Werner Rätz, of Attac Germany’s working group enough for all, gave a lecture on 10 April in Brussels entitled, “UBI, Health, Degrowth.” According to Ratz, although the subjects of health and degrowth are closely linked to UBI, the UBI-movement has paid low attention to them up to now.
Source: carolinecircle.com
Jill Segger, “Living by bread alone: economic growth and the citizen’s income”, Ekklesia, February 7, 2014
On May 1, 2011 the Singapore government distributed a “Growth Dividend” to almost all adult citizens—about 2.5 million people. Singapore has experienced enormous growth (12 percent) in the past year, ballooning government revenues. Lawmakers, who created the payment, cited the need to ensure that everyone shares in the benefit of that growth. The size of the dividend was graduated so that people with lower income and wealth would receive a larger dividend. Most Singaporeans (80%) received S$600 to S$800 (about $488 to $650 in U.S. dollars). Those with higher income or wealth received S$100-S$300. So far, more than 90% of Singaporeans have signed up to receive their dividend. The rest have until the end of the year to do so. Although Singapore has distributed dividends before, it has not promised to distribute dividends every year.
For info on the Singapore budget including the “Growth Dividend” go to:
https://www.singaporebudget.gov.sg/budget_2011/pd.html#s7
For an article discussing the dividend go to:
https://www.todayonline.com/Singapore/EDC110430-0000682/Growth-dividends-in-by-Sunday
For an editorial discussing BIG in Singapore go to:
https://veryfinecommentary.tk/articles/the-slow-trickle/
The South African Civil Society Information Service
This article looks back on the campaign for BIG in South Africa, discussing its successes and failures. Its online at:
https://www.sacsis.org.za/site/article/615.1
As more countries are facing a secular stagnation and as it is becoming clear that it is unrealistic to hope to increase total economic output (measured as the gross domestic product GDP)) without further worsening the environmental crisis, a new question emerges: how can we make progress towards eradicating poverty without growth? While the Pact for the Future adopted on 23 September 2024 reaffirms the need to “urgently develop measures of progress on sustainable development that complement or go beyond GDP”, indicators alone, while useful, remain insufficient: what matters is the reorientation of the economy — of our ways of producing and consuming.
The Special Rapporteur proposed a range of answers, which include strengthening the social and solidary economy, identifying new sources of financing for State services that do not depend on growth, better valuing care work and better aligning wages with the social utility of work. The overall objective should be to expand the toolbox of governments in the fight against poverty. This will allow to move beyond a grow-tax-transfer approach to poverty reduction (the dominant post-market model to combating poverty), to focus more on pre-market measures (including investing in early childhood education and care) and on market reforms (to make markets more inclusive).
To read the full document, click here.
The 24th BIEN CONGRESS in Maricá & Niterói – Rio de Janeiro, Brazil – 27-29 August 2025
Linkedin, Instagram, X – biencongress25 (at) gmail [dot] com
BIEN2024 was August 29–31 (Pictures and more coming soon)