What made you become an activist for basic income, and devote so much time to it?
A revolution is taking place here and now, and each person has a choice: to be an active part in that revolution (to work for it to succeed), to be a passive part in it (to let it happen, if it must), or to fight against it. For me, the latter is just plain nonsensical. To be passive does not quite go along with my character, so I guess I could only go with the first one.
I identify with this revolutionary course – the implementation of basic income – because it’s about recognizing the humanity in us all, of our birth right to a decent living, and enough freedom to actually pursue happiness in this life.
What are other terms or phrases for ideas associated with, but not the same as, Basic Income (BI)? What characterizes them?
In most welfare states there are social benefits in place, paid in cash or in the form of tax credits. However, all of them are conditional, usually on income and/or willingness to take up a job. In Portugal, for instance, there is a minimum insertion income (RSI), which is only given to people who clearly show they have no other source of income.
There are also, for example, child benefits, disability benefits, income assistance…a whole set of income redistribution schemes, which always entail some conditionality. The only exceptions I know of, other than basic income pilot projects, are the Alaska and the Macau dividends. The latter two dividends, although unconditional, are not basic (not enough to cover basic expenses).
What makes the BI plan of action unique?
If I can put my finger on one main feature, I would say it is its unconditional nature. That’s what makes people roll their eyes around. What? Now we’re giving all this money to people, even if they don’t work? That’s just plain unfair.
Well, of course this is a short sighted opinion at best, and a plain lie at worst. It’s a limited view on our humanity. Usually people view themselves as active and willing to contribute with their work, but then are suspicious that their neighbours will do the same.
Of course that if everyone thinks this way we’ll arrive at an impossible proposition: that everyone is active and willing, while not being active nor willing, at the same time. But apart from our personal sensibilities, results from basic income pilot projects show that people contribute as much or more to society with their work, while receiving a basic income.
And even when slight decreases are observed, these are coupled with investments in education.
What are the most common success stories of BI or similar programs? Any failures?
The basic income pilot projects I usually cite are the Namibian, Indian and Canadian experiences. The first two were experiments in very poor, rural contexts, while the Canadian one was both urban and rural, involving the entire local population.
In all these cases, people receiving the basic income did not stop working (clearly the opposite in the Namibian and Indian cases), health conditions improved, as well as education indicators. There were also other benefits, such as reduced crime rates (in Namibia and India).
I think that, in the context of basic income experimentations, there cannot be ‘failures’. If done properly, these experiments aim to widen our knowledge, while temporarily helping the populations in question.
Of course that, as it was the case in the United States experiments, the results can be “spun” in different ways for political purposes. But that is always a risk attached to any experiment, especially those related with social behaviour.
What country seems the most progressive and forward thinking in implementation of BI?
According to news information around these days, Finland seems to be the part of the world most willing to formally take up the idea of trying basic income. Finnish officials and partners are developing an experiment, which is setup to start in 2017.
However, I would not say that translates necessarily into greater progressiveness than other regions of the world. The Finish experiment is already plagued by several shortcomings, even before it has started (although I still think it’s worth it).
The Canadian central and regional governments, and particularly the latter, are also seriously considering experimenting with the basic income. As well as regional Dutch officials, who are already developing their own basic income experiments (similar to Finland’s experiment).
Let’s also not forget the Swiss case, that recently held a national referendum on the subject. And also Spain, particularly in the Basque region. However, the interest in basic income is growing quickly around the world, so who knows who will implement it first?
Activist networks for basic income are also spreading. At this moment, BIEN already has 30 national and regional affiliates, and this is expected to rise in the next few years.
What is your work on BI?
At Basic Income News, I do writing, editing, training and coordinating. I also represent BIEN, on occasions, as an advocate for basic income in international meetings (up until now, related to the CO-ACTE project).
Locally, I also participate in some actions for our activist network in Portugal, by writing articles, speaking at venues and organizing events.
Any advice for would-be policy makers or activists about strategies for the implementation of BI?
I guess that if I could choose one piece of advice it would be not to consider basic income as a ‘miraculous’ cure for all social problems. Basic income is a helpful tool, even a crucial one, but cannot replace a “systems approach” thinking about society, a holistic view.
Also I would recommend to self-analyse and make clear why each of us is defending basic income, and how we think it should be implemented. Because the devil is in the details, and basic income can get “dirty” when analysed in its implementation depth.
I have been, more than once, challenged by the possibility of a “right-wing” basic income, which would come as a replacement of all other social benefits and welfare state public systems, including health and education.
This approach to basic income is common among the “right-wing” side of the political spectrum. It is dangerous and a real possibility which all activists should be aware of if they really care about the wellbeing of present and future society.
*Transcribed from informal Skype chat, content not quoted in full.*
How’d you get an interest, and how’d you get involved, in basic income?
There were two phases. My initial interest came from early on, when I was in my late teens. My involvement started one year ago.
As a teenager, I was interested in Ayn Rand and Libertarianism. I believed in freedom, free markets, no restrictions on the pursuit of self-interest –but I noticed a tension between this view and other things, as a teenager, such as underground music.
I was into certain bands at that time. If bands went to make money in the marketplace, it wasn’t something for them to do without becoming ‘sellouts’. If you want music artists to pursue their own interest, you expect them to not really ‘give a rat’s ass’ and to make great music. This conflicts with selling to the public.
In this one area, I was concerned about it [Libertarianism]. I could see places for people to not make a profit. These ideas conflicted with the Libertarian ideals –this free-market framework.
For a while, I had cognitive dissonance and unresolved tension. That is, a conflict between a ‘morally correct economy’ and my deeply held conviction of people pursuing art and knowledge for its own sake. They shouldn’t have to worry about profit.
At some point, in a random Libertarian publication, I learned about the basic income experiment in Manitoba –the Mincome experiments. This didn’t seem like a bad idea: give people enough money for their basic needs, and with these met, people have the freedom to pursue whatever they want to pursue.
I stuck with this for a while. This fulfilled the need for believing in something morally decent to me. It wasn’t relevant to college or graduate work. I wasn’t politically active at all during my 20s. However, I had this shoved away in the back of my head.
My involvement came about a year ago. The circumstances of this were finishing my PhD in early 2015. I became involved in late 2015. One thing that influenced me was not having a basic income. For the first time in my life, I did not have economic security.
All through college and graduate school, I was paid through stipends from scholarships and fellowships, and graduate assistant positions. There were either no work requirements or the connections to jobs (like teaching and grading) were at best rather nebulously defined.
All of a sudden, without ever thinking of education as job training or working a normal job, I was left on my own post-graduation. I still didn’t know what I wanted to do. I very much did not want to look for a standard job. Obviously, a basic income would have helped me.
At the same time, we have the rise of the Bernie Sanders movement. Many friends were followers and part of the Fight for ’15 Movement. I didn’t understand how a living wage would help someone like me.
That is, I work on things that interest me; it seems like a good idea. [But] a $15/hr minimum wage does not help if you’re not in a waged position. There is plenty of good work that needs to get done which is not necessarily suitable for wage labour.
I began thinking again about basic income. It accomplishes the basic goal of eliminating poverty. So, I started mentioning it to people. And it turned out I had friends who had heard of it. I started researching what had been written on it. As it turns out, there were some articles being written, and groups and individuals working on it.
I started subscribing and following these articles and people, respectively. Later in the year, I started following Basic Income Earth Network (BIEN) on Facebook. They started putting out calls for reviewers. I reviewed for them and then began writing for them.
From this work from PhD to basic income, it is a passion for you. It takes a lot of time. What is the main passion in this initiative for you to become an activist and devote a tremendous amount time to it? I can look at the number of publications alone.
(Laugh)
There are a few motivations. So, one thing is I enjoy the type of work. It’s challenging. I’ve done work writing for newsletters before. I am continuing to do this. I am doing an annual newsletter for my academic department.
What I do with BIEN is so much more challenging. I learned a couple different software platforms. In addition, I have to keep up on the day-to-day research. I have to do a lot of investigation. I have to find a lead about some topic, new announcement, or new study.
I am coming into this as a non-expert by any means. However, I want to present the information in an accurate way. There is a demand to do research and figure out things that I’m learning for the first time.
Also, I want to represent information without leading readers astray.
(Laugh)
I do not want them to have false inferences or beliefs. I want them to have true beliefs via true information.
I [also] really like the fact that this work is something I can do on my own time in my own place. I don’t have to go into an office. I don’t have bosses looking over my shoulders, at least directly. If I were to have a job, this is embodying my own ideal. I can sit and write. It is variety and a challenge. It is for a good cause. I deeply believe in this. I work with cool people.
I do not work in an office. I interact via Skype and email. I am totally independent. I can work from my apartment, a coffee shop, and at the bar, whatever. It’s like the perfect job, even though it doesn’t pay.
I have multiple aspects of work that align with my values, personality, and work preferences. It seems like the perfect fit. If I can continue to afford doing this without relying on a job, and if I keep doing this for the sake of the movement and myself, and if I stick with this, I want to see where this goes.
I’ll at least do something that I tremendously enjoy that is a fit for a while.
This interview is continued in Part Two, where McFarland discusses her values in news reporting.
Unconditional Basic Income Europe (UBIE), a regional affiliate of BIEN, has begun to raise funds through the crowdfunding platform Open Collective. UBIE works to secure the implementation of unconditional basic income across Europe.
The organization formed in 2014 after the European Citizens Initiative (ECI) for Basic Income had, in the previous year, brought together people from 25 countries and collected 300,000 signatures in support of the idea.
Since then, UBIE has worked with regional basic income groups to organise public events in Brussels, Athens, Maribor, Budapest, Maastricht and Hamburg. Its members are currently looking forward to their next meeting in Madrid, 14-16 October which will feature a public roundtable with Spanish, French, Swiss and Scandinavian activists and BIEN co-chair Karl Widerquist. The event concludes, fittingly, on the eve of the UN’s International Day for the Eradication of Poverty (17 October).
In addition to supporting and exchanging information with regional groups, UBIE is actively engaged in lobbying and research projects. At the moment, UBIE members are writing a response to the EU’s Social Pillar proposals, developing ways to practically implement the Eurodividend first proposed by Philippe van Parijs, gathering interested localities into an EU-wide pilot project, researching the potential impact of basic income on local food systems, and organising to make sure another EU-wide ECI for basic income gains even more support than the last.
Despite having existed for only two years, UBIE was mentioned in a recent report by a research group for the European Parliament as one of the ‘key civil society organisations’ working on basic income in Europe.
So far, UBIE has been run entirely by volunteers working in their spare time. In order to fulfill its ambitions and expand its reach, however, the alliance wants to professionalise some aspects of its work. Money is needed to maintain the ‘back office’ aspects of the alliance, to help activists travel to meetings, to hire interpreters and, eventually, to staff a small office in Brussels.
Open Collective provides a transparent funding platform where contributors can make regular donations and follow how their money is being spent, while organisations can crowdsource a regular and reliable funding stream.
My interest in BI started back around 2013 after reading a Reason article. It described how a BI would provide a much more efficient social safety net. It intrigued me at the time and over the next couple of years I periodically would seek out the latest research on BI. I was hooked by a documentary on the basic income featuring Guy Standing.
Standing’s discussion of the “precariat” and the need to counter the challenges of automization convinced me of the BI’s approach. The day after watching the documentary, I reached out to Standing to see how I could get involved with BIEN. He put me in touch with Karl Widerquist and André Coelho. André was my trainer and his patience and encouragement is what kept me on with the team initially.
What makes the BI plan of action unique?
That is a difficult question because there are many ways to implement the BI. I think what unites the BI movement, though, is that we want to fundamentally alter people’s relationship with the market and the government. We do not have to have a job in the traditional sense to contribute to ourselves and society. The basic income liberates us to take on the projects or activities that we are truly passionate about, instead of being forced into a certain line of employment.
There are a host of reasons I think this is good for sustainable economic development. But more importantly, this would be a positive development for human happiness. A basic income would also reorient our relationship with the government. Instead of ceding individual choice to government bureaucrats, a basic income provides freedom of choice to everyone. Centralization of power and resources swallows our humanity, and basic income is an enormous step in bringing that power back to the people.
What are the most common success stories of BI or similar programs?
What has been overlooked in the mainstream press (and what I first tell people skeptical of BI) is the recent release of a meta-analysis of 15 years of cash transfer research across 165 studies. It looks at the best research available and determines there is a consistent reduction in poverty from these cash transfers. It also determined there is no real evidence of lowered work hours while showing some evidence that cash transfers may increase work hours and intensity. For BI advocates, I think it is important to get familiar with this meta-analysis.
In the United States, the most famous example of an actual BI-like program is the Alaskan Permanent Fund. This program is funded by Alaska’s oil reserves and is provided to nearly every Alaskan resident. The experience in Alaska, and most BI programs, is that the policy rarely creates negative unintended consequences and has a much greater potential to create a positive ripple effect throughout society.
What is your work on BI?
I am the features editor for BI News. I will personally write opinion, interview and news-based articles. I have the privilege of working with and seeking out some amazing writers and thinkers, helping to edit and post their features articles. When the need arises, I help to train newcomers to BI News, including contributors and editors. I am currently in Taiwan completing a Master’s degree where I am working with the Taiwanese Basic Income organization. For the future, I have some ideas to promote basic income in Taiwan that will be forthcoming.
What are the main lessons for about BI that should be out in the public domain more?
Everyday around the world there are billions of interactions, transactions and events that would be made simpler by the establishment of the basic income. It helps to take these billions of events and simplify it to one individual to better understand the depth of change this policy would have on everyday life. Among those close to me, I can think of a clear instance where a basic income would dramatically improve a family’s circumstances, much more so than traditional welfare.
Think of how a basic income would help the person with a sick mother, the person whose car gets totaled, the person who wants to take more time to raise their child, the person who wants to find a better suited job…All of these situations would be more easily managed with a basic income, especially for those who are of modest means. Perhaps more significant are the new and unpredictable opportunities created by basic income that would otherwise never occur.
Who are the people to watch – the major BI players?
Here are a couple that come to mind:
Matt Zwolinski is my favorite libertarian scholar, primarily because of his work on the basic income. He has done a lot to bring on the libertarian side of the political spectrum to consider the basic income. The next generation will have significantly more libertarians than the current generation, so I think the philosophical marriage on this issue with libertarians will be increasingly important as we pursue the basic income’s implementation.
Kate McFarland is one of my favorite writers at BI News and a great person to work with. I think she will be a big figure in the BI movement in the coming years because of her non-stop dedication to the cause.
Any advice for would-be policy makers or activists about strategies for the implementation of BI?
During this stage, I think it is important that we maintain healthy disagreement in the movement. There are a lot of different motivations behind the BI which manifests in an array of different implementation methods. Despite this, I hope that we can retain this amazing civility that has united people from such diverse philosophical and personal backgrounds thus far.
On the long-term policymaking level, my hope is that in those areas we think must be earmarked (particularly healthcare and education). We will still utilize the basic income framework. For example, universal education savings accounts and health savings accounts (which there is evidence that these two programs are already effective where they are used). The basic income has the potential to really revolutionize the way we think about government services. The government is really efficient at issuing checks to everyone, but it is not great with creating innovative programs. That is why a basic income framework creates an ideal social safety net, as it brings the security of government distribution and the innovation of the market.
Karl Widerquist’s August 2016 presentation on Armando F Sanchez Production. An analysis on how extensive the governmental economic policies are and yet fail to meet the needs of the poor. Guaranteed basic income extends beyond the issue of permanent unemployment. It is a vital issue of ethics and social justice for those that are born in a time where they cannot obtain and enjoy the benefits of the basic resources that are needed to live.
