BIEN | News
News on the global Basic Income debate
CANADA: Pirate Party of Canada Makes Basic Income a Major Part of their Platform
The Pirate Party of Canada has explicitly made a basic income guarantee one of four key components of their platform. As a national election is upcoming, the party has publicized several of their key issues and has made both a video and an infographic...
UNITED STATES: Hillary Clinton asked about Negative Income Tax and does not answer the question
U.S. presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, in her first Facebook question and answer session on July 20, was asked about her feelings regarding the Negative Income Tax. Her exchange with an editor at the Huffington Post did not directly answer whether she would...
Scott Santens, “Minimum Wages vs. Universal Basic Income”
Basic income advocate Scott Santens has published a piece in the Huffington Post arguing that a UBI is a vastly superior alternative to minimum wages policies, which he says treat only the symptoms rather than the causes of low pay. The intervention in the American...
Judith Tielen, “7 redenen waarom de VVD het ‘experiment basisinkomen’ in Utrecht afkeurt” [7 reasons why VVD rejects the basic income experiment in Utrecht]
A local branch of the powerful Dutch liberal party VVD has issued a strongly worded rejection of the proposed basic income pilot project for the city of Utrecht. The VVD’s Utrecht spokesperson on work and incomes Judith Tielen writes that she is responding to...
Mario Charette, “Un revenue minimum garantit la liberté” (“Basic income secures freedom”)
The francophone Métro newspaper in Canada has run an in-depth article promoting a universal basic income in its careers advice section. The article by job-market and study-choice expert commentator Mario Charette provides a rundown of pro-BIG arguments, including...
INTERNATIONAL: Positive change ambassador Miss Bridget Walsh takes BIG pledge
Musician Miss Bridget Walsh has taken the so-called BIG pledge and is lending her artist’s platform to the promotion of basic income. The New Zealand-born artist who is described as an international “ambassador for positive change” is now actively promoting...
LEEDS, UNITED KINGDOM: “Finding Solidarity Within Precarity–Lessons from the US Welfare Rights Movement Regarding the Role of Universal Basic Income,” presentation IIPPEE Sixth Annual Conference, 9-11 September 2015
The IIPPE’s upcoming Annual Conference at the UK's Leeds University features an in-depth basic income presentation by longstanding anti-poverty activist professor Ann Withorn. For more information and registration please visit the International Initiative for...
GREECE: Government to roll out a Guaranteed Minimum Income scheme
The general wording of the bailout agreement remains vague and the GMI has not yet been approved by parliament.
Wien anders, “12 Punkte für ein anderes Wien” [12 policies for change in Vienna]
A left-leaning alliance is contesting the upcoming elections in the Austrian capital of Vienna with unconditional basic income at the very top of its twelve-point electoral program. The so-called Wien anders coalition – consisting of communists, pirates,...
Scott Santens, “Should the Amount of Basic Income Vary With Cost of Living Differences?”
Scott Santens argues that there are sound economic reasons for introducing a basic income at exactly the same rate throughout the United States rather than taking into account America’s large cost-of-living differences. Santens, a well-established basic income...
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