What I heavily disagree about is when you said that humans will aways want infinitely more.
People actually dont really want infinitely more, because to want infinitely more is to never be satisfied with your own life and strive for something as a way to "fix your existence", even though existence has never been a mistake.
The reason why this ends up happening is that our system ends up forcing people to live lives they dont really wanna have, desire things they dont really need and reward beuaviors which are actually bad for them. This happens when the whole system centralizes our ego over our own souls.
I agree that PLE is much better than It is currently, but it is definitely not gonna be an utopia.
A true utopia would be a system which puts meaning and purpose as central to existence itself, not as mere sympthoms. A spiritual civilization where the whole point is the cultivation of the spirit, connection to the Universe and human flourishing, not really about mindless consuming.
We will get there eventually, but yeah, PLE is gonna be crucial for us to then later get there.
I come at the Protestant work ethic from another direction. I think it comes down to a misunderstanding. Work and Toil are two different things, even from a biblical perspective. Toil is labor related to futility. Work is related to purpose. If that realignment can take place in people's thinking on it, then I see no reason why PLE can't coexist with, or make stronger, the Protestant work ethic. From the Christian perspective, AI and PLE could free humans from toil such that we can work with the purpose humans were created for.
Your analysis of the 'Great Decoupling' is surgically accurate, but it leads to an unavoidable conclusion: we are beyond the point of incremental adjustments. The 'Customer Crisis' you describe is the primary threat to market stability, and there is only one viable, turnkey solution: the Declaration of Universal Dignity and Economic Reciprocity.
This isn't a theoretical pivot; it is a master blueprint that solves the 'How' and 'Why' of post-labor survival through two critical vectors:
Strategic AI Utilization: Rather than viewing automation as a threat to be managed, the Declaration utilizes AI to bridge critical labor gaps in essential services, decoupling human survival from traditional labor while maintaining the flow of goods and services.
The Abolition of Economic Fragility: By implementing the 13 Pillars of Funding, the Declaration ends homelessness and hunger—not as charity, but as a mandatory Market Maintenance protocol. If the 60-80% of household income derived from wages is vanishing, the Declaration replaces it with a system of economic reciprocity that ensures every citizen remains a participating 'customer' in the new capital-dominant economy.
The question is no longer whether the system is failing—it is. The question is whether we are prepared to implement the only framework structurally sound enough to prevent a deflationary death spiral. This Declaration is the restoration of dignity through the strategic mastery of technology.
Great article! I would like to know your opinion about a natural income rate for UBI. I saw that there is a group from Boston proposing this, creating a committee to have UBI indexed to productivity and inflation volatility, like with have a Central Bank (FED) to decide on interest rate.
In a way, this seems to go against theories from MMT proponents, who suggest setting interest rates to zero and implementing a government-backed job guarantee.
How will we realistically usher this new system? Won't be frictionless to say the least. Won't this abandonment of private property and transfer to co-ownership simply result in "winner takes it all" scenario? Winner being US and A. Not much different from now I guess
When he says "ownership", I am pretty sure he means it in the same way as someone who owns stock in a company partly owns the company.
I would actually worry about the opposite. If the US does decide to do this, then large companies might decide it is more profitable to run their fully automated business from a country that doesn't tax automation or require companies to pay a certain percentage of their profit as dividends. I worry that if other countries aren't on board with PLE, that we will just end up like states that try to increase taxes on the wealthy. The wealthy flee.
It also raising questions about the ownership economy and what happens when the majority of a company is owned by people from other countries?
What I heavily disagree about is when you said that humans will aways want infinitely more.
People actually dont really want infinitely more, because to want infinitely more is to never be satisfied with your own life and strive for something as a way to "fix your existence", even though existence has never been a mistake.
The reason why this ends up happening is that our system ends up forcing people to live lives they dont really wanna have, desire things they dont really need and reward beuaviors which are actually bad for them. This happens when the whole system centralizes our ego over our own souls.
I agree that PLE is much better than It is currently, but it is definitely not gonna be an utopia.
A true utopia would be a system which puts meaning and purpose as central to existence itself, not as mere sympthoms. A spiritual civilization where the whole point is the cultivation of the spirit, connection to the Universe and human flourishing, not really about mindless consuming.
We will get there eventually, but yeah, PLE is gonna be crucial for us to then later get there.
I come at the Protestant work ethic from another direction. I think it comes down to a misunderstanding. Work and Toil are two different things, even from a biblical perspective. Toil is labor related to futility. Work is related to purpose. If that realignment can take place in people's thinking on it, then I see no reason why PLE can't coexist with, or make stronger, the Protestant work ethic. From the Christian perspective, AI and PLE could free humans from toil such that we can work with the purpose humans were created for.
https://darkdeal.substack.com/p/can-ai-bring-about-a-renewed-eden?utm_campaign=post-expanded-share&utm_medium=web
Your analysis of the 'Great Decoupling' is surgically accurate, but it leads to an unavoidable conclusion: we are beyond the point of incremental adjustments. The 'Customer Crisis' you describe is the primary threat to market stability, and there is only one viable, turnkey solution: the Declaration of Universal Dignity and Economic Reciprocity.
This isn't a theoretical pivot; it is a master blueprint that solves the 'How' and 'Why' of post-labor survival through two critical vectors:
Strategic AI Utilization: Rather than viewing automation as a threat to be managed, the Declaration utilizes AI to bridge critical labor gaps in essential services, decoupling human survival from traditional labor while maintaining the flow of goods and services.
The Abolition of Economic Fragility: By implementing the 13 Pillars of Funding, the Declaration ends homelessness and hunger—not as charity, but as a mandatory Market Maintenance protocol. If the 60-80% of household income derived from wages is vanishing, the Declaration replaces it with a system of economic reciprocity that ensures every citizen remains a participating 'customer' in the new capital-dominant economy.
The question is no longer whether the system is failing—it is. The question is whether we are prepared to implement the only framework structurally sound enough to prevent a deflationary death spiral. This Declaration is the restoration of dignity through the strategic mastery of technology.
Great article! I would like to know your opinion about a natural income rate for UBI. I saw that there is a group from Boston proposing this, creating a committee to have UBI indexed to productivity and inflation volatility, like with have a Central Bank (FED) to decide on interest rate.
In a way, this seems to go against theories from MMT proponents, who suggest setting interest rates to zero and implementing a government-backed job guarantee.
UBI should probably be calibrated to inflation
Brilliant article 🫶🏽
How will we realistically usher this new system? Won't be frictionless to say the least. Won't this abandonment of private property and transfer to co-ownership simply result in "winner takes it all" scenario? Winner being US and A. Not much different from now I guess
When he says "ownership", I am pretty sure he means it in the same way as someone who owns stock in a company partly owns the company.
I would actually worry about the opposite. If the US does decide to do this, then large companies might decide it is more profitable to run their fully automated business from a country that doesn't tax automation or require companies to pay a certain percentage of their profit as dividends. I worry that if other countries aren't on board with PLE, that we will just end up like states that try to increase taxes on the wealthy. The wealthy flee.
It also raising questions about the ownership economy and what happens when the majority of a company is owned by people from other countries?
We're not abandoning private property. That's literally the opposite of what this article says.