LOS ANGELES, CA: Second Basic Income Create-A-Thon, April 15-17

LOS ANGELES, CA: Second Basic Income Create-A-Thon, April 15-17

The second Basic Income “Create-A-Thon” will be held in Los Angeles, California, from April 15-17. The event will unite “writers, artists, videographers, developers, musicians, and other creatives” for the purpose of creating “content and media around the theme of a Universal Basic Income in the United States.”

A similar event was held in San Francisco last November, bringing together 60 creative-minded basic income advocates, and resulting in the development of eight separate projects, including, among others, a documentary, cost-calculator, policy proposal for the city of San Francisco, and the United States’ first crowd-funded basic income raffle.

For more information, to register, or to learn about how to initiate a Basic Income Create-A-Thon in your own city, see the Create-A-Thon’s official website.


Photo of LA skyline CC Wikimedia Commons

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New articles connect automation with the need for basic income

The automation argument for basic income has reached the New York Times as an article by Farhad Manjoo argues that automation will replace millions of jobs and the best solution might be basic income. This is one of many recent articles around the world making the connection between technological displacement of workers and basic income.

Toby Deller has a slightly different take on automation in an article in Rhinegold Publishing, which has published content aimed at people in the music and performing arts industries since 1976. This article worries that the current state of automation has led increasingly to an insecure gig economy even if it has not decreased the number of available jobs.

Deller writes, “For musicians the benefits are clear. Peripatetic teachers, freelance players, composers, conductors are all among those with quiet periods of the year to negotiate (one of the worst coming at exactly the time that self-assessment tax payments are due). A guaranteed few quid would be a welcome security net. But the UBI would do more than address that. … The truth is that for musicians, for any artist, having to work is not the chief obstacle: it’s not being able to work. The universal basic income promises to lower that obstacle in the most socially responsible way – just one reason why the classical music industry should be joining the debate, lobbying for its introduction.”

Articles mentioned:

Toby Deller, “The arts world should look outside itself and campaign for universal basic income

Farhad Manjoo, “A Plan in Case Robots Take the Jobs: Give Everyone a Paycheck.” New York Times, March 2, 2016

Stuart Goldenberg via the New York Times

Stuart Goldenberg via the New York Times

Futurist Gerd Leonhard on BIG

Futurist Gerd Leonhard on BIG

Gerd Leonhard, the acclaimed futurist speaker and author, believes that a Basic Income Guarantee (BIG) might be a necessary consequence of increased automation.

Last February, Hank Pellissier of the Institute of Ethics & Emerging Technologies interviewed Leonhard on his “opinions and forecasts” regarding BIG.

In the brief interview, Leonhard discusses the conditions that he sees as prerequisites for the adoption of a BIG, concluding that “a basic income guarantee is only possible once we unbundle work money, and once the traditional mantra of profit and growth at all costs has collapsed.” He is optimistic that, eventually, societies will assume this post-capitalist outlook.

After addressing questions on BIG-related topics, including Switzerland’s basic income referendum and technological unemployment, Leonhard broaches the idea of “automation tax,” which “companies would pay for each job replaced by a machine.” In Leonhard’s view, an automation tax may be an effective means of providing governments with money to reinvest in “creating a flourishing society and allowing for human happiness.”

Read the interview here:

Hank Pellissier, “Basic Income Guarantee will allow us to move the Maslow Pyramid – interview with Gerd Leonhard”. Institute of Ethics & Emerging Technologies, February 7th 2016.

For more about Gerd Leonhard, including videos and descriptions of speaking topics, see his website.

Image credit: ictQATAR

VIDEO: The Big Picture, “Universal Basic Income has begun” – interview with Jenna Van Draanen

Jenna van Draanen. Credit to: The Big Picture.

Jenna van Draanen. Credit to: The Big Picture.

The Big Picture, the American political news show hosted by Thom Hatmann, has taken an interest in basic income. That interest was spurred by the situation in Canada, where new tests of basic income are being planned, and materialized in inviting Jenna Van Draanen, secretary from the board of directors of Basic Income Canada Network, to the program. The conversation starts with a general description of the Ontario’s recent proposal of a basic income trial, passing through a rough comparison with the Alaska Permanent Fund. Jenna underscores basic income’s potential advantages, such as simplicity, debureaucratization, freedom of choice, empowerment (especially for the poor) and savings in social programs.

 

More information at:

The Big Picture, “Universal Basic Income has begun” – interview with Jenna Van Draanen

UNITED STATES: White House Economic Report Discusses Technological Automation

UNITED STATES: White House Economic Report Discusses Technological Automation

Released in late February, the White House’s Economic Report of the President discusses a number of topics related to the United States economy, including the global macroeconomic situation, the economic benefits of investing in U.S. infrastructure, and technology and innovation.  Within that last category, the report covers declining labor market dynamism and notes, “Both job creation and job destruction as a share of total employment have been in continuous decline since 1980 but that job creation has fallen faster in the last two decades.”  This is shown by Figure 5-4 from the report.

WH1

After introducing the fact that jobs are currently being destroyed faster than they are being created, the report continues to discuss robotics and the future of innovation.  According to the report, “Robots, like other types of automation can be either complements to, or substitutes for, conventional labor.”  And while many have argued that mass unemployment due to robotics and automation is decades away since history has shown that new jobs are created as old ones are destroyed, the report cites an Oxford University study by Frey and Osborne (2013) that argued that big data and machine learning will make it possible to automate many tasks that previously seemed impossible to automate.  As seen in Figure 5-15 from the report, a vast majority of jobs that pay less than $20 an hour are in danger of eventual automation, as are a significant number of jobs that pay $20-40 an hour.

WH2

 

On this topic, Scott Santens has written an article in response to the White House report in which he argues that such mass automation may be nearer than we thought.  Santens references a major development in artificial intelligence recently that many thought was a decade away but that has recently been achieved: A computer was able to defeat one of the world’s best players in a game called Go.  According to Santens, “Go is a board game so complex that it can be likened to playing 10 chess matches simultaneously on the same table.”

Santens believes that a basic income is the best way forward to ensure a minimum standard living for those who will lose their jobs to robots.  As technology continues to improve and the world is introduced to self-driving cars and other robots that will replace large swaths of jobs that are not merely routine and manual but also nonroutine and cognitive, Santens thinks society needs to be proactive in enacting a basic income to help decouple income from labor as labor demands from humans begins to shrink.