, we know where there's ~50 years worth of oil that's financially viable with current techology. But you have to understand that the oil that we're producing right now was considered unviable in previous decades. But pay more per barrel and there's more available. Improve technology and there's more available.

For example:

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/american-oil-find-holds-oil-opec/story?id=17536852

"...if half of the oil bound up in the rock of the Green River Formation could be recovered it would be "equal to the entire world's proven oil reserves.""

"...in all of human history -- we have consumed 1 trillion barrels of oil. There are several times that much here,""


We're not going to run out, because long before the prospect of actual physical resource limits become anywhere even close to an issue...we're not going to be using it anymore. Do you really think society is going to depend on gasoline combustion engines in 50-100 years?

When "peak oil production" hits, it's not going to be because there's no more oil. It's going to be because we've simply stopping using it. Remember there are synthetic oils for lubrication. the modern petroleum industry is only about 150 years old, and we're not still going to be burning fossil fuels in 150 years any more than we use horses to pull carriages.




Anyway, to speak more generally than the specific example of oil, scarcity is an illusion. The universe doesn't work like Starcraft. Remember that the water your body is composed of has been around for millions of years. Things don't get "used up" when they're used. They simply move around and change form.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservation_of_energy

"...energy of an isolated system cannot change—it is said to be conserved over time. Energy can be neither created nor destroyed,"

Worrying about "running out of stuff" is silly. Scarcity is an illusion. Yes, like somebody pointed out earlier in the thread, things like front row seats at a specific concert exist in scarcity. Yeah, ok. And? While we're at it, the sun might become a red giant in a couple billion years. Neither of these need to be policy concerns.

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