In the springtime 2011 Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, started to talk with experts, practitioners, citizens and representatives of the civil society on how to deal with the challenges of the future.
During these meetings several times people wanted to know Merkel’s position on Basic Income. At 8th June 2012 Deutsche Welle, a German media concern, reported in English:
Chancellor Merkel used her answer to make a point against the unconditional basic income that some in Germany have called for. Everyone had to try and live off their work, she said, pointing out that generally, there was a lot of flexibility on today’s job market.
Already on 15th April 2012 the collection and election of topics for another meeting concluded. Among all of the 11,618 suggestions received, about 2 percent (approximately 270) demanded Basic Income in different descriptions. Susanne Wiest, who already submitted in 2009 a petition on Basic Income and who spoke at the German petition committee, also submitted her idea of Basic Income. Her suggestion came among the top-ten.
On 8th June 2012 Susanne Wiest wrote in her blog, that she received a letter from the organisation team who invited her to present on 3rd July 2012 her suggestion directly to Angela Merkel and to talk about it.
Link to the initiative “Dialogue on the Future” (in German): https://www.dialog-ueber-deutschland.de
Link to the article of Deutsche Welle (in English): https://www.dw.de/dw/article/0,,16007820,00.html
Blog of Susanne Wiest and her post about the invitation (in German): https://grundeinkommenimbundestag.blogspot.de/2012/06/grundeinkommen-im-kanzleramt.html
This is a common argument used by people against the idea of a basic income. People must work to earn money. How can people get money for free? From the view of current democracies, this seems like a fair enough argument.
However, from the perspective of a citizen-ownership democracy, this argument is just not valid. Look at the owners of properties, or owners of shares in companies. Do these owners work to get their monies? No. And the country’s laws will make sure that renters pay rent. Thus, it is not true that everyone lives off his or her work. The very rich can live off their ownership rights.
Citizens are being short-changed. They are owners of their country. Yet they get nothing from their ownership (except Alaskans). Just like the very rich who own properties and shares, citizens too own many properties and other forms of wealth in their country. Just like the very rich who receive monies from being owners, citizens too should receive monies from being owners of their country.