by BIEN | Oct 2, 2016 | News, Testimonies
How’d you get an interest in Basic Income (BI)?
My interest in BI started back around 2013 after reading a Reason article. It described how a BI would provide a much more efficient social safety net. It intrigued me at the time and over the next couple of years I periodically would seek out the latest research on BI. I was hooked by a documentary on the basic income featuring Guy Standing.
Standing’s discussion of the “precariat” and the need to counter the challenges of automization convinced me of the BI’s approach. The day after watching the documentary, I reached out to Standing to see how I could get involved with BIEN. He put me in touch with Karl Widerquist and André Coelho. André was my trainer and his patience and encouragement is what kept me on with the team initially.
What makes the BI plan of action unique?
That is a difficult question because there are many ways to implement the BI. I think what unites the BI movement, though, is that we want to fundamentally alter people’s relationship with the market and the government. We do not have to have a job in the traditional sense to contribute to ourselves and society. The basic income liberates us to take on the projects or activities that we are truly passionate about, instead of being forced into a certain line of employment.
There are a host of reasons I think this is good for sustainable economic development. But more importantly, this would be a positive development for human happiness. A basic income would also reorient our relationship with the government. Instead of ceding individual choice to government bureaucrats, a basic income provides freedom of choice to everyone. Centralization of power and resources swallows our humanity, and basic income is an enormous step in bringing that power back to the people.
What are the most common success stories of BI or similar programs?
What has been overlooked in the mainstream press (and what I first tell people skeptical of BI) is the recent release of a meta-analysis of 15 years of cash transfer research across 165 studies. It looks at the best research available and determines there is a consistent reduction in poverty from these cash transfers. It also determined there is no real evidence of lowered work hours while showing some evidence that cash transfers may increase work hours and intensity. For BI advocates, I think it is important to get familiar with this meta-analysis.
In the United States, the most famous example of an actual BI-like program is the Alaskan Permanent Fund. This program is funded by Alaska’s oil reserves and is provided to nearly every Alaskan resident. The experience in Alaska, and most BI programs, is that the policy rarely creates negative unintended consequences and has a much greater potential to create a positive ripple effect throughout society.
What is your work on BI?
I am the features editor for BI News. I will personally write opinion, interview and news-based articles. I have the privilege of working with and seeking out some amazing writers and thinkers, helping to edit and post their features articles. When the need arises, I help to train newcomers to BI News, including contributors and editors. I am currently in Taiwan completing a Master’s degree where I am working with the Taiwanese Basic Income organization. For the future, I have some ideas to promote basic income in Taiwan that will be forthcoming.
What are the main lessons for about BI that should be out in the public domain more?
Everyday around the world there are billions of interactions, transactions and events that would be made simpler by the establishment of the basic income. It helps to take these billions of events and simplify it to one individual to better understand the depth of change this policy would have on everyday life. Among those close to me, I can think of a clear instance where a basic income would dramatically improve a family’s circumstances, much more so than traditional welfare.
Think of how a basic income would help the person with a sick mother, the person whose car gets totaled, the person who wants to take more time to raise their child, the person who wants to find a better suited job…All of these situations would be more easily managed with a basic income, especially for those who are of modest means. Perhaps more significant are the new and unpredictable opportunities created by basic income that would otherwise never occur.
Who are the people to watch – the major BI players?
Here are a couple that come to mind:
Matt Zwolinski is my favorite libertarian scholar, primarily because of his work on the basic income. He has done a lot to bring on the libertarian side of the political spectrum to consider the basic income. The next generation will have significantly more libertarians than the current generation, so I think the philosophical marriage on this issue with libertarians will be increasingly important as we pursue the basic income’s implementation.
Kate McFarland is one of my favorite writers at BI News and a great person to work with. I think she will be a big figure in the BI movement in the coming years because of her non-stop dedication to the cause.
Any advice for would-be policy makers or activists about strategies for the implementation of BI?
During this stage, I think it is important that we maintain healthy disagreement in the movement. There are a lot of different motivations behind the BI which manifests in an array of different implementation methods. Despite this, I hope that we can retain this amazing civility that has united people from such diverse philosophical and personal backgrounds thus far.
On the long-term policymaking level, my hope is that in those areas we think must be earmarked (particularly healthcare and education). We will still utilize the basic income framework. For example, universal education savings accounts and health savings accounts (which there is evidence that these two programs are already effective where they are used). The basic income has the potential to really revolutionize the way we think about government services. The government is really efficient at issuing checks to everyone, but it is not great with creating innovative programs. That is why a basic income framework creates an ideal social safety net, as it brings the security of government distribution and the innovation of the market.
by Roland Duchatelet | Sep 30, 2016 | Opinion
During the 20th century, the increase in purchasing power of the workers in Western Europe was negotiated by the labour unions and paid for by the spectacular increase in productivity of agriculture and industry: we made more and better products with less workers. This yielded generous increases of net salaries and on top of that it allowed governments to pay for schools and health care. This resulted in the general belief that the wealth of a nation is the result of labour, because it paid not only for salaries, but also for social security and other government spending. Since then, the world elite believes that labour participation is the basis of our social security system and our wealth.
There are a few problems with this belief, however.
The first problem is that with the collapse of communism in 1989, the size of the economy grew from 1 billion participants (Europe, the US, Japan and a few small countries) to 6 billion. Cheap labour supply became abundant while the world wide bargaining power of labour unions became irrelevant. Many manufacturing companies moved their production to low cost countries. The “low cost” of these countries was mainly due to the insignificant tax on labour there, compared to Western Europe, where the labour tax was between 100 and 200% of the (higher) net salaries. The saving of the high labour tax was a major cost reduction driver for companies which moved their production, much more than the net salaries of the highly qualified, well trained, loyal, productive local workers which lost their jobs. Political Europe was sleeping apparently, not realising that the corresponding financing of the social security was moving away with the factories.
The second problem is that increasingly machines, robots and computers used in production of goods and services decrease the need for human workers.
The third problem is that social security contributions from the rapidly increasing public and subsidised employment are not real, because the wallet which collects them is the same wallet which pays them: the state.
The fourth problem is that life expectancy is growing, affecting the cost for the state paid pensions. Since health care cost is much higher in old age, the cost of state paid health care increases as well.
The fifth problem is that income from savings is trending toward zero. Citizens owning property are mostly excluded from social aid provided by the state, since they are supposed to derive an income from their property. This induces a new type of poverty. Moreover, the decrease in income from capital affects overall consumer spending, also within the working class.
As a consequence, the purchasing power of the working class has stalled in Western Europe and the US since 2000. This is hidden in the national accounts because in those figures the “income” which households derive from labour is the “gross” income including social security contributions and income taxes. The latter have risen.
Some political parties start to plead the reduction of social security benefits, which would be the start of a negative spiral.
The labour tax based system is structurally unstable. When sales decrease due to economic slowdown and workers are laid off, their income decreases so they buy less leading to further sales decreases and job losses in other businesses. The “Labour Church” will tell you that the central bank then should decrease the interest rate to stimulate investment and spending. This is speculative and slow to start effect. In any case, the interest rate is now zero and hence cannot be reduced anymore. The “Labour Church” system is in deep trouble. They seem to hope for a miracle: I see no “Plan”.
There is however one stabilising factor, our social security, which makes people continue to spend money when they have no work. This hints to the fact that “Purchasing Power” could be the solution to our stalled economic system. When the economy weakens, we should inject additional purchasing power into the economy. When the economy gets overheated, we could reduce the purchasing power injection.
Purchasing Power injection, Basic Income, should replace “labour” as the motor and regulator of our economic system. The distributed purchasing power generates spending, entrepreneurship and work for those who want to earn more money. Tax on labour can only be an auxiliary source of funding if we want such a system to be stable.
Basic Income supporters are a minority still. But we have a Plan.
by Kate McFarland | Sep 27, 2016 | News
The Canadian Initiative for Basic Income has created an online petition asking Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and members of the Canadian Parliament to “implement a basic income program for eligible Canadians in a timely manner”. As of Monday, September 26, the petition has gathered nearly 22,000 signatures.
The petition was developed last spring by a group of participants in the Leadership and Community Engagement training of North York Community House (NYCH). To conclude the training, participants were asked to select one important practicum issue and to develop an action plan to generate change within the community. As one member ofCanadian Initiative for Basic Income described in a blog of the NYCH, the idea originated in a class exercise that required attendees to use one of several tools to determine the priority of issues. The group selected a two-by-two matrix that measured importance against urgency:
Out of all, we deemed basic income to be the one with both the highest urgency and most importance. This was due to our belief that our existing income security system in place has become ineffective when it comes to helping people afford life’s basic necessities – food, housing, and other general expenses (“NYCH Participants Lead Basic Income Petition”; September 12, 2016)
Although originally designed just to fulfill a class exercise, the petition gained over 15,000 signatures in the first week alone–with signatories coming from across the nation. In light of the petition’s success, the Canadian Initiative for Basic Income decided to continue the project, developing a more detailed proposal to submit to the government of Canada (which the group eventually hopes to have translated into French).
The full text of the letter (sans footnotes) reads as follows:
Dear Prime Minister Trudeau and Members of Parliament,
As Canadians in poverty, we are calling for strengthening the income security system with the adoption of a Basic Income policy. Our petition for Basic Income has generated over 20,000 signatures from across Canada.
The sharp surge in basic living expenses, added to a large wealth and income gap, precarious work, stagnant wages, and diminishing social services is forcing Canadians to live with ever poorer access to basic necessities and the mental and physical deprivation that accompany this way of life. Currently, over 4.9 million Canadians are living in poverty. A report by Statistics Canada lists Canada as having one of the highest percentages of low-paid workers among industrialized nations.
Existing federal and provincial income security programs have not achieved their intended goals, as evidenced by their failure to provide vulnerable recipients with the ability to afford basic living needs such as adequate housing and food. These needs are basic human rights, as set out in The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, ratified by Canada on May 19, 1976. Yes, that was four decades ago and we refer to; Part 3, Article 11.
We believe that a basic income policy in tandem with the existing income security system will be the most effective way of providing Canadians living with poverty the ability to afford basic living expenses. There is a rich history behind Canada’s existing income security system, and though some reform may be necessary for a basic income policy to be adopted, dismantling the existing welfare system would be dangerous and may leave those that already live in poverty in a similar or worse state.
A basic income program will cost Canada just over 1% of its GDP. This level of spending is within Canada’s means. We strongly believe that Canadians can afford this relatively modest expenditure, given the scope of the proposed policy and the significant benefits it will provide. Basic income will pay for itself in numerous ways; by decreasing healthcare costs, reducing social problems, boosting the economy, and providing low income Canadians with secure and productive job opportunities.
Basic income experiments are already being carried out in various European countries – but such experiments are not unique to Europe. The Croll Report, published under the Trudeau government in the 1970s put basic income policy in a favorable light, and the corresponding pilot program implemented in Dauphine, Manitoba yielded successful results. We are calling on your government to reintroduce Basic Income and move forward with its adoption. A basic income policy will not just mean upholding Canada’s human rights values and obligations, it will reduce poverty and create a more equitable, inclusive, and sustainable society that will benefit every Canadian.
Sincerely,
Canadian Initiative for Basic Income
Feroza Mohammed is the lead coordinator for planning and organizing the group’s activities to move the petition forward. She comments on the inspiration and values behind this work:
We do believe that the existing income security system in place has become ineffective, by way of providing assistance that is unsustainable. People are struggling to meet their basic daily living expenses for food, housing, accessible services, transit, and good jobs, as recommended by residents through local community consultations, across the City of Toronto. I believe that a Basic Income is necessary to improve the living standards for the most vulnerable population within our society. Currently there are about twenty percent, or approximately five million people in Canada living in poverty. To quote from comments on the petition, “Poverty should not exist in Canada”. This resonates with my belief, and I hope the government will act to implement a strong Basic Income policy that will improve lives for all Canadians. A basic income will provide people with the ability to afford life’s basic necessities.
Reza Hajivandi, the lead policy research and analyst behind the petition, adds:
We believe that the time for the reform of income security is overdue. Current programs are not providing people with the basic resources to survive, let alone live in dignity. In this light, a Basic Income policy could be the right step to take. A BI would not only provide people with resources to live a dignified life, but it can also reduce the discriminatory surveillance mechanisms and other conditions that are prohibiting recipients from achieving their aspirations and goals in life. A BI would also act to create and extend solidarity amongst people. However, with all the positive impact of BI, we need to be very careful about how or what we dismantle from the existing system. This system is the culmination of many years of thinking and history, and without first having a thorough understanding and discussion of its history and design, notions of wiping out certain components or wiping the whole slate clean can be counterproductive and unhelpful to the basic income and larger social justice movement.
Created on the Change.org platform, the Canadian Initiative for Basic Income petition is not an official e-petition of the Canadian government. Thus, the petition is not en route to be presented in the House of Commons, and the government has no formal requirement to take any action in response. However, as Change.org points out in describing its function, “When hundreds or even thousands of people raise their voices about an issue they care about, the message is very hard to ignore.”
Read–and sign–the petition here.
Thanks to Feroza Mohammed and Reza Hajivandi for contributions to this article.
Photograph: Canadian Initiative for Basic Income.
Thanks, as always, to Kate’s supporters on Patreon.
by Stanislas Jourdan | Sep 25, 2016 | News
Twice in a week, the French socialist Prime Minister raised the topic of basic income, pledging to open up the discussion on how to modernize the country’s welfare system.
Updated on 26/10 after Nicolas Sarkozy’s statement on basic income.
For a second time this week and third time this year Manuel Valls, the French Prime minister, mentioned basic income as a possible way forward.
In a statement on his Facebook page, the minister said: “We need to open up new paths. Here is one: a universal income, a single benefit, open to all starting from 18, replacing a dozen existing benefits. The government will engage a dialogue with all stakeholders in order to build a flexible, simple and therefore more efficient solution for all individual situations. I think this debate should be opened. In order to go further! To reinforce our social model!”
“We know how much complexity increases inequality. Having access to a minimal income should not be an obstacle race,” Valls also said earlier this week at a ceremony in remembrance of Michel Rocard, a prominent figure of French Left and spiritual father of the RMI, the first minimum income scheme implemented in France in 1988.
Back in April, Valls made strong commitments to modernize and simplify the welfare system in France. This happened after the Government published a report outlining bold recommendations to simplify and modernize France’s welfare system. Although the report doesn’t endorse basic income, it provides an in-depth analysis of the idea, and offers ambitious policy proposals that could pave the ways towards UBI. In particular, it proposes to extend the eligibility criteria of the current minimum income scheme to people from 18 to 25 years old, to make benefit payments automatic, and to partly individualize the benefits.
At the time, Valls committed the government to look into the proposals and speed up the implementations of the proposed measures.
Ambiguous statements
However, the Prime Minister has always been ambiguous in defining “basic income”. Speaking of a “universal income” in an earlier confused statement this year, he made it clear that he believed that such a system should be means-tested. According to him, universal income should not be “paid to everyone including those who have sufficient income – it would be too costly and meaningless – but a targeted grant to all of those who really need it.”
Race to the elections
With the French general elections in the horizon (May 2017) and the primaries campaign hitting the media everyday, French politicians are quickly joining the basic income camp, especially on the Left.
Already several candidates have publicly supported basic income in the context of their Party primaries. In the Greens, all candidates support the measure (Karima Delli, Yannick Jadot, Michèle Rivasi, Cécile Duflot). In the Socialist Party, Benoît Hamon recently announced his strong support for the idea. Emmanuel Macron, who recently left his post as Minister of the Economy to focus on his electoral campaign also said he is interested in the idea.
Among the conservatives, MP Frédéric Lefebvre has become a vocal UBI supporter and was intending to run as candidate for the Party’s primaries, but he did not collect enough sponsors. In the meantime, former President Nicolas Sarkozy who is trying to make is political come-back and run the election again said he is against UBI. However he is in favor of a single benefit scheme which would be a move towards UBI. ” I want those who live on the welfare state to be obliged to accept a job, a training or to do volunteering for the community” Sarkozy explained.
Other socialist candidates including Jean-Luc Bennahmias, Arnaud Montebourg and Marie-Noëlle Lienemann are also known to be sympathetic to the idea but have not made committing statements so far.
Behind the growing fear of the rise of the Far-right’s Front National, chances have never been so high for France to seriously look into the the possibility to adopt a basic income, or at least to implement paving stones towards it.
Picture: CC Parti Socialiste
by Hilde Latour | Sep 22, 2016 | News
On the first day of International Basic Income week and just six months before the election of a new House of Representatives (“tweede kamer”) in March of next year, a debate on unconditional Basic Income was held in the Dutch parliament on September 19th. This debate was initiated by Member of Parliament Norbert Klein of the Cultural Liberal Party (Vrijzinnige Partij), who wrote a ‘note of initiative’ (“initiatiefnota”) in January this year, called “Certainly Flexible: about thinking differently about work and social security with an unconditional basic income”
Klein asked for three things:
1. The government’s reaction
The Minister of Social Affairs and Employment, Lodewijk Assher (Labour Party, PvdA), answered in writing on May 31st, that introducing a basic income is simply too expensive as the number of people paying taxes will decrease dramatically.
In addition to the economic arguments against a Basic Income, the Minister states: Having a job is more than having an income. (…) A job offers people a social network, structure in life, self esteem and personal development.” That participation in (paid) labour is good for everyone, is the broadly supported position of the Dutch government. This is what Klein refers to as a “one size fits all” policy.
In this context it is worth noting that in the current Dutch participation legislation (“participatiewet”), people are not allowed to choose the job or activities they like. The government decides which work is suitable, prohibiting many kinds and types of participation with extremely high penalties for people who participate in other activities without specific permission of the (local) government. There is very little freedom of choice and many people report to be forced into meaningless jobs. The Minister refers to this policy as “support with an activating character”.
Apparently the characterization “one size fits all” for the current policy hurts, because the minister bounces it back at Klein, by saying that a basic income is a “one size fits all” idea. He states that in case of an unconditional basic income, every citizen would receive the same income support, even if they don’t need it. He ignores the fact that the richer part of the population would be paying back most of it through taxes as was indicated by Klein in his note of initiative.
He also ignores the fact that people will regain their freedom of choice to either participate in (paid or non-paid) labour, education, caring roles or anything else that helps them create structure in their lives, build social networks, and nurture self esteem or personal development.
Furthermore, the Minister argues that European legislation might be a roadblock on the way to implementing a Basic Income in the Netherlands. However, no definite answer is given about this possible hurdle, nor is the minister referring to any specific European legislation that might stand in the way of implementing a Basic Income in The Netherlands.
During the meeting the Minister confirms he is not in favour of new research, as enough research has been done. He indicates the possibility that the House of Representatives would have to order an investigation by itself.
2. More extended research on the effect of a basic income on the state’s budget
Klein states, the research on the impact on the state’s budget done so far, has been incomplete regarding the domains in which the effect of basic income can be expected. He questions the conclusions of previous research on the effect of a Basic Income on the state’s budget and formulates a list of examples of positive side effects that were not included in the calculations (i.e. effect on health, housing market, executional costs, increased entrepreneurship and participation in labour). He asks for new research where these effects will be included.
3. A debate in the House of Representatives
During the meeting of the Committee of Social Affairs and Employment on September 19th, seven political parties of the House of Representatives of the Dutch Parliament were represented: Socialist Party (SP), Green Left (GL), Christian Democratic Appeal (CDA), People’s Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD), Democrats 66 (D66), Labour Party (PvdA) and of course Klein / Cultural Liberal Party (Vrijzinnige Partij).
The main decision to be made during the debate: Is the House of Representatives willing to order an investigation by the Central Planning Agency (CPB) and the Socio-Cultural Planning Agency (SCP) for an explorative study on the financial / socio-economic as well as the behavioral aspects of an unconditional basic income?
The VVD is firmly against a basic income, where in the past the option was openly supported by the VVD-Minister of Economic Affairs, Gerrit Zalm. An unconditional Basic Income is an unfair solution according to the right wing-party nowadays, arguing as follows: the working part of the population pays for the people sitting at home. It is senseless, anti social and unaffordable. What if everyone chooses to do fun things instead of going to work? The effect of an unconditional Basic Income will be less participation in labour, resulting in a decrease in tax-income. We already have too many regulations that discourage people to go to work. Freedom of choice for people that is paid by others is not a dream but a nightmare. No further research is needed according to the VVD.
All other parties first have questions about the note of initiative and ask for further information. What will happen to the current social security system, what will be the cost of a basic income and how will it be financed?
In response to these questions, Klein hands out an estimate of the cost (130 billion euros) of implementing an unconditional Basic Income of 800 euros per person and a proposal of how this could be financed. He also alters his initial inclusion criterion for a basic income (living 10 years in the Netherlands) towards people with a Dutch residence permit. He emphasizes the starting point is a positive image of citizens, where most people want to participate in society in a good way. A basic Income should be seen as a springboard, not a safety net. He states that unpaid work can be as beneficial for society as paid work.
Green Left is the party most positive towards researching the effects of a Basic Income, but does not support the idea of an income guaranteed for everyone. Green Left is in favour of a looser link between work and income but wants different options to be investigated, e.g. Basic Income, negative income tax and dividend on robotics.
All parties, except the VVD, asked for a suspension of the meeting to another date to be able to study Kleins’ financial proposal. A date will be chosen during the next meeting of the committee.
To be continued…
Info and links
A report of the meeting can be found here (in Dutch)
Both letters (Klein’s note of initiative and Assher’s response) can be found here (in Dutch).
Related Basic Income News articles:
NETHERLANDS: Basic Income debated for first time in Parliament
[Hilde Latour]
THE HAGUE, NETHERLANDS: Expert Meeting on “Sense (and Nonsense) of a Basic Income”
[Florie Barnhoorn]
Special thanks to Josh Martin, and Cameron McLeod for reviewing this article.
Cover photo:
Meeting of Committee of Social Affairs and Employment – Hilde Latour 19 sep 2016
