by Josh Martin | Aug 24, 2014 | Research
Spafford tackles a largely untouched question in basic income studies: How will a basic income change immigration patterns? Spafford believes that a basic income will lead to a significant influx of new immigrants and thus the country will likely have to implement tougher immigration laws. Looking at Europe, those countries with large welfare states often have significant anti-immigrant sentiment. This is an issue for pro-immigration supporters of a basic income, but Spafford proposes one way to remedy the two policies: a Graduated Basic Income (GBI). Under a GBI, an immigrant’s basic income would start out at zero in their first year and slowly increase each year until they eventually reach the level of the maximum basic income. This GBI might deter some of the increased immigration, but still feels unfair to immigrants, so Spafford proposes using the GBI on every citizen starting at 18 years old. Under this policy all citizens at 18 years old will see their basic incomes increase from nothing to the maximum amount in a set number of years.
Jesse Spafford, “Reconciling Basic Income and Immigration”, Metamorphoses and Deformations, 8 December 2013
by Karl Widerquist | Aug 23, 2014 | Research
-Foreign Affairs
SUMMARY: Without using any familiar terms for Basic Income Guarantee, this article argues for a temporary BIG as a response to the Great Recession (or recessions generally). The U.S. Federal Reserve usually tries to stimulate the economy during recessions through monetary policies (such as reducing interest rates or increasing the money supply). These policies favor large financial institutions and according to authors, Mark Blyth and Eric Lonergan, “stimulating the economy in this way is expensive and inefficient, and can create dangerous bubbles — in real estate, for example — and encourage companies and households to take on dangerous levels of debt.” Instead, the authors argue that the government should simply give cash unconditionally to citizens. They argue, “In the short term, such cash transfers could jump-start the economy. Over the long term, they could reduce dependence on the banking system for growth and reverse the trend of rising inequality. The transfers wouldn’t cause damaging inflation, and few doubt that they would work. The only real question is why no government has tried them.”
Blyth and Lonergan suggest building up a sovereign wealth fund (SWF) capable of paying dividends, much like the Alaska Dividend, funded by its SWF. They claim, “The Bank of England, the European Central Bank, and the Federal Reserve already own assets in excess of 20 percent of their countries’ GDPs, so there is no reason why they could not invest those assets in global equities on behalf of their citizens.” They even suggest that government could take advantage of current near zero interest rates to spend another 20 percent of GDP buying equities, which would be likely to return 100 percent in 15 years. It is uncertain then whether the fund would pay dividends regularly or distribute them only during recessions. In either case, this plan would be a significant step toward a BIG.
Mark Blyth and Eric Lonergan, “Print Less but Transfer More: Why Central Banks Should Give Money Directly to the People.” Foreign Affairs, September/October 2014 Issue.
by Josh Martin | Aug 23, 2014 | Research
[Josh Martin]
Gordon provides a wonderful, in-depth introduction to the universal basic income from a conservative perspective. He provides real world examples of basic incomes, academics that have supported it, and possible funding options. He also discusses current conservative welfare ideas from Marco Rubio and Paul Ryan that seem to be a step on the way to a radical simplification of welfare.
Noah Gordon, “The Conservative Case for a Guaranteed Basic Income”, The Atlantic, 6 August 2014
Swiss backers of a minimum income spread out coins in Bern. (Denis Balibouse/Reuters)
by Josh Martin | Aug 22, 2014 | Research
[Josh Martin]
Dolan’s post focuses on Representative Paul Ryan’s recently proposed welfare reform, which would consolidate many individual welfare programs into one grouped “Opportunity Grant” for each applicable citizen. While Ryan should be praised for trying to cut back on the bureaucracy in welfare, Dolan believes that Ryan’s biggest error was continuing to impose work requirements on each beneficiary, thus maintaining the work disincentives associated with moving from benefits into work. Dolan believes that Ryan’s plan should have gone further in allowing states to implement a universal basic income if they choose.
Ed Dolan, “Universal Basic Income: An Idea Whose Time Has Come”, Real Clear Markets, 6 August 2014
by Karl Widerquist | Aug 22, 2014 | Research
John Danaher, NUI Galway
John Danaher, a lecturer at the National University of Ireland, Galway and a regular blogger at Philosophical Disquisitions, has written a series of blogs about basic income. The series contains nine articles so far, post from December 23, 2013 to July 18, 2014. According to the author’s summary, “I’ve written a number of posts about the ethics and justice of the basic income grant. I thought it might be useful to provide an index to all of them in this post. Most of these posts look at whether an unconditional basic income grant can be justified from a particular theoretical perspective, e.g. feminism, libertarianism, liberal egalitarianism, and republicanism. One of them asks whether there should be a right not to work.” Items in the series include:
From Philosophical Disquisitions
John Danaher holds a PhD from University College Cork (Ireland) and is currently a lecturer in law at the National University of Ireland, Galway. His research interests range broadly from philosophy of religion to legal theory, with particular interests in human enhancement and neuroethics.
John Danaher, “Blog series: Philosophy and the Basic Income.” Philosophical Disquisitions, July 18, 2014 [December 23, 2013 – July 17, 2014]
by Jenna van Draanen | Aug 21, 2014 | Research
In this opinion piece, the author lays out an argument for basic income on the grounds of needing to democratize the economy, protect human rights, and allow freedom. The article argues that we need to decentralize the creation of money to avoid having a privileged group of bankers controlling society.
Language: French
Thierry Crouzet, “Pourquoi défendre le revenu de base? [Why defend basic income?]” Blog at tcrouzet.com, July 16, 2014.
Tant qu'on voudra vivre là, il faudra de la monnaie. -blog.tcrouzet.com
