An early version of a book, Alaska's Permanent Fund Dividend: Examining its Suitability as a Model, is now available for free download on my personal website. A summary, from the first chapter of the book (2012), is reprinted below. If you want to cite or quote it,...
Debate over Alaska’s Permanent Fund Dividend
Alaska’s House of Representatives has passed a bill which sets the state’s annual PFD (Permanent Fund Dividend) at approximately $1,600 per person next year, an amount which has been confirmed after a hard-fought legislative battle over the size of the payment. The...
Alaska’s Permanent Fund Dividend has no overall effect on employment
Alaska’s provision of regular, unconditional income to its inhabitants has had no overall effect on employment, a recent study has found. The Permanent Fund Dividend (PFD), provided by the Alaskan government to all citizens who apply for it, currently stands at...
ALASKA, US: Survey shows support for Permanent Fund Dividend amid continued legal controversy
The Economy Security Project has published the results of a new survey of Alaskans’ attitudes towards the state’s Permanent Fund Dividend.
Alaska’s Permanent Fund Dividend: The world watches anxiously
Alaska’s Permanent Fund, Dividend and the central idea that minerals are a shared inheritance have inspired numerous social and political movements across the globe.
ALASKA, US: Amount of 2016 Permanent Fund Dividend to be $1022
The amount of this year’s Alaska Permanent Fund Dividend was announced by the Governor on Friday, September 23: every Alaskan will receive $1,022, less than half the amount of last year’s dividend.
ALASKA, US: Senator files suit against Governor’s veto of half of Permanent Fund Dividend
On September 16, Alaska senator Bill Wielechowski filed a lawsuit contesting Governor Bill Walker’s veto of half of the funding for the Permanent Fund Dividend. It is unlikely to be resolved before payouts begin on October 6.
ALASKA: Study Links Permanent Fund Dividend with Increased Birth Weight
New research from economists at Hallym University in Chuncheon and Korea University in Seoul found that Alaska’s Permanent Fund Dividend has helped increase birth weights for Alaska newborns. According to the study, from 1978 to 1984, the dividend cash transfer...
Karl Widerquist and Michael W. Howard (eds), Exporting the Alaska Model: Adapting the Permanent Fund Dividend for reform around the world
In 1797 Thomas Paine suggested that, because in principle the land belongs to everyone equally, those who occupy it should pay a ground rent to the whole community. We can generalise the profits that landowners reap from the occupation of land into the concept of ‘economic rent’: if someone uses natural resources that belongs to all of us in order to make money, then any income greater than the cost of production is ‘economic rent’. Paine would have made the point that the economic rent belongs to all of us.
L’Hirondelle, C.A., Frederik Schenk, and Eric Manneschmidt, “Why Alaska Permanent Fund Dividend is a bad idea”
Written as response to the article, “Six Lessons from the Alaska Model,” by Karl Widerquist, C.A. L’Hirondelle, Frederik Schenk, and Eric Manneschmidt argue that resource dividends are not a good source of funding for a basic income because, “The Alaska Permanent Fund...
Karl Widerquist and Michael Howard, Alaska’s Permanent Fund Dividend: Examining its suitability as a model
Karl Widerquist and Michael Howard, Alaska’s Permanent Fund Dividend: Examining its suitability as a model, Palgrave Macmillan, 2012, xvii + 267 pp, hbk, 0 230 11207 0, £62.50 In 1967 oil was found in the relatively new state of Alaska; in 1976 a constitutional...
Event: How the Alaska Permanent Fund Dividend Could Work in Iraq and Other Countries: A Conversation with Todd Moss
Monday, June 3, 2013 - 3:00pm to 5:00pm As part of the University of Alaska Anchorage's Institute of Social and Economic Research series of lunchtime talks, “Understanding Alaska,” Todd Moss discussed whether something like Alaska’s Basic Income, the Permanent Fund...
HOWARD, Michael, June 21, 2011: “Alaska’s Permanent Fund Dividend: A policy ripe for export”
Michael Howard is a professor of philosophy at the University of Maine and co-editor with Karl Widerquist of the forthcoming book “Exporting the Alaska Model: How the Permanent Fund Dividend Can be Adapted as a Reform Model for the World” (Palgrave MacMillan).
New Article on UBI in Scientific American by Michael Howard
Michael W. Howard is professor emeritus of philosophy at the University of Maine, past president of the U.S. Basic Income Guarantee Network, past co-editor of Basic Income Studies, and co-editor, with Karl Widerquist, of two books on Alaska's Permanent Fund...
Alaska Permanent Fund Defenders campaign to save the Dividend
The Alaska Permanent Fund was started in 1982 to make sure Alaskans directly benefit from its resources in the wake of its oil boom in the 1970s. Part of the proceeds from investments of the principle, which is held in trust for the state and invested by an...
China: An Undergraduate Academic Seminar Held in CUPL
The news is written by Chen Xixi and modified by Furui cheng The Screenshot of Our WeChat Group In the ‘International Basic Income Week’, we three sophomores in CUPL (China University of Political Science and Law) organized an online feature academic report about...
Answers to Four Essential Questions About the Alaska Dividend for People Interested in Basic Income
I was recently asked four questions about Alaska’s Permanent Fund Dividend, and I think the answers provide a pretty good overview of what people who are interested in UBI need to know about the fund. 1. When was the Alaska policy passed? The enabling legislation was...
Congress papers
BIEN 2022, Brisbane Maria Ozanira da Silva e SilvaTHE “BOLSA FAMÍLIA” PROGRAM AND THE “AUXÍLIO BRASIL” PROGRAM: advances and setbacks in the construction of a Basic Income in BrazilFernando FreitasCash transfer with social currency in Brazilian Cities: poverty...
Exporting the Alaska Model: An early version now available for free download
An early version of the book, Exporting the Alaska Model, is available for download for the first time. This is possible because most academic publishers allow authors and editors to post early versions of their works on their person websites. A preview, written in...
The Alaska Permanent Fund on an interactive news-documentary format
A new kind of news-documentary interactive presentation has been delivered by Frame, a digital newsmagazine that uses human-centered stories to illuminate key topics in the news. Its latest issue features the Alaska Permanent Fund, named "The Alaska Model". The piece...