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.
Personal reflections on the 14th congress of the Basic Income Earth Network
What did I learn from this splendidly organized gathering of academic and activists from over thirty countries? As usual, many things. About people and about things. About facts and about dreams. I discovered, for example, that Götz Werner was perhaps even better at...
OPINION: Conservative website finds USBIG behind vast government conspiracy
You reach a milestone the first time you or your organization is named the mastermind behind a vast government conspiracy that goes all the way up to the President of the United States. This happened to the U.S. Basic Income Guarantee (USBIG) on July 23, 2012, when an...
OPINION: Money Trees, Digital Deficits, and Ubiquitous Can Kicking
In December of 2010, CBS aired a segment of 60 Minutes in which reporter Scott Pelley asked Chairman Ben Bernanke a question about the bailout money provided to banks during the 2008 fiasco: Pelley asked, “Is it tax money the Fed is spending?” Bernanke replied, “It's...
OPINION: Turn the Fed on its Head
I have watched with quiet fascination the evolution/resurgence of alternative politics since the financial meltdown of 2008. In my opinion, we have (at least) two broad camps developing: a Ron Paul brand of libertarianism that seeks to return to a prior vision of capitalism lost, and a new brand of Economic Democrat (often reflected in the Occupy Movement and/or Green Party or the ‘New Economy’ movement) that seeks a balance between capitalism as we know it and the people at large, who are more often than not suffering the brunt of capitalism run amok.
OPINION: The persistence of poverty and a negative income tax: The poor are just like everyone else
At the North American Basic Income Guarantee Congress in Toronto, which I attended in May 2012, Charles Karelis, author of The Persistence of Poverty, demonstrated what is wrong with much thinking about poverty, using a simple analogy. Suppose you are stung by a bee,...
OPINION: Report from the NA-BIG Conference
The Eleventh North American Basic Income Guarantee (NA-BIG) Congress took place at the University of Toronto on May 3-5, 2012. I had the privilege of attending this conference. It provided an unusual opportunity for me to go to a NA-BIG Congress purely as a participant, because I had almost nothing to do with the organization of it this year.
OPINION: Leviathan’s New Clothes
Some might know the tale “The Emperor’s New Clothes” by Hans Christian Andersen. The story is about how betrayers sell new clothes to a vain Emperor. As the betrayers insist, the specific qualities of the clothes are such that they could only be seen by the cleverest and bravest people.
OPINION: Interesting times for Alaska’s Fund and Dividend
Alaska’s basic income is cursed with interesting times. The Permanent Fund Dividend (PFD) is a small, variable basic income given yearly to every Alaskan who meets the state’s residency requirement. The size of the dividend is determined by several different factors, all of which are facing increased uncertainty and possibly moving in different directions.
Review: Graham Room, Complexity, Institutions and Public Policy: Agile decision-making in a turbulent world
Graham Room, Complexity, Institutions and Public Policy: Agile decision-making in a turbulent world, Edward Elgar, 2011, vii + 383pp, hbk, 0 85793 263 1, £95 This is one of those rare books which studies the deeper foundations of theory and practice: not just a...
Review: Paul Spicker, How Social Security Works: An introduction to benefits in Britain
Paul Spicker, How Social Security Works: An introduction to benefits in Britain, Policy Press, 2011, xii + 284 pp, hbk 1847428110, £65, pbk, 1847428103, £23.99 This well-organised book is what it says it is: an ‘introduction’ to the ‘design, management, operation and...
Review: Beverley A. Searle, Well-being: In search of a good life
In this thorough and very readable book Beverley Searle employs extensive panel survey data to study people’s subjective well-being and the economic and material contexts of their lives. A complex picture emerges. As we would expect, someone’s health influences their subjective well-being; interestingly, people over 55 tend to report higher subjective well-being than those under 55; and having and changing social relationships can affect subjective well-being in a variety of ways.
Review: Social Policy and Administration
As Bent Greve writes in his introduction to this highly topical edition of Social Policy and Administration, the financial crisis which began in 2008 has given rise to ‘a new era of welfare states … where targeting and emphasis on work are more substantial than earlier’ (p.333). Cuts in welfare budgets mean lower and more restricted benefits and higher retirement ages. The aim is now to save money rather than to improve services.
