Basic Income for Artists

[tegs07]

9 minutes ago, TimR said:

Normal - what most people do.

 

Not everyone has to buy lunch every day. It's a numbers game. But if everyone is working from home, no one is buying lunch and all the money is going to the big Supermarkets.

 

Fine, if you all want to sit at home, not spending money and isolated from social interaction, do that. But don't complain that people aren't comming to your gigs, because sitting at home on your own is habbit forming. 

The problem with this approach is it’s too broad brush. Plenty of jobs have to be done on site. Office jobs can benefit from some on site presence. HR, IT support, any creative industry. Flexible working makes more sense though. Not everyone needs to be in every day.

 

Many people are realising that if they want career progression then full time work from home is a dead end so are going into work.

 

I guess the city centre has lost out on footfall, but most people I have worked with who don’t bring their own lunch tend to get a meal deal from a Supermarket anyway. The higher earners in city centres might eat out more often, I don’t know. I tried that lifestyle and it wasn’t for me.

 

I don’t know anyone who has been able to WFH who has given up on their social life. People are generally finding that their money buys them less so have cut back in going out though.

 

Edited 5 hours ago by tegs07

[TimR]

1 minute ago, tegs07 said:

The problem with this approach is it’s too broad brush. Plenty of jobs have to be done on site. Office jobs can benefit from some on site presence. HR, IT support, any creative industry. Flexible working makes more sense though. Not everyone needs to be in every day.

 

Many people are realising that if they want career progression then full time work from home is a dead end so are going into work.

 

I guess the city centre has lost out on footfall, but most people I have with who don’t bring their own lunch tend to get a meal deal from a Supermarket anyway. 

 

 

I think we are getting away from my point.

 

Artist Universal Income has been introduced to subsidise artists because attendance has dropped off due to the effects of the pandemic. 

 

A lot of my friends play in London. A lot of people would stay around affer work for a meal, a beer and a gig.

 

Now, if you're working from home, its a trip to London after work into London. Only very keen people are going to do that. 

 

That's not limited to London, that is going on all over the country. 

[tegs07]

8 minutes ago, TimR said:

 

I think we are getting away from my point.

 

Artist Universal Income has been introduced to subsidise artists because attendance has dropped off due to the effects of the pandemic. 

 

A lot of my friends play in London. A lot of people would stay around affer work for a meal, a beer and a gig.

 

Now, if you're working from home, its a trip to London after work into London. Only very keen people are going to do that. 

 

That's not limited to London, that is going on all over the country. 

It’s the wrong conclusion. 2008 and then Covid saw a massive increase in the money supply. Central banks printing like crazy. This stoked massive inflation - particularly in stocks and property. Prices went up hugely. Mortgages went up, rents went up, food went up, transportation costs went up, wages went up slightly. People are not going out because of Covid or working from home.

 

They are not going out because they are skint. All of these schemes, every attempt at raising wages are all going to fail. You can’t fill a collinder with water. No matter how good the intentions or how much water you pour in. 

 

Edited 4 hours ago by tegs07

[Woodinblack]

1 hour ago, tegs07 said:

Indeed. I work from home most days. My days in the office are my least productive as I can’t concentrate over the inane conversations. Ironically my last two jobs were focused around increasing productivity through technology investments and innovation. 

 

Well, yes, when I said I WFH all the time, we actually go in every other tuesday, where we have a couple of meetings, then go down the pub at lunchtime (when we were full time there we never went down the pub), then chat - so it is more a sociable time. It is nominally a work day but we go home earlier and nothing really gets done, even indivual sessions where you need to help someone discuss something don't tend to be as productive as on teams as its generally just too noisy with too much going on.

[Dan Dare]

I agree with both Tim and Tegs. Many people are struggling financially for the reasons Tegs describes, but circumstances - as referred to by Tim - also mean they are less likely to go out in the evening and spend what fun money they do have. It's not either/or.

 

Some kind of guaranteed income for artists would be a nightmare to administer and run. Who qualifies and how? Is it reasonable to spend scarce public resources on things that might not be considered essential, when public services are under the cosh and many people struggle to heat their homes and afford other necessities? And so on.

 

Tim makes a very good point about encouraging/helping people to become less reliant on public funds. We already have in-work benefits for people in low-paid jobs, which are intended to do just that. The trouble is that they mean large amounts of public money go towards subsidising the wage bills of large and very profitable corporations, which pay their staff poorly in the knowledge that there are few well-paid jobs on offer and that the taxpayer will step in and make up the difference.

 

 

Edited 4 hours ago by Dan Dare

[Rosie C]

59 minutes ago, TimR said:

At one time everyone bought lunch in the works canteen and sat around talking instead of sitting working at their desk eating a sandwich. (Which is also now normal behaviour) 

 

Amazingly that was my last job. We had a subsidised works canteen, everyone ate there and it had a really good atmosphere. Sadly I lost that job when covid struck and I doubt many companies still have a canteen.

[BigRedX]

As has been said, who decides who qualifies as an "artist" and who doesn't?

 

IME people who are driven to create will find ways of doing so no matter what their financial circumstances are. That's certainly how I have operated all my life. 

 

Also IME when money is available for "popular" arts you end up with bland mainstream dross. In fact Coldplay. They have done very well for themselves out of the system, but the have hardly changed the face of popular music and the world wouldn't miss them if they and all their recordings disappeared tomorrow.

 

And to get back slightly off-topic, working from home hasn't killed my social life. After a day in front of the computer screen on my own I'm ready to go out 2-3 nights a week to interact with people. The difference is I am no longer forced to interact with witless twats who just happen to have the same employer as me. Instead I rehearse with my band and play gigs where I get to meet other interesting creative people.

Edited 4 hours ago by BigRedX

[tegs07]

8 minutes ago, Dan Dare said:

I agree with both Tim and Tegs. Many people are struggling financially for the reasons Tegs describes, but circumstances - as referred to by Tim - also mean they are less likely to go out in the evening and spend what fun money they do have. It's not either/or.

 

Some kind of guaranteed income for artists would be a nightmare to administer and run. Who qualifies and how? Is it reasonable to spend scarce public resources on things that might not be considered essential, when public services are under the cosh and many people struggle to heat their homes and afford other necessities? And so on.

 

Tim makes a very good point about encouraging/helping people to become less reliant on public funds. We already have in-work benefits for people in low-paid jobs, which are intended to do just that. The trouble is that they mean large amounts of public money go towards subsidising the wage bills of large and very profitable corporations, which pay their staff poorly in the knowledge that there are few well-paid jobs on offer and that the taxpayer will step in and make up the difference.

 

 

I think a culture change is also needed. My kids generation are happy to spend eye watering sums of money to see the bigger artists on their mega tours but have really minimal interest in watching unknown artists. When I was their age (and still) once bands had got bigger than the Brixton Academy (this was my yardstick) I was no longer interested. Not because they had ‘sold out’ or whatever other nonsense but because I prefer smaller venues and some spontaneity. I don’t want to buy an overpriced ticket months in advance.

 

Even now in Bristol it’s the Fleece, Thekla, Strangebrew or Lantern (there are a couple of others but you get the idea).

[Woodinblack]

1 minute ago, Rosie C said:

Amazingly that was my last job. We had a subsidised works canteen, everyone ate there and it had a really good atmosphere. Sadly I lost that job when covid struck and I doubt many companies still have a canteen.

 

When I was first out of school there was a works canteen, but since that job I have never worked anywhere big enough to have a works canteen. Since 1983 I haven't worked at anywhere with over 20 employees - oh hang on, not true, I worked at westlands but that was mostly from home too, and when we were in contractors didn;t go to the canteen (in fact I am not sure where it was)

[Burns-bass]

1 hour ago, TimR said:

Normal - what most people do.

 

At one time everyone bought lunch in the works canteen and sat around talking instead of sitting working at their desk eating a sandwich. (Which is also now normal behaviour)

 

Not everyone has to buy lunch every day. It's a numbers game. But if everyone is working from home, no one is buying lunch and all the money is going to the big Supermarkets.

 

Fine, if you all want to sit at home, not spending money and isolated from social interaction, do that. But don't complain that people aren't comming to your gigs, because sitting at home on your own is habbit forming. 

 

Nobody has come to any of my gigs since 2005, so I can't blame the current financial malaise for that.

 

My problem isn't a lack of social interaction, it's having too much to do and not enough time. That's a conscious decision on my part to invest in friendships and do voluntary work. 

[TimR]

@BigRedX The Irish governement decided. You applied and if you met certain criteria you were given one of the 2000 trial places. 

 

It worked, or at least it reprotedly has worked.

 

It seems to me to just be a shift in 'benefits' to low paid workers, but it does allow them to be productive and examples given show the artists are generating more revenue for other people than they're recieving themselves.

 

 

Edited 4 hours ago by TimR

[Woodinblack]

2 minutes ago, tegs07 said:

I think a culture change is also needed. My kids generation are happy to spend eye watering sums of money to see the bigger artists on their mega tours but have really minimal interest in watching unknown artists. 

 

Well, when I was young we saw the bigger groups at the Portsmouth Guildhall, but they were very cheap and affordable compared to how much we had, so it was actualy the same price as going to the pub, which obviously we did quite often, because that was cheap. There would often be a band in the pub, or one of the smaller venues. None of those things are that cheap any more.

But then, it was the status of those groups, you see iron maiden /  scorpions / Dio etc, they weren't mega legacy groups at hte time, they were just the normal groups 

[TimR]

In an ideal world mininum wages would be linked to a companies profitability or at least all employees should be guaranteed a bonus based on companies results. 

 

No more giving directors and shareholders a preference on dividends. 

[tegs07]

Just now, TimR said:

The Irish governement decided. You applied and if you met certain criteria you were given one of the 2000 trial places. 

 

It worked, or at least it reprotedly has worked.

 

It seems to me to just be a shift in 'benefits' to low paid workers, but it does allow them to be productive and examples given show the artists are generating more revenue for other people than they're recieving themselves.

 

 

I wonder if it did work. Ireland (and every thing Irish) became really fashionable for a while, largely due to Fontaines DC and a couple of in crowd actors. For a while I was no longer the guy drinking the old man pint. France never seemed to match the UK success in music despite funding. It’s not that I al against this idea. I just think that there are bigger issues to tackle and have lost all faith in big government and central control of funding.

[TimR]

10 minutes ago, tegs07 said:

minimal interest in watching unknown artists.

 

The world is flooded with mediocrity on Social Media. 

 

The bands that know how to use social media get people to their gigs. Sponsored posts targeted at the town you're going to be playing in for a start. 

 

Playing loads of gigs of the same material in your local area because band members don't want to travel is not making the most of your band, and having the same bands play the same venues isn't going to make your venue attractive to an audience looking for fresh bands. 

[tegs07]

53 minutes ago, TimR said:

 

The world is flooded with mediocrity on Social Media. 

 

The bands that know how to use social media get people to their gigs. Sponsored posts targeted at the town you're going to be playing in for a start. 

 

Playing loads of gigs of the same material in your local area because band members don't want to travel is not making the most of your band, and having the same bands play the same venues isn't going to make your venue attractive to an audience looking for fresh bands. 

I can’t comment personally. My generation (and the only time I have been in a band) there were lots of local bands and lots of live music in pubs. People in general had less of an aspirational lifestyle. They went to the pub to watch mates play and occasionally to London.

 

Most guys I know in bands now struggle to get a younger crowd and play to the grey hairs and no hairs. As for social media - mixed success. Clicks don’t equal revenue is the feedback I get. They are not in it to be social media stars. You guys will know more about this than me though.

Edited 3 hours ago by tegs07

[tauzero]

4 hours ago, Woodinblack said:

Agreed - speaking as a full time working from home guy, when I was working from work I took my lunch with me, and work was about 15 minutes, so expenses wise, apart from burning more fossil fuel it wasnt adding anything. Maybe 'normal' depends on the area. and I get more done, isn't that the idea of productivity, rather than everyone going out and buying sandwhiches and making things dirty?

 

Same as you, when I was working in the office I took lunch in with me, and a copy of Private Eye, so I didn't buy anything form a newsagent either. The I was WFH from the start of lockdown until I retired at the end of 2022. It saves companies money because they can get shot of their offices, and saves employees money because they no longer have to pay to commute. So that means more available money to spend in other ways than on petrol, and for companies the possibility of either better pay rises or other investment.

[prowla]

2 hours ago, BigRedX said:

As has been said, who decides who qualifies as an "artist" and who doesn't?

 

IME people who are driven to create will find ways of doing so no matter what their financial circumstances are. That's certainly how I have operated all my life. 

 

Also IME when money is available for "popular" arts you end up with bland mainstream dross. In fact Coldplay. They have done very well for themselves out of the system, but the have hardly changed the face of popular music and the world wouldn't miss them if they and all their recordings disappeared tomorrow.

 

And to get back slightly off-topic, working from home hasn't killed my social life. After a day in front of the computer screen on my own I'm ready to go out 2-3 nights a week to interact with people. The difference is I am no longer forced to interact with witless twats who just happen to have the same employer as me. Instead I rehearse with my band and play gigs where I get to meet other interesting creative people.

 

I WFH; I have no wish to spend 2 hours each way travelling on unreliable public transport to get to an office where I have a cramped desk, small computer screen, and have to wear noise-cancelling headphones to hear myself think.

Socially I do fine; going out, having a chat, doing jams and get-togethers, meeting people, having a walk across the park and stopping for a natter, going to events, etc.

As for bands, I haven't been to see one in ages: the price of seeing a major artist is unrealistic and if it's in London I typically have to leave before the end to get the last train home. In other towns the cost of parking is ridiculous and the operators are sitting there waiting for you to transgress some contrived rule so they can send you a fake "fine" demanding money. In all honesty, I prefer listening to music on my hi-fi at home or watching gigs on my TV rather than on screens at a venue because you're too far from the stage. TBH, I find gigs pretty solitary places anyway.

So I simply don't buy the assertion that WFH is killing social interaction and nor that I am somehow unclean for not wanting to go places to spaff money in some affected spirit of altruism so as to keep the local service industries in business.

Harking back to a time before social media is a forlorn quest.

[TimR]

As @tegs07 will probably explain. Produtivity and a nation's wealth depend on people spending money and paying taxes. 

 

If people stop spending the money they earn (I don't believe loads of people are poor) then they're not paying the taxes.

 

The government will then have to raise income tax...

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ce8g6kdgzelo

 

The banks will be giving the government statistics on savings. 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited 27 minutes ago by TimR

[tegs07]

22 minutes ago, TimR said:

As @tegs07 will probably explain. Produtivity and a nation's wealth depend on people spending money and paying taxes. 

 

If people stop spending the money they earn (I don't believe loads of people are poor) then they're not paying the taxes.

 

The government will then have to raise income tax...

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ce8g6kdgzelo

 

 

 

 

 

Government keeps raising taxes Tim and you are correct people need to spend and government needs to raise funds to run the country. I also agree that we are not all poor but it really is a K shaped economy. Some people are doing fantastic. Some are really feeling the pinch and the vice is squeezing every last drop out of the low hanging fruit. This is the USA but we are the same:

 

Now any rational person (this is not party politics) would look at this and think feck me the public are playing their part. Corporations are paying a tiny fraction and the interest rate on the deficit we have to borrow is enormous. Let’s try and balance the books, boost productivity, get people out spending, learning and becoming more productive, healthier and happier.

 

Nope. Instead they cut social spending, tax individuals more rack up more debt, print more money to cover the deficit, watch the rich buy more houses, cars, stocks, gold etc and the poor get poorer as inflation rises and then rinse and repeat.

 

I know I am a stuck record but honestly fcuk the lot of them. Particularly central bankers. They are either idiots or are genuinely sick in the head.

Edited 17 minutes ago by tegs07