Behind the Wall Street Protest

>>One thing that happens is that the shitty jobs don't get done.<<

That depends on how the money is arranged. One might, for instance, post a list of things that need doing and/or have people list their skills, so that people are doing something in exchange for the benefits they receive. Another approach would be to look at the crucial things people are doing but not getting paid for -- such as caring for children or elders, or volunteering in a fire department -- and pay them for the hard work they're already doing rather than society continuing to mooch off them.

>>As one person put it to me, "everyone should get to live like Paris Hilton".<<

That is neither possible nor desirable. Everyone needs to have healthy food, shelter, clothing, health care, physical and psychological safety, and something productive to do. While those needs vary somewhat, it's not hard to figure out how much resource is required per person. I believe that the basics should be provided for everyone, and people who want more should have opportunities to work harder in order to obtain it.

The mistake that socialism and communism tend to make is providing benefits without incentives, which tends to make people lazy and indifferent. The mistake that capitalism tends to make is putting a price tag on everything, which tends to make people greedy and selfish. Look at nature. Nature buffers important processes to avoid big spikes and dips. Nature cycles; it doesn't dump things in one place and leave them there. Energy always moves. There's always an exchange. That works. Let's emulate that, because the ideas we've been trying are just not very effective.