A European Citizens‘ Initiative (ECI) in favor of an EU UBI has been started on 25 September 2020. The collection period currently ends on 25 June 2022.
The ECI proposes “… to establish the introduction of unconditional basic incomes throughout the EU which ensure every person’s material existence and opportunity to participate in society as part of its economic policy. This aim shall be reached while remaining within the competences conferred to the EU by the Treaties.“ Further, the ECI requests “… the EU Commission to make a proposal for unconditional basic incomes throughout the EU, which reduce regional disparities in order to strengthen the economic, social and territorial cohesion in the EU. This shall realize the aim of the joint statement by the European Council, the European Parliament and the European Commission, stated in 2017, that ‘the EU and its member states will also support efficient, sustainable and equitable social protection systems to guarantee basic income’ in order to combat inequality.“
More than 169 thousand have signed the ECI as of 12 January 2022. But one million signatures are required. BIEN life members, BIEN affiliates in the EU and other UBI-Advocates in the EU may support the ECI-UBI-campaign at the following URL: https://de.eci-ubi.eu/.
Advocates of the ECI UBI are also active on the online platform of the Conference on the Future of Europe. It is not only in three interim reports on the online platform that the proposal on Unconditional Basic Incomes throughout the EU is highlighted. The UBI also has a high approval rate at the Europe Talks of major newspapers in Europe.
In order to make UBI (and the European Citizens’ Initiative) even more popular, endorsements and positive comments on the ECI proposal may be given on the online platform of the Conference on the Future of Europe: https://futureu.europa.eu/processes/Economy/f/10/proposals/1556.
“The Executive Committee of the Basic Income Earth Network (BIEN) which is a global network of social scientists and others studying basic income models across the world, appreciates and salutes Mr. Lee Jae-myung for proposing in his manifesto in the context of the forthcoming Presidential elections in March-April 2022, a progressive and feasible basic income model for the Republic of Korea, one that would assist humanity in the march against global inequality and global warming.
A Basic Income successfully implemented in the Republic of Korea would provide her people with a secure layer of income, would enhance opportunities for education about Basic Income around the world, and would provide significant opportunities for research about the desirability, feasibility, and implementation of a Basic Income system.
It would improve the status and economic position of women and youth and establish the Republic of Korea as a resilient society able to deal well with future pandemics and other economic shocks. If implemented successfully, this model will stand as an example worthy of emulation across the world.”
(Korean Translation)
“전 세계적으로 기본소득 모델을 연구하는 사회과학자들 등으로 이루어진 기본소득지구네트워크 (BIEN) 집행위원회는 다가올 대통령 선거에서 이재명 후보가 대한민국에서 진보적이고 실현 가능한 기본소득 모델을 공약으로 제안한 것에 대해 환영하며 경의를 표한다. 이 제안은 전 지구적 불평등과 지구 온난화에 맞서는 노력에서 인류에게 도움이 될 것이다.
대한민국에서 기본소득이 성공적으로 실시된다면 대한민국 사람들은 소득의 한 층을 보장받게 될 것이며, 전 세계적으로는 기본소득에 관한 교육의 기회를 확대할 것이며, 기본소득제의 바람직함, 실현 가능성, 실행 등에 관해 중요한 연구의 기회를 가지게 될 것이다.
이 기본소득 모델은 여성과 청년의 지위 및 경제적 처지를 개선할 것이며, 대한민국이 장래의 팬데믹과 기타 경제적 충격을 감당할 수 있는 탄력 있는 사회가 되게 할 것이다. 이 기본소득 모델이 성공적으로 실행된다면 전 세계적으로 따라 할 만한 모범이 될 것이다”.
The Denver Basic Income Project (DBIC) is the first major effort in the United States to study the impact of providing guaranteed income to individuals who are unhoused, as a means of accelerating the path toward stability. It was founded by Denver Colorado businessman and philanthropist Mark Donovan and seeded with $500,000 capital gains he made by selling his Tesla stock. DBIC has already raised an additional $3.3M on top of this to provide unconditional basic income to people experiencing homelessness in Denver, accompanied by a rigorous randomized control trial run by Denver University’s Center for Housing and Homelessness Research.
Donovan believes it is not necessary to wait for the government to come in and fix things, as Tesla has shown in the automotive industry. What is needed is to offer better solutions. Direct cash is increasingly seen as one of the most effective ways to fight poverty and economic inequality. DBIP plans to replicate its program in 20 more cities in 2022 and 200 in 2023.
Donovan recounts that by 2020 he was already familiar with the powerful efficacy of guaranteed income. Then he started to do a deeper dive into the literature and found astounding results like those of the New LeafProject in Vancouver and the Stockton Economic Empowerment Demonstration. He believes the current social safety net in the United States is not only highly inefficient and ineffective, it is also demeaning and disrespectful to those it seeks to serve. The number of people who are unhoused is growing despite the enormous resources dedicated to this challenge. The concept of basic income appealed to him, as it acknowledges the fundamental injustice and inequalities built into our economic systems while also making a powerful statement of trust and respect to individuals it serves. It is a direct investment in people that has the power to not only alleviate enormous human suffering but also unleash massive amounts of latent potential. It also has the potential to be an enormous stimulus to the economy.
Guaranteed income programs are popping up everywhere in the US. It is time to expand beyond local pilot programs and embrace a nationwide Citizen Dividend, an annual distribution of a share of business profits to every American, to beat back against rising economic inequality and hold true to our deepest American values.
Three years ago, perhaps the only widely known American guaranteed income program was the Alaska Permanent Fund which doles out annual payments to every Alaskan funded from state oil and gas revenue. In recent years, pilot programs giving $500 – $1,000 a month to low-income residents have been implemented or proposed in Stockton, California; Jackson, Mississippi; Phoenix; Pittsburgh; and Chicago.
Perhaps the simplest, widest-reaching, and easiest to implement form of guaranteed income we could adopt would be the Citizen Dividend. The debate around guaranteed income often boils down to two fundamental questions: Who deserves the income and how can we pay for them? With a national Citizen Dividend, we answer both of those questions clearly and compellingly.
First, who deserves this income? We all do. No business in this country turns a profit without using wealth we all own together – our natural resources; our societal resources like our roads, our public safety, and our education system; and our inherited systems like our Constitution and our courts. Every citizen has an equal ownership stake in these forms of collective wealth. Therefore, each American deserves some slice of the profits realized by their use. Sure, individual hard work, talent, and good strategy help bring about business success. Imagine though trying to create value without energy, roads, courts, and an educated workforce. It would be downright impossible.
Second, how do pay for this income? A Citizen Dividend is funded through one form of our collective prosperity – business profits. Businesses should retain 95% of their profits to invest in growth, return wealth to private shareholders, and pay the government for the services our society needs (e.g. taxes). But 5% of those profits should be returned to each American in recognition of the collective wealth that was used to create those profits.
Easy to understand and clear in its funding, a Citizen Dividend would have a meaningful positive impact on the lives of Americans and on the fabric of our economy. Using 2015 estimates on business net income, a Citizen Dividend could return $570 to each American every year – or over $2,200 for a family of four. This payment – which amounts to nearly two months of rent or food for the median American family – could stave off some of the harshest impacts of rising inequality. But perhaps more importantly, it would challenge the false narrative that profit is created merely through individual action and that wealth should be hoarded by those who have the opportunity to do so. Instead, it would reinforce a deeper American story, that we are our best as a nation when we come together across all our differences to blaze a trail toward a common future.
A Citizen Dividend breathes life into the spirit of our nation’s first motto – E Pluribus Unum – out of many, one. It is time we recognize what truly belongs to every American and be bold in our willingness to build an economy that reflects our best values. It is time for a Citizen Dividend.
Brian C. Johnson is the CEO of Equality Illinois and the author of Our Fair Share: How One Small Change Can Create a More EquiBrian C. Johnson has served in education and advocacy, community organizing, and political activism at local and national levels for two decades, dedicated to the American promise of fairness for all. He’s been featured on CNN and in The Washington Post, USA Today, and TheNew York Times. Johnson currently serves as the CEO of Equality Illinois, one of the nation’s most successful LGBTQ civil rights organizations. He lives with his husband and their daughter in the Lincoln Square neighborhood of Chicago, Illinois.
The Freiburg Institute for Basic Income Studies (FRIBIS), a network of several faculties at the University of Freiburg, has expanded with a new international team which focuses on basic income and gender issues, pulled together by Enno Schmidt. It uses as a starting point, the study by Prof. Toru Yamamori on the British women’s liberation movement in 1970’s, which was already calling for a UBI. According to Yamamori, grassroots feminist economic and political thought forms a basis of the demand for basic income, and the beginning of this can be seen during the women’s liberation movement in 1970’s Britain. For this reason, the relationship between grassroots feminist economic and political thought and basic income deserves to be re-examined, as this area has often been overlooked.
As a comprehensive research and design goal, the initiative seeks to examine grassroots feminist economic understanding and behavior and its potential in forming a new social contract with a particular focus on asic income. Based on this main principle, to amplify the voice of women in basic income research and design, the initiative seeks three objectives.. First, the further elaboration of Toru Yamamori’s study with final book publication, supported in particular by the collaboration of Barb Jacobson and Dr. Liz Fouksman in the UK. Secondly, a study and documentation on the question of women’s understanding of and behaviour in the economy and cooperation with members of the Self-Employed Women’s Association (SEWA) in India under guidance of Renana Jhabvala. This will be supplemented by similar empirical research by Liz Fouksman in South Africa and Prof. Dr. Kaori Katada in Japan and by the experiences, data and results of basic income projects in Canada by Chloe Halpenny. As a third goal, enriched by the outputs of the other 2 goals, the initiative aims to embed their relevance in a potential new social contract for real gender equality. This is planned to be introduced as a pilot project, in a yet to be determined region in the USA under the guidance of Prof. Dr. Almaz Zelleke and others to come. However, the team is also open to new influences and directions that arise during the collaboration, for example an additional focus on China.
For these purposes, the research programme will take place in 4 stages. The first phase will include a manifesto and presentations based on research which is already ongoing and which will start shortly. At this stage, the data, interviews and questionnaires of the participating researchers will be used. In the second phase, the focus will be on the collective reconstruction and articulation of “grassroots feminist economic and political thought”. At this stage, the experiences of relevant people in the research team will be used. In the third stage, the aim is to determine the positions of the above research in academic disciplines. In this sense, theoretical and anthropological studies will be carried out at this stage and the theoretical infrastructure of the outputs of the first two stages will be established. Based on the presentation and evaluation of the nature of women’s cooperation and work, and women’s perspectives on work and economy, this will significantly benefit from the experience of SEWA, and the Basic Income Pilot Projects for women in New Delhi and the 2009-10 pilot project in Madhya Pradesh. The fourth and final stage as envisaged so far, will include the implementation of UBI and new laws in a community in the USA.
In summary, the project aims to combine the introduction of a basic income and the creation of a new social contract from the point of view of women. The output that is intended to be reached at the end of the project is the draft of a new social contract. In other words, the main goal here is to present in a holistic way a draft programme for a society based on unconditional basic income, which is necessary to bring women to equal status with men.
The research team consists of Dr. Liz Fouksman, Chloe Halpenny, Prof. Dr. Kaori Katada, Prof. Dr. Toru Yamamori, Prof. Dr. Almaz Zelleke and as actors from social society Barb Jacobson and Renana Jhabvala. PhD student Jessika Schulz is organisational coordinator of the team on the part of FRIBIS.
Further information about the initiative and the project can be found at the following links:
