{"id":417,"date":"2016-06-24T23:30:13","date_gmt":"2016-06-25T03:30:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/commoncents.blogwyrm.com\/?p=417"},"modified":"2016-06-10T07:07:27","modified_gmt":"2016-06-10T11:07:27","slug":"gravity-falls-on-switzerland","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/commoncents.blogwyrm.com\/?p=417","title":{"rendered":"Gravity Falls on Switzerland"},"content":{"rendered":"

Switzerland just flirted with their own version of the social experiment that has already worked oh so swimmingly for the company Gravity Falls<\/a>:\u00a0 guaranteed outcome regardless of the performance.\u00a0 Flirted but not consummated.\u00a0 Swiss voters overwhelmingly rejected a proposal to grant each citizen the security of certain level of income regardless of personal station or level of responsibility or work ethic or any of those things that society wishes to incentivize with profit.<\/p>\n

So, does this mean that Switzerland is not the social democracy that much of the rest of Europe is?\u00a0\u00a0 Well, that is not a safe conclusion to make.\u00a0 While there seems to be a germ of common, economic sense in the average Swiss, the fact that the proposal made it up for a national referendum is worrisome.\u00a0 So too are some of the explanations for why the measure was defeated by a 3-to-1 margin.<\/p>\n

Before digging into the analysis, some words are in order to describe what that proposal actually proposed.<\/p>\n

According to the BBC<\/a>, the central notion was that each Swiss citizen would receive a stipend each month from the government in an amount of $2,500 USD for basically, well\u2026, breathing.\u00a0 In addition, for each minor child that is also sucking in air, the caregiver would receive an additional $600 USD.\u00a0 (Please note that the figures cited here are rounded down from their actual values.)<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s take a moment to look at this.\u00a0 A single person would make a gross income of $30,000 for just hanging out.\u00a0 A married couple would make $60,000 for just hanging out with each other.\u00a0 If they start having children then the value goes up.\u00a0 A family of four would then \u2018earn\u2019 $88,000.\u00a0 Not too bad.\u00a0 Certainly it pales in comparison with the approximately $55,200 average net salary<\/a> for a working individual (or $110,400 for a family of four) under the current rules, but then again, the recipient of the proposed windfall would not have to deal with that pesky work thing.<\/p>\n

For those wondering if a fairer comparison would use the average gross salary, realize that about 1\/3 of gross income goes to the government, whereas this \u2018free money\u2019 would also be free of taxes since it is provided by the government, who, no doubt, already took its cut \u2013 or so its supporters likely think.\u00a0 \u00a0The picture further tilts towards disengagement from honest work when one realizes that average incomes are always skewed towards the high end by the few very larger earners (bankers, CEOs, and entertainers).<\/p>\n

Thankfully, the Swiss recognize that such a method is a fast way to disengage people from working.\u00a0 However, it is fun to think about what would have happened if the measure had passed.<\/p>\n

The first day after passage would find not much had changed.\u00a0 The same number of Swiss would go to work as had gone the day before.\u00a0 This would last until the first checks were cut, shipped, and cashed.\u00a0 Then suddenly there would be more money chasing the same number of goods.\u00a0 So, step one is inflation.<\/p>\n

Now everyone is more miserable, and the hard workers would start looking around for someone to blame.\u00a0 It won\u2019t take long for some of them to act on their resentment and quit \u2013 equity theory at work<\/a>.\u00a0 They would lose their salary, but would have the guaranteed money to fall back on.\u00a0 Now things may briefly get a bit better, as the inventory will not immediately fall, but a lesser amount of money is now chasing the same number of goods.\u00a0 Thus inflation drops.\u00a0 So, step two is a modest recovery.<\/p>\n

But the recovery can\u2019t last for very long.\u00a0 For when the inventory shrinks, the number of goods will as well since there are now fewer people working.\u00a0 So here comes inflation again.\u00a0 Here comes more resentment by those who kept working.\u00a0 And, no doubt, some more workers will drop out.<\/p>\n

\"Miserable<\/a><\/p>\n

And the cycle repeats itself, with the only result being an ever-shrinking GDP and an ever-growing misery.<\/p>\n

This pattern has been seen time-and-time again, starting with the classic story of the near failure of the Plymouth Plantation<\/a>, to the case of Gravity Falls, where a minimum salary prompted some of the best and most valuable employees to up and leave.\u00a0 Other cases include the Soviet Union, Zimbabwe, and like economic situations.\u00a0 When the profit incentive to work is lost, so is the society as a whole.<\/p>\n

What was really interesting were the arguments both for and against the Swiss measure as cited by the BBC.\u00a0 On the pro-loafing side, the proponents claimed that<\/p>\n

since work was increasingly automated, fewer jobs were available for workers.<\/p>\n
\u2013 Supporters of the Unconditional Swiss Salary<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Okay, let\u2019s think about this for a bit.\u00a0 Who maintains the machines?\u00a0 Perhaps other machines, which are, in turn maintained by still other machines.\u00a0 Switzerland must have machines all the way down.\u00a0 Oh, wait!\u00a0 There must be human workers who maintain the machines.\u00a0 And what about improvements?\u00a0 Surely, even the fine country of Switzerland must have problems.\u00a0 Perhaps the supporters of this idea might put their energies into curing cancer, or helping the poor, or\u2026 well, you get the picture.<\/p>\n

Now, the fact that there are slackers who want a free lunch presents no surprise.\u00a0 Every society has them.\u00a0 The fact that they were able to mount enough effort to get this measure up to a referendum is mildly unexpected but, given Swiss law, still not shocking.\u00a0 The real shock came in the governmental response.<\/p>\n

The BBC quotes one Luzi Stamm, a supposed right-wing member of parliament, as opposing the proposal by stating<\/p>\n

Theoretically, if Switzerland were an island, the answer is yes. But with open borders, it's a total impossibility, especially for Switzerland, with a high living standard.<\/p>\n

If you would offer every individual a Swiss amount of money, you would have billions of people who would try to move into Switzerland.<\/p>\n

\u2013 Luzi Stamm<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Right wing, huh?\u00a0 More like right out to lunch.\u00a0 This quotation is perhaps one of the stupidest things I have ever heard.\u00a0 What does being on an island have to do with it?\u00a0 The Pilgrims were effectively on an island and their communal economics nearly killed them<\/a>.\u00a0 And the Earth is the most ideal definition of an island you can get.\u00a0 Isolated by space, with nobody getting on or off (except by birth and death) the planet has the most perfectly implemented closed borders.\u00a0 So, following Stamm\u2019s logic, we should all print ourselves money and, theoretically, it will all work out.<\/p>\n

Thank goodness there are still hard working people in Switzerland with some sense in their head.\u00a0 No sooner had this measure\u2019s defeat become news than we started hearing rumors that Washington D.C. was starting to explore the possibility of the same kind of handout.\u00a0 Whether the people of the nation\u2019s capital have sense remains to be seen.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Switzerland just flirted with their own version of the social experiment that has already worked oh so swimmingly for the company Gravity Falls:\u00a0 guaranteed outcome regardless of the performance.\u00a0 Flirted... Read more ><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-417","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/commoncents.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/417","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/commoncents.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/commoncents.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commoncents.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commoncents.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=417"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/commoncents.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/417\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":428,"href":"https:\/\/commoncents.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/417\/revisions\/428"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/commoncents.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=417"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commoncents.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=417"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commoncents.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=417"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}