Digital Citizenship

Might as well go right to the beginning, huh? I'm talking about a whole new interface of citizenship and it would begin with the birth certificate.

At birth each American child (*) would be issued a birth certificate (name of child, date of birth, gender of child (**), names of parents, names of legal guardians, place of birth, height and weight, and the name of the person that completed the certificate itself). Immediately with this comes a Tax Id # (ugh, currently we call these Social Security numbers but I'd get rid of that), the establishment of an account with the Federal Reserve, automatic registration with e-Verify and the Census Bureau, and an individual dedicated email address with 1TB of storage. Your email address (in tandem with a second private email address) becomes the core of who you are, your interface with everyone you meet for the rest of your life.

Social Security? Well, my impossible dream here is that Congress will create individual retirement accounts (IRA), that are actually capitalized rather than this leaky slush fund of IOU's that Congress has been pissing away for decades called Social Security. Obviously this is probably not possible--there's no actual money there, so unless Congress were to imagine IOU's as actual currency (I suppose this could be possible but probably not very healthy), we're going to be stuck with this scheme of stealing from young workers to pay retirees even though it is embarrassingly crass and inefficient simply because the 'do-gooders' of our society have upheld it as 'helping the poor'--even though that's precisely the opposite of what happens. (smh) Social Security is the worst thing that ever happened to American workers, especially the poorest of them, but good luck finding a politician that would (or even could) truly explain what a waste of capital it is and how incredibly detrimental to the lives of the working poor Social Security has been. Phasing it out can begin once a new system has been constructed.

E-verify? Newborn babies are cited for work status? Yes and they'll stay registered as such until retirement. Labor statistics that are 100% accurate and up to the minute are vital. Data is everything in our world now and our society would be best served by having as much of it at its disposal as possible. Unemployment isn't simply something you register for when you are out of a job, it is something that is tracked from birth to retirement and your relative job status is a means of determining your relative taxation rate (positive or negative). In times of emergency (such as we have now seen), this could be a method of making quick payments/loans/etc to individual citizens. Also, this becomes a mechanism for tracking each person's vaccinations and health status.

Census Bureau? Yeah, this would require a vast expansion of the budget of the current Bureau (though not necessarily its reach), every single day rather than once per decade, but it needs to happen anyway and the Census Bureau is the perfect place for it. Why? Because the Bureau is uniquely focused on the citizenry and nothing else, is insanely dedicated to privacy and has absolutely zero reek of politics (because heretofore it has been so fucking basic as to be un-sexy even to the conniving-est of deep staters). Collecting specific data on each individual citizen would be massive amounts of data entry but the raw general data could then be farmed out to other institutions and corporations for actual analysis. The Census Bureau does one single task as quietly as possible, then disperses the general data--no specifics--to others for practical value. How does it do this? Simply removing names, tax IDs and birthdates (to be replaced by age) in any data disbursement. Massive amounts of demographic data becomes available without impinging on the privacy of a single person. And this data could be disbursed weekly or at least monthly.

The Federal Reserve? The Fed would honor each registration of birth with $40,000 worth of brand new 18-year bonds, that would mature on the newborn's 18th birthday. Four bonds of $10,000 would be in your account: one for education, one for health, one for housing and transportation, the other just for being born. And they could be spent, here's how: when one takes on an educational opportunity, for example, one pays by crediting a portion of their Education bond to that teacher/institution; if the institution charges $150 then $150 of that 18-year bond would then be credited to that institution and they would collect when that bond matures. Wouldn't the interest payments eat that capital away? No. There is no interest, there is simply the principal to be paid at a future date. Why would any institution want to work this way? Because when you have a massive population of people giving a $150 of future earnings at a time, then the institution itself becomes capitalized through this debt obligation and as more institutions take on this form, then an entire market based on the transfer of future bond obligations is born. This capitalizes the debt market for education without punishing each individual student with massive debt obligations. Don't get me wrong: this wouldn't pay for one's entire education but at least the first $10,000 could be accounted for and spent more wisely (and if you're pleased with your level of education, good for you, keep the cash when the bond matures).

Now by the time you turn 18 your entire education bond will likely be used up. Oh well, you got the first $10k for free and by wisely apportioning your share, you maximized its value while doing your part to create and capitalize a whole new market for education. And if you decided to ditch education at an earlier age, then more of that $10k cashes out to you on your 18th birthday. Not necessarily the wisest option....or maybe it is...I dunno, it's up to you.

Giving every citizen $40,000? Seriously? Yeah. Hell, I think it would be cheaper than what we have now! By setting up each citizens with $40,000 in the form of 18-year bonds, the Fed knows to the penny how these funds are traveling through society and it gives each citizen an enormous amount of control over their choices. This favors 1) the bold who master their opportunities and 2) the plodding masses that just keep doing it the right way day after day, because even to them they will eventually accrue a good chunk of change.

Unfortunately, this does not favor those with horrible parents. Would it be possible for parents to squander their children's fortunes? Yes, it would. I'm not opposed to the idea of money-savvy parents investing that $40,000 better than in the form of 18-year bonds, so taking that initial investment from the Fed and increasing it through some other method of investment is a win-win for everybody...when it is successful. But those parents that foolishly waste their children's capital would find themselves in a brand new form of public shaming--possibly even prison--so they better choose wisely or face social ostracism that will be hard to outgrow. Children are still at the mercy of their parents. We can only have faith that parents will be wise enough to make forward-thinking decisions for their children. (And, truth be told: it'll only be the second generation of parents, that is those that were born into this system that would really understand it, so it'll take 30 years for this to really sink in...hmmm, I probably shouldn't have said that...)

Until you're 18, you are still a "Child". After 18 you become an "Adult" ("worker" would be more apt but probably not as politically palatable). That doesn't mean that Children wouldn't be allowed to work, indeed I'd rather see high schools and community colleges, in particular, take on a lot more internships, apprenticeships and job training that would literally involve sending students out into the world instead of languishing in schools. (***) And since their labor would be entirely tax deductible (indeed negative taxation would allow them to accrue credits whenever they get out into the world and start producing), it would allow them to actually start banking savings before they turn 18.

Your Federal Reserve account, too, could be a method for forced savings--reserve requirements extended to individual citizens just as they are for banks and financial institutions--that would give the Fed a blueprint of which people should be required to save money and which would be encouraged to spend more. More people would be making more and saving more and producing more.

The basics of your birth certificate form the basis of your digital citizenship. From here an entire dashboard of interaction can be crafted that can monitor your health, your finances, your vaccinations, your taxes, your job history, your educational accomplishments,your prison record, your registered vehicles, even your social media standing, etc. Where does this dashboard come from? Well you'd see all of it but in fact it would be a series of discrete pieces of info provided by each representative agency. For example, when applying for a passport, the State Department could issue one immediately if your info is up to date and the relative info they would need would be available to them--but nothing else. And the info that you see in your dashboard relating to your passport would come from the State Department, but not your educational accomplishments, that piece of data would come from another agency. The two agencies are contributing to your one single dashboard but they'd be ignorant of each other's contributions. You'd see it all but no single agency (except the overall webmaster) would have access to any more than the piece they have contributed.

In your digital citizenship the information you possess about yourself would be entirely in your control. For example, you might not want to share your health info with a total stranger...unless that total stranger is a paramedic charged with saving your life; you might give that guy a little more access to your data even if he is a total stranger. Or when going into a job interview, you would want to give them complete access (temporarily) to your entire educational history or you may want to share a bit of your financial background to show that you are a responsible citizen...or maybe you wouldn't, the choice is yours.

Or how about a method of verification where the gov't can project that your data is up to date without actually revealing said data. For example, you would be required by law to update your dashboard once a year--that is, check in with the Census Bureau that you are in fact still alive and that your work/tax status (and perhaps an medical questionnaire) and your contact info is up to date. The period of your check in would be the 90 days from the 1st of the month before your birthday month to the end of the month after your birthday month. (Ex: your birthday is August 16, you would have from July 1 to September 30 to check in) This would register you to vote, confirm that your tax schedule is correct, serve as your annual registration of house, auto, boat, etc. and whatever else you need done. It is reasonable for the gov't to expect you to confirm your existence once a year, considering the convenience of citizenship, this is not a high price to pay. But doesn't everyone pay taxes on April 15? Not any more, everyone would pay on rolling basis that's based on your birthday.

So, say you're applying to rent an apartment, the potential landlord can check your dashboard, where he would see nothing of pertinent value--except that the gov't can confirm that you are up to date. The gov't does not reveal your tax ID# but it can confirm that you have one and that is properly active.

Yeah, I know: the civil libertarians have been warning you against this for eons. I get it, I'm creeped out by all of it, too. But this isn't a function of gov't, it is a function of technology. And the technology exists to streamline all of our interactions with the gov't in such a way that the gov't can actually be helpful to us! (Ain't never heard a civil libertarian say that before, have you?)

Our possibilities as workers are too important to leave to a rickety system that exposes us to more harm than good. The danger of this system is identity theft--which already happens. And the danger of that does not come from the gov't (all the 'identity' there is to thieve is info the gov't already has), it comes from our fellow citizens. We need the gov't to have the reach to protect us from each other and to be the guarantor of contracts that is the gov't's mission.

Only when the gov't creates a system that protects our identities while allowing us to have them, can we have true liberty and true connection with our homeland. And gives heaping helpings of analyzable data for the gov't and culture to improve our lives without sacrificing anyone's identity. Will it be expensive? At first but in the long run it'll create efficiencies that will save future generations gajillions of dollars while protecting their Constitutional rights.



(*) This is all about citizenship. Non-citizenship is entirely separate. Non-citizens can be absorbed into this system in other ways, but they would not be receiving all the perks of citizenship because they are citizens of another nation. This is a function of gov't: the Constitution of the United States does not apply to non-citizens. There is a movement afoot to discard terms like 'alien' or 'legal/illegal' in favor of 'citizen' or 'non-citizen'---YES! This is a good move. It puts the language firmly in the legal context rather than the cultural one (which is begging for willful misuse).

(**) Yup I'm already getting hot button on the first step. I believe birth gender of the child should be recorded so as to compile data on potential future births. That is, how many baby-making females exist in the country at any given moment. Data is vital, ladies and gentlemen, for the health and well-being of the Republic itself. Again, though, this information would strictly be generalized and never specified, so as to spot larger trends without implicating any given individual. And in the individual's daily life, he/she would be free to 'identify' as he/she however one likes.

(***) Yeah, I should probably admit up front: I kinda hate schools. I think the problem with education is we keep thinking of it in terms of 'schools', which is a horrible way to think of how people learn. Schools want you to believe that the only learning you do is in schools--which is not merely patently false but the opposite of what any good school should be teaching. I think breaking students and teachers away from each other (I'll return to this) is the next great step in education. Say it with me: Education is about learning, it's not about teaching; education is about learning, it's not about teaching; education is about learning, it's not about teaching; etc. ad infinitum until it finally sinks in. Education is a demand problem, not a supply problem: until you want to be educated, you ain't learning shit. The relative supply of education is as wide as the universe but until you demand it, your wants and needs will just be stars in the sky.