Johanna

In a way, basic income as an automation solution is both too much and not enough. It’s too much of a solution for the problem of long-run mass technological unemployment, primarily because that’s a fake problem that hasn’t happened yet and likely never will. But it’s not enough of a solution for the temporary dislocation that automation will, in fa... See more

Basic jobs don’t help caretakers. (...) Basic jobs once again drops the ball on this problem. If your mother is dying, you can’t be there to help her, because the government is going to make you dig ditches and fill them in again all day to satisfy people’s worry that somebody somewhere might be getting money without doing enough make-work to “dese... See more

Almost everyone I’ve ever met would be well-served by spending more time thinking about what to focus on. It is much more important to work on the right thing than it is to work many hours. Most people waste most of their time on stuff that doesn’t matter.

The home run theory of careers: What matters is eventually hitting a home run, and the way to do that is training hard and a lot of at-bats. You only have to be right once, and it's ok to be wrong a lot of times. Be bold. Move fast. Work hard. Ignore haters. Keep swinging.

On the face of it, this makes the numbers come close to acceptable. It also means that UBI schemes essentially take money out of the pot currently reserved for the needy and disabled, and distribute it to able-bodied people plus the needy and disabled. Such a scheme has the potential to have good effects: by eradicating welfare traps that keep peop... See more