But in general, people want to do cool things, even boring or simple things, as long as they feel they are contributing to something good.
Do people who retire contribute to society more or less than they did before retirement? Pensioners are the closest thing we have to a long-term UBI today.
It’s an unfair comparison. A pensioner is someone that by definition already contributed the most they could to the economy. As experience has it, plenty of pensioners continue to work even after retirement.
We have seen experiments with ubi and they almost unanimously conclude that it’s a net positive, people tend to find work that both they actually want to work in and have the most skill on. It improves work conditions overall as well. Instead of settling for worse conditions or unfit positions.
Happy people are more efficient and productive. That’s a no brainer.
A pensioner is someone that by definition already contributed the most they could to the economy
Not really. There are plenty of healthy early retirees. Do they on average contribute more or less than before they retired?
As experience has it, plenty of pensioners continue to work even after retirement.
What percentage? How does that compare to what they did before?
Any early retiree is most likely a billionaire, so by definition they weren’t even contributing that much to begin with, probably just hoarding generational riches.
Retired people can contribute time to their families, the community, and other non-capitalist endeavors. So could one spouse in a single income family, or those that don’t need to work for income, but to generate profit every adult is now expected to work and never retire.
Retired people can contribute time to their families, the community, and other non-capitalist endeavors.
Of course, and that’s great. But who pays for the UBI? Rich people? And what do we do when we have taken everything from them, or they move overseas?
They will get UBI too so worst case they hit the same floor as everyone else.
But they will never reach that point because taxing the rich will never make them anything other than the richest of the population. They will still be rich, just with a smaller gap between them and everyone else.
As a side note, why are you worried more about the rich than the poor?