by Tyler Prochazka | Apr 18, 2016 | Opinion
Just because someone is disabled doesn’t mean they’re any less of a person. Most disabled individuals can still work jobs, get into Disabled Dating, have families, go places, etc. However, society has a tendency to discriminate against them and doesn’t offer disabled the same treatment as able-bodied individuals. Is basic income guilty of this too? That’s what we shall be discussing in this article.
The Universal Basic Income movement continues to pick up steam around the world, with reports that Finland is interested in starting its own UBI pilot program, joining a growing list of countries around the world. Still, many important questions surround the details of a basic income system.
One criticism raised even by some supporters is that many recent discussions of the UBI have overlooked the disabled and chronically ill. This is not the first case of discrimination against people with disabilities to affect the U.S financial system. While disabled people are always able to take out disability insurance from somewhere like https://www.leveragerx.com, there is no reason why they should be left out of the Universal Basic Income plan.
For example, in its groundbreaking UBI report the Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce (RSA) mentioned disability only to say specific benefits for the disabled were excluded from its model. This is something very important to the disabled community, many of whom click here to get information about their long-term options.
This silence has led some commentators to be skeptical of the UBI’s ability to accommodate the specific needs of disabled individuals. In an article recently published in the Independent, one critic worried that a basic income would either be too low to assist the disabled or too high to be affordable.
Critics are right to point out those who need special assistance are an important consideration when constructing a UBI scheme.
Fortunately, there are ways to integrate these concerns into UBI models while largely retaining the program’s simplicity.
For instance, an additional supplement for the disabled could be granted based on the severity of the disability. The current structure and eligibility requirements for disability insurance from the U.S. Social Service Administration could be utilized to determine the amount of additional aid.
There are three potential options for such a supplement:
- Provide a simple cash transfer that will allow the individual to spend the money accordingly.
- Provide a cash transfer to an account modeled on the Health Savings Account (HAS) structure. HSAs restrict account purchases to medicinal goods and services, but an individual can generally purchase these goods and services from any provider they see fit. This structure may capture the best of both worlds; it would prevent fraud given that those who are not truly disabled would be unlikely to apply for a supplement that is restricted to purchasing goods and services needed for disabled individuals, while also retaining account holders’ flexibility in choice of private providers.
- Expand in-kind services that cater to disabled individuals. While specific in-kind services that should be expanded are beyond the scope of this article, it is almost certain that existing federal and state services for the disabled would not be altered if a UBI was implemented.
Regardless of which option is chosen, none of them make the UBI “utopian” as some critics have recently charged. By adapting existing governmental structures, policymakers can create a UBI while also making special accommodations for those citizens who do need additional supplements to the basic income. Such a system would still be much simpler than the existing structures of government assistance. In the United States, for instance, the vast majority of the current social services bureaucracy could be eliminated and replaced with a streamlined system that looks at only age and health/disability status to determine the size of the benefit. In fact, for those with invisible disabilities, a UBI would likely be a vast improvement to the current situation.
So far, critics have come up short in offering compelling reasons why accommodating those with special needs will drastically undermine the efficacy of UBI models. Nonetheless, they do raise an important concern, and the UBI movement must make room for discussion regarding how to integrate these needs into the basic income.
by Andre Coelho | Feb 24, 2016 | News
Last week, an important conference was held in Lisbon focused on basic income (BI) and its implications. Although similar initiatives have occurred in Portugal in the past, this was the first conference of its scale; it brought together national and international speakers, received a large amount of media attention and was organized by multiple partnering organizations: Grupo de Estudos Políticos, the political party PAN (Pessoas, Animais e Natureza), Movimento Rendimento Básico Incondicional – Portugal, Grupo de Teoria Política – CEHUM, and IHC (Instituto de História Contemporânea). This initiative accompanies PAN’s intention to propose, in parliament, a countrywide BI feasibility study.
The conference spanned two days, the 15th and 16th of February, and drew an audience of around 100 people.
The first day’s session, held in a conference room at the parliament building, was chaired by PAN’s Jorge Silva and presented keynote speakers such as Amílcar Moreira, Jurgen De Wispelaere, Roberto Merrill, Sjir Hoeijmakers, Pedro Teixeira and Miguel Horta. It also included the presence of political party representatives Ivan Gonçalves (PS), Ricardo Moreira (Bloco de Esquerda) and Miguel Santos (PAN).
Jorge Silva. Credit to: Luís Gaspar
Roberto Merrill opened up the session, presenting a theoretical framework for basic income: pre-distribution (instead of redistribution). According to his research, social problems do not derive from the lack of jobs but from restrictions in access to resources. He also listed a range of authors and most prominent publications on the subject.
Jurgen De Wispelaere’s presentation focused on the Finnish BI experiment, which is planned to begin next year. This two-year experiment is aimed at assessing the ability of BI to eliminate the poverty trap and reduce complexity, bureaucracy and costs in social security. According to Jurgen, the fundamental reasons to experiment with BI are to demonstrate its potential, raise awareness and build a political coalition. Finland’s experiment will necessarily have shortcomings, such as its limited duration, sample size and resources, but it nevertheless can be used to study a wide array of effects, such as popular opinion and preferences and the impact of a BI on labor markets, social security and poverty.
The next speaker, Sjir Hoeijmakers, presented the municipal experiments in the Netherlands, which are expected to start by late 2016 or early 2017 and involve at least 90 municipalities. Although there are around 300 municipalities in the Netherlands, the 90 that have already agreed to participate in the study represent more than 50% of the country’s population; thus, there seems to be a strong public support for these initiatives. In his talk, Sjir described the main worries that prompted the experiments: technology replacing jobs, and the complexity, conditionality and lack of freedom under the traditional social security system.
Jurgen De Wispelaere. Credit to: Luís Gaspar.
Amílcar Moreira and Pedro Teixeira presented more cautious views regarding basic income, although both were generally supportive. Amílcar warned that Portuguese social politics have historically been very conservative and favorable to the establishment of conditions on social security. Pedro presented a model for financing a basic income of 200 €/month, which he considers politically easier to implement than higher-valued BI proposals. He warned, however, that there would be a need to finance a BI through taxes other than labor (e.g., taxes on property, natural resources and pollution), since labor taxes are already imposing too much stress on the middle class.
The last keynote speaker of the day, Miguel Horta, presented his BI study, according to which higher redistributions occur with higher income inequality. In his model, which is self-balanced and budget neutral, a 50% tax on labor income can finance a 435 €/month BI in Portugal, with 25% of it given to children up to 18 years old. The current labor tax would be replaced, and a few social security programs would be rendered irrelevant, which would leave the fund for a BI only 2200 M € short. Miguel reasoned that this relatively small amount could be obtained from savings in health, security, very high pensions (caps), tightened fiscal collection on high incomes and reduced costs associated with bureaucracy.
After the last keynote address, the audience had time to interact with the speakers, and the political party representatives presented their views on BI. Among the political party representative, Ricardo Moreira of the left-wing party Bloco de Esquerda was the only to clearly oppose BI. Ricardo views BI as a right-wing tool to wipe out the welfare state.
Miguel Horta. Credit to: Luís Gaspar.
On the second day of the conference discussion continued at the FCSH university campus, with authors André Barata and Renato Carmo presenting their arguments for BI. Renato suggested that an exclusively national attempt to implement BI is too difficult, however, and instead recommended an approach like that proposed by Van Parijs, who calls for an European dividend. José Neves also defended BI, while cautioning activists to avoid purely cost/benefit logic, as if BI were a simple matter of arithmetic. He also called for a wider trust network in society, which comes when one considers every member of society as potentially creative and productive. Mariana Duarte Silva, an arts and co-work manager in Lisboa, also presented her arguments for BI, focusing on its universal nature, although admitted that she learned of the concept only when she was invited to this conference. Another newcomer to the BI discussion was workers’ and women’s activist Lina Lopes, from the union UGT, who found the concept interesting and promising. Lina suggested that BI could start out as a distribution to caretakers (the majority of which are women).
José Augusto Oliveira, representing the workers union CGTP, presented an opposing view of BI. Like Ricardo Moreira, José Augusto adheres to a full-employment ideal and believes that BI would effectively subsidize sloth. António Dores used his speaking opportunity to challenge the way in which social NGOs are managed at present: hostage to conditional financing schemes, which end up wrapped in dubious financial practices if not blatant corruption. Dores also denounced the precarious work conditions within these NGOs, concluding that BI would revitalize NGOs and provide dignity to a host of volunteers who participate in these organizations.
João José Fernandes, CEO of the Portuguese NGO Oikos, delivered an interesting and timely presentation on food (in)security, the main reason the national health service in Portugal is presently under tremendous stress. It turns out, according to Fernandes, that food intake problems are correlated with unemployment, most notably with insufficient income. This trend is aggravated by low levels of education. Fernandes pointed out that, for an average Portuguese adult, the minimum income for maintaining a healthy diet is around 200 €/month. He argued that any BI proposal must take this into account, and that the amount of the basic income must be adequate to cover a healthy diet, in addition to other basic necessities.
Three final presentations were given by Glória Fonseca, from Movimento de Trabalhadores Cristãos (Christian Workers Movement), robotics specialist and BI activist Dario Figueira, and Jurgen De Wispelaere. Glória focused on the natural link between Christian values and BI. Dario reviewed BI pilot studies worldwide, presenting their main results. Finally, Jurgen spoke on political feasibility and challenges; he surveyed the political obstacles to BI implementation, and recommending caution and clear-sightedness at every step of the way.
Throughout the entire conference, the audience was very active in questioning the authors and speakers, generating a healthy and useful debate about many facets of BI. The event was closely covered by the media, who interviewed for SIC Notícias TV André Silva from PAN and some of the main speakers for publication in newspapers and magazines. (See the list of publications below.)
Conference room at Portuguese Parliament. Credit to: Luís Gaspar.
More information at:
Language: Portuguese
Sofia Rodrigues, “PAN vai propor estudo sobre atribuição do Rendimento Básico Incondicional [PAN is proposing a study on Basic Income]“, Público online, 15th February, 2016
Sábado Magazine, Entrevista a Jurgen De Wispelaere [Interview with Jurgen De Wispelaere], 18th February, 2016
Paulo Chitas, “Especialista defende que o rendimento básico não promove a inatividade [Specialist defends that the Basic Income does not promote inactivity]“, Visão Magazine online, 15th February, 2016
Maria João Lopes, “E se tivéssemos direito a um rendimento só por nascermos [What if we were entitled to an income just for being born?]“, Público online, 15th February, 2016 (interview with Jorge Silva)
Maria João Lopes, “Com um RBI, há mais liberdade para ter um trabalho, remunerado ou não [With a Basic Income there is greater freedom to work, getting paid or not]“, Público online, 15th February, 2016 (interview with Roberto Merrill)
Movimento Rendimento Básico – Portugal website.
Political party PAN – political priorities.
by Albert Joerimann | Feb 14, 2016 | News
Daniel Häni. Credit to: The Establishment.
Within the past two months, the well-known German magazine Der Spiegel has published two comprehensive articles about Basic Income.
The December 25th edition of Der Spiegel contains an article that discusses models of Basic Income and the current popular initiative in Switzerland, as well as some calculations on the cost of introducing it in Germany, Finland and Switzerland.
The author, Florian Diekmann, distinguishes between two basic formats: a “humanistic” approach that lets people make a free choice on the base of a real income guarantee, and a “neoliberal“ model that would get rid of a large part of the traditional social security payments as well as the social bureaucracy. The Swiss proposal is presented as an example of the “humanistic” model, and the Finnish pilot in its current design as the “neoliberal” model. For Germany, following the Swiss model would result in a Basic Income of €1,500 per month/person and following the Finnish model €664 per month/person. (Currently, most German supporters of the Basic Income talk about a BI of approximately €1,000 per month/person.) All in all, Basic Income would cost Germany €1.2 trillion per year under the Swiss model, €530 billion under the Finnish model and about €800 billion for the level proposed by the German BI supporters. In comparison, the current annual amount of social expenditures in Germany is about €850 billion.
Diekmann also compares the proposed amounts of a Basic Income to the level of all incomes in Germany for the year 2011. For the Swiss model, the BI corresponds to nearly two thirds of all private incomes; for the Finnish model, in contrast, it is barely 30%.
On January 28th, Der Spiegel published an in-depth interview with Daniel Häni and Philip Kovce, the authors of the book Was fehlt, wenn alles da ist? (What’s missing if everything is there?). (See the book review on this webpage as of November 15th, 2015)
Philip Kovce
In the interview, Häni and Kovce emphasise that one of the core motivations for a Basic Income is the social transformation from alienated work into intrinsically motivated, freely chosen activities. They believe that, if provided a guaranteed, unconditional Basic Income, most people would continue to be active and work to create value, albeit on a radically different fundament. To achieve such a change, Häni and Kovce acknowledge that a long process will be necessary, but they stress that this process is one which has been initiated already, due to recent changes in working conditions and the evolution of the economy in the second, third and now the fourth industrial revolutions. Nobody can seriously expect the return to full employment under the conditions and in the form we experienced in the 1970s.
More information at:
Language: German
Zeit Online, “Digital revolution: The boss of Deutsche Telekom is in favour of a Basic Income [Digitale Revolution: Telekom-Chef Höttges für bedingungsloses Grundeinkommen]“, December 29th 2015
Giovanni di Lorenzo, “The difference between humans and computers will be lifted soon [Der Unterschied zwischen Mensch und Computer wird in Kürze aufgehoben sein]“, January 14th 2016
Carsten Knop, “A Basic Income is helpful for everybody [Ein Grundeinkommen hilft allen]“, Frankfurter Allgemeine, January 21st 2016
by Marc de Basquiat | Feb 1, 2016 | Opinion
Multiple surveys across many countries show an increasing support for the idea of providing every citizen with a monthly lump-sum allowance to ensure everyone can meet their basic subsistence needs. In France, the IFOP (a leading French national market research institute) has shown that this support goes beyond political orientation divisions. From the question: “Are you in favour of implementing a guaranteed basic income for all citizens which would replace most existing allowances?” came a positive answer, depending on the degree of support for one party or another, from 72% to 79% for left wing sympathizers and from 50% to 54% for right wing sympathizers.
However, what would an unconditional basic income in France look like in concrete terms?
The Finland experiment
Since the election in April of the Finnish pro-basic income coalition, the topic has given rise to renewed international interest. All started when the Prime Minister of Finland Juha Sipilä announced the launch of a series of pilots, the most important being a “universal basic income” [1], in order to reform the social security system in response to the evolution of the labour market. This will also allow the evaluation of how to reinforce autonomy and incentives to work, as well as reducing bureaucracy and the complexity inherent in accessing social assistance.
The lead role in this project has been given to professor Olli Kangas (KELA) who has outlined the following schedule[2]: preparation phase from December 5th, 2015 to November 15th, 2016; two-year experimentation starting in 2017; evaluation in 2019.
Olli Kangas explained that the work group will evaluate at least four options:
- a “full basic income” (~800 €) replacing almost all basic and insurance-based benefits;
- a “partial basic income” (~550 €) replacing all basic benefits but leaving intact almost all insurance-based benefits;
- a negative income tax in which benefits would phase out as people earn more money;
- miscellaneous other approaches including a universal income and additional components.
Everyone who has recognised the need for major reforms of our social protection mechanisms perceives the announcement of the Finish pilot as an opportunity. However, we need to give time to our Finnish friends for their project to mature.
Which options are possible in France?
The Association for the Introduction of an Existence Income (AIRE) has been working on these questions since 1989, gathering studies and proposals from numerous experts, philosophers, economists, sociologists, politicians, etc. The French Movement for a Basic Income (MFRB) created in 2013 involves activists from a wide variety of backgrounds, leading actions through the country and enriching proposals by bringing together citizen experiences from the grass-roots[3].
Despite apparent simplicity, an unconditional basic income would require a series of structural choices. Precise adjustment of the parameters would need to be made in order to ensure it performs optimally in terms of justice and efficiency. Considering the vast number of options, it would be fallacious to believe that there is an ideal solution. Actually several options that must be weighted by parliamentary and experts in order to create a consensus that is adapted to the reality of our country.
Our experience leads us to recommend a universal income that would vary based on the beneficiary’s age. In particular the case for children should be processed separately, which means organizing an in-depth discussion about the French family assistance policy. This means replacing all or part of the actual eight allowances[4] by a lump-sum for each child. A key stake is to eliminate the high variability of the State grants according to the child’s rank within the family, the matrimonial status of the parents or the parent’s income (knowing that a single child of a middle-income level couple currently receives a remarkably low grant). The potential variation of the universal income amount according to child age (3, 14, 18 year old thresholds) must also be further investigated.
Similarly a discussion is needed regarding senior citizens. The question of incentive to work disappears with the elderly, but the dependency issue arises. Do we need to define a higher amount above 65 years old? How should the matrimonial life conditions be integrated? The ASPA[5] level (800 € for a single person, 1242 € for a couple) gives an indication but not a clear answer on the solution to be implemented.
The coordination with housing allowances constitutes a third theme to be carefully analysed. Acknowledging the inflationary effect of housing allowances (APL) on the rental market price, some politicians and economists[6] are investigating the potential effects of merging the APL and the RSA[7]. As the AIRE association is attached to the Tinbergen rule[8], we are highly reluctant to support this proposal, but the underlying issues must nonetheless be addressed. In any case, it is important to revisit conditionality links between several allowances and the housing grant, in particular the existence of a problematic “housing lump-sum” component within the RSA.
The last framing issue is to define the scope of beneficiaries for a “universal income”. Despite this designation, it is necessary to limit eligibility to a national community. This needs to be defined in terms of residence and/or nationality, probably through continuity of the rules applying today for the RSA beneficiaries. However, this still creates a variety of fundamental questions, for example the potential right to the universal income for prisoners or asylum seekers (currently receiving the ATA[9]).
Three scenarios for a universal basic income for “active age” adults
Similarly to the Finnish approach, we identify three quite different scenarios to defining a universal basic income that would be paid to any adult in France.
- Baseline: extend the distribution of the “RSA single person allowance” to the whole country population (excluding the housing lump-sum component), being 470 € by month in 2016, financed by a flat tax system replacing several current basic social and family allowances as well as tax mechanisms.
- Maximised: distribute equally to the whole population the entirety of the social protection budget, including pensions and unemployment benefit. This would mean about 800 € per month.
- Dynamic: delete all employment incentives to companies and allowing a massive flexibility improvement in terms of minimum salary, in order to finance a basic income ranging between 500 € and 550 € by month. This would also replace a major part of the social and tax mechanisms but leave intact all insurance-based benefits.
The financial feasibility of scenario A is proven and it does not lead to a large upheaval of the redistribution operating in France. It allows a massive simplification of the social and tax systems, facilitating the daily life of the population and reducing operational costs. This scenario, like the following ones, eliminates many inconsistencies, iniquities, and numerous more-or-less known perverse effects. In terms of microeconomic analysis, it implies a massive evolution neither by an income effect nor by a substitution effect, unlike the other scenarios. However, when it comes to tax in france for non residents, one may have to pay tax on income that comes from French sources. In other words, if you work for a French company, even if you do not reside permanently in France, the income you earn will be taxed.
Scenario B designates the losers: those who contributed all along with their life for pensions and unemployment benefits and who would be left without those related benefits. Neither the AIRE nor the MFRB association support this scenario. Such an approach – if it proves to be meaningful – could be considered only through a very long migration phase from one system to another. This would need to be built cautiously, with the implication of the labor unions. Besides, the high level of the benefit leads to a high income effect, many people being possibly satisfied by this amount without seeking a complementary paid activity. The substitution effect contributes on the same way, due to the high level of contribution necessary to finance it.
Scenario C is probably the most audacious challenge, by lightening massively legal constrains framing the labour market, leaving it up to individual and collective negotiations. Citizens with better secured economic status are then on a better position to decide whether to accept or not professional opportunity offers, or to create their own activity by minimising their personal and family risks. The micro-economic analysis is more ambiguous, the income effect being stronger than in scenario A and on the contrary the substitution effect encouraging the activity thanks to a higher flexibility of the labour market.
Of course, the consensus that will emerge from a parliamentary work gathering representatives of all parties and the support of experts from diverse fields could finally be a combination of those three scenarios with potential integration of others approaches. In any case, no option presented in this note should be excluded without in-depth investigation.
Special thanks to Xuan-Mai Kempf for translating the text from French.
ENDNOTES
[1] https://www.kela.fi/web/en/press-releases/-/asset_publisher/LgL2IQBbkg98/content/universal-basic-income-options-to-be-weighed?_101_INSTANCE_LgL2IQBbkg98_redirect=%2Fweb%2Fen%2Fpress-releases
[2] https://www.vox.com/2015/12/8/9872554/finland-basic-income-experiment
[3] Some discussion papers from the field can be tough however well documented. For instance, in order to rebel against the home control by the family assistance administration: https://www.lesenrages.antifa-net.fr/la-caf-contre-les-femmes/
[4] Family allowances, premium for age, family complement for 3 children, basic allowance for child under three, school yearly allowance, RSA increase for each child, income tax reduction according to the number of children, tax reduction for child schooling.
[5] Solidarity allowance for elderly persons.
[6] Cf. the « Unique social allowance » of François Fillon or the IPP report: https://www.ipp.eu/publication/juin-2015-reformer-les-aides-personnelles-au-logement/
[7] RSA: Revenu de Solidarité Active, is the main French allowance providing a minimum guaranteed revenue.
[8] Based on the name of the first Nobel Prize for Economics winner, Jan Tinbergen, a supporter of an unconditional basic income, who stipulated that for each policy objective, one policy instrument is needed, and one only.
[9] Allocation Temporaire d’Attente.
by Vito Laterza | Dec 26, 2015 | News
On December 11, anti-poverty activist and scholar Jason Burke Murphy appeared on the popular David Pakman Show to discuss basic income and how to implement it in the United States. Murphy is assistant professor at Elms College. He serves on the National Committee of the U.S. Basic Income Guarantee Network and the BIEN Executive Committee.
The conversation touched on the reasons for introducing a universal basic income, and the practicalities of implementing it.
Murphy traced the beginnings of his basic income activism back to his experience of working with low-income communities in Arkansas in the 1990s:
All the neighbourhoods where I was knocking doors, almost nobody had a plan that would do anything significant in that neighbourhood. The city wanted to raise taxes to build the sports arena. The federal government has weapons purchases. And every time a job program was announced, the jobs were not a significant improvement, or they just were not coming to the areas we were working in. So this seemed the only thing that would actually get to the people I was working with.
Jason Murphy, BIEN Executive Committee.
Murphy’s anti-poverty perspective shapes his views on how to implement a basic income. He noted that the bureaucracy faced by those wishing to access current welfare benefits like food stamps is extremely complex. This means that many people who are entitled to these benefits do not actually receive them. Basic income would overcome these problems, and would also eliminate the poverty trap; as it is an unconditional payment, people would not have to worry about losing their benefits when they find employment.
Murphy stressed that implementing a basic income does not necessarily entail the immediate and total phasing out of other benefits:
We could keep things like food stamps or some disability services, there is nothing barring us from doing that. But we ought to have something that unconditionally belongs to everybody.
According to him, basic income should not be part of a race to the bottom:
It needs to be progressively funded from progressive taxation. Why? We have a serious problem with inequality and I see nothing that directly approaches that like a progressively funded basic income dividend.
Murphy also stressed the need for ecological taxes as another source of financing for basic income, as this would ensure that wealth would be redistributed in an environmentally sustainable way.
Watch the full video below.
