We need to discuss why Zack Polanski and Elon Musk are both selling essentially the same dangerously utopian dream. Call these fantasies what you like: universal basic income (UBI), hyperabundance, MMT (unlimited borrowing), work as merely an option – they all boil down to the same idea, that there’s a magic wand available that will wish all our problems away.
For those of you not familiar with UBI I suggest a visit to UBI.org where you can watch interesting videos from Barack Obama, Yanis Varoufakis John McDonnell, Ed Miliband and many others talking about its merits. The site even links to an Economist article by Nicola Sturgeon encouraging us all to take a second look at UBI. And, for those of you not familiar with Elon Musk’s claim that robots and AI will render human work an option, this link is just one of many that will take you to where he makes out the case.
