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Billionaires Like Elon Musk and Sam Altman Advocate for Universal Basic Income as a Solution to Unemployment Caused by Automation.
Imagine a world where everyone receives a monthly amount to ensure their survival, regardless of their financial situation.
In an era of increasing automation and technological advancements that promise to replace various professions, the idea of universal basic income (UBI) has gained traction among major figures in technology.
Elon Musk and Sam Altman, powerful names in the sector, have stood out in advocating for a “universal minimum wage” to mitigate the effects of the technological revolution.
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The Proposal Uniting Billionaires in Technology
Universal basic income is a policy that suggests the distribution of a fixed amount of money to all citizens, with no requirements or conditions.
Musk, the billionaire and owner of companies like Tesla and SpaceX, believes in UBI as a solution to the mass unemployment that automation may cause.
According to him, with artificial intelligence taking over various professions, work would become optional, while the guarantee of a minimum income would become essential for survival.
Altman, co-founder of OpenAI and president of the company behind ChatGPT, also shares this vision.
However, he has gone beyond words and raised approximately R$ 60 million to start practical UBI testing.
In an experiment conducted by his organization OpenResearch, about a thousand people from Illinois and Texas received US$ 1,000 monthly for three years.
Another group of two thousand participants, in turn, received only US$ 50 monthly, forming a control group.
According to the initial results of the study, 81% of the money was allocated to basic needs, such as housing, and 22% for leisure, revealing a positive impact on the participants’ quality of life and financial security.
Universal Income: Testing and Limitations of the Proposal
Although UBI is gaining popularity, practical implementation presents challenges. Jurgen De Wispelaere, a researcher at the Basic Income Earth Network (BIEN) and one of the leading scholars on the subject, points out that existing experiments have significant limitations.
“Due to being temporary and focused on small groups, participants tend to use the resources cautiously and do not make radical changes in their lives,” he commented to the newspaper O Globo.
According to him, despite its limitations, the tests offer a “laboratory” that allows observation of the effects of UBI in different social and economic contexts, in addition to helping define the mechanisms to make this policy feasible on a large scale.
On a platform that maps ongoing UBI experiments around the world, De Wispelaere has already registered 18 UBI pilots, totaling investments of US$ 286 million in six countries, including Canada, Finland, and India. In the US, the policy is being tested in 35 states, with 150 active initiatives.
UBI and Inequality: Funding is a Critical Point
While magnates advocate for universal income as an alternative to the challenges of the future of work, economists and experts in social inequality raise the question of its economic viability.
Viviana Santiago, Executive Director of Oxfam Brazil, points out that the debate over UBI arises in a context of extreme concentration of global wealth, at unprecedented levels.
A recent Oxfam survey revealed that the richest 1% of the world holds more wealth than the combined total of the poorest 95%.
Santiago warns that without fair taxation to redistribute wealth, resources to finance UBI may become increasingly scarce.
According to the director, the concentration of wealth without a significant redistribution policy may undermine social policies, like UBI itself.
For her, the real question is about sharing the wealth of billionaires and a tax reform capable of funding public policies that benefit the majority.
The “World” Project: Biometric Identity to Ensure Universal Income
In addition to the experiments with OpenResearch, Altman is involved in another front, the company World, which proposes a biometric identification system with iris scanning to enable the distribution of universal income.
The proposal is to connect each individual to a unique digital identity and ensure that the resource is directed safely and individually.
This system involves three pillars: iris scanning, personal biometric identification, and a cryptocurrency to facilitate payments.
In an interview with Oxygen, Andrea Janér, founder of the organization, highlights that World seeks to resolve the issue of unique identity to ensure the distribution of universal income in a society where employment will become increasingly unnecessary.
“By launching ChatGPT and advancing the creation of artificial intelligence, Altman creates a cycle in which he dictates the pace of the future while proposing solutions to the challenges that his technologies bring,” Janér points out.
The First Advocates and Growing Support in Silicon Valley
Silicon Valley is no stranger to the concept of universal basic income. Since the 2000s, with the emergence of social networks, the idea has been gaining momentum in the region.
Mark Zuckerberg, creator of Facebook, and Jack Dorsey, founder of Twitter, have already expressed support for the concept, although they have not been directly involved in implementing UBI projects, like Altman.
Even though support for this policy is growing among technology leaders, economists warn that the effective implementation of UBI depends on a global consensus on the redistribution of resources.
So far, universal basic income remains a viable utopia on small scales, but still far from being adopted as a large-scale public policy.
The Question That Divides Opinions: Is it Worth Investing in Universal Basic Income?
Universal basic income has the potential to transform the future of work, but it still divides opinions regarding its viability.
For some, it is a necessary response to the effects of technology on the workforce, while others believe that its implementation requires a redistribution of wealth that few countries are willing to adopt.
Is the world ready to sustain a universal basic income policy and confront the concentration of billionaires’ wealth?
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