BIEN | Opinion
Opinion Posts
Here you will find articles expressing opinions about current issues in the Basic Income debate. Opinions expressed are not necessarily the opinions of BIEN.
Alaska’s BIG parodied in The Simpson’s Movie while Albertans call for their own Dividend (from 2007)
This essay was originally published in the USBIG NewsFlash in November 2007. Public awareness of BIG took a small step forward this summer when the Simpsons Movie made a joke about it. Homer and his family are greeted at the Alaskan border by an official who...
Canada: An Open Letter to the Ontario Government
The Ontario pilot is a world-leading test of how basic income can transform lives for the better.
The problem with basic income pilots
Scientific reasoning rarely works in the public sphere. Instead, basic income projects are at risk of ending prematurely.
Basic Income Guarantee On (and Off) the Front Pages in Canada (from 2001)
This blog was originally published at the USBIG NewsFlash in January 2001. It's a good example of the way Basic Income was treated by major media outlets before the recent wave of support took off. On Saturday, December 9th, just after the ruling Liberal Party won a...
The Goals of BI News (from 2014)
This essay was originally published on Basic Income News in March 2014. Basic Income is suddenly the subject of much more discussion around the world. Political movements are growing. The media, social networks, and blogs have suddenly devoted more...
Basic Income and the something for nothing objection
One of the main criticisms of basic income is that if the government gave us money we did not have to work for, we would work less.
Why We Need Universal Basic Income – The University of Sydney
This audio is a talk I gave on why we need a Universal Basic Income. I gave the talk for the "Sydney Ideas" series in August of 2017, and I'm particularly happy with it. It summarizes the reasons I think are most important, and I think I did a relatively good...
Crowdsourced funding as a ‘basic income’ for artists
What do we do when the future we want is precluded by precarious economic conditions or a staleness social system?
Volunteering after the 9/11 attacks in New York 2001.
Apparently I was one of the few people from Cass County, Michigan living in New York City at the time of 9/11 attacks of 2001. Partly because I couldn't get into my office for a few weeks, I volunteered for the clean-up efforts. Newspapers from my hometown and two...
Do we need a Coalition of Basic Income Activist Networks?
Do we need a worldwide Coalition of Basic Income Activist Networks to do what BIEN can't? BIEN is chartered as an "educational charity." It can educate people about BI and spread news about BI, but it cannot lead or coordinate activism on BI. There are many national...
Review of Marshall Brain, “Manna: Two Visions of Humanity’s Future” (from 2014)
This essay was originally published on Basic Income News in June 2014. Marshall Brain is a science writer (both fiction and non-), futurist, founder of the website How Stuff Works, and a long-time advocate of basic income. His book, Manna: Two Visions of...
Lou Foglia, Universal Basic Income: Money for Nothing
This 8-minute video, entitled Universal basic income: money for nothing, is by Lou Foglia for Beme News (CNN’s YouTube Channel). It first appeared on July 25, 2018. It's a good fast-pasted introduction to UBI. It quotes me at 1:11, slightly misquoting me at one point...
