We've all heard those problems before.
Automation is taking over jobs, the gap between the rich and the poor is growing, and the middle class in the United States is shrinking...
...at least that's what it seems so far.
On the other hand, since the late 2010's, I have noticed two powerful emerging forces that could counteract the negative effects caused by wealth inequality, automation, and poverty: one of them is known as blockchain and the other as universal basic income.
Blockchain
From what I've observed, blockchain takes advantage of the concept of currency trust- basically meaning that no single object has value unless other people give it value. We have persisted for many years through bartering, negotiation, and reciprocation (ex. I'll give you my cow if you maintain my garden), so when these ideals were measured in the form of numbers and mathematics, this established the basis for economics, currency, supply, and demand.
The creation of cryptocurrencies and the economic systems that dictate their circulation, supply, and scarcity formed the basis of what we now know as blockchain. The technologies behind blockchain are what helps independent creators at Steemit or DTube earn cash more fairly without the high thresholds and low payouts of ad monetization.
Blockchain is also what helps sites like Mannabase distribute their cryptocurrency in regular payouts to universal basic income recipients who signed up for their cause. If you haven't signed up for it yet, I highly recommend you do so as they have been sending me regular handouts of manna each week with no strings attached! If you want to trade your manna for US dollars, you can do so at any time on a special website known as SouthXchange.
Now that we've covered the basics of blockchain's capabilities, we can talk about its relationship with Universal Basic Income and how it could change the way the world conducts business in the future.
Universal Basic Income
Universal basic income is an idea that is quickly growing in popularity thanks to fears over automation's potential for eliminating jobs. Automation has been getting better and better at performing complex tasks than we give them credit for and self-driving trucks and cars are already stirring panic and controversy amongst the trucker community.
Automation has the potential to exacerbate the problems caused by wealth inequality. While we have Jeff Bezos approaching $120 billion dollars in net worth, the total number of undernourished individuals increased from 777 million people in 2015 to 815 million people in 2016 (Our World in Stats). To put this in perspective, one man gained wealth equivalent to the entire net worth of Elon Musk while a group of people equivalent to the population of California became undernourished in that same year.
It's clear that wealth inequality is starting to become a major problem and the statistics show that it is getting worse, not better. We need a system put in place that will prevent people from dying because their basic needs weren't met while the rich and powerful splurge in Lamborghinis and exorbitant yachts. Universal basic income through federal legislation could bridge that divide through a tax-based redistribution from the rich to the poor, but the wealthy are already easily avoiding this through loopholes and offshore accounts.
This is where a UBI cyrptocurrency infrastructure like Mannabase can come in to save the day. It's featured testimonials have come from people in developing economies, and they have seen that it works and that the idea is feasible. You can sign up to support their cause, and you get a small handout each week for the rest of the program. As mentioned prior, you can exchange the manna for US dollars and there is no risk to sign up. It's literally free money!
But on a deeper level, it shows that new technologies like blockchain and cryptocurrency can create a more fair and equitable society for every present and future person on this planet. Right now, we are all members of the Steem platform, so we are the early adopters of a disruptive blockchain infrastructure. I know it may not seem like one account could do much, but if none of us signed up for this platform after hearing about it, the entirety of Steem itself would collapse into oblivion, abandoned and forgotten.
Just like investing a few dollars in a stock could land you a thousand dollars later on, investing in a UBI idea like Mannabase could enable progressive ideas and technologies like this to soar to new heights. Even if manna isn't the magical cryptocurrency that could implement a universal basic income around the world, it's technology and methodology can be used by others to create their own platforms that can sustain this idea.
We can't let the injustice of extreme income inequality percolate throughout our lives. Blockchain gives voices back to the people, and UBI gives wealth back to the people. Mannabase could be the fabled cryptocurrency that can bridge these two influential concepts to establish a global prosperity never before seen in all of human history.