Main Blog Page

A month into Finland’s experiment with a basic income, the idea is taking criticism from an unexpected source: The country’s largest labour union.

“We think it takes social policy in the wrong direction,” Ilkka Kaukoranta, chief economist at the Central Organization of Finnish Trade Unions (SAK), told Bloomberg . The union’s membership of 1 million includes more than one out of every five people in Finland.

But supporters of a basic income say unions are simply afraid of losing membership, should the idea be implemented. Pedestrians crossing a street in Helsinki, Finland. The country’s government is running two-year a trial of […]

Full Post at www.1000islandsganchamber.com

Ebay founder Pierre Omidyar The idea of a universal basic income has found growing support in Silicon Valley as robots threaten to radically change the nature of work.

Ebay founder Pierre Omidyar is the latest tech bigwig to get behind the concept. His philanthropic investment firm, the Omidyar Network, announced Wednesday that it will give nearly half a billion dollars to a group testing the policy in Kenya.

Universal basic income is the notion that a government should guarantee every citizen a yearly sum of money, no strings attached. The thinking is that such a program would relieve economic stress as […]

Full Post at mashable.com

Basic income important for people with disabilities A basic income guarantee (B.I.G.) would transform the current social welfare system and policies to a system based on human rights and basic needs. Why is basic income especially important for people with disabilities?

A basic income guarantee would be a move away from determining a person’s value based on their work. It would eliminate the discriminatory attitude that people with disabilities are takers, not contributors, and challenge the harmful idea that wealth is for the blessed.

Disability and poverty are interlocking. Today, 70 per cent of people born with a moderate to […]

Full Post at www.theguardian.pe.ca

In his first ever interaction with the public through Facebook Live, Arvind Subramanian, the chief economic advisor to the Finance Ministry, discussed the idea of Universal Basic Income (UBI) again and said it will bring the people out of poverty, if implemented. The idea of UBI was recently proposed in the Economic Survey for 2016-17 presented ahead of the Union Budget.

The Survey described UBI, a form of social security in which everyone is allotted a basic allowance, as "a powerful idea" but one that’s "not ready for implementation".

"The amount that is given (under UBI) will be enough to guarantee […]

Full Post at profit.ndtv.com

Along with the discussion of the government paying “basic income” to all citizens, some advocate a robot tax. KAIST Moon Soul Graduate School of Future Strategy Dean Lee Kwang-hyung and Tim Dunlop, author of “Why the Future is Workless,” are notable champions of the robot tax. Their premise is the end of working.

As robots will replace human jobs, there should be an imposed tax to secure the source of revenue for basic income.

Regardless of one’s position on basic income and the robot tax, we all agree that many of the jobs today will become unnecessary in the near future. […]

Full Post at koreajoongangdaily.joins.com

The numbers game: It needs thorough checking – Photo: V Ganesan But the Government’s commitment cannot be unconditional. That would be politically and economically unviable

The Economic Survey has traditionally been a document which gives us the latest on the state of the economy and provides some idea on the prospects for the year.

Two things have changed in the last few years. Firstly, we get relatively better data on a regular basis on almost all economic indicators which denude to an extent the novelty of this document. Secondly, some high profile economists occupying the post of chief economic advisor have […]

Full Post at www.thehindubusinessline.com