I fear a world where people don't need to aspire to something to better their lives (ie studying, learning a skill or educating oneself) wouldn't be a very nice world to live in at all. If we didn't need to work, what reason would there to learn to read? If we were rewarded with land, shelter, food and comfort for doing nothing, what would the incentive for those who will inevitably be responsible for keeping everything together?
Plants don't grow without care and attention, electricity isn't as simple as sticking two wires into a powerpoint or setting up solar panels, if nobody worked, nobody would study and if nobody studied there would be no people left in the world.
Money, sad to say motivates people, it motivates the disadvantaged to strive for more, it motivates the rogue developer with a wife and kids to attempt to build the next big thing knowing the reward will be a comfortable life where the family doesn't need to worry about money.
Perhaps there is a better way, removing class barriers, maybe there is no such thing as lower class, you are either middle or upper class. A system where even a school janitor has an opportunity to do something more and earn a decent living.
We can only dream, but I doubt for a very long time will there be a shake up to the class wars and pay discrepancies amongst professions.
> Plants don't grow without care and attention, electricity isn't as simple as sticking two wires into a powerpoint or setting up solar panels, if nobody worked, nobody would study and if nobody studied there would be no people left in the world.
People would do these things out of curiosity, or because they want to see what happens. The need to know, learn, understand, and create wouldn't go away. Intrinsic motivation wouldn't go away. Indeed, I can imagine these becoming stronger if one could devote most of his waking hours to learning about the variety of topics that interest him.
A couple months of laying around doing nothing will drive most people crazy and they'll begin asking themselves what they want their life to be about.
And even if they don't contribute anything, should all people be required to useful to others or can't some just choose to be left alone if they are self sufficient?
In a world of scarcity I can see the argument of forcing people to contribute if they want to take back but what about a world of abundance? You and I are breathing abundant air, for free, and nobody is getting angry right? What if other resources like electricity were as abundant as Tesla once dreamed?
I'm not saying I'm right or wrong. These are just thoughts worth consideration.
>A couple months of laying around doing nothing will drive most people crazy
I think on HN we frequently assume that "most people" are like us, but HN is such an unrepresentative sample of the world that this is dangerous, especially here. You and I and other knowledge workers would probably get bored and want to do something useful to find purpose. But there are many people today who work at unskilled jobs because they have to put food on the table. They don't derive their sense of purpose from it. It's very difficult to predict what these people would do if they suddenly had no financial necessity to work. There are listless unemployed people living off of various forms of government assistance today, and this would make it possible for many more to join them.
Money can still be an incentive in a world with guaranteed basic income if that income only covers the minimal cost of living. People would still choose to work if it was the only way to have disposable income for entertainment, hobbies, having the nicest toys or the fastest car, etc.
Plants don't grow without care and attention, electricity isn't as simple as sticking two wires into a powerpoint or setting up solar panels, if nobody worked, nobody would study and if nobody studied there would be no people left in the world.
Money, sad to say motivates people, it motivates the disadvantaged to strive for more, it motivates the rogue developer with a wife and kids to attempt to build the next big thing knowing the reward will be a comfortable life where the family doesn't need to worry about money.
Perhaps there is a better way, removing class barriers, maybe there is no such thing as lower class, you are either middle or upper class. A system where even a school janitor has an opportunity to do something more and earn a decent living.
We can only dream, but I doubt for a very long time will there be a shake up to the class wars and pay discrepancies amongst professions.