Comingle is an interesting idea that would act as a pseudo emergency fund to provide a stable week to week income for their users. It could act to stabilize your income if you have an irregular income or as an backup plan or insurance for when you lose a job or income source. It works by distributing the average of all their members contributions weekly to each user. Once the service starts, the end result will be a net gain for those with low income and a payment to provide a guaranteed monthly income for higher earners.
- For those with low income, any amount of extra money can aid in the pursuit of opportunity and keep things from turning desperate.
- For freelancers and gig-workers, reliable weekly income can ease the complications of sporadic cash-flow.
- For those with more income, Comingle lets you help others, sends you a little extra cash on slow weeks, and provides a safety-net if things take a turn for the worse.
Disclaimer: I am not affiliated with them. I just got this in an email newsletter and was intrigued.
soo… not UBI
Seems to be unemployment insurance with extra steps and not backed by the government. Or a ponzi scheme.
Not really either, its a crowdfunded income equalizer. It is not based upon infinite growth so its not a ponzi scheme.
Edit:On second thought, it can act as unemployment insurance not backed by the government, but I would contend that is a good thing since the government programs often have an excessive amount of strings attached.
Not sure why people are downvoting me. I guess I offended someone. Not sure how. ** shrugs **
I downvoted you because it’s disingenuous to present “as guaranteed as a company can be” with “guaranteed”
There’s no outside mechanism to protect the customers from this company. That’s not guaranteed.
Of course there is an outside mechanism, it is
Nothing is fully guaranteed. Society as we know it could easily collapse in our lifetime. Ultimately it will likely be a less conditional income than a job where you can be fired at any time for literally no reason. I see a guarantee as a promise essentially. It is only as trustworthy as the party guarantying it.
So you individually sue them after they fail to make good on their claims.
You should be able to see why this puts their customers in a compromising position
Yes or as I stated earlier and is far more common, you can stop letting them have access to your financial account.
No, I really can’t see why that is a comprising position. This is how every business in the US operates. If a company defrauds you have to take it up with the company, (not likely to work if they are acting in bad faith), your financial instution or in a court individually or via a class action. How does this put you in any more of a compromising position than if you your internet stops working and continues to bill you for it?
The worst that could happen is you have to get your bank or credit card to stop paying them because they don’t live up to their end of the deal. While there is risk involved with giving companies access to withdraw from your bank account, there are also safeguards built into the system that can be used. All banks and credit card companies have ways to mitigate fraudulent billing. That is in addition to the option you always have of taking them to court.
The worst thing that can happen is paying into this, and not receiving a pay out when you get fired or get injured. Instead of having that money is a savings account, which would be the alternative that a service is not needed for.
This is strictly worse than having a savings account you contribute to.
Your correct, technically it is a guaranteed basic income. The newsletter I heard about it from was one that promotes UBI so I got mixed up.
Technically it’s not. If they go bankrupt somehow or defraud their customer base, there’s very little recourse from the users.
It is as guaranteed as a company can provide. IF they operate honestly, I see no reason they would go bankrupt. I would assume the users would have recourse via small claims court or possibly other courts if they fail to provide what they agree to provide.