by Josh Martin | Aug 10, 2014 | News
[Josh Martin]
Martin Bohmeyer, a 29-year-old web developer in Germany, has been living on a self-imposed basic income for the past half of a year. He crowdfunded this basic income and after seeing its effects firsthand, Bohmeyer is now crowdfunding even more to finance other peoples’ basic incomes. His initiative, “Mein Grundeinkommen” has already raised enough for almost two full basic incomes of €12,000 per year. Bohmeyer encourages his website visitors to submit their information to possibly be one of the winners of a basic income. The winners are to be chosen at random, but this project has generated responses from people saying what they would do with a basic income.
For more information, read the following links:
“Should we all get €12,000 a year?” The Local, 25 July 2014.
Mein Grundeinkommen home page
Should we all get €12,000 a year? (Source: The Local)
by Josh Martin | Aug 7, 2014 | Research
[Josh Martin]
Huemer provides the first response to Zwolinski’s lead essay in the Cato Unbound debate on the basic income. Coming from an anarchist-libertarian perspective, Huemer’s main arguments against a basic income are against governments in general. His line of thought is the following:
1) A basic income guarantee is permissible only if the state has political authority.
2) No one has political authority.
3) Therefore, a basic income guarantee is impermissible.
Huemer then entrenches himself deeper within this anarchist philosophy by arguing that the government cannot assume a continuity of obligations from their new taxpayers to, in fact, pay taxes. Thus, a government cannot impose a basic income upon its citizens since they have not consented to be governed. Lastly, Huemer discusses the argument that a basic income would promote individual freedom. Huemer claims that imposing a basic income would instead infringe on some freedoms to give freedom to others, which he believes is against the one true libertarian philosophy where every freedom must be protected, even if infringing on one freedom might provide much more freedom as a consequence. All in all, Huemer’s response comes from an uncompromising libertarian view of the welfare state, where the only possible form of the welfare state is a nonexistent one.
Michael Huemer, “Is a Basic Income Permissible?”, Cato Unbound, 6 August 2014.
Cato Unbound is hosting a month-long discussion on "The Basic Income and the Welfare State"
by Josh Martin | Aug 7, 2014 | Research
[Josh Martin]
Walker’s post is in response to the Cato Unbound debate on the basic income which was kicked off by Zwolinski’s lead essay on the libertarian argument for the basic income. Walker adds to the discussion with two well-informed points. First, while Zwolinski hopes for a basic income that can replace the welfare state, Walker finds that improbable and instead argues for reform to cashify multiple programs into one cash benefit. Instead of housing, food, and health assistance, Walker suggests combining them into one assistance cash benefit. Second, Walker calls on basic income debates to remember to include discussions on natural resource based dividends like the Alaska Permanent Fund. Walker believes these programs to be an excellent real-world example of a basic income, even though it is rarely seen as a welfare program.
Jesse Walker, “Making the Welfare State Less Intrusive”, Reason, 5 August 2014.
Walker responds to Cato Unbound's debate on the basic income
by Josh Martin | Aug 7, 2014 | Research
[Josh Martin]
In this post Brown highlights the month-long debate that has just begun at Cato Unbound titled “The Basic Income and the Welfare State”. Brown then discusses the first article, which was written by Matt Zwolinski and looks forward to the upcoming articles from other academics at Cato Unbound.
Elizabeth Nolan Brown, “Libertarians Debate Basic Income Guarantee”, Reason, 4 August 2014.
by Josh Martin | Aug 6, 2014 | Research
[Josh Martin]
Zwolinski’s excellent article acts as the lead essay for a special month-long debate hosted by Cato Unbound on “The Basic Income and the Welfare State”. Written from the pragmatic libertarian perspective, Zwolinski outlines the current libertarian objections to the welfare state—largely its complexity and extensive bureaucracy—and argues that a basic income guarantee would be much more desirable for libertarians than the status quo. To solidify his argument he highlights four main benefits of a basic income guarantee: it would have less bureaucracy, be cheaper to implement, see less rent-seeking behavior, and be less paternalistic in nature than the current system. Zwolinski ends his essay by admitting that a perfect libertarian utopia will never happen, but a basic income guarantee could help nudge society in its direction.
Matt Zwolinski, “The Pragmatic Libertarian Case for a Basic Income Guarantee”, Cato Unbound, 4 August 2014.
Cato Unbound is hosting a month-long discussion on "The Basic Income and the Welfare State"
