by Kate McFarland | May 22, 2017 | News
As the Canadian province of Ontario prepares for a three-year trial of guaranteed minimum income (GMI), the Centre for Labour Management Relations (CLMR) at Ryerson University in Toronto is holding a conference to explore the economic motivations and labor market consequences of such a policy. The conference, The New Economy and a Basic Income Guarantee [1], is a private, registration-only event. According to CLMR’s website, the event will bring together over “250 representatives from academia, community, government, industry, law, unions and workers.”
Conference participants will investigate topics including the following: changes in the nature of work and employment that are generating pressure for new forms of the social assistance; theoretical and empirical work on GMI, with a focus on “intended and unintended labour market impacts”; the relationship between a GMI and labor and tax policies in the province; economic, political, and social factors that motivate Ontarians towards “administering, designing, organizing, planning, and receiving” a GMI.
The all-day event will take place on Monday, May 29.
Part of Ryerson University’s School of Management, CLMR promotes relations between labor and management that lead to (in the word of its mission statement) “greater productivity and profitability for businesses, improved job and income security for workers, and decreased inequality and injustice for all of society”. The center funds research projects in various disciplines and provides education and training to both students and professionals.
Photo (at Ryerson University) CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 wyliepoon
Text reviewed by Dave Clegg
[1] To minimize confusion, I use the term ‘guaranteed minimum income’ rather than ‘basic income guarantee’ (cf. my editorial “Basic Income’s Terminological Quagmire”). A basic income guarantee is often defined in American and Canadian contexts as an unconditional guarantee to all members of a community of an income sufficient to meet basic needs. This definition is narrower than BIEN’s definition ‘basic income’ in one dimension–it requires a minimum amount of the income guarantee–while broader in another, in that is not does require that payments be universal and of uniform amount (that is, it encompasses programs in which the amount of the benefit is reduced with earned income, as in Ontario’s forthcoming pilot program).
by Guest Contributor | May 19, 2017 | Opinion
Written by: Conrad Shaw
There is an idea out there. It is of the transformational variety. It exists in various forms and goes by many names: universal basic income, basic income guarantee, negative income tax, citizen dividend. All of these monikers highlight important aspects of this concept. “Universal” because it applies to everyone with no conditional requirements. “Basic” and “guarantee” to emphasize that, rather than subsidizing luxury or ease, it’s about guaranteeing the right to simply live in dignity and security. “Negative income tax” to illustrate that tax structures can be understood and utilized not only as a way to extract money from the people, but also as a means of fair predistribution to those being underserved by our system. “Citizen” to encourage taking ownership of one’s community and obligations. “Dividend” to emphasize that it is not a form of charity, but a return on an investment, the rightful entitlement every one of us has to our proper share of this country’s resources and opportunities.
“A basic income is a periodic cash payment unconditionally delivered to all on an individual basis, without means-test or work requirement.”
-Basic Income Earth Network (BIEN)
This idea, if you haven’t heard of it before, is the simple premise that the government (composed of the people) would deliver a regular, guaranteed, and unconditional amount of income to every person in a society. Some argue that only citizens should receive it, some say legal residents, some suggest only adults, and some insist that every breathing human within the borders deserves the payment. There are valid arguments for all of these viewpoints, and I hope that soon enough we will have the good fortune of debating at great length these strategies on the national scale, because it will mean that the very premise has been accepted into our hearts and consciences as both essential and moral moving forward.
For that to happen, the idea must first inspire the support of the people as a whole, and because the United States is a nation of pride and marketing savvy, nothing sells here without a good, cohesive pitch. As a first order of business, we should settle on a name for our American version of this policy, and I have a suggestion:
The American Dividend
“American” because the only requirement is that you, in fact, are a part of this great country, and we will recognize that with your “Dividend,” your carried interest in the investment you and your family have made and continue to make in this country by merit of your participation in it.
On to the details. Perhaps alarm bells are ringing and red flags are waving for you right now. “That sounds like socialism,” you might point out. I freely admit that it is a socialistic policy, and I argue that an appropriate amount of socialism is essential in a successful and just society – even a capitalist one. We seem, in America, to cling to the naive idea that we can or should only have one or the other, socialism or capitalism. That idea has run its course; we must have both. Neither of these simple, broad ideologies is robust enough to run our complex economy alone, because our economy is not only one of markets, but also of human beings. Markets run by the laws of supply and demand, and are greatly motivated and spurred on by capitalism, the great incentivizer. A purely socialized, redistributive society in which all citizens received the same reward regardless of their contributions could squash the immense growth, motivation, and innovation that capitalism fosters. Human beings, though, survive and thrive by the natural laws of inalienable rights, defined and set out by and for ourselves as entitlements to which we are guaranteed by dint of nothing other than our humanity. Socialistic regulations are required to make sure we adhere to these natural laws. Healthcare, for example, must eventually be socialized and untethered from the need for financial means, because no supply and demand curve can fairly measure the value of health. The demand is infinite, because a sick or dying individual will agree to pay any amount for even a chance at survival. This is where capitalism fails. It eventually localizes far too much power in the hands of the few, the owners of property and corporations, and we find ourselves in a situation closer to extortion than free markets.
My argument even leaves aside our very significant problem with automation. As we continually and irretrievably lose massive chunks of our labor market to machines, these pressures toward economic inequality will exponentially intensify. Properly addressed, however, these same technologies could provide abundance to society rather than greater scarcity and insecurity.
The answer to the question of growing complexity in human and economic markets is not to throw away our hard-won structure as a total failure, but rather to keep tweaking the capitalism/socialism balance to calibrate it to the changing needs of the times. In determining what should be socialized, we can tie it all back into life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Written deep within our American values, these freedoms are the inheritance of all people regardless of circumstance, be it race, culture, gender, age, or financial means. Life requires, at the very least, food, shelter, and health. Liberty and the pursuit of happiness require the ability to choose one’s path without fear of harm or retribution from any authority, and without fear of starvation. Our system has never fully guaranteed these things, and so we have not yet managed to fulfill our constitutional mission statement. The American Dividend can be used to ensure those rights. It can guarantee all people the ability to feed and house themselves as well as the power to say NO to any path in life that doesn’t serve their interests, be it a line of employment or an unhealthy relationship.
If we understand that we have always lived in a blended society of both socialism and capitalism, we can let go of our distrust of these words, our reflexive labeling of them as inherently evil or good, and instead see them simply as tools in the constant balancing act of governance.
Let’s address the two main sticking points the American Dividend will encounter: 1) the fear/resentment of subsidizing laziness by paying hard-earned money for others to sit around and do nothing, and 2) the very prudent concern that it might be simply infeasible to fund a program of such broad scope – essentially the fear that we can’t afford to guarantee these rights to all.
Paying for Sloth?
As to subsidizing laziness, this fear is created and nourished by a skewed perspective in the American capitalist culture that money is the driving motivator for work. We place the dollar on a pedestal far above all others, but money does not deserve this worship. The adage that money is the root of all evil is myopic. Insecurity is the root of evil, and money, or more accurately the lack thereof, is merely our means of expressing and comprehending insecurity. Whereas money is nothing but a tool, poverty is a force. It is the lack of freedom. Because we have been inculcated our entire lives with the idea that money represents value and merit, we have fallen into a misunderstanding of our fellow human beings. We have descended into the weary and preoccupied mind’s fallacy of “othering.” This is to say we have allowed ourselves to perceive the other members of our society as opponents, statistics, enemies, leeches, and threats to our own security. When we are in constant competition mode, we forget the other players for the sake of the game.
When we take the time to truly examine and understand our neighbors, compatriots, brothers, and sisters, however, we see that they are merely reflections of ourselves. We all have hopes and dreams; we all want to be special; we all want to contribute. The current system, which clumsily attempts to reward valuable effort but often disincentivizes hard work and ethics, leads people to despair and apparent laziness, sapping their motivation. In its current form, welfare assistance disappears the moment someone gets a job and increases their income, creating welfare traps. Additionally, other societally valuable endeavors like child-rearing, home healthcare, the arts, furthering education, and entrepreneurialism aren’t deemed worthy of any kind of salary in this economy. They can only be done on faith, at a loss, and at risk of harm to oneself. Throughout human history, a great majority of the movers and shakers of the arts, sciences, and business have had the luxury of pursuing their passions without earning an income from an employer because theyither came from means or they gained access to a benefactor. Wouldn’t it be something new and remarkable if those rich in inspiration and motivation but lacking an inheritance or extreme risk tolerance weren’t forced to spend years of their lives struggling to survive, seeking funding, essentially asking permission from corporations and the owner class in order to pursue the realization of their visions? With guaranteed security and the freedom to choose one’s work and define one’s value, people will contribute their best selves, and we can slowly change our national ethic from one of taking and hoarding to one of contribution. Productivity increases, health improves, and crime decreases in a society that chooses not to allow poverty, thereby permitting its members to be more effective versions of themselves. “Survival job” should not be a term, and a gun to the head is not nearly as effective a motivator in the long term as the ability to pursue meaning in life.
But the Cost!
Now comes paying for it all. Let’s do some simple, back-of-the-napkin, ballpark math for the numerically inclined. To immediately raise every American above the poverty line, we could provide a dividend of $12,000 per year to every adult and $4,000 per year to every child. That’s a bit under $3.25 trillion, which is certainly a huge number, but it’s not a direct expense. Think of it this way: the US GDP is approximately $18 trillion. If a simple across-the-board tax increase was levied on every American to raise that full amount for the dividend, a flat tax plopped down on top of our progressive system, that would mean about an extra 18% in taxes we’d each pay. That may sound like a lot, but since every taxpayer would also be receiving an extra $12,000 in income, then everyone making under $66,000 would come out ahead to some degree. At the $66K breakeven point, an individual would be paying $12K in extra taxes to receive the $12K in dividends. You can plug $66K into this US income percentile calculator and see that this represents over 75% of all Americans who would receive more money under this policy than they would give in taxes to pay for it, thereby directly profiting at the same time as we strive to completely abolish extreme forms of poverty and homelessness. That in itself should make the American Dividend a no-brainer.
However, a uniform tax levy like this is far from the only source of funding at our disposal. We could fund a large part of the American Dividend in many other ways. Taxes on the use of resources can chip in quite a bit. Taxes on carbon, pollution, minerals, timber, land value, and other natural resources acknowledge that we all own the land in equal share and would simply require companies profiting from and often damaging our commonly-owned property to repay the costs we bear by permitting them to do so. This would also discourage abuse of resources and incentivize more ecologically sustainable innovation. Very small taxes on financial trades would both reduce harmful speculation currently performed on a massive scale by large institutions with black box algorithms – encouraging long-term investment in its place – and it would acknowledge that we all own the financial system in this country and deserve a return from its continued function. Cutting tax exemptions that benefit the wealthy almost exclusively — scrapping the social security tax cap, raising unearned income tax rates to at least the level that earned income bears, cutting the home mortgage deduction, and a host of other such measures — would fund a significant part of the dividend. These measures are long overdue in any case and would represent a strong step forward against the economic injustice in our current system. Finally, raising the income tax rates on those in the very top brackets would acknowledge the fact that these earners have attained their position not only through intelligence and merit, but also through the good fortune of living within a system that allows for a few to leverage their positions to reap enormous returns — a system of laws, infrastructure, and opportunity that has been built over the course of generations, a system that each of us owns in part and deserves a share of. Factor in these methods, and we could pay for much of the dividend. As an example, if we paid for a third of the dividend this way (an entirely feasible amount according to the economists with whom I’ve spoken), it would bring the necessary tax increase down to around 12% and the break-even point to everyone making under $100K. Plug that into the calculator and see for yourself that more than 88% of the country would directly and immediately profit from the American Dividend under this scenario. Someone out of a job or unable to work would receive the full $12,000. Someone making $50K would come out $6,000 ahead. Someone breaking even at $100K will know that they are part of a stable system that will protect them should their fortunes turn for the worse. So, while it will end extreme poverty as we know it, the American Dividend is clearly not just for the extremely poor. It is for all Americans.
What’s more, we haven’t even factored in the savings yet. When people are secure, healthcare costs fall, crime drops, and entire welfare programs can eventually be phased out. This pushes the break-even point even further upward. This is not yet even accounting for the benefits reaped from fueling innovation and entrepreneurialism. Also, unlike the failed policies of trickle-down economics under which much of the money this country makes lands in wealthy bank accounts and simply sits there, money given to the lower classes is generally spent immediately on necessities and better quality of life, equating to a massive boost in the overall economy as businesses gain new customers across the board. It would be presumptuous to predict the actual magnitude of these windfalls, but I would bet you the American Dividend, in very short order, would begin to pay for much of itself.
Bear in mind this is not a panacea, and we mustn’t perceive or promote it that way. The American Dividend will not immediately usher in a new Utopian Age, and there will still be some that need help, but it has the power to effectively end catastrophic poverty and homelessness. It will grant all Americans a real shot at the American Dream. It will mean a simpler governmental system, a change of social and cultural ethics, and a betterment of individual quality of life across the board. And we have the means to do it. All we need is the political will of the people to stand up and demand it.
Give it to Me Straight
So tell me, if this idea of an American Dividend can: 1) end homelessness and catastrophic poverty, 2) establish and reinforce basic human rights and security across the nation, 3) improve healthcare outcomes and reduce costs, 4) reduce crime, 5) encourage entrepreneurialism, 6) act as an economic stimulus, AND 7) result in an immediate net income gain for the vast majority of the population… tell me how can this idea not sell? How can it not sweep the nation? Tell me it’s not an issue of marketing savvy.
And tell me, now that you’ve seen my arguments about the wider economic implications, what would you do with your Dividend? Take a little time and play out the thought experiment. Now imagine what your brother, mother, sister, father, son, daughter, friend, neighbor, boss, coworker, employee, or passing acquaintance would do with it? What would each be able to contribute? What would your community look like? What would America look like?
It’s time for the American Dividend.
Check out our upcoming film, Bootstraps, at www.bootstrapsfilm.com
by Kate McFarland | May 1, 2017 | Opinion
I have some ambivalence about the attempt to rebrand May Day as “Basic Income Day”. I have some ambivalence also, however, about the “modernization” of May Day as a time to demand higher wages for workers but give no attention to another historically important demand: the demand for reduced working hours. It was the latter, after all, that was at issue in the fateful demonstrations at Haymarket Square in May 1886.
That specific demand, of course, was the eight-hour workday. Over 130 years ago, it was widely accepted that society would not cease to function if workers clocked only eight hours per day. In light of such astronomical increases in productivity over the past 130 years, why, pray tell, is the eight-hour workday still considered standard? Why have demands for reduced work hours been all but absent from the US labor movement for over 80 years? Why has technological advancement not translated to increased leisure? Where is the 15-hour week prophesied by John Maynard Keynes? Where is this “fight for 15” campaign? It seems that a 40-hour work week has become all we can envision; we have lost our imagination.
I used to support a renewal of the demand for reduced work hours–and I still do. But I now recognize that it is insufficient, and insufficiently radical. Given the increasing prevalence of alternative job structures–short-term contract work, freelancing, self-employment–a mandatory reduction in work hours would have little or no effect on a large portion of the economy. And precarious employment, I believe, is something that we should not merely accept as inevitable but indeed welcome and embrace. Although not everyone’s cup of tea, perhaps, the freedom, flexibility, and variety is ideal for many of us–and might well be ideal for many more, if only they had a safety net sufficient to eliminate the constant financial anxiety that too often accompanies the lifestyle.
Rather than merely spending less time in traditional jobs (if they happen to be traditionally employed), individuals could–and should–have the option and opportunity to piece together a livelihood out of part-time and short-term work. Doing so with equanimity, however, requires the reliable financial floor that a basic income could provide. Moreover, a basic income could be considered a subsidy that effectively allows individuals to reduce work hours on their own terms.
Of course, a reduction in work hours is still desirable–and perhaps necessary–for traditional full-time jobs which, after all, still predominate in our society (and this might be joined to other reforms, such as legislation mandating that employers allow job-sharing or permit employees to trade income for time). However, with the rise of the “gig” or “1099” economy, an increasing number of individuals find their time not evenly and consistently distributed between work hours and non-work hours but, instead, erratically and inconsistently divided between times of employment (sometimes at multiple “gigs” at once) and times of underemployment or unemployment. For those of us in precariat, the most suitable analogue to work-hour reduction is the provision of an economic safety net that is not contingent on employment, such as a stakeholder grant or basic income, allowing us to seek fewer part-time jobs or short-term contracts.
In the end, then, insofar as May Day recognizes and commemorates not only the demonstrators at Haymarket Square but also the validity of their demand, it might just be that advocating a basic income is the best way to honor the spirit of the day.
Reviewed by Tyler Prochazka
by Andrea Fumagalli | Apr 19, 2017 | Opinion
By: Andrea Fumagalli
Introduction: the minimum income
In Italy, the debate surrounding basic income has been ongoing for almost 20 years. It began, in fact, with the August 1997 publication online (on the site ecn.org) of my pamphlet entitled “Ten theses on citizenship income”. The pamphlet saw successful underground circulation, and was re-edited into the book “Tute Bianche“[1]. The pamphlet presents a survey of the Italian debate around the introduction of a basic income, a proposal that had begun to circulate in the neo-workerist environments of the previous 2 years[2].
Twenty years later, it should be acknowledged that the definition of “citizenship income” has created more negative effects than positive: at that time, although starting to increase, the phenomenon of migration had not yet assumed today’s proportions. The term “citizenship” was used without considering the concept of “citizenship” in a way that was not terribly ambiguous. In fact, it could then be used as part of an ethical and philosophical framework for designating that every human being is born already a “world citizen”, regardless of nationality. But increasingly today, the concept of citizenship has to do with the legal-national sphere and then with a grid of limited rights ius soli, and is not extended to those who were born outside a nation’s borders. From this perspective, the idea of a “citizen’s income” can only be misunderstood as a proposal limited to specific nationalities, in contradiction with what is our idea of a ”right to income”. The term “basic income” appears therefore more appropriate and inclusive.
There are now many examples of proposed basic income legislation, in Italy and abroad; policy initiatives and declarations in favor of the introduction of some form of income support independent of employment status.
And just as numerous, and well differentiated, are the various interpretations of such a measure. In the cultural political debate promoted by Bin-Italy[3], which for years has promoted a cultural and socio-political campaign aimed at introducing a guaranteed minimum income (basic income), it is necessary to define certain parameters, to reduce the interpretive confusion that has now reached a critical level that makes unclear what actually a “citizen’s income”, “minimum income” or “a dignity income” are (to use the most common names).
To actually talk about “basic minimum income” (we use this term in a broad sense and provisionally), we believe that at least 5 criteria have to be met:
- Individuality: the minimum income must be paid at the individual level and not at the level of the family. Following this, there can then be a discussion as to whether children under 18 years of age will have the right or not.
- Residence: the minimum wage must be paid to all people who, residing in a given territory, live, rejoice, suffer and participate in production and social cooperation regardless of their marital status, gender, ethnicity, religious belief, etc.
- Maximum extension of unconditionality: the minimum income must be provided by minimizing any form of compensation and/or obligation and be as free an individual choice as possible.
- Access: the minimum income is paid in its initial phase of experimentation to all who have an income below a certain threshold. This threshold may, however, be greater than the relative poverty line and converge toward the median level of the personal distribution of existing income. Moreover, this level of income must be expressed in relative terms, not absolute, so that increasing the minimum threshold (as a result of the initial introduction of the measure) the range of beneficiaries will increase continuously until it hasrisen to graded levels of universality.
- Funding and transparency: the modalities of financing the minimum income must always be set out on the basis of economic viability studies, detailing where resources are obtained based on an estimate of cost when necessary. These resources have to fall on general taxation and not on other assets of origin (such as, for example, social security contributions, sale of public assets, privatization proceeds, etc.).
The criteria 1, 2, 5 should not be amendable, while criteria 3 and 4, are expressed in relative terms, may be subject to additional definitions depending on the context, but within the principle directives we have just outlined.
When basic income is the primary income it is therefore unconditional
That basic income is good and necessary, is a claim inspired by the composition of labor and the modalities of accumulation and exploitation which are today dominate.
In this regard, it is necessary to propose a cultural leap before political steps are taken, and to affirm that Basic Income is a primary distribution variable: the basic income must intervene, in fact, directly in the income distribution of productive factors: such as salary, which remunerates certified labor time as such, or profit, that rewards the business entity or rent, which derives from a property right. Being a primary distribution variable means that it is not a re-distributive variable: it directly occurs at the level of the balance of power and social relations within a certain process of accumulation. Despite this, a redistribution of income, which occurs at a later stage, is the outcome of a second level of indirect distribution, an extra market level, thanks to appropriate discretionary economic policies.
If a basic income is remuneration, the question that naturally follows is what it is that it pays. To answer, it is necessary first to analyze what in contemporary capitalism the main sources of exploitation/valorization are. More and more studies and case studies confirm that today life itself, in every daily event, is the productive factor par excellence.[4] If we take into account the many acts of daily life that characterize our existence, they can be categorized into four types: labor, work, leisure, entertainment. More and more today no only labor is to be the basis of added value but also the time spent in creation (opus/work), the otium/leisure time, and entertainment time: all are included in a growing and continuous enhancement mechanism. The classic dichotomy of the Fordist paradigm between labor and non-labor time, between production and consumption, between production and reproduction are now partially obsolete. It is the result of a historic process of structural changes in manufacturing processes and labor organization, which marked the transition from a material Fordist capitalism to a bio-cognitive and financialized capitalism.
Today, wealth production derives, at the same time, from absolute surplus value and relative surplus value extraction, where for absolute surplus value there is intended a sort of primitive accumulation, in capitalist organization based on capital employment and on private property. The result is the change of the relationship between productive and unproductive labor. What in the material Fordist capitalism was considered unproductive (i.e. no production of surplus value and therefore not remunerable), has now become productive, while the remuneration remained anchored to that of Fordist era (the crisis of salarization, for example). As a result, we are facing new kinds of valorization such as “dispossesion” (Harvey[5]) and “extraction”, to which no remuneration is applied, according to the dominant rules (legal, industrial relations, uses and so on).
It is no coincidence that unpaid labor is sharply increasing, as it is from those sectors that more has been invested by the transformation of enhancement methods and the adoption of the new linguistic-communicative technological paradigms (new cognitve-relational activities).
Against this background, one proposal could be advanced to counter this phenomenon of unpaid labor (i.e., basically “slavery” with another name, even though for most it is not perceived as such) is to proceed with its salarization. But, we might ask: is this possible? If the answer is yes, no longer necessary is a basic income.
The vagueness of labor time
This question opens a second theoretical problem – political and, at the same time, methodological. When technological and organizational transformations favor the spread of increasingly intangible productions with a high degree of non-measurability, when value is created by a whole range of life activities, from learning processes, to social reproduction[6] and networks of relationships, there arises the problem of “measure.”
The theme of measure is linked to the calculation/quantification of labor productivity. Unlike in the past, where this calculation was possible because employee labor activity could be measured in hours and by an equally measurable amount of production on an individual basis, productivity today has changed shape: it depends on the increasing use of new forms of scale economies: learning and network economies). These are scale economies no longer static but dynamic, because it is the flow (continuously) of time that allows for growth and learning of social skills as well as social reproduction and thus increased productivity, whose effects can be seen no more on individual basis but on the social one. Both learning and networking, in fact, need a social context and social cooperation. Productivity in bio-cognitive capitalism is therefore primarily social productivity or, with reference to the role of knowledge, general intellect.
Learning economies are based on the generation and dissemination of knowledge. Knowledge is not a scarce resource, such as material goods, but abundant: the more you swap, the more it spreads, the more it grows, a highly productive cumulative mechanism: cumulativeness requires relationships and social networks. Learning and networking are two sides of the same coin: if knowledge is not spread through relationships, individual processes are not economically productive. Only if you develop social cooperation and general intellect do you become productive.
We’re not talking about the traditional sense of the term co-operation, that is, “join forces” but co-operation, namely the interaction of individual operations that only achieve synergy in the common processes of accumulation and thus of surplus value creation. These relational activities often hide forms of hierarchy and exploitation, whose value is difficult to measure, not only on individual bases but collective ones, too. If the traditional factory productivity was based on precise technical mechanisms that allow you to measure individual productivity in the labor places today, the productivity of social cooperation cannot be measured in terms of individual productivity.
Not just individual productivity but also the same product of social cooperation is not measurable. When you are producing symbols, languages, ideas, forms of communication, social control, what kind of measurement we can take? Every relationship between output value, its production time (measured in hours) and its remuneration (measured in wages) becomes almost impossible or very difficult and subjective.
The crisis of the labor theory of value derives from the fact that not only the individual contribution today is not measurable but also the output tends to escape a unit of measurement, the more the more the production tends to become immaterial. And this takes place in a context in which the measure of value is no longer constrained by a scarcity factor. As was pointed out earlier, learning (knowledge) and network (space) are as abundant, and theoretically unlimited (especially if we consider the virtual space), as human nature. A theory of value based on the principle of scarcity, such as the one implicit in the theory of free market founded on the law of supply and demand, today has no longer any economic and social relevance. It is only artificially perpetuated in market dynamics where are continuously defined by power relationships. Paradoxically, the only theory of value that appears adequate to contemporary bio-cognitive capitalism, the labor theory of value, is not able to provide any measure.
How measure social cooperation and general intellect?
One possible aspect to consider has to do with the sphere of financialization: the pervasive and central role of financial markets, such as investment financing tools, privatization of social welfare and the partial compensation of knowledge labor, has affected not only the sphere of realization but also that of production. In capital gains, the speculative activity partially derives from the value produced by the cognitive-relational living labor. It is in financial markets that we can roughly see the implementation of the process of expropriation of social cooperation and of general intellect.
This process is not immediate and direct. It is often handled by the dominant bio-power management and the hierarchical relationships that continually redefine the property structure and market structure.
From this point of view, basic income, as a primary income, becomes even more a tool of direct re-appropriation of the wealth that is generated by the common life time put to labor.
The inadequacy of wages: body and mind
The order of discourse leads us to say that the traditional salary structure is no longer adequate, it does not fully capture the transformations in the valorization process. The classic wage structure can still be useful in those parts of the overall production cycle in which there is a measure of the value of labor in terms of time. But it cannot be generalized. From a theoretical point of view, this issue leads to the need to review, rethink and redefine the Marxian labor theory of value.
The inadequacy of the wage form as remuneration for all the productive aspects of life, leads to say that we need another way of remuneration (in addition to the wage forms where these are measurable). From this point of view, a basic income is something structurally different from a salary (though potentially, in the future, convergent): it cannot simply be understood as an extension of the wage form, because it is necessary to take into account the quantitative and qualitative change that new technologies have generated.
In particular, I’d like to stress the relationship between human and machine.
In the sixties, the relationship between human beings (with his body, his nerves, his muscles, his brain, his heart, his eros) and the machine was a relationship between separate domains: on the one hand, the human being, living labor, on the other hand, the machine, dead labor. The relationship between life and death was clear, physically traceable. From the point of view of human inner, the machine was something external and tangible, separate from himself.
Since the nineties to the present, such a separation is no longer so clear. The machine loses some of its materiality: the old Tayloristic machine becomes increasingly linguistic and relational. In presence of linguistic-communication technologies (ICT), only the support is material (hardware) but the core depends more and more on cognitive-relational human faculties processes. The use of language as the main tool of the operation changes the relationship of interdependence between human and machine typical of Taylorist technologies.
What kind of direction does this hybrid between man and machine take? And is it ‘the machine that is humanized or rather the human becoming mechanical?’ Are we witnessing the becoming human of the machine, or rather the becoming machine of humans? That’s the challenge of bio-robotics.
Consider the web 2.0 and the recent spread of social media. “The profit of advertising agencies, just like the profit of all firms web 2.0, [is] almost entirely depend on the ability to develop [and] control technologies.” Social control is then presented as the only way to innovate, develop in the future. But what is checked, exactly, today? Our identities and how they change. “The profiling algorithms of digital technologies feed on human biodiversity that it is itself channeled and integrated “in a Panopticon space, completely transparent, where we are called to act publicly.” See Google Pagerank, for instance.
Control of the body-mind becomes today (in agreement with the unpaid labor) the new enhancement border. Even if such activities could be salarized or simply paid otherwise (which is not the case), our freedom of choice would be conditioned.
An unconditional basic income is also a tool not only to recognize that our life is an active part (though often not aware) of contemporary exploitation but also able to exercise the right of choice, that is towards an individual and social self-determination: the right to choose our destiny as far as social participation is concerned, and also the right to refuse bad and indecent labor conditions. And this cannot be allowed, otherwise there is the risk of breaking the fragile balance of social control and supine conditions of subordination. From this point of view an unconditional income is subversive and that is the political struggle.
Andrea Fumagalli
(Università di Pavia – BIN Italia)
Andrea Fumagalli note for the conference: “Future of Work” Zurich 4 May 2016
Notes:
[1] A. Fumagalli, M. Lazzarato (eds), Tute Bianche, Derive-Approdi, Roma, 1999
[2] M. Bascetta, G. Bronzini (eds), La democrazia del reddito universale, Manifestolibri, 1997. Il tema di un reddito sganciato dal lavoro, etichettato con il termine salario sociale era già stato patrimonio del dibattito degli anni Settanta a parte dalla formulazione del rifiuto del lavoro (salariato).
[3] See www.bin-italy.org
[4] A. Fumagalli, C. Morini, “Life put to work: towards a theory of life-value”, in Ephemera, vol. 10, 2011, p. 234-252
[5] D. Harvey, “The new imperialism. The accumulation by dispossession”, in Socialist Register, 2004
[6] C. Morini, “Riproduzione sociale” in C. Morini, P. Vignola (eds), Piccola Enciclopedia Precaria, Milano X, Milano, 2015
Reviewed by Cameron McLeod
by Roberta Stewart | Apr 17, 2017 | News
Photo: Christine Cornege
Dr. Jess Berentson-Shaw, a science researcher, has co-written a book with Dr. Gareth Morgan entitled Pennies from Heaven, which advocates implementing a UBI for lower income families. Berentson-Shaw has a PhD in Health Science from Victoria University, and works for the Morgan Foundation with Dr. Gareth Morgan, an economist and public policy analyst. The Morgan Foundation is a trust with the stated aim of reducing wealth disparities.
The book argues for $200-a-week benefit for all parents with a child under three, and a basic income for lower-income families, which would be financed through the redistribution of taxes in New Zealand. For example, a CCIT (Comprehensive Capital Income Tax) for investment property owners could be used to finance the model, along with a more equitable and readjusted New Zealand Super model. Berentson-Shaw claims the children’s benefit would also lead to savings of “$1.1b in poor education and its impact on productivity, $2b in health, $1.1b in crime and $700m in social welfare savings.”
The author explains that despite the popular opinion among New Zealanders that lower-income people will spend the extra money on vices like tobacco and alcohol, research indicates otherwise. Poor families are more likely to increase spending on their children when access to more money is available. As Berenston-Shaw puts it: “New Zealanders are quick to moralize about the poor” and in respect to the administering of such a policy, she envisions it as being politically disruptive. “About half of New Zealanders can see the structural issues that feed into low incomes and poor outcomes, and that means about half don’t.” Her task then, and perhaps one of the purposes of the book, is to win over many of those who don’t, by convincing them that the benefits of a UBI do indeed outweigh the costs.
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