by Kate McFarland | Dec 7, 2016 | News
Universal basic income (UBI) was a topic of discussion at Europe’s largest annual startup conference, Slush, which convened in Helsinki from November 30 to December 1.
A roundtable (or, more accurately, round-fire) discussion held on the second day of the conference, titled “Basic income – Our next moonshot”, featured three advocates of basic income: Albert Wenger of Union Square Ventures, who has prominently promoted basic income as a response to automation; Matt Krisiloff of Y Combinator, who is a research director of the firm’s basic income pilot in Oakland, California; and Roope Mokka of Demos Helsinki, who wrote an article calling basic income “the moonshot of our generation”.
The discussion covered advantages of basic income, as well as potential hurdles in its acceptance and implementation. Wenger emphasized the potential for UBI to promote entrepreneurship, branding it as “seed money for the people”. Mokka, while agreeing that UBI “has to happen”, added that society additionally needs to conceive of new ways in which individuals can relate to society in a world with much less work for them to do. Krisiloff suggested that, rather than implementing a UBI all at once, it would more feasible to introduce a UBI gradually in a country like the United States, due to the cultural opposition to giving people “money for nothing”.
Two attendees, Sharetribe CMO Sjoerd Handgraaf and tech journalist Derek du Preez, have written summaries of the conversation with brief commentary:
Derek du Preez (December 2, 2016) “Slush 2016 – Universal Basic Income ‘has to happen’,” diginomica.
Sjoerd Handgraaf (December 2, 2016) “Universal Basic Income @ SLUSH 2016,” Medium.
Slush states that its mission is “to help the next generation of great, world-conquering companies forward.” This year, the non-profit event was attended by an estimated 17,500 individuals from 124 countries.
Watch the 30-minute fireside chat
Reviewed by Genevieve Shanahan
Slush photo CC BY-NC-2.0 Taloudellinen tiedotustoimisto
by Kate McFarland | Dec 3, 2016 | News
Videos of the workshop “Experimenting with Basic Income: Finland and the Netherlands” are available online. Additionally, Jurgen De Wispelaere has a new blog post describing the promises and challenges of a comparative approach to basic income experiments.
As described in recent articles in Basic Income News, both Finland and the Netherlands will be launching basic income experiments early in 2017. In each case, the experiment is planned to continue for two years, the target population under investigation will be restricted to individuals currently receiving social assistance benefits, and research questions will center on the basic income’s effect on work incentives. Despite such broad similarities, however, the experiments also have notable differences — in both design and political context.
Workshop at Kela
To address these issues, Kela, the Social Insurance Institute of Finland, hosted a day-long workshop on “Experimenting with Basic Income: Finland and the Netherlands” on November 8. Speakers included Sjir Hoeijmakers, Loek Groot, Timo Verlaat, Ernst-Jan de Bruijn, and Ruud Muffels on the Dutch experiments, and Johanna Perkiö, Olli Kangas, and Kathrin Komp on the Finnish experiments.
Videos of all sessions are now available (click on the above embedded links).
Lessons and Challenges
Jurgen De Wispelaere, a research fellow at Finland’s University of Tampere, presented opening and closing comments at Kela’s workshop, respectively titled “Putting Basic Income Experiments in Context” and “Comparing Basic Income Experiments: Lessons and Challenges” (see video below).
In a recent post on Kela’s blog, De Wispelaere outlines three main reasons to engage in a comparative study of basic income experiments: the comparative approach allows researchers to pool information about issues faced in running a basic income experiment, pool knowledge about the effects of basic income, and study the political forces behind the rapid rise in popularity of basic income.
Jurgen De Wispelaere (November 14, 2016) “Comparing Basic Income Experiments: Lessons and Challenges” Kela.
Other Experiments
While the Kela workshop and De Wispelaere’s brief article focus specifically on the experiments in Finland and the Netherlands, we might note that other basic income pilots and experiments are about to begin around the world. In Canada, the provincial government of Ontario plans to roll out a basic income pilot study by April 2017. The government of France is also investigating the possibility of experimenting with a basic income, although no launch date has been specified. Several privately-funded basic income pilots and experiments are also scheduled to begin in 2017, including those of the Silicon Valley firm Y Combinator (in Oakland, California) and the charities GiveDirectly (in multiple Kenyan villages) and Eight (in a Ugandan village).
Reviewed by Genevieve Shanahan
Photo: Kela office, CC-BY-SA-4.0 Kotivalo
by Kate McFarland | Nov 4, 2016 | News
Roope Mokka, co-founder of the independent Nordic think tank Demos Helsinki, believes that a universal basic income provides a springboard for the creation of a new universal monetary system.
In a piece for Slush, he contrasts several arguments put forward by UBI advocates (e.g. as a way to increase employment, as the Finnish government hopes, versus a way to cope with increased un-employment due to technology). He then argues that the potential long-term benefits of a UBI–conceived as a way to usher in even more radical changes to the economy and monetary system–could be even more profound than most supporters have envisioned.
Mokka has written previously on basic income for Demos Helsinki. In one blog post, for example, Mokka describes how Finland’s novel commitment to experimental politics–to testing policies before implementing them, rather than merely speculating about the results–lay behind its ability to experiment with basic income. In another, he compiles the views of five prominent advocates on what basic income should be and why it matters.
Read more:
Roope Mokka (October 16, 2016) “Basic Income Could be the Moonshot of Our Generation” Slush.
Photo by NASA/David Scott, Public Domain.
by Kate McFarland | Oct 27, 2016 | News
As previously announced on Basic Income News (and elsewhere), the governments of Finland and the Netherlands are both preparing to experimentally test a basic income, with trials beginning as early as January 2017.
On November 8, Kela, the Social Insurance Institute of Finland, will be holding a workshop on both countries’ upcoming experiments, fittingly titled “Experimenting with Basic Income: Finland and the Netherlands”. The workshop is open to the public and will be streamed live.
The goals of the event, which brings together leading researchers on both projects, are to “explore both similarities and differences between the proposed schemes, to examine the role of basic income experiments in each country, and to analyse the political and policy processes associated with piloting basic income in advanced welfare states”.
Kela researcher Olli Kangas will introduce the event, and Jurgen De Wispelaere, of the University of Tampere, will deliver opening and closing lectures that compare and contextualize the two experiments (“Putting Basic Income Experiments in Context” and “Comparing Basic Income Experiments: Lessons and Challenges”).
Additionally, three panels will be held concerning details of the respective experiments:
1. “Experimenting with Basic Income in the Netherlands: General Considerations” featuring panelists Sjir Hoeijmakers (independent scholar) and Loek Groot (University of Utrecht), moderated by Paula Laine (Sitra).
2. “Experimental design and implementation: Utrecht, Wageningen and Tilburg” featuring panelists Timo Verlaat (University of Utrecht), Ernst-Jan de Bruijn (University of Wageningen), and Ruud Muffels (University of Tilburg), moderated by Laine.
3. “The Finnish Basic Income Experiments” featuring panelists Johanna Perkiö (University of Tampere), Olli Kangas, and Kathrin Komp (University of Helsinki), moderated by Pertti Koistinen (University of Tampere).
“Experimenting with Basic Income” takes place as part of the research program Tackling Inequalities in Time of Austerity (TITA), funded by the Strategic Research Council at the Academy of Finland. (See TITA’s research plan for more information about its activities.)
Join in-person or on-line:
To attend, register by November 4 here: https://www.lyyti.fi/reg/workshop20161108.
The event will be streamed lived and recorded. Information will be available at this link: https://www.kela.fi/experimenting-with-basic-income-finland-and-netherlands.
Reviewed by Robert Gordon.
Photo: “Helsinki y la catedral” CC BY-NC 2.0 Mariano Mantel.
by Kate McFarland | Oct 15, 2016 | News, Research
As previously reported in Basic Income News, Kela, the Social Insurance Institution of Finland, submitted a report on basic income experiments to the Finnish Government on March 30. Previously released to the public only in Finnish, the report is now available in English.
Kela’s report describes and analyzes several basic income models, including a “full” basic income of at least 1000 EUR per month, which would replace all existing social insurance programs, a “partial” basic income of under 800 EUR per month, and a negative income tax. It additionally examines conditional programs such as a participation income.
In the conclusion of its report, Kela advises the Finnish government to adopt a partial basic income model for its experiment.
In August, Finland’s Ministry of Social Affairs and Health drafted a bill authorizing the basic income experiment. This bill revealed that the government plans to test of a partial basic income of 560 EUR per month, distributed to a random sample of 2,000 individuals who are between the ages of 25 and 58 and currently receive unemployment assistance. The Ministry’s proposed legislation also made clear that experiment will be designed specifically to test whether a partial basic income incentivizes employment.
The English version of Kela’s 62-page report is now available as a free download from its website (see link below). This version also includes a postscript concerning the bill drafted by the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health, including a summary of criticisms of the bill and an explanation of the government’s decision to adopt the chosen experimental design.
Kansaneläkelaitos Kela; Social Insurance Institution of Finland Kela (2016) “From idea to experiment. Report on universal basic income experiment in Finland”
Link: https://helda.helsinki.fi/handle/10138/167728
Photo: CC BY-NC 2.0 Aaronigma
