by Kate McFarland | Feb 20, 2017 | News
Ashley Dawson, professor of English at the City University of New York (CUNY) in New York City, maintains that the loss of biodiversity (with hundreds of species facing extinction each day) is rooted, in part, in global capitalism — a theme at the center of his 2016 book Extinction: A Radical History.
Dawson explains in The Guardian:
“Capitalism is an economic system founded on ceaseless expansion,” Dawson, who specializes in Postcolonial studies, said. “It must grow at a compound rate or it will experience convulsive economic and social crises. The contradictions of this system are patently self-evident: an economic system based on infinite expansion must inevitably crash into the natural limits of finite ecosystems.”
According to Dawson, the only way to forestall mass extinction is to shift to an economic system that is not founded on the goal of unlimited growth. As the summary in The Guardian describes, Dawson looks to indigenous groups and small-scale farmers as examples of ways in which communities may develop “using sustainable practices and living close to nature.”
One starting point considered by Dawson is the provision of a guaranteed income to people living in biodiversity hotspots, biologically rich areas including “tropical woodlands of Brazil’s Atlantic coast, southern Mexico with Central America, the tropical Andes, the Greater Antilles, West Africa, Madagascar, the Western Ghats of India, Indo-Burma, Indonesia, the Philippines, and New Caledonia.” By alleviating poverty, a guaranteed income would remove the pressure to engage in poaching and other environmentally destructive practices:
“Focusing such guaranteed income on the relatively limited number of biodiversity hotspots would remove the prime economic motive people living in such areas have for destroying their local environment: poverty.”
Dawson suggests funding the guaranteed income by measures such as a tax on financial transactions, stating, “Such a Robin Hood tax, of even only a very small percentage of the speculative global capital flows that enrich the 1%, would generate billions of dollars to help people conserve hotspots of global biodiversity.”
He emphasizes that the guaranteed income should not be seen as a replacement for existing conservation efforts but rather as a supplement to them.
Read more:
Jeremy Hance, “What if we gave universal income to people in biodiversity hotpots? [sic],” The Guardian, January 24, 2017.
Ashley Dawson, “Why the Extinction Crisis Isn’t Just About the Environment, but Social Justice,” Alternet, November 29, 2016.
Reviewed by Cameron McLeod
Photo: Hall of Biodiversity at American Museum of Natural History, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 Dom Dada
by Hilde Latour | Feb 17, 2017 | News
Business Insider published an article based on an interview with co-founder of BIEN, Guy Standing, focusing on his analysis of the working class in the Western world.
Standing sees a growing class of “precariat” workers, caused by a political agenda promoting market-led competition since the 1970s. A significant group of this “precariat” is prone to listen to ugly voices playing on their fears and supporting neo-fascist populism as a result. This helps explain the election of Donald Trump in the US, but also Brexit and the popularity of Marine Le Pen and Geert Wilders in Europe.
He refers to his book “The Corruption of Capitalism”, where he describes a growing group of wealthy citizens (the “rentier class”) who live on income from investments and property (including copyright and patents that often last for 20 years). This increases the gap between the rich and the poor.
According to Standing, at least part of the solution could be the introduction of a universal basic income (UBI), and he has seen growing support for this idea from both left and right wing politicians, economists and many others in the last few years.
“I see no reason why we will not have it within the next ten years — and maybe sooner.”
Standing states that a UBI can be seen as a matter of social justice, as a compensation for a system of property that results in a loss of natural inheritance, a point argued extensively by Thomas Paine, who introduced the idea of a citizen’s dividend back in 1795. It would also enhance individual liberty and give people a sense of security.
The affordability of a UBI is not a problem, Standing argues. It would replace other forms of public spending, and could be funded by the establishment of capital funds, like those derived from oil in Alaska and Norway, and the rental flows from patents.
The belief that UBI would remove the incentive to work is ridiculous, he further claims. Enough evidence is available to show it is the opposite:
“If you had a basic income, it would mean that everybody would have a base, on top of which their earned income would be taxed at the standard rate of tax. That would increase the incentive to take low-wage jobs.”
The current Western systems of ‘social welfare’ discourage people from taking low-wage jobs. These systems are poverty traps, argues Standing.
“We must have a new income distribution system [as] real wages will continue to decline in OECD countries, insecurity will continue to grow, and rental incomes will continue to go to the top. That is a recipe for economic instability, political extremism, and a lot of other nasty things.”
Info and links
This article is the second in a two-part series based on Thomas Colson’s interview with Standing. The first article contained ambiguities that lead to inaccurate reports about the Indian situation. It was corrected in a Basic Income News article “Jumping the Gun in India“.
Special thanks to Josh Martin and Genevieve Shanahan for reviewing this article.
Photo: yinxu – oracle bones by Xuan Che, CC-BY-SA 2.0
by Genevieve Shanahan | Feb 12, 2017 | News
The Dún Laoghaire branch of the Social Democrats will hold a public debate on basic income on Tuesday, February 21. The discussion will be chaired by Social Democrat TD Róisín Shortall and speakers will include Eamon Murphy and Sean Ward, both from Social Justice Ireland, and Anne Ryan and Sinéad Gibney, both of Basic Income Ireland.
The event page calls universal basic income “a new way to provide the people of Ireland the freedom to control their lives. It has the potential to help deliver on our ideals of a society based on values of equality, dignity and fairness, built on a strong and sustainable economy.”
This discussion will address how basic income would work in Ireland – what existing social welfare payments would be subsumed, how it would be financed and potential consequences.
The Social Democrats are a new centre-left party, founded in July of 2015. At present, it holds two of 158 seats in Dail Eireann, the lower house of the Irish government.
Given the affiliations of the speakers, it is fair to presume that the discussion will be fundamentally accepting of the idea of a basic income. It is possible, then, that the debate might focus on the details of implementation, rather than the general idea of basic income.
Basic Income Ireland is the Irish affiliate of BIEN. It has been active in promoting the idea of basic income in Ireland since the 1990s and hosted the BIEN international conference in 2008. They host monthly meetings in the Dublin Institute of Technology, the next of which will be at 6pm on February 15.
Social Justice Ireland, an independent think tank and justice advocacy organisation, recently published a social policy book titled “Basic Income – Radical Utopia or Practical Solution?” (available as a free PDF here), which was presented at their conference of the same name last November. Social Justice Ireland supports a basic income and is on the steering committee of Basic Income Ireland.
The public debate kicks off at 19:30 (UTC) and is scheduled to last an hour and a half. More information is available on the event’s Facebook page. While admission is free, the organisers request that attendees reserve tickets on their Eventbrite page.
Social Democrats Dún Laoghaire – “Can Ireland afford Universal Basic Income?” – a Public Debate, Royal Marine Hotel, Marine Road, Dublin, February 21, 2017.
Read more:
“Basic Income – Radical Utopia or Practical Solution?”, Social Justice Ireland, December 13, 2016.
Kate McFarland, “IRELAND: Papers and Cartoons from “Basic Income – Radical Utopia or Practical Solution?” conference available”, Basic income News, January 4, 2017.
Kate McFarland, “IRELAND: Social Policy Conference on Basic Income (Nov 22)”, Basic Income News, November 9, 2016.
Reviewed by Kate McFarland
Photo: Royal Marine Hotel, Dun Laoghaire, CC 2.0 by William Murphy
by Hilde Latour | Feb 9, 2017 | Research
David Piachaud, Emeritus Professor of Social Policy at the London School of Economics and an associate of The Centre for the Analysis of Social Exclusion (CASE), published a discussion paper on Citizens’ Income (CI) in December of last year.
Abstract:
A Citizen’s Income, or a Basic Income, is not a new idea but it has been receiving
increasing attention. There is confusion about the idea and an attempt is made to
distinguish different concepts. Then a full Citizen’s Income is examined in relation to four key criteria: the justice of an unconditional benefit; the possibility and fairness of a simple individual benefit; economic efficiency; and political feasibility. On all four criteria, Citizen’s Income fails. It is concluded that Citizen’s Income is a wasteful distraction from more practical methods of tackling poverty and inequality and ensuring all have a right to an adequate income.
Summary
Piachaud first acknowledges that a CI, or a basic income, is attractive in its simplicity, and he cites article 25 of the UN Declaration of Human Rights of 1948: “Everyone has a right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and his family.”
Piachaud states, “A Citizen’s Income could ensure that right was achieved.”
He then describes four different concepts of a Citizen’s Income (CI):
- Bonus CI (a basic income based on a dividend)
- Partial CI (a basic income for particular groups only)
- Supplemental CI (additional income alongside a social security system)
- Full CI (an unconditional basic income adequate to live on to all citizens)
In the rest of his paper, Piachaud examines a full CI (which in his definition is not based on dividend but fully financed out of taxation) in relation to four key criteria. Through his analysis, he concludes that Citizens’ Income fails all four of these tests:
- The justice of an unconditional benefit
Piachaud discusses Philippe Van Parijs’s paper “Why Surfers Should be Fed: The Liberal Case for an Unconditional Basic Income” and argues that it is unfair (and therefore unjust) for healthy people to live off the labor of others.
- The possibility and fairness of a simple individual benefit
A full CI is intended to ensure (in a simple manner) that needs are met, but not everyone has the same needs. Piachaud gives examples related to disability, diversity in housing costs, and diversity in living arrangements (people living alone or with others). Basing a CI on individuals and assuming their needs are identical, is therefore unjust, Piachaud argues. “The social security and in some ways the tax system attempt to take these factors into account, however inadequately.”
- Economic efficiency
Piachaud defines a full CI as an unconditional income fully financed out of taxation. With respect to the economic efficiency, he argues:
“A full CI goes to everyone unconditionally, whereas social security is targeted at certain groups who in the absence of social security would be most likely to be poor. In consequence, a full CI that replaces social security is far more costly than social security, and this has to be paid for from higher taxes on all incomes with far-reaching economic consequences. The inevitable conclusion is, therefore, that a targeted social security system was, is, and will be more efficient and equitable than a full CI.”
- Political feasibility
Piachaud finds it very unlikely any political party will adopt an unconditional CI as a policy proposal either in the full or supplemental forms
After this analysis, David Piachaud concludes, “Citizen’s Income is a wasteful distraction from more practical methods of tackling poverty and inequality and ensuring all have a right to an adequate income.”
Info and links
The full paper can be found here.
Special thanks to Josh Martin and Danny Pearlberg for reviewing this article
Photo: diversity by Nabeelah Is, january 2012, CC-BY-SA 2.0
by Julen Bollain | Feb 7, 2017 | News
(Picture credit: Counterpunch)
In this article Julie Wark and Daniel Raventós write about why the trade unions do not support an unconditional basic income when “properly understood and administered, basic income could have enormously positive consequences”.
Prior to their discussion of the reasons why trade unions do not support an unconditional basic income, they first try to assess both the normative and the practical questions that must be answered when it comes to speaking about the unconditional basic income.
It is also analyzed the right-wing and left-wing unconditional basic income supporters.
Finally, Their discussion is comprised of a point by point response to the six arguments most often raised by unionists when opposing basic income and after discussing them the article is finishes by saying that unionists “also raise basic issues about what kind of society we should and might be able to have because the underlying human rights concerns are always the same and they affect everybody: freedom, justice and dignity”.
Daniel Raventós is a lecturer in Economics at the University of Barcelona and author inter alia of Basic Income: The Material Conditions of Freedom (Pluto Press, 2007). He is on the editorial board of the international political review Sin Permiso.
Julie Wark is an advisory board member of the international political review Sin Permiso. Her last book is The Human Rights Manifesto (Zero Books, 2013).
More articles by Daniel Raventós and Julie Wark, here.
Read the original article:
Daniel Raventós and Julie Wark, “Why don’t Trade Unions support an Unconditional Basic Income (precisely when they should)?”, Counterpunch, January 11th, 2017
