alt Hacker News>You just seem to live in a fantasy world where people aren't exchanging their labor for money.
Where did you get that? My entire contention centers around a lack of good options for workers seeking to work fewer hours. A logical assumption, then, would be that I want policies which would give said workers more options. Examples include stronger protections for unions, higher minimum wages, etc. Since I saw these as the logical extrapolations from what I'd said originally, I figured your issue was gov interference in the labor market itself, since you said things like
>In a world where workers are exchanging their labor for wages, that's how it's supposed to work.
>(as in, you're paid money for not working more hours)
You took issue with more money for the same hours, did you not? Why wouldn't overtime be an obvious example? The reason I assumed you were just a libertarian or something was because it doesn't seem like there's an obvious logical juncture to draw a line at. If you're fine with society altering the behavior of the labor market to achieve certain desirable results, then why would this be any different fundamentally?
I think you're confused. I'm not making any moral judgements or prescriptions here. If you want to change society such that we're not working in exchange for money, then go ahead. Overtime is an example of a policy which limits that relationship.
However, while we live in the world where we're exchanging labor for money, it's not as simple as what you originally wrote: "I think it’s just the result of disproportionate political influence held by the wealthy, who are heavily incentivized to maximize working hours."
You're not considering the choices being made by the people actually doing the work. People work for a significant amount of their life because they're paid to do it. There's no council of wealthy people conspiring to achieve this conclusion: they have work that needs to be done, and they're willing to pay for people to do it.
My thesis was just this: while people are exchanging labor for money, people will work. If you introduce a policy where people are given some UBI regardless of employment, they will still work. They want the money. They will buy more televisions, better food, more vacations. If I'm paid my current salary to work for 5 hours a week, I will start interviewing for more jobs. And yes, inflation may soon render the UBI you've introduced to be not so great.