I’ve thought about this...especially among the very wealthy. Why continue to be a high pressure CEO when you basically never have to work again?
My hypothesis is that most very high paying roles are incentive-based, and incentives can be addicting: meet a goal, get a million dollar dopamine hit. I don’t think these people hate their jobs as much as they might say they do.
That's why things like UBI are a pipe-dream. Any Fortune-500 executive could live a life of leisure with 2-3 years of planning. They tend to not make that choice.
On the contrary, UBI would free people to leave the jobs that feel meaningless, and do things they are passionate about.
If the problem is that people need purpose, what better than a system that allows people to find purpose, rather than one that keeps them trapped doing work they hate?
Remember how the internet was supposed to bring people together, enhance the spreading and sharing of ideas, bring knowledge and information to everybody? Not many people predicted it'd end up with people going into echo chambers, spreading misinformation about one another, and helping to drive a wedge in society so extreme that an increasingly large chunk of society (myself not included) believe it will culminate in civil war [1]? Can't win 'em all I guess.
The point I'm making here is that we shouldn't play the naive game twice. Give people free money and an extra ~10 hours a day with no obligations to anybody. This isn't going to bring in some utopia of people pursuing wonderful new interests and ideas they always really wanted to, but were just held back by socioeconomic obstacles.
So let's think about realistic predictions. I mean I do agree with you people would be looking for purpose. Companies would be quick to try to provide this purpose by providing the most addictive, immersive, and life destroying games ever -- even the most hardcore WoW player would blush at what we'd have in store there. We'd also probably see people finding purpose similar to how we already do online. Imagine Twitter outrage mobs. Except now since people have no obligations and really nothing to do, there's a very good chance this would spill into the streets and likely in quite high numbers. 'Hey let's come protest against [xyz] in LA on the 17th!' 'Whoa, sounds like fun. Btw, no idea what [xyz] is, fill me in then?' 'Sure, not so clear myself tbh!'
Ooo and then the inevitable happens. There'd be another group, also looking for purpose, that now decides to counter protest. And these 'meetings' would be immense. There'd suddenly be thousands to millions of people with nothing to do and no obligations showing up to face off against each other to try to find some sort of purpose and meaning in life. No worries. I'm sure they'll just come together, spread and share ideas, and bring knowledge and information to one another.
Well at least everybody could come together in nonstop protests demanding that the basic income should be increased.
I like the dystopian outlook and dislike of UBI. However, the advent of the internet = civil war 2 is a false premise. Dividing the country was possible long before the internet existed. You can argue that being able to rapidly spread information accelerated the preponderance of these echo chambers- however- you can just as easily say that the advent of the internet has made the world a more enjoyable place and has increased most people's quality of life.
Yet the prejudice against UBI always assumes the poor and disadvantaged will always take the lazy option. They tend not to make that choice either as poor people need a purpose too.
Do you have any evidence of that? All the studies I have seen, imply or play out the opposite. The poor stay poor and disinclined to achieve. Survival is hard enough at the bottom rung.
This is exactly why UBI works -- people need a purpose. The Canadian study I'm thinking of showed the only people who left the workforce left to pursue liberal arts or to be stay-at-home parents. UBI lifts up the bottom line in a society to a level we should all deem acceptable and freeing them to continue to find their purpose.
Seems like that shows why UBI could work. The worry with UBI is that a ton of people just check out of the workforce forever once it’s no longer necessary in order to eat. If in fact most people want to work because they need purpose in their lives, that seems to indicate that this won’t happen.
I read somewhere (I don't remember where) that when you're a CEO and all your friends are CEOs, you start to compare yourself to them and want to make as much as they do.
My hypothesis is that most very high paying roles are incentive-based, and incentives can be addicting: meet a goal, get a million dollar dopamine hit. I don’t think these people hate their jobs as much as they might say they do.