Reddit reviews The War on Normal People: The Truth About America's Disappearing Jobs and Why Universal Basic Income Is Our Future

It's the expression of a particularly cold, individualistic, often libertarian or anarcho-capitalist ideology. At times, it has been a strong theme in American culture, and it is part of why many Americans are hostile toward welfare and toward anyone who is different or has any kind of disability.

Most human civilizations (and pre-civilized societies, too) would have found this idea incomprehensible. Most cultures raise kids to be part of a web of reciprocal obligations. You owe certain things to other members of your family, tribe, village, whatever, and they owe things to you in return. You can count on their support in times of trouble, and they expect your support when things go badly for them. No man is an island, and all that.

One of the more intriguing things about American history is how the myth of the independent loner developed during the settling of the West, in an environment where settlers were utterly dependent on the support of their neighbors.

"Small town values" may preach self-reliance, but that's to keep people from abusing the strong expectation of neighborly support and mutual aid. In reality, the selfish miser and the freeloading mooch were despised and effectively forced out of society.

America's libertarian strain, with its focus on independence and self-reliance, is strongest in conservative and fundamentalist Christian areas, which is another odd thing, considering how much emphasis there is in the Christian bible on charity and the obligation to care for those less fortunate than you are.

As society has become large and impersonal, government has necessarily taken over the role of helping people out in time of need. And as a rich, mostly Christian nation, we're very uncomfortable with the idea of letting people die of hunger, or exposure, or the lack of basic medical care, so we do provide welfare. But the conservative/libertarian political elements in our society are also strong, so the assistance we do provide to people is made as grudging and unpleasant and generally ineffective as possible.

So, depending on context, "nobody owes you anything" can mean:

• "It's a cold, harsh world, and you will have to earn whatever you need; you can't count on any help from other people, so keep struggling and don't give up."
  
  
• "If you don't work hard and act in a subservient and respectful way to the people around you who have wealth and power, you don't deserve any help."
  
  
• "I (the speaker) am entitled to wealth and power; you are poor and worthless, and are entitled to nothing."
  
  
• "I (the speaker) am rejecting in advance any claim you might think you have to my charity or support if you find yourself in need."
  
  Generally, these messages come from people who are healthy, able, and well off and have extensive webs of support based on their families, schools, and social class. They feel entitled to their own place in the world, and they want to be sure that you understand that you don't have any claim on their time, their sympathy, or their wealth.
  
  If all of this strikes you as wrong, I urge you to read about Andrew Yang's campaign to radically change the way we do welfare and things like disability in the U.S.
  
  That's his website; this is his most recent book:
  
  
• The War on Normal People: The Truth About America's Disappearing Jobs and Why Universal Basic Income Is Our Future
  
  The UBI would guarantee every American a minimum income as a right of citizenship. In this, Yang follows a long line of American political thinkers going back to Thomas Paine, who believed that we DO owe each other at least a bare minimum livelihood.

It’s called “The War on Normal People ”. It’s mentioned earlier in the article.

Here

He specifically states in his book implementing a 10% Value added tax. that's roughly half the level that many European nation have theirs set at. With the size of our economy its estimated over 2 trillion increase in revenue. Added to that virtually all current welfare programs would be removed freeing up 717billion a year and effectively shrinking the government. Thats Not including social security and medicare. Also the money while distributed to all would still be taxed as income so people already making good money would be paying it back. He referenced in his book unless your spending upwards of 120k a year you would see a benefit from the UBI and VAT tax. That means the UBI would benefit 80% of our population. He chose the vat tax because it is an effective way of taxing automation which in the next 10-20 years is going to be a huge problem. BTW This is the book im paraphrasing The War On Normal People

Yes, I did mean dividend thanks for correcting that- it has been a ROUGH week let me tell you haha.

So the 1000 freedom dividend is one of many things being offered by a Yang government the idea of "now shut up about ever wanting anything else" is just misdirected and I would highly encourage you to either read his policies or read his book. That interpretation of the freedom dividend is completely out of left field.

The dividend is an opt-in solution, canceling social programs is not on the agenda and frankly, those benefitting more than 1k a month through these social programs would do good by sticking with these programs.

How is it less effective showing if all we've seen this past decade is the incompetence and vulnerability of our government to make a decision. How can you be so confident that a more polarized government is better for the nation? How is it not clear that allowing people to make financial decisions on their own would ultimately lead to better results as a nation?