this post was submitted on 19 May 2025
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Just like today, most of us are "not slaves" and many even take pride in being exploited.
It still happening, it is a tricky balance. Simplifying the situation to the following makes reasonable.. if you have a gold mine that generate 1 million coin a day, and you have a population of 1 million, and you secure jobs such as mining, tools makers, home builders, farmers, governor, and military. But you end up with a 300,000 people or families with no jobs.
If you gave every person a coin a day, then people who work harder or risky job will figure they better not work and enjoy life, so it would make sense to start making useless projects to keep people employee and restore some sort of balance.
The issue when the balance is exploited like what happens in modern governments.
There is no issue with rewarding work with luxury while still providing everyone with the necessities to survive - such as a basic home and food.
Besides, you can reduce unemployment by just reducing working hours. 40 hours per week is way too much frankly. Why not 30 or even 20? That way everyone has more free time which results in better health and more productivity.
Yes the first thing to cut out is the "unearned income".
Higher income linked to real work / productivity is unlikely to be as big a problem unless the higher paid/skilled workers start gathering market power and controlling stuff (unearned income like a monopoly premium).
But the original thought experiment seems cart about horse to me - the work and product comes first, coins come along second to make it easier to specialise and trade.