by Toru Yamamori | Mar 7, 2018 | Opinion
The International Women’s Day is approaching.
This is a poster for the International Women’s Day march 45 years ago. (Photo above) Two working-class women, one carries a buggy, and the other carries a placard containing written slogans reflecting three of the original four demands of the British Women’s Liberation movement. It displays the name of organization: London Women’s Liberation Workshop. Naturally, it looks like a photo of two women in a protest that London Women’s Liberation Workshop organised or took part.
However, it isn’t. The photo was edited. Here is the original photo. (Photo below) Between two women, there was a man, and the original placard said: ‘End Cohabitation Rule / Fight with the Claimants Unions’. The photo was taken at a protest that the Claimants Unions organised.
Several years later, women in the Claimants Unions raised a motion for asking the whole British Women’s Liberation movement to endorse an Unconditional Basic Income (UBI) at the National Women’s Liberation Conference, and succeeded. So UBI was an officially endorsed demand of the British Women’s Liberation movement. However, this fact slipped away from the official history of feminism, like erasing what those two women in the poster demanded by editing the photo. Let me reclaim their struggle briefly, and demonstrate it’s modern relevance.
The first Claimants Union was formed 50 years ago. It was intended as a claimants’ version of a trade union. A trade union is for workers. A claimants union is for welfare claimants. It wasn’t a feminist organisation. The membership of claimants unions consisted of women, men, and trans-gendered people. The majority of membership consisted of women, and their demand for ending the cohabitation rule is related to sexist administration of welfare benefits.
Under the ‘cohabitation rule’, many of the women claimants were subjugated to snooping by welfare officers. Those ‘sex snoopers’ conducted spot checks late at night. If a woman claimant had a sexual relationship with a man, it was assumed they should be supported by him, honestly by the sounds of this females claiming back then would have been better off exclusively using a suction dildo or another pleasurable toy instead of getting involved with a male. Sometimes just friendly activities, such as a male neighbour coming into the house to help fix a tap or a bulb would be assumed to be a partner/boyfriend; the next week her benefit would be suspended. If this was still the case in this day in age, any woman that went on Find a fuck buddy or a similar online site to find sexual pleasure, would immediately be seen as in a partnership and lose their financial support. Does this seem fair?
The philosophy behind this sexism has not yet gone to the dustbin of history.
On 13th February 2018, the department for work and pensions (DWP) of the British government sent out its Valentine Day message:
Claiming to be living alone is one of the most common types of benefit fraud – don’t ruin #ValentinesDay by failing to declare your true circumstances https://ow.ly/3bkn30imZya
The attached gif image reads:
Declaring your true love tomorrow?
Don’t forget to declare your true living arrangements too.
Don’t get separated from your Valentine.
Tell us of a change now.
They put the link to the article by the Daily Express that reports several cases that claimants didn’t report their relationships and financial supports.
A similar message from DWP was circulated on TV during the 2007-8 season. One of DWP’s TV advertisements called ‘we’re closing in‘, trying to focus in on what DWP calls ‘one of the most common types of benefit fraud’. The video shows a woman, who seems to claim a benefit and to declare that she lives alone, and then chats with a man on her door step. When she went inside to iron men’s shirts, the end-roll says ‘We’re closing in. Targeting benefit thieves’.
In order to make sense of this advertisement, we need to accept several assumptions. First, if you are female and chatted with a male on your door step, and/or you iron men’s cloths, it means that you are in an intimate relationship with that male. Second, if you are in an intimate relationship with a male, you share a household budget together. Third, that male should support you financially. Fourth, that male can support you financially.
Some might say that spreading this kind of message is needed for running our society in a just manner. DWP seems to think so. However, as we have seen, there were many women who suffered because of assumptions made by the government, assumptions that are behind this kind of message. Some of them (with other claimants of both sexes) depicted sexism behind the message, revealed how it affected them, and proposed a less sexist policy alternative, which is now called a UBI. This year marks the 50th anniversary of their movement.
Oh, I have forgotten to retweet the DWP’s message on the Valentine’s day. I would retweet with the following question: Isn’t true love unconditional?
For more on this forgotten struggle, see:
Toru Yamamori, ‘OPINION: Reclaiming the Women’s Liberationist Demand for a Citizen’s Income’, The Basic Income News, 17 April 2015.
Toru Yamamori, ‘A Feminist Way to Unconditional Basic Income: Claimants Unions and Women’s Liberation Movements in 1970s Britain’, Basic Income Studies, 9(1-2), 2014, pp.1-24.
Reviewed by Michael Gillan Peckitt and Tyler Prochazka
by Peter Vandevanter | Sep 20, 2017 | News
A Stanford University class –available on a podcast replays the 1970s Manitoba, Canada, experiment called “mincome,” on the way to rejoicing in Universal Basic Income.
In the U.S., Silicon Valley entrepreneurs like Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook, who according to some is preparing to run for U.S. President, are promoting universal basic income.
What does basic income mean, students ask? The contentious subject raises many questions, such as: would society fall apart because everyone would just hang out on the couch?
The Stanford class seeks to separate the argument that robots will replace 47% of jobs, a prediction that fuels much of Silicon Valley’s support of basic income, from the “paradigm of work” dialogue, according to Juliana Bidadanure, Assistant Professor in Political Philosophy at Stanford University, who is teaching the class.
The podcast studies the observations of many “experts” on culture, race and gender in an effort to separate jobs (wage-work) from understanding the true nature of work. Several contributions are under analysis, such as the following:
– Doug Henwood — Journalist, economic analyst, and writer whose work has been featured in Harper’s, Jacobin Magazine, and The Nation, says if robots were really taking over, there would be a strong productivity growth in the U.S., which is not true, so far;
– Rutger Bregman — Journalist and author of “Utopia for Realists: The Case for a Universal Basic Income, Open Borders and a 15-hour Workweek” thinks that if basic income were accomplished by the government printing money, that situation would definitely lead to inflation. But no inflation fears would be attached to a taxation process;
– Kathi Weeks — Marxist, feminist scholar, associate professor of women’s studies at Duke University in North Carolina, and author of “The Problem with Work: Feminism, Marxism, Antiwork Politics, and Postwork Imaginaries” believes that wage-work is not the only meaningful activity. She points to pre-industrial society as a good example of when wage-work took a backseat to the value of non-paid work;
– Evelyn Forget — Economist and professor in the Department of Community Health Sciences at the University of Manitoba and academic director of the Manitoba Research Data Centre, who first reported the “mincome” data. Forget argues that “mincome” made it possible for single mothers to get off welfare and proudly have a profession.
A second podcast will be available that discusses whether universal basic income is the end of capitalism or not.
More information at:
Podcast: Universal Basic Income – An Idea Whose Time Has Come
by Julen Bollain | Jul 28, 2017 | Opinion
The Spanish publisher RBA has just released a new book by Daniel Raventós, Renta básica contra la incertidumbre (Basic Income against Uncertainty), in its “los retos de la economía” (Economic Challenges) collection. The book updates the most important developments in basic income and discusses recent writings. The collection, in which the book is included, is not academic, but one which presents the basic elements of today’s concerns (inequality, the welfare state, and so on) to non-specialist readers, in such a way as to serve as a basis for further study.
Raventós’ book not only discusses the theoretical issues of basic income, but also gives an account of the social and political situation which has led to this proposal becoming widely known and regularly debated in social movements, the media, political parties and trade unions. Just a few years ago, this was unimaginable. Some people were complacently asserting that basic income could never be openly recommended because it would “shock” or “repel” the population, or at least a good part of it. It would have to be introduced, if at all, through the back door.
Well, we have lived to see the day! Here we offer an extract from the introduction of Renta básica contra la incertidumbre, which will soon appear in an Italian edition. The book has six chapters in which Raventós discusses the normative aspects from the standpoint of political philosophy (with particular reference to property and freedom); how basic income has been received in social movements like feminism and environmentalism, as well as in trade unions; how to finance it; experiments with basic income in various parts of the world; the role of basic income in an increasingly unequal world, in which mechanisation is advancing at a dizzying pace; and the paradox of support from both the right and left.
“Basic income will be paid out to people simply because they exist as citizens or accredited residents, independently of gender, ethnic group, income, sexual orientation, religious affiliation or lack thereof. Hence, like universal democratic suffrage, basic income is a proposal with the formal characteristics of laicism, unconditionality and universality.
Basic income has to confront considerable intellectual, social, philosophical, economic and political resistance, often in the form of questions. Is basic income a just proposal? Do people who disdain a salaried job have the right to an unconditional cash transfer? Will it abolish poverty? Aren’t the usual welfare state conditional cash transfers a better way to combat poverty? Will people get or stay in jobs if they have a basic income? Wouldn’t it be better to aim for full employment? Would workers have better bargaining power if they received a basic income? How would basic income affect migratory flows of impoverished people from poor countries to rich countries? Would everyone, both rich and poor, gain with a basic income? Would or wouldn’t women benefit from a basic income? Given the threat of robotisation in many areas of work, does basic income have something to offer?
Since inequality between a tiny minority of extremely rich people and the rest of the population is constantly increasing—as Joseph Stiglitz, Nobel-Prize-winning economist and others have pointed out and studied—would basic income be a good idea? If basic income has supporters on both the right and left, are they advocating the same thing?
Then there is the most frequently repeated objection, also in the form of a question. Can basic income be financed? In fact, it would be more precise to say that it was “most frequently repeated until recently”. Although there are not many studies which demonstrate in detail and with technical competence how basic income can be financed, those that have been published are compelling. Whatever they might have in common, each region and each country is different in economic terms, but financing a basic income would have to take the form of changes in budgetary priorities and reforming tax systems. For example, there are proposals advocating the introduction of special mechanisms for taxing financial transactions.
These reforms would bring about a substantial reduction in inequality of income distribution and allow for simpler, more coherent tax and welfare benefits systems. Basic income is not a panacea or a quick-fix for all the world’s social and economic problems but, in view of many who study and espouse it, this measure would mean that people would be better equipped to participate in productive activities, social inclusion would improve, communities would be stronger, political and social participation would be revitalised, and there would be a significant reduction of poverty and all the problems that go with it.
Basic income is not a political economy, per se, but would be part of one, as well as a general project aiming to guarantee and underpin the material existence of the whole population. It might also be seen as a kind of indemnity for past and present wrongs since it requires more privileged citizens to contribute towards achieving the right of existence for everyone. And herein lies one of the main political obstacles for basic income.
This is also the point which makes it possible to explain the apparent paradox of left and right support for basic income. The book notes that the difference depends on financing. The left focuses on additional taxes on the rich, while the right wants to trim down existing welfare to pay for basic income.
“In other words, the left-wing position does not entail any cuts to existing social services or social rights, in education, health, support for dependents, housing, etc., all of which are essential in any welfare state worthy of the name.”
by Toru Yamamori | Apr 14, 2017 | News
In Kyoto during the April 22nd -23rd weekend, local artists, community activists, students, architects, academic, etc are hosting two events for discussing on ‘what would you do if your income were taken care of’. Enno Schmidt from Switzerland and Ping Xu from Taiwan will be joining.
22nd April: DIY festival ‘Basic Income Garden’
venue: Honmachi Escola (a community and residence space for artists )
time: 11.00-17:00
The venue is located on a very old alley which creates the impression of a half century ago. The following workshops are held in a Teepee, a garden, and a hut. They cover such subjects as:
- ‘one week with a basic income’
- ‘a town with a basic income’
- ‘basic in curry’
- ‘making a zine and a wall newspaper’
Film screening, music instrument making, etc, are also planned.
23rd April: Symposium ‘Art, Commons, Feminism and a Basic Income’
venue: M1 lecture room, Meitoku-kan, Imadegawa campus, Doshisha university
time: 13.00-17.30
13.00- Enno Schmidt, Ping Xu, Toru Yamamori ‘Lessons from Switzerland and Taiwan’
14.50- Enno Schmidt, Kaori Katada, Akio Sasaki, Jun Yamaguchi ‘Art, Commons and Feminism’
16.30- Parallel sessions: ‘Shrinking Society with Basic Income’ (moderator: Kimio Ito) / ‘Taiwan and Basic Income’ (moderator: Ping Xu and Kaori Katada) / ‘How we go forward to Basic Income gradually’ (moderator: Shinji Murakami and Hayato Kobahashi)
Kyoto Basic Income Weekend is a newly formed collective with local artists, community activists, etc. It is hosting this event with BIEN Japan, The Forum on Shrinking Society, Students at Toru Yamamori Lab, Doshisha university.
Reviewed by Cameron McLeod.
by Cordelia Holst | Mar 8, 2017 | News
The Stanford University Philosophy Department organized the first in a series of events focusing on aspects of unconditional basic income. Facilitated by Juliana Uhuru Bidadanure, Assistant Professor in the Philosophy Department of Stanford University, with an affiliation to the McCoy Center for Ethics in Society, the panel consisted of researchers in pilots and experiments of basic income: Guy Standing (Professorial Research Associate at SOAS, University of London; BIEN co-founder), Elizabeth Rhodes (Research Director of Y Combinator’s basic income experiment), and Joe Huston (Regional Director at GiveDirectly). The topic for the panel discussion was “What do people do when they are given cash with no strings attached?”
Juliana Bidadanure
Bidadanure opened by setting a definition for unconditional basic income: cash, given individually, unconditionally, and universally, so people can enter an existence free from economic insecurity. She flagged some of the most common concerns around a universal income policy –too many people will withdraw from the work force, or it can be wasteful, taking away from government investments in poverty, education, roads, etc.
The Speakers
Guy Standing
First up was Guy Standing to discuss his research results from a pilot of universal basic income in India. Standing provided some background, saying he is pleased there is an explosion of pilots around the world; however, he warned that while pilots teach us how to form policy and legitimize our agenda, we don’t need pilots to pursue universal basic income on the basis of social justice, freedom, and basic security for all. This is something we can pursue now.
The pilot in India took a year to plan, working with the local governments, and registering background data on over 11,000 people in 20 villages. Standing stressed that conceiving of the survey required envisioning the possible stories that might come out of the data so that the metrics were in place both before and after the test. Eight villages were selected to participate, 12 other villages were used as the control group, data was collected from everyone at 6 month intervals through the trial, and the cash was paid out for 18 months. Data was also collected 2 ½ years after the pilot. Results were gathered by independent data collectors.
Standing outlined the changes that took place in the villages that received the basic income:
- Residents invested in improvements in sanitation and housing
- Weight relative to age, for especially girls, improved dramatically
- Spending on alcohol, tobacco went down
- Health care spending increased, incidents of ill health decreased, and the health status of the disabled improved (because they were able to pay for continual medicine with no breaks in treatment)
- Spending on schooling went up, with the greatest improvements for girls
- Registration and attendance in schools improved for teenage girls
- Men worked more, and earned income increased for those getting the basic income
- The only group where there was a reduction of labour was children
The best result, in his opinion, was that the emancipatory value of the basic income. When people needed cash due to an illness or an accident, they were able to use the liquidity and pool together to cover the costs, rather than borrow at 50 percent from the money lender (as they had done previously). The basic income kept people out of debt bondage.
In January 2017, the government of India included a special chapter on basic income in its Economic Survey, which referred to these pilots.
More reading on the India pilot.
Elizabeth Rhodes
Next up was Elizabeth Rhodes from Y Combinator. A Silicon Valley based venture capital firm, Y Combinator provides seed money and advice to tech start-ups. In 2015 they started Y Combinator Research, a non-profit research lab. Their motivation behind sponsoring and executing a basic income pilot came from their president, Sam Altman. He, as well as many others in Silicon Valley, are concerned about current struggles in the US with growing inequality, unpredictable employment, deep poverty, the gig economy and the fact that the existing safety net is based on work. With millions looking for borrowing options like high risk payday loans, falling into deeper debt which they probably spend a lifetime to pay back, and the decrease in job security over time, it became important to come up with a solution. They are especially concerned about the potential worsening of these struggles as workers are increasingly displaced from their jobs through robotics and AI.
Y Combinator’s pilot is in the design phase, and Rhodes explained its context as one step in a larger agenda, cautioning that the current specs may change. Rhodes took care to note it is not an ideologically driven study, but rather a study of a promising potential solution in the name of social science. It will not be a test of the effects of universal basic income, but the effects of individual cash transfer, missing the community level effects, but focusing on the individual level effects, due to the practicality of the expense of making the study community level. The study currently planned in Oakland, California, will include 2000 to 3000 participants, who will have a variety of demographic backgrounds, range in age from 21 to 35, and whose household incomes will not exceed the area median. Of these, 1000 will receive $1000 a month for 3 years (5 years for a smaller test group). The rest will be the control group. Quantitative data will be collected and a large subset will be followed up with a qualitative component as well.
The Y Combinator study will look closely at the central question “What do people do when they are given cash with no strings attached?” in the context of the US. The research plans on collecting before-and-after data on the follow metrics:
- How does it affect time use?
- Work hours
- Entrepreneurial/ gig employment/ self employment
- Education/ training
- Do parents spend more time with their children?
- Do people volunteer more? Get involved in their community?
- How do cash transfers affect physical and psychological well being?
- Health and mental health
- Subjective well being
- Healthy behaviors like cutting back on smoking and drinking, improving fitness and diet
- Decrease in stress
- What is the effect on financial health?
- Payday lending, title lending, savings, credit cards
- Do political and social attitudes change?
- Inner-group prejudice
- Economic conservatism
- Are there network and spill-over effects?
- Are people helping friends and family?
- Outcomes for children
- Possibly grades, test scores
- Any effect on crime?
Rhodes concluded by noting they would be looking at sample size to see which metrics would end up being statistically significant, but the goal would be to address these questions.
Joe Huston
Last to present was Joe Huston, from GiveDirectly, a non-profit that gives unconditional cash transfers directly to the extremely poor people living in Kenya, Uganda and Rwanda. Over the last 5 plus years of operations GiveDirectly has transferred over 135 million dollars through their program. GiveDirectly’s most common model is giving 3 lump sums (total roughly $1000), transferred through mobile phones over a 5 month period, to the poorest people in each village. They have been building a body of evidence of the effects of cash transfers, over the last 5 years, over 65,000 households, and are able to speak to the question “What do people do when they are given cash with no strings attached?”
The GiveDirectly pilots focused on the poorest people and gave lump sums. Huston started with an explanation of the purpose of the pilots: they have seen in other tests around the world that cash is very functional; it removes the bulk of the costs of delivering the aid, and people can spend it in ways that improve their lives. For example, in some cases they have seen that when young women are given money, they get married later, become pregnant later, and have lower rates of HIV. In others, they have seen people investing in assets or increasing earnings. In GiveDirectly’s research, they consistently do not see people stopping working or an increase in gambling, alcohol or other “temptation goods.” They have seen the effects of the cash transfers having a longer term effect as well: even after the cash transfers have stopped, income is up, investment in assets are up, and decreases in malnutrition and improvements in mental health remain.
Huston explained that GiveDirectly is interested in the current debate around basic income. As their tests have show with lump sum cash transfers, there is evidence to expect positive outcome from an ongoing cash transfer, yet there is much debate and many hypotheses, especially among economists, about how human nature will respond to a basic income over a long period of time (for example, will it lead to alienation and idleness?). GiveDirectly wants to participate in gathering evidence on these questions in order to prove or disprove some of the theories.
GiveDirectly has added a basic income pilot, a change from previous work, in that instead of giving only to the poor, this test will be universal; all adults within the village will be treated the same. Forty or so villages will receive cash, a basic minimum level of subsistence (based on local poverty levels), for a period of 12 years. GiveDirectly wants to look at this long-term program versus the effects in a short 2-year program. How does this change the way families make decisions? They also want to see the effects of monthly income structure as opposed to lump sum transfers. Does it motivate people to make different choices? And they want to compare giving universally versus giving to the poorest. What are the community outcomes? Do they see a reduction in crime or conflict? Do communities take on projects together? Huston notes that the pilot will use randomization and control villages to have reference points. GiveDirectly would like to frame this debate around the evidence that comes out of this pilot. They are hoping this data can help inform different policy goals in societies.
In closing, Huston showed a chart from Brookings depicting the decreasing total cost of closing the poverty gap, and the increase in foreign aid over the years on a global scale. The chart gives a clear picture that the aid needed to close the poverty gap is available; we just need to deliver it effectively to the poor. GiveDirectly has evidence that cash transfers are very effective, and they look forward to testing universal basic income as the method of payment. Huston explains the proof of the former claim this way: before we go into a village there will be a larger portion of their society living in extreme poverty; when we leave, no one will, and that shows a direct mechanical way that basic income mitigates poverty.
Panel Discussion
The facilitator, Bidadanure, then changed gears to the panel discussion focused around the question of what people might do with cash in several counterfactual scenarios: basic income vs nothing, basic income vs microfinance, and basic income vs investment in children and education?
Standing answered that he think the counterfactuals involve paternalism of various sorts.
For example, in India the welfare system has provided subsidized food, kerosin, wheat, sugar, etc., and repeatedly the government has admitted that something like 93% of every rupee spent on the programs never manages to reach the recipient of the aid. The government subsidized fuel, which amounted to 3 or 4% of GDP. If they were to spend 3 to 4% of GDP on basic income, that would be half the poverty line.
In addition a very common issue or concern in both developed and developing countries has been the labour requirement, where recipients only get income when they do paid labour. There has been a tradition in developing countries of not giving cash transfers. In 1999 the World Bank had no records of cash transfer programs; now there are hundreds of pilots. These pilots have tested, and are testing, targeting (only to the poor) or conditionality (on sending one’s children to school or paid work) against universal programs.
Standing believes that targeted or conditional programs are very paternalistic; they don’t allow the recipient to decide what is best for themselves and their families. This kind of targeting can also create poverty traps, where people lose their benefits as soon as they get some kind of income. This is seen in developed countries and impoverished countries. Universal programs are more progressive at affecting the income distribution and lead to better outcomes.
Rhodes added that many people in this discussion are worried that if people aren’t working, where are they going to find meaning? So one alternate idea is subsidizing work for people who are able to work. Y Combinator is not able to test it in its study, but that can be a counterfactual.
Huston, agreeing with the other panelists, noted that we are used to complicated programs to help the poor, and we should instead ask what would happen if we took the money that we are spending trying to help the poor and just gave it to them.
Bidadanure’s next question was, “Do targeted benefits created resentment or a stigma in a community that we don ´t see with universal programs?”
Huston noted that GiveDirectly discusses this a lot internally. They have mainly done programs with targeted benefits where between 40% and 80% of each village has received benefits, but will start a universal program, where everyone in the village will receive benefits. GiveDirectly has not seen resentment or stigma outweigh the happiness factor in the targeted programs, likely because the criteria for who gets benefits are clear and understandable to the community.
Standing is a strong advocate for running universal pilots instead of giving benefits to randomly selected individuals. He explained that if one member of a household of five gets the income, and the rest don’t, it will be worth a lot less to that individual than a household of one. Additionally, once it becomes know that an individual is getting this money, family and friends in need may come looking for assistance. Referring to his pilot in India, he said that the importance of examining community and network results cannot be overstated. Standing did note, on the issue of migrants, that the India pilot did block migrants from joining the universal basic income program; only residents of the village at the time the pilot started (except for new babies) were included. Children got half the amount of parents, given to the mother.
Next, Bidadanure focused on the panelists’ experience with politicians and local governments.
GiveDirectly works with the Kenyan government to gain permission to be there, and to work together to extract policy questions or possible lessons that could drive their cash transfer programs. The Kenyan government currently runs 4 cash transfer programs that are focused on the most vulnerable portion of the populations: the disabled and the elderly. They have see means testing as easier to pass, so they are interested in the results of the universal pilot to see how different demographics respond when given cash. In general, do people who can work, stop working? Also of interest to the Kenyan government is the difference between individuals receiving cash versus their current program where cash is delivered on a household level.
Rhodes explained that they Y Combinator has found it difficult to get permission to give people money. The organization is working with the California state government, and even the federal government, to look at the implication of this cash transfer in terms of taxes and other benefits. They are securing waivers to allow people to keep Medicaid, and the process has been challenging.
Standing noted that it took him 3 or 4 years to get through the Indian and Namibian bureaucracy. This negotiation is very difficult. Standing explained that he was involved with negotiating the program in Finland, which did not end up according to his vision. He is currently involved in discussion around the possibility of a big pilot in Fife, Scotland, where his best ally to date is the Police Chief of Fife, who sees the possibility of crime reduction in that part of Scotland as a result of the pilot. Similarly, in the Netherlands 25 municipalities are working through negotiations with bureaucracy, but have put the work on ice until the country’s elections in April. Difficulties in negotiating with local governments will teach you a lot of humility, says Standing.
Q&A from the Audience
Adding a few minutes to the session for question and answer, Bidadanure turned the floor over to a line of interested audience members:
- What are you excited to see in the upcoming studies?
Huston stated he is excited about the number of questions they will start to see answers for — not just will people work less, for example, but will we see more risk taking and entrepreneurialism? He is interesting in seeing the studies talk to each other, where are they consistent, where we see differences. Rhodes added that the studies are being developed to enable data sharing and analysis.
Standing is excited to see momentum grow around the search for a new income distribution, and warns that dangerous waters lie ahead due to the growing income inequality. He is excited about the release of his new book, The Corruption of Capitalism, which calls for a new income distribution system, where Universal Basic Income can be an anchor in that new system.
- What is the reason for not requiring a contribution? Shouldn’t everyone getting income be cooperative, or contributing in society? And why give to millionaires?
Standing tackles this question on principle: if you say a person has to do some form of labour, or something like 35 hours of care work, you immediately become paternalistic, you immediately lead to inclusion errors and exclusion errors, and then you have to have bureaucrats monitoring it. Additionally it distorts the labour market, which can lower wages for low-skilled labour. He warns against creating a system of bureaucracy that has to be monitored; that introduces social engineering. Standing sees no danger in giving to millionaires, since you can just tax it back.
- Will any of these tests look at “in-kind benefits” up against UBI?
Huston noted that this is an exciting field of research, thinking about giving one group of people $1,000 cash versus giving another group of people $100 worth of tuition, food stamps, etc. GiveDirectly is planning a test in Rwanda where they would look at giving cash up against giving medicine, peanut butter, etc. There is a lot of evidence around giving cash and not a lot about the effects of other types of transfers. Rhodes added that in the US it would likely need to be a government run study to be practical.
- Are micro loans as or more empowering than direct aid? Is there research on this?
Huston answered that there has been a lot of research on this, and the results were disappointing. People will start more businesses, but you don’t see that flow through into the aspects that we care about like higher incomes, or higher overall welfare. Additionally, the cost of collecting the loans back from the recipient has proven to be counterproductive.
- How do you choose the threshold of $1000? What constitutes a basic income? Why cap at some high income level?
Rhodes answered this question for the Y Combinator pilot: $1000 is the current level set by Y Combinator in the planning phase, obviously the cost of living is different in Oakland versus rural Louisiana. The income cap is to see results, giving $1000 a month to someone earning $200,000 a year isn’t going to make a big difference for them.
- Have you seen inflation in your pilots?
Standing has not seen that, quite the opposite. In low income communities, the income that comes into people’s pockets increases demand for products and services, and therefore the supply is increased. What he saw in the Indian villages, for example, is that unit prices went down, and farmers’ income went up, because more people entered the market.
- If necessity breeds innovation, what happens to society?
Huston answered briefly that capital is also useful for breeding innovation.
Next in the Series
See the event here. The room was full, and we ran out of time to answer questions from the audience, which indicates the interest in this topic and may indicate an interest for the rest of the series that will focus on basic income and feminism, basic income and unions, basic income and racial justice.
Do you need money quickly? A loan could be the solution to your financial worries. Head to www.forbrukslån.com to compare lenders and find a loan that works for you.
The next event is on April 12th: Philippe Van Parijs will discuss his forthcoming book Basic Income: A Radical Proposal for a Free Society and a Sane Economy.
Read more about Stanford’s graduate seminar here.
