I rather think the RBE will fail if one of it's main goals is to eliminate 'poverty' because the natural currency that would arise, without people even realizing it at first, would be 'reputation' & 'popularity'.
People would be sucking up to each other left right and center to 'put a good word in for me' with someone else.. to be part of the 'in' group etc.
That's how you'd get your massage. "hey.. get me invited to that party all the cool folk are going to.... I'll give you a nice back rub!"
There would still be social lepers - and they would be the new poor, but this time there isn't some other currency they can use to alleviate the suffering their social ineptitude might cause them.
I agree with this. Reputation and popularity are not really going anywhere even in a RBE. I have a hard time imagining a human society where these attributes would be eliminated. But what would change is what kind of people are admired. That is for sure. These days people seem to admire people who are famous, with no regard to how this person has actually contributed to the society. I see being a scientist or an engineer a much more popular position simply because people would see them as major contributors.
In my opinion the first goal for a RBE is to achieve sustainability both ecologically and socially. This does not mean a perfect society, that will never be possible. But if we aim for this I'm fairly certain the result will be closer than if we're not even trying. Even the Star Trek RBE is less utopian than to think that our current society will be able to continue without a major civilizational collapse. This is inevitable unless we make big changes.