by Kate McFarland | Feb 15, 2017 | News
In January, Apolitical published an exclusive interview with two leaders behind the planning of a pilot study of a basic income guarantee program in Ontario, Canada: Helena Jaczek, Ontario’s Minister of Community and Social Services, and project advisor Hugh Segal.
Earlier this month, the interview was republished in the official blog of the World Economic Forum, the Switzerland-based organization responsible for the prestigious annual Davos meeting (which this year held a panel discussion and debate on “basic income: dream or delusion”).
In the interview, Jaczek and Segal explain the reasons for their interest in and optimism about basic income. Jaczek sees the program as a means to provide economic security to allow individuals to contribute to society. Segal supports basic income as a way to avoid the “poverty trap” that occurs when poor individuals lose benefits after taking a job, as well as a way to empower the poor to make decisions on their own behalf.
The Government of Ontario has recently completed public consultation hearings on an initial proposal for the pilot study, and will release its final plan in Spring 2017. As proposed, the pilot will consist of both a randomized control study in a large metropolitan area (in which randomly selected individuals receive the basic income guarantee) and several saturation studies (in which all members of a small city receive the basic income guarantee). If Segal’s initial recommendations are followed, subjects will be eligible to receive an unconditional cash transfer of up to 1,320 CAD (about 1,000 USD) per month, gradually tapered off with additional earnings, which would replace existing unemployment programs in the province.
Read more:
“Exclusive: Inside Canada’s new basic income project,” Apolitical, January 4, 2017.
“Canada’s basic income experiment – will it work?” World Economic Forum blog, February 2, 2017.
Reviewed by Danny Pearlberg
Photo (Ottawa, Ontario, Canada) CC BY 2.0 Brian Burke
by Kate McFarland | Jan 12, 2017 | News
Finland’s basic income experiment is now underway, with the first payments having been mailed this week. With the experiment generating much media attention, here is a review of some of the basics.
On January 1, 2017, Finland launched an experiment in which 2,000 individuals–randomly selected from a pool of unemployment benefit recipients–will receive unconditional cash payments of €560 (about 590 USD) per month for two years.
The first payments were sent out on Monday, January 9.
The main goal of the experiment, as it presently stands, is to determine whether unconditional cash transfers are more effective than means-tested unemployment benefits with respect to promoting job-seeking and employment. Olli Kangas, leader of the research team at Kela that designed the experiment, has recommended expanding the experiment to other target populations (including “other persons with small incomes” and individuals under age 25).
The Sample
The test subjects comprise 2,000 individuals between the ages of 25 and 58 who were receiving unemployment benefits from Kela (the Social Insurance Institution of Finland) as of November 2016. These subjects were randomly selected from a pool of about 175,000 individuals nationwide.
To avoid selection bias, participation in the experiment was mandatory for those selected.
Kela reports that, of those selected, 87% had been receiving the Labour Market Subsidy, while 13% had been receiving the Basic Unemployment Allowance. These programs provide taxable payments of €32.80 per day, five days per week, to those (and only to those) who are officially registered as unemployed job seekers. The benefits are subject to withdrawal if a recipient turns down an offer of work or training. Furthermore, if a recipient takes temporary or part-time employment, the amount of the benefits is decreased (as a general rule) by 50 cents per euro in earned income over €300 per month.
The Basic Income
Those included in the study population will be paid a monthly basic income of €560 for a period of two years. Unlike the Labour Market Subsidy and Basic Unemployment Allowance, the amount of the benefit does not decrease if the recipient earns additional income (regardless of the amount of earned income).
The basic income is not subject to tax. However, it is counted as income for the purpose of determining eligibility for additional social assistance.
Kela notes that there are some circumstances under which payment of the benefit might be terminated, such as moving abroad or entering military service.
Research Objectives
The Finnish government is interested in testing basic income as a way to remove work disincentives in the current welfare system as well as to reduce bureaucracy.
Kela plans a study of the trial in which the group of the 2,000 individuals receiving the basic income is compared with a control group consisting of all individuals in the original target population who were not selected to receive the benefit. The study will examine, for one, differences in employment rates between these groups.
Information about individuals’ employment status will be gathered through register data. Kela will be conducting no interviews or questionnaires of the test subjects, since such interventions have the potential to influence behavior. (Kela has also expressed concern about interviews with test subjects conducted by the media.)
It is possible that the experiment will be expanded in subsequent years–as research team leader Olli Kangas has recommended–to test different levels of basic income or different taxation models, or to include additional population groups. However, no firm plans have been made, and moving forward with any expansion is contingent on the amount of funding allocated to the experiment by the Finnish government.
More Information
The latest information about the study can be found on Kela’s “Basic Income Experiment 2017-2018” webpage: https://www.kela.fi/web/en/basic-income-experiment-2017-2018.
Thanks to Danny Pearlberg for reviewing this article.
Photo: Saariselkä, Finland CC BY 2.0 Ninara.
by Hilde Latour | Jan 8, 2017 | News
At the party’s congress on December 17th, members of Dutch political party Green Left (“Groen Links”) were given the opportunity to vote on amendments to its election program. This document will be released soon, in advance of the country’s parliamentary elections, which will be held on March 15th, 2017.
In the draft version of the election program, a basic income was only mentioned as a possible means to reform the social welfare system.
Two amendments concerning a universal basic income (UBI) were voted on at the party’s congress:
- Implementation of a UBI
“Green Left supports the (eventual) implementation of an unconditional basic income for everyone, high enough to live decently from. Unconditional economic security will lead to possibilities for a fairer distribution of paid jobs, caregiving, volunteer work and income. In addition to that, it will facilitate entrepreneurship. Starting point is that the lowest incomes will not decrease and the basic income will be co-financed through progressive income taxes. Existing additional financial support for citizens in specific circumstances can continue to exist.”
- Experimenting with a UBI
“Implementation of a national representative experiment of a universal basic income, to be conducted on a large-scale and over several years, aimed at a better understanding of the effects on people’s behaviour.”
Before the voting took place, the board of the party advised members to reject both of the amendments, arguing:
“an unconditional basic income is a bridge too far, as an unconditional basic income uses tax money to support people who don’t need it”.
But the members decided differently: approximately 80% of those present, voted in favour of the second amendment: to start a nationwide experiment of a universal basic income.
The first amendment, concerning the implementation of a UBI failed in a much closer vote: 53% rejected this proposal.
“We now are working hard to make changes in the text of the election program and the definite version will be available soon”, Christel Kohlmann (Head Strategy and Information of the party) explains. It could not be confirmed whether the experiments would really be aimed at a UBI for everyone, however.
For comparison, the currently planned experiments in The Netherlands, although they will test elements of basic income, are not examining a representative sample of the entire population. The social security experiments expected to start this year, for example, will examine only a group selected from people currently receiving welfare benefits.
Green Left is now the second Dutch elected political party that is already in Parliament and now in favour of experimenting with a real UBI. (That is, its members are in favour, and with a convincing majority). The Party for the Animals (“Partij voor de Dieren”) is also in favour of a serious experiment with a UBI and has formulated that in their program. In addition to these two parties, sitting Member of Parliament Norbert Klein will participate in the upcoming elections with the Cultural Liberal Party (“Vrijzinnige Partij”). Klein is now in Parliament as an individual member, having left the 50plus party after the last elections. The Cultural Liberal Party is also in favour of research with a universal basic income, and has even produced a rough calculation on how a UBI should be financed.
Compared to the former elections, support for a UBI has clearly spread and grown in The Netherlands. More than 65.000 people already signed a petition and this number is still growing. In the upcoming month, more political parties will have their members voting for amendments to their party programs in advance of the upcoming elections in March.
Info and links
The amendments on a universal basic income can be found on page 75 of the Green Left congress paper (in Dutch).
The election program of Green Left can be found here (when ready and in Dutch).
Information about the upcoming experiments with social welfare can be found here and here (in Dutch).
THE NETHERLANDS: Party for the Animals wants Universal Basic Income to be investigated
[Hilde Latour]
NETHERLANDS: Debate about unconditional Basic Income in Parliament
[Hilde Latour]
Photo: Euro by Alf Melin 2012, CC BY-SA 2.0
Special thanks to Josh Martin and Kate Mc Farland for reviewing this article
by Dave Clegg | Dec 18, 2016 | News
Finland’s Ministry of Social Affairs and Health has issued its latest and apparently final press release outlining its long awaited Basic Income pilot project slated to begin Jan 1st, 2017. Near the end of the first year the project will be assessed for the feasibility of a second year as well.
This project will be narrowly focused on a small, random sampling of employable adults and the ways in which a BI might improve their employment chances. This project will not be looking at any other populations, vulnerable or otherwise, which might benefit from a BI. However, Finland’s government sees this pilot as the beginning of a “… culture of experimentation” designed to identify and then help address the most pressing needs of their citizens in the years to come.
Photo: “Colors of Finland” CC BY-NC 2.0 Mariano Mantel
by Kate McFarland | Dec 18, 2016 | News
Kela, the Social Insurance Institution of Finland, announced on December 14 that the Finnish Parliament has passed the act authorizing an experiment of basic income. The experiment is set to begin on January 1, 2017.
Finland’s Ministry of Social Affairs and Health drafted the legislative proposal for the experiment in August, and submitted the proposal to Parliament after hearing public opinions on the draft proposal. The proposal elicited some controversy, in part due to the relatively small size of the basic income (560 EUR) as well as the choice of sample population, which will consist only of recipients of the country’s unemployment benefits. However, the basic design of the experiment remains unchanged: a random sample of 2,000 individuals, drawn from current working-age beneficiaries of unemployment benefits, will receive an unconditional basic income of 560 EUR per month for a two-year period. (Brief responses to the objections are included in the most recent version of Kela’s report on the experiment.)
The primary objective of the experiment is to assess whether an unconditional basic income promotes employment. Experimenters will compare the employment rate among basic income recipients to that within a control group of individuals who continue to receive traditional unemployment benefits. As Kela’s website states, the Finnish government is interested in basic income due to its potential to “reduce the amount of work involved in seeking financial assistance” and “free up time and resources for other activities such as working or seeking employment”. The experiment will also provide data used to estimate the cost of implementing a nationwide basic income.
The 2,000 experimental subjects will be chosen by a random-sampling algorithm and contacted by the end of December. Participation is mandatory for those selected.
The first payments will be distributed to subjects on January 9, 2017. Automatic payments will continue through December 2018.
More information about the experiment is available on Kela’s newly-launched web page, Basic Income Experiment 2017–2018.
Source:
Kela (December 14, 2016) “Preparations for the basic income experiment continue”
Photo (Helsinki) CC BY-NC 2.0 Jaafar Alnasser
