Union Perspectives

What does a universal basic income (UBI) and a board game have in common? Free money. When the game Monopoly was originally invented as The Landlord’s Game back in the early 1900s by Elizabeth Magie, it was created as a teaching tool to help people understand the consequences of David Ricardo’s Law of Economic Rent and Henry George’s concept of economic privilege and land value taxation. Hence, a player buys a piece of property and then puts a railroad on it, if another player lands on that property they have to pay a price to the land’s owner. Magie’s intent in creating the game was to teach and help people understand that renting property enriches the owner while impoverishing the tenant into bankruptcy, especially those not under rent control. The concept of this game has been used as a teaching tool internationally, as well. It’s the game’s “Pass Go Collect $200” that brings it around to the UBI concept. Trump has ensured the rich receive a UBI of sorts by cutting their taxes...

Billionaires want to save the capitalism. There are and have been many people with ideas on how to fix the capitalist system so that it will work for everyone. Thomas Piketty (who wrote Capital), Bill Gates, (who created Microsoft) Thomas Paine (who wrote Common Sense Rights of Man), and Peter Barnes (who wrote With Liberty and Dividends For All). There is no silver bullet to fix capitalism. It will take many measures, such as bringing back the cash corporation and the very rich have stashed in offshore accounts. This money needs to be brought and put back into the flow of capitalism. The estate tax needs to be reinstated; the practice of inheriting extreme wealth from one generation to the next in families just allows the family’s power to grow with each generation. There is also the idea of charging payment for the use of our Commons, which some people and large corporations use freely, such as the air, water, minerals, courts, laws, protection of patents, our armed forces protect...

The two things which will destroy our world as we know it, are inequality and climate change. The Freedom of Enterprise Act (FEA) being proposed by the Republicans will be against anything that alleviates climate change and inequality. In fact, EEA exempts anyone worth a billion dollars from paying taxes and from having to obey all laws, exempts for now homicide and assault. OxFam, an international charitable organization focused on eliminating global poverty, says there are now 2,043 billionaires in the world and their fortunes grew by $762 billion in 2017 while the poorest of humanity saw no increase in their wealth. Bill Gates, Jeff Bezos and Warren Buffett have $250 billion more than 160 million Americans. If this trend continues driving up the bargaining power of those at the top while driving down the bargaining power of those at the bottom, this will trap people in poverty and further fracture our society. OxFam said the massive inequalities are being driven by factors t...