by Andre Coelho | Mar 21, 2017 | News
Picture: Viktor Orbán. Credit to Politics.Hu
Viktor Orbán, Hungary’s prime minister, made reference to basic income in his speech at the Hungarian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, held on 28 February, 2017.
The speech itself is very much focused on economic issues, centred on the Hungarian reality. Orbán, however, also offers comments about his vision for Hungarian society and energy investment in the near future. Regarding society, Orbán portrays a vision of a homogenous racial and cultural profile, in which all jobs are performed by Hungarians. In fact, he repeats the word “homogeneity” seven times in the speech within this context. On energy, he firmly supports a nuclear-powered “cheap energy” economy, despite the fact that other nations are divesting from nuclear, with nearby Germany, for example, having closed eight reactors in six years.
Most notably, Viktor Orbán refers to basic income midway through his speech. He starts out by labelling it as “communistic” and “some sort of basic benefit or pay – or something like that”. According to him, “this is an utterly unthinkable approach”, which nonetheless is being pursued in countries like Finland, Canada, and the Netherlands, and seriously discussed even in the United Kingdom. Orbán continues to declare that Hungary would “close shop” if something like basic income were to be implemented. He claims that it would mean Hungary would slip “back to the culture of benefit-based economies”, in what seems to be a reference to communist times. It would also, he warns, bury the “work- and performance-oriented culture based on merit”, and thus, under such a system, “investors can go to another country with their capital investments, because here they could only go bankrupt”. The assumption that people would become idle given a basic income seems to run deep in Viktor Orbán’s view. He concludes his critique of the basic income concept with the following words:
“So I propose that we protect ourselves in a timely fashion – firmly based on foundations of common sense – against these socialistic ideas, which originate from Heaven knows where. […] We don’t have the means or the capacity to distribute money without performance and work in return. We have the means and capacity to build a system in Hungary which is fundamentally based on competitiveness, performance and merit, while also asserting fairness and social and humanitarian criteria. If we undermine these philosophical foundations of the Hungarian economy, we won’t be able stay alive. So in this respect I earnestly ask you not to give in to any kind of political temptation, or to such siren voices.”
by Guest Contributor | Mar 17, 2017 | Opinion
Article 25 and Basic Income: The perfect match
Most of us are aware of the problems we are collectively facing: environmental issues, job losses or job insecurity, homelessness, increased violence, terrorism, an immigration and refugee crisis, overpopulation, poverty and famine.
What hardly anyone is talking about is that we are all connected, and as much as we may have separated ourselves by nationality, religion, cast, political parties etc., the fact remains that we are one humanity or, as some describe, “one human family”. The planet provides for all of us without making a distinction – food, water, air, oceans and land – our commons. Yet we have managed to privatize these essential resources for only one purpose: to make money and profit, thus determining who should have access and who should go without.
Humanity has become so complacent over the last few decades that 18 million people are dying every year in a world of abundance. They have become the forgotten people as we have normalized their plight in our minds, often with the words “poverty has always existed, it’s nothing new”. Yet that poverty is steadily growing in many countries, with more impoverished famines in the developing world and increased homelessness and foodbanks across the West. We don’t hear much of those either, unless we ourselves are affected. Yet these deprivations are directly connected to increased violence, immigration, a degrading environment, homelessness and overpopulation.
So, what is the answer? Demanding Article 25 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and a Global Basic Income could be the solution we are looking for, as they go hand in hand.
On December 10. 1948 the General Assembly of the United Nations adopted and proclaimed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, including Article 25 on the right to an adequate standard of living:
Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control.
Motherhood and childhood are entitled to special care and assistance. All children, whether born in or out of wedlock, shall enjoy the same social protection.
Sadly, Article 25 has never been implemented globally through appropriate government interventions and redistributive measures, but if it were, it would finally end poverty and create hope for millions of people for the first time. An Unconditional Basic Income, a periodic cash payment delivered to all on an individual basis to cover basic needs, would also be essential, because it will help make it all possible. It will finally guarantee the universal realization of Article 25.
Basic income is already widely debated around the world within some countries, such as Finland, Spain, Canada, Holland and Scotland having trial projects. Peter Bevan Baker of the Green Party on Prince Edward Island, Canada, stated positive effects of an Unconditional Basic Income that include: “Local economic growth, supporting entrepreneurship, reducing administrative, complexity and costs, improving working conditions, reducing crime, improving health, and helping to build vibrant rural communities” (source).
However, some free market thinkers argue for a fixed (basic income) amount per person in favor of scrapping all other social services, like unemployment benefits and housing benefits. Their argument is that it will save the government a lot of time and money in determining who qualifies for welfare and who does not. This might be an incentive for politicians, but at the same time it might worsen the situation of relatively disadvantaged, vulnerable, or lower-income people. Basic Income Earth Network (BIEN), at last years General Assembly in Seoul, stated that it should not replace the compensatory welfare state, but rather complete and transform it into an emancipatory welfare system. Unconditional Basic Income Europe (UBIE) agrees with that statement, and both organizations advocate that there should be no means testing, but a guaranteed monthly or annual payment given to all.
In this way, a basic income is an emancipatory policy and will help us to strengthen democracy. The word ‘democracy’ originally comes from Ancient Greece and means ‘power of the people’. Unfortunately, this type of democracy does not exist anywhere in the world, but to get closer to this ideal, everyone on the planet should have a minimum degree of economic freedom to be able to choose how they want to live their own lives. It is the hope for every human being, given the social transformations it will unleash by enabling all people to plan for a secure future.
Of course, for an Unconditional Basic Income to work for everyone, the different living conditions of people around the world need to be considered. Some people live in dire poverty, with no roof over their head and no idea where their next meal is coming from. A small monthly income might make life a bit easier, but it will not be enough to lift them out of poverty once and for all. There is a growing sense of a new consciousness or awareness that we cannot separate ourselves from the cries of our brothers and sisters, no matter where they are in the world. Unconditional Basic Income was originally discussed only on national levels, but has since expanded in view to a global level, to include the most marginalized people.
What should also be taken into account is that most countries outside Europe do not have a comprehensive welfare system in place. This is another reason why many economic migrants are seeking a livelihood in Western Europe, where they would have the right to free medical treatments, housing and other benefits. If they had these basic social services guaranteed at home, they may never leave. Also, many developing countries do not have an adequate tax system in place to offer a functioning welfare system. Even with overseas aid going to many of these countries, the money flowing out to the more affluent parts of the world is usually much greater than the original donations given.
If it is not large corporations that harm these countries through illicit activity and profit repatriation, then it is often corruption at the highest level. Nigeria for example has a tremendous wealth of oil and minerals. Here the government officials live like kings, yet their people are one of the poorest in the world, with millions now facing the prospect of famine. Let us also not forget the numerous tax havens that many big companies use, which is equivalent to any other form of corruption. In all cases, money and resources is effectively stolen from the people that are in most dire need of it.
The list of corruption and exploitation goes on, endlessly. For all of these reasons, we urgently need to demand the human rights of Article 25 for everyone in the world, which is the key that will open the door to a truly Global Basic Income. Firstly, we must ensure that everyone has their basic needs covered, which means adequate housing, food, medicines etc., and an Unconditional Basic Income will safeguard the rest.
Over time, the guaranteeing of Article 25 and a basic income will mean that the world population will eventually stabilize, and people will no longer need to immigrate on a mass scale. Even the environment may be less exploited when illicit practices like poaching and sales of rare timber become much less common, or stop completely, as this has often been the only means for some poor people or villages to make a livelihood.
If enough people demand the full realization of Article 25, there will also be a huge knock-on effect on the wars that are everywhere being waged, as government spending must first cover the needs of its people before it can further invest in armaments.
Furthermore, food speculation must stop, as instead all countries work together to finally distribute the food to where it is most needed. For too long has food been used as a commodity in the financial sector, where it is often left to rot in the store houses of the West to increase its market value.
Pharmaceuticals will also have to change their profit-orientated ways of doing business, if we want to guarantee free or cheap healthcare for all citizens of this world.
The founder of Share The World’s Resources, Mohammed Mesbahi, has described in a new book how these drastic changes in government priorities can be brought about. In ‘Heralding Article 25: A people’s strategy for world transformation’, he writes that if we are waiting for our governments to do the job for us, we will be waiting for eternity, while most social and environmental trends are getting worse. Our only hope is to join together with millions of ordinary people in huge, continuous protests on a world-wide scale to demand from our governments the immediate implementation of Article 25, with the United Nations as the governing body to oversee and the organizational logistics.
For many people, such a plan of action may sound far too simple and even naïve, considering the complexity of political issues today. Yet there is nothing complicated about the fact that there is more food in the world than is needed, and yet people are dying of hunger. Governments all over the world are not serving their people, but instead they facilitate the profit interests of multinational corporations, which in turn exploit us. The only way to reverse this systemic injustice is through the people of the world uniting under the banner of Article 25. Not against capitalism or ‘the system’, which has also led us nowhere in the past, but through a simple demand for everyone’s right to a dignified life.
Of itself, an Unconditional Basic Income will not be sufficient to achieve an end to poverty. The hollow promise of economic growth and more jobs will also never work. The one ingredient that will make it possible is countless numbers of people rising up in peaceful protest with an engaged heart, and not just the intellect, for anything else will be short lived.
There are many groups that are doing tremendous good work for people and planet, and that should and must continue. But if we could unite even once a week and raise our voices for governments to implement Article 25 and a Global Basic Income, then we might start seeing some real changes.
By Sonja Scherndl and Anja Askeland
by Kate McFarland | Mar 12, 2017 | News
Robert Reich, Professor of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley and former US Secretary of Labor, recently visited Google to discuss the economic impact of automation and artificial intelligence. Reich has previously endorsed a basic income as a way to address automation in the future.
At one point in his talk, Reich predicts that, as we move to a “new world of technological displacement,” people will be forced into lower wage and less secure jobs. To address this problem, he maintains that, in the future, we will need to implement a new type of income supplement, such as a guaranteed minimum income. (On a terminological point: Reich mentions “guaranteed minimum income” but discusses “universal basic income” during the Q&A. There is no indication that these terms are meant to refer to substantively different policies.)
During the Q&A, Reich elaborates upon issues related to universal basic income, beginning with the question of whether giving people money would just encourage them to be lazy. Reich explains that the this outcome has not been observed in pilot studies of basic income — “people don’t just sit and do nothing” — and that, moreover, the basic income could and should be fixed at a level that covers only minimal needs, so that most people would still be motivated to seek a job. In response to the worry that work is also a source of meaning to many people, Reich points out that a universal basic income doesn’t imply that there will be no more work. Additionally, not all meaningful work is paid, and many people currently face the problem of working long hours at multiple low-paying jobs.
Reich also states that a basic income in the United States should be built on popular federal programs like Medicare and Social Security (which provide medical and financial benefits to Americans upon reaching retirement age). He says that he’d call “universal basic income” by a different name, and call it “Title V of Social Security.”
In answer to a third question, Reich turns to discuss the expansion of the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) as a near-term solution to low wages and economic insecurity.
Watch the full video:
Source
Robert Reich, “Preparing Our Economy And Society For Automation & AI,” Social Europe, February 17, 2017.
Reviewed by Genevieve Shanahan
Photo: Reich speaking at the Santa Rosa Unitarian Church in 2013, CC BY 2.0 ATIS547
by Ashley | Mar 11, 2017 | News
Bill Gates. Credit to: The Huffington Post
On a recent Reddit AMA, Bill Gates says countries aren’t rich enough to support a Universal Basic Income (UBI). In the meantime, Gates suggests investing in government programs and increasing the demand of labor.
Bill Gates posted his fifth Reddit AMA on Monday, February 27th, 2017. He responded to questions on a number of topics, ranging from his favorite vacation spot to his viewpoints on whether social media has contributed to divisions in the United States. One Reddit user asked Gates about his thoughts on Universal Basic Income (UBI).
In his response, Gates points to constraints in making this alternative economic system scalable today. He described how countries may not currently have the financial capacity to support a UBI, stating: “Even the US isn’t rich enough to allow people not to work.” Currently, there is a lack of evidence that UBI is linked to decreasing employment or willingness to work. On the contrary, Rutgers Professor James Livingston has shown there is empirical evidence that a subsidy to one’s income has little to no impact on one’s work ethic. Countries around the world are initiating UBI pilots to test feasibility, structure and impacts. In fact, the Finnish UBI pilot is intended to increase employment and reduce poverty.
In the meantime, Gates proposes supporting specific historically marginalized populations, such as seniors and youth with disabilities. He also suggests increasing the amount of “adults helping in education.” One pathway of support he mentions is investment in government programs, like the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC), that will “help increase the demand for labor.” The Earned Income Tax Credit is a policy initiative that focuses on alleviating poverty for US citizens and has been shown to increase labor-market participation. There are numerous variations of UBI models; some which envision a guaranteed income working in tandem with existing government programs. In contrast to many currently existing government subsidies and programs, UBI assumes a guaranteed income to each individual member regardless of household income.
Gates raises a noteworthy point about the need for an increased demand for labor during a time where there is growing concern about how automation may lead to the loss of jobs. In a recent video interview, he has proposed taxing robots that take humans’ jobs and using that money to finance sectors like education, provide job training, and support government programs. Basic Income News author Tyler Prochazka expands upon Bill Gates’ former comments on taxing robots in his article and how this connects to UBI.
More information at:
Tyler Prochazska, “Bill Gates is Wrong: Don’t Tax Robots”, Basic Income News, February 22th 2017
Mary Hynes, “Jobs are disappearing and to me that’s a good thing: Why We Should Abandon Work”, CBC Radio, March 2nd 2017
John Henley, “Finland Trials Basic Income for Unemployed”, The Guardian, January 3rd 2017
Giacomo Tognini, “Universal Basic Income, 5 Experiments Around The World”, WorldCrunch, February 23rd 2017
On Youtube: “Bill Gates: The Robot That Takes Your Job Should Pay Taxes”, February 16th 2017
On Reddit: “I’m Bill Gates co-chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Ask Me Anything”, February 27th 2017
by BIEN | Mar 9, 2017 | News
The issue of the basic income, its pros and cons and the feasibility of its implementation have occupied space in media outlets in recent years, mainly due to the visibility it gained after the referendum in Switzerland and the experiment started this year by the Finnish government. However, this discussion has not reached all corners of the planet. Or at least not until recently.
On February 1st of this year, the Argentine conservative-leaning newspaper La Nación published an opinion piece entitled “An universal income that compensates for poverty and unemployment”. The author of the article, Eduardo Levy Yeyati, is an economist, writer, and civil engineer, with a PhD in Economics from the University of Pennsylvania. Yeyati introduces the concept of universal income and describes the historical dimensions of this idea, as its discussion has spanned the centuries, from Thomas More, to Martin Luther King, to its contemporary promoters such as the British Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and the French presidential candidate Benoît Hamon.
However, the text mainly discusses three fundamental complications surrounding the idea of basic income. First, despite having multiple detractors and defenders, the basic income is still an idea in search of a design. According to Yeyati, there is a rather classic proposal such as an unconditional basic income (the model advocated by the most ardent supporters of the initiative), a conservative proposal that would be represented by the negative income tax defended by Milton Friedman and a compromise third-way between these more extreme positions that seeks to guarantee a basic salary floor for those who already receive some type of income.
Second, the author identifies two moral dilemmas that must be addressed and answered by any definition and operationalization of the basic income. First, should it be paid only to those who have a registered job, in the style of an addendum and prize to effort, or should it be paid to everybody, even to those who have no intention of working? Second, should the person who has a lower income receive more money, should everybody receive the same amount or should the person who works the most receive more? For many advocates of this initiative, a basic income basically implies answering these dilemmas in the most “generous” way: it should be paid to everybody and everyone should receive the same. In this sense, it seems that Yeyati uses the term more broadly than a lot of speakers in other countries, not compromising to any of the possibilities.
Finally, the author ventures one last idea in which he discusses the feasibility of thinking and discussing the implementation of a basic income in Argentina today. And despite some pessimism on his behalf and considering that it would take several years of political maturation to reach the appropriate level of discussion, Yeyati does believe that it is possible to move towards the realization of a basic income today through the design and implementation of a Finnish-style pilot in Argentina. Basically, the author argues that this would not be very costly, that the twin challenges of poverty and unemployment will dominate the development agenda in the coming years and that, in order to move forward, this debate needs information that we do not currently have. In this sense, despite the fact that this issue it not yet in the agenda in the Latin American and Argentine context, at least there are people who are encouraged to discuss its implications and there are media outlets, however conservative they may be, willing to publish them.
Featured Image CC Mike Ramsey (via flickr, Scott Santens)
