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Finland just launched an experiment giving 2,000 people free money until 2019

Finland just launched an experiment giving 2,000 people free money until 2019

Reuters/Vesa Moilanen Finland has an ambitious New Year’s resolution in mind: learn how offering free money for two years helps the unemployed get back to work.

Starting January 1, 2017 and lasting until 2019, the federal social security institution Kela will distribute roughly $590 each month to 2,000 jobless Finns.

Regardless of whether they find work during that period, the money will keep coming in at the beginning of each month — a trial version of basic income, one of the past year’s most popular theories of how to solve poverty.Under universal basic income (UBI), people receive a standard amount of […]

Finland’s Basic Income Experiment Starts – Really, It’s Testing The Laffer Curve For Poor People

Finland's Basic Income Experiment Starts - Really, It's Testing The Laffer Curve For Poor People

Finland is just starting an experiment which has a lot of us economic types rather excited. Yes, I know, sad, isn’t it, that we might get excited over something that seems so trivial. For what Finland is doing is testing out the core idea of a universal basic income. Instead of paying welfare benefits conditional upon circumstances, like being unemployed, or having too little an income, why not just pay people a set minimum? Not a huge amount, to be sure, but enough to just keep body and soul together. And make it unconditional. Doesn’t matter whether you look […]

Basic income is the latest bad political idea that refuses to die

Basic income is the latest bad political idea that refuses to die

One proposal for a universal basic income in Britain would see every citizen awarded £8,320 regardless of their circumstances or employment status The zombie policy of the universal basic income is the first to rise from the grave of well-intentioned impractical ideas in 2017. Labour-controlled Glasgow city council is the latest to announce that it intends to investigate a pilot scheme.

There is a reason why the basic income is the eternal news story. Someone, somewhere, is always saying what a marvellous idea it is. Some local government, or much less often a national government, is saying that it is […]

Basic income is a bad idea that refuses to die

The zombie policy of the universal basic income is the first to rise from the grave of well-intentioned impractical ideas in 2017. Labour-controlled Glasgow city council is the latest to announce that it intends to investigate a pilot scheme.

There is a reason why the basic income is the eternal news story. Someone, somewhere, is always saying what a marvellous idea it is. Some local government, or much less often a national government, is saying that it is going to look at it, or going to bring in a pilot scheme or even, every now and again, actually bring in […]

Guaranteed Income for Every Citizen – Best Way To Revitalize Humanity by luzcypher

In June 2016, Switzerland voted in a referendum on the topic of introducing a basic income. If it had passed, all Swiss citizens, working or unemployed, would have received about $2,500 Swiss francs for adults and 625 francs for children per month as a guaranteed stipend from the government.

Switzerland would have become the first country in the world to implement such an idea. Although the Swiss Federal Council rejected the initiative in August 2014, the rejection was more of a symbolic suggestion to vote against the basic income than a consequential political action: the Swiss people had already asserted […]

Finland gives 2,000 citizens guaranteed income

Finland gives 2,000 citizens guaranteed income

Finland is giving 2,000 citizens a guaranteed income – Jan. 2, 2017

The program, which kicks off this month, is one of the first efforts to test a “universal basic income.” Participants will receive €560 ($587) a month — money that is guaranteed regardless of income, wealth or employment status.

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Finland is giving 2,000 citizens a guaranteed income

Finland is giving 2,000 citizens a guaranteed income

Carl Icahn: ‘The minimum wage should go up’ Finland has started a radical experiment: It’s giving 2,000 citizens a guaranteed income, with funds that keep flowing whether participants work or not.

The program, which kicks off this month, is one of the first efforts to test a "universal basic income." Participants will receive €560 ($587) a month — money that is guaranteed regardless of income, wealth or employment status.

The idea is that a universal income offers workers greater security, especially as technological advances reduce the need for human labor. It will also allow unemployed people to pick up odd […]

Scottish Councils Are Considering Implementing Universal Basic Income

Scottish Councils Are Considering Implementing Universal Basic Income

Glasgow, pictured above, is among two Scottish councils interested in testing an idea based on Thomas More’s “Utopia.” Michel Curi / CC BY 2.0

Now that Scotland will have more power over its finances, the councils of Glasgow and Fife are eager to try out an economic plan already running successfully in parts of Finland, Netherlands, Africa, India and Canada: universal basic income.

Proponents of the concept, which would allow the state to allot a set amount of money to all inhabitants of a given place regardless of income, understand that it will require a significant shift in social thinking. […]

Scotland set to pilot universal basic income scheme in Fife and Glasgow

Scotland set to pilot universal basic income scheme in Fife and Glasgow

The SNP passed a motion in support of universal basic income at their conference last year A radical scheme to give every citizen a universal basic income (UBI) regardless of whether or not they work is set to be piloted by two Scottish councils this year.

Labour-run Glasgow and Fife councils are designing trial schemes following meetings held late last year.

One expert said the decisions represented “a very significant step forward for basic income in Scotland”.It has not yet been announced what level the basic income will be set at, but the councils are to proceed with the pilots, subject […]

Finland is giving 2,000 citizens a guaranteed income

Finland has started a radical experiment: It’s giving 2,000 citizens a guaranteed income, with funds that keep flowing whether participants work or not.

The program, which kicks off this month, is one of the first efforts to test a “universal basic income.” Participants will receive €560 ($587) a month — money that is guaranteed regardless of income, wealth or employment status.

The idea is that a universal income offers workers greater security, especially as technological advances reduce the need for human labor. It will also allow unemployed people to pick up odd jobs without losing their benefits.The initial program will run […]