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The effects of Technology on Education, Demand and Employment.

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IainB:
I am reviving this discussion thread with a post about the YouTube video where economics Prof. Yanis Varoufakis talks about (universal) basic income becoming a necessity as technology and especially the technology of AI (Automated Intelligence) fundamentally and irreversibly changes the economic concepts of labour, capital and reward, with the state being held collectively responsible for enabling all economic production in a democratic and civilised society. His ideas are a breath of fresh air in a typically hidebound debate.
He stresses that he is not a statist, but wishes to provide people with the freedom to say "No" to employment opportunities that they might otherwise be obliged to accept (cannot refuse due to economic coercion), even though they might find them reprehensible, which would be a dehumanisation of labour in a civilised society.
Though it is a brief talk with Q&A, the case put by Varoufakis seems quite compelling and he seems to have plugged all or most of the potential loose ends and main objections and avoids it seeming like just another regurgitation of statist lefty-liberal religio-political ideology.



The earliest "modern" proposal for a (universal) basic income in a capitalist economic system, that I have come across in my reading to date, is the book The Collapse of Work (1979) by Clive Jenkins (ASTMS General Secretary) and an economist, Barrie Sherman.

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