SUMMARY: This article argues that Basic Income proponents claim to advance the cause for the disadvantaged, but in fact they block strategies that would really help the one billion most disadvantaged people on the planet, concluding, “Do we see pure evil here or not?” Thomas Cool is an econometrician and teacher in mathematics in Scheveningen, Holland.
Thomas Cool, “The pure evil of a Basic Income.” Boycott Holland, April 20, 2014.
Boycott Holland
The title alone suggests he’s a crank, and he rails against censorship but then doesn’t allow comments on the blog. Which is just as well, because his whole argument hinges on the spurious claim that we can return to full employment simply by eliminating the “tax void”…which appears to be a reference to the income tax paid by on minimum wage.
I was hoping there would be real critique of the basic income here to respond to. But this is just an academic who is upset that an academic committee with a BIG advocate on it it ignoring his personal theory that he thinks will help more people than a BI. Whether his theory is right or wrong, this really has nothing to do with a basic income.
I doubt he’s an academic.
To investigate critical perspectives on BI is important. But the “pure evil” talking blogger is really just a crank. Nothing substantive there.