Essay Questions

What is Andrew Yang's keystone policy proposal?

Andrew Yang's keystone proposal is his so-called "Freedom Dividend," which is a strategic rebranding of the term UBI, or Universal Basic Income. Under Yang's plan, every American would receive $1,000 per month. Yang would pay for this in two ways: 1) "a 10% Value Added Tax (VAT) on all goods and services" and 2) by replacing "the vast majority of existing welfare programs" with his "Freedom Dividend."

Why does Yang believe there will be a "Great Displacement" of jobs in the United States in the next few decades?

With the advent of A.I. and other autonomous technologies, Yang believes that the need for human labor will be significantly diminished. Yang also hypothesizes that "normal people" will become redundant, which he says will lead to violent protests.

What is "human-centric capitalism?"

Yang describes "human-centric capitalism" quite simply: "goals and measurements like childhood success rate, mental health, levels of engagement with work, [and] freedom from substance abuse" will measure the success of the economy. He also argues that in this stage of capitalism, GDP will be an incredibly inaccurate measurement because most work will be performed by robots. In other words, the way we look at the economy -- and the economy itself -- will have to be radically transformed to take into account labor from robots.