Postcapitalism and the Impending Death of Work

[Bennis of the Brown Shield]

7 minutes ago, Wolfgang I said:

A realistic UBI would probably be far bellow with median income imo.

In Austria the median income is € 22215.19 per year. (Although median income is a worthless metric anyway because of the 1%.) 

In Austria we have a needs-based minimum benefit system(Mindestsicherung) which is € 827.82 per month(€ 9 933.84  per year) for singles living alone .

You only get it if you have less than € 4222.70 in savings.

You can live of the Mindestssicherung although rent can be difficult even with the housing benefits you get on top of it.

 

Some additional details for people who are interested:

€ 620.81 per month for singles with a roommate

€ 1241.74 € per month for couples.

Some regional governments by more than that minimum(921.30 € for singles in the federal state I live in for example).

You get additional benefits depending on the number of children in a household.  

The roommate thing was added later, if I remember correctly, because a lot of couples separated(at least officially) after the Mindestsicherung replaced other kinds of social security.
 

There are lot of conditions though and the amount is often reduced if you do not comply and you have to look for work if you are able to. 
Unless you are disabled or need it for work(if you earn less than € 827.82 your income is topped up) you might have to sell your car if you have one.  

More or less the only valuable property you are allowed to keep is a house or flat if you live in it. 

You get the basic health insurance which is pretty decent even be euro-commie standards although I guess the Scandinavians beat us in that regard.  

Cut backs are coming of course because we just got a far right & neoliberal government.

Some regional governments have already reduced the maximum household income to 1500 €(you could get significantly more depending on the number of children) and reduced the amounts for persons entitled to political asylum unless the agree the certain integration related conditions.

Yes, in European welfare states instituting a system to handle mass permanent unemployment wouldn't need very many changes. Just remove the "have to keep applying for jobs" part for receiving existing handouts I guess. 

 

[Luzifer's right hand]

1 minute ago, Khaleesi did nothing wrong said:

Yes, in European welfare states instituting a system to handle mass permanent unemployment wouldn't need very many changes. Just remove the "have to keep applying for jobs" part for receiving existing handouts I guess. 

 

The problem with the current system is that if you are unskilled and able to work collecting benefits and working cash-in hand will get you much more in the short term. You can always work as a cleaner or on construction for example, you will earn more than you would earn otherwise and you will get the benefits on top of that.

You will pay for it once you reach retirement age or if you get sick/disabled though. Or if the taxman catches you but that is unlikely if you stick to cash.  

 

[Loge]

31 minutes ago, Wolfgang I said:

A realistic UBI would probably be far bellow with median income imo.

In Austria the median income is € 22215.19 per year. (Although median income is a worthless metric anyway because of the 1%.) 

The one percent don't have an impact on the median income. It's the income level that divides the richer half of the population from the poorer. Average would be worthless because of all the part time and precarious jobs on the lower end and the very rich on the higher end. Your figure looks a bit low, BTW. That has to be net salary after taxes and social security. That would be misleading when compared to other countries with different level of social security / welfare. That's the point I was making above. How much money a household needs to survive and preserve some level of dignity depends a lot of the services and social security schemes your government provides. 

[Bennis of the Brown Shield]

55 minutes ago, Wolfgang I said:

The problem with the current system is that if you are unskilled and able to work collecting benefits and working cash-in hand will get you much more in the short term. You can always work as a cleaner or on construction for example, you will earn more than you would earn otherwise and you will get the benefits on top of that.

You will pay for it once you reach retirement age or if you get sick/disabled though. Or if the taxman catches you but that is unlikely if you stick to cash.  

 

Yeah, hopefully that will become more difficult as cash is phased out and replaced by digital currencies*. 

 

*Not cryptocurrencies!

42 minutes ago, Loge said:

The one percent don't have an impact on the median income. It's the income level that divides the richer half of the population from the poorer. Average would be worthless because of all the part time and precarious jobs on the lower end and the very rich on the higher end. Your figure looks a bit low, BTW. That has to be net salary after taxes and social security. That would be misleading when compared to other countries with different level of social security / welfare. That's the point I was making above. How much money a household needs to survive and preserve some level of dignity depends a lot of the services and social security schemes your government provides. 

I'm not sure if that figure is too low. Median income generally includes students, retirees, disabled, unemployed, part time workers etc. 

Median income in the USA is about €27000 per year, but they also work longer hours and have lower unemployment. 

Edit: Median incomes in the USA and Germany are about the same though, even though Germans work far fewer hours per year (and also get way more public benefits when it comes to healthcare and education etc). That's because America has far larger income inequalities. 

[Luzifer's right hand]

2 hours ago, Loge said:

The one percent don't have an impact on the median income. It's the income level that divides the richer half of the population from the poorer. Average would be worthless because of all the part time and precarious jobs on the lower end and the very rich on the higher end. Your figure looks a bit low, BTW. That has to be net salary after taxes and social security. That would be misleading when compared to other countries with different level of social security / welfare. That's the point I was making above. How much money a household needs to survive and preserve some level of dignity depends a lot of the services and social security schemes your government provides. 

I guess you are right.

According to the site I visited median income usually does not contain income from non-work sources like investments at least in Austrian statistics. One site added it on top of the normal median income which increases the gap between the top 10% and the rest significantly. It was not a neutral website though(Arbeiterkammer). The top 1% get more from such sources than the lowest 30% get from work. 

It was the net median income 2015 according to that site.

According to another site it the median net annual income 2015 was €19 558 (women: €15 986, men: €23 235). https://www.statistik.at/web_en/statistics/PeopleSociety/social_statistics/personal_income/annual_personal_income/index.html

Gross income is pretty much irrelevant in that context at least for Austria as most people have the same health insurance and social security is the same for everybody. Better insurance has to be paid from your net income.

Comparing different countries is indeed difficult.

Honestly I doubt that many noneuropean countries are relevant for a realistic discussion about UBI. The USA is pretty much irrelevant though. It does not even have a decent healthcare system.

[Bennis of the Brown Shield]

Regarding the concept of "postcapitalism" (not sure if that is really the appropriate term of what we are talking about), I think something else to consider is how the world will change as China replaces the USA as the most powerful in the country of the world in the next 10 - 20 years. 

In the same way that the Americans have been pushing their ideology of neoliberalism around the world, especially since after they won the Cold War, we can probably expect China to promote their model of state capitalism*. Something like a UBI might be more probable to become implemented in such an ideological context than the one of "big gubmint took my JOBS!" 

 

*Or what you want to call it.