by Yannick Vanderborght | May 19, 2011 | News
The latest BIEN NewsFlash was published in November 2010 (Flash 63). The present NewsFlash (64) is unusually late, but it includes some very good news for those committed to or interested in basic income: the launch of a new website entirely devoted to basic income news.
Basic Income News (https://binews.org/) is the online incarnation of the BIEN NewsFlash and affiliated publications, such as the USBIG Newsletter. The BIEN NewsFlash and its predecessor, the BIEN Newsletter, have been in publication since 1988. The USBIG Newsletter has been going since the year 2000. It is the creation of the U.S. Basic Income Guarantee Network (the USBIG Network), BIEN’s affiliate in the United States (https://www.usbig.net).
Basic Income News began in the spring of 2011, when Joerg Drescher approached the editors of the BIEN and USBIG Newsletters about creating an online version of the basic income newsletters, in hopes that it would be more up-to-the minute and interactive.
Basic Income News can be found at https://binews.org/. This site will have frequently updated news stories about Basic Income around the world, provided initially by BIEN and USBIG. We hope soon that many more of BIEN’s affiliates will contribute as well. If you have news about Basic Income that you think should be published in Basic Income News, please contact the editors at <desk@binews.org>. Make sure that the information you send is complete, reliable, and in accordance with copyright rules.
Joerg Drescher (Webmaster of Basic income news)
Yannick Vanderborght (Newsletter Editor of BIEN)
Karl Widerquist (Co-chair of BIEN, and Newsletter Editor of USBIG)
by Yannick Vanderborght | May 19, 2011 | News
The USBIG Network has added two blogs to its website: the Alaska Dividend Blog and the Basic Income Guarantee Blog. Both have news and opinion on those topics going back to 2000, and both will continue to be updated periodically. Both allow for reader comments and feedback. They’re online at:
https://www.usbig.net/blogs.php
by Yannick Vanderborght | May 18, 2011 | News
USBIG reports that Martin Hopenhayn, head of the Social Development Division of the United Nations’ Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) said that several Latin American countries are in the position in which they could introduce a universal basic income (UBI) for all citizens. In a recent interview with Dario Montero of Inter Press Service News Agency, Hopenhayn said that UBI would be an effective tool in fighting poverty and inequality. Although he believes that many conditions have to come together to make UBI feasible, and he believes it would take a major reform of the social benefit system to install it, he said that Chile, Argentina, Uruguay and Costa Rica are in position to do so and Brazil is not far off. Montero’s interview with Hoopenhayn is online at: https://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=53793
by Yannick Vanderborght | May 18, 2011 | News
According to USBIG, the Kuwaiti parliament has voted to distribute an unconditional cash grant of 1,000 dinars ($3,580) and free essential food items to each of Kuwait’s 1.155 million citizens for the next 14 months. The total cost of the package will be over $5 billion. The cash will be paid on February 24. The distribution of food begins February 1 and lasts until March 31, 2012.
This policy decision sounds more generous than it actually is. More than two-thirds of Kuwait’s residents are not citizens and have no path to citizenship. The cash and food will not be distributed to the 2.4 million foreign residents in the country, and the needier residents tend to be among the foreigners working the country.
For an article on the Kuwait grant.
See: https://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20110126/wl_mideast_afp/kuwaiteconomygrant_20110126110550
by Karl Widerquist | May 18, 2011 | News
The Basic Income Network of Italy (BIN Italia) reports on recent struggles for a minimum guaranteed income in Italy. According to BIN Italia, the local government of the Lazio Region (which includes Rome) recently approved a law for an income guarantee for the unemployed and precarious. Funding for the new program has been inadequate, and there were demonstrations in Rome during November and December in favour of the measure.
For more information, go to: https://www.bin-italia.org/informa.php?ID_NEWS=252. This website can translate the text into more than a dozen languages.
