Tag: basic income

Building on the RSA’s proposal, Jonny Ross-Tatam sets out the Buchanan Institute’s case for a Universal Basic Income.

An effective welfare system should provide a secure financial foundation on which everyone can build their lives and reach their potential. It should provide a stable safety net in the hard times, reward work and largely leave people to get on with their lives. A growing consensus of policy makers and politicians, from across the political spectrum, believe this is not the case with much of the current UK welfare system. Critics from the right take aim at its ‘high marginal deduction […]

Full Post at www.thersa.org

© Icy and Sot. COLOUR RAIN, Icy and Sot (New York, USA, 2013) The idea of an unconditional basic income (UBI) is quite simple: every legal resident in a country receives a monthly stipend sufficient to live above the poverty line. Let’s call this the ‘no frills culturally respectable standard of living’. The grant is unconditional on the performance of any labour or other form of contribution, and it is universal – everyone receives the grant, rich and poor alike. Grants go to individuals, not families. Parents are the custodians of under-age children’s grants, which may be smaller than […]

Full Post at www.unesco.org

Finland Basic Income Come January, the country of Finland will embark an experiment to see what happens when you give a universal basic income to unemployed citizens. It will hand out a cash sum of 560 euros ($585) to a random selection of 2,000 unemployed citizens in place of current social security benefits. The program will last for two years even if participants find work during that time.

It’s a grand social experiment to see how the labor market behaves when you secure and guarantee income. Some argue that it would help put a dent in unemployment because people unwilling […]

Full Post at fanvive.com

In a recent interview, Swiss entrepreneur and activist Daniel Häni contends that “the unconditional basic income is an initiative against laziness.”

Häni is well known in the basic income as the co-founder the co-founder of Switzerland’s popular initiative for an unconditional basic income (UBI), which launched the campaign for a referendum to establish a national basic income.

In the interview, he talks about new conceptualizations of work in modern society, the value of time, and implied social changes from a UBI. Häni argues that man is not by nature lazy. He notes that, in contrast, much opposition to UBI comes from […]

Full Post at basicincome.org

The National League of Cities (NLC) — an advocacy organization representing 19,000 cities and towns in the United States — has published a report called The Future of Work in Cities , which briefly recommends that cities investigate universal basic income.

The Future of Work in Cities examines the changing nature of work, especially due to automation and the growth of the “gig” or “1099” economy, and the lays out several policy recommendations for cities to address these changes. One recommendation is that cities “explore basic income and other more broad-based social support systems.”

The NLC report describes basic income […]

Full Post at basicincome.org

Mission: poverty eradication. An idea gaining traction in various part of the world is that everyone in society should receive an amount of money from the state to cover their basic cost of living. People would no longer be stigmatised on benefits, argue supporters.

Dependent women would become financially independent. People would be freed to care for the elderly, crime would fall and the general health of the population would improve. Particularly in an era of fears about future mass unemployment caused by automation, there is a growing feeling that this citizens’ basic income is an idea that’s time has […]

Full Post at theconversation.com

It was with great interest and enthusiasm I followed news of the Basic Income Guarantee motion that was unanimously approved by all parties in the P.E.I. legislature on Tuesday, Dec. 6. A policy worth exploring.

Through his piece in The Huffington Post, Green Leader Peter Bevan-Baker spoke not only to what he referred to as the more obvious and immediate affects of alleviating poverty (better health and mental health outcomes, food security lower crimes rates, educational achievement etc.) he also spoke to what he referred to as the more subtle outcomes of a basic income program that could allow […]

Full Post at www.theguardian.pe.ca

Universal basic income is the operating system of a post-industrial state There are very few policy ideas that attract support from all sides of the political spectrum these days. Universal basic income is one of them.

The idea of replacing existing welfare systems by giving everyone unconditional cash payments—regardless of income, work status, or anything else—is appealing to conservatives who want to shrink government bureaucracy, liberals who want to support low-wage workers, and technologists who think that robots will soon take all our jobs. In short, for a wide range of problems, basic income is presented as the solution.

Progress implementing […]

Full Post at epeak.in

Kanata Kourier-Standard

On a recent trip out of town, I found myself eating at restaurants three times a day. For five days, I found myself eating takeout in the car, sitting in the hospital drinking coffee, and eating very salty restaurant food when I could grab a proper meal.

By the third day, the thought of another restaurant meal made my tongue raw. In fact, my entire mouth was raw. And my head hurt, and my glands were swollen. And my back ached. A quick Google search on the subject told me I likely had an autoimmune disease with limited time […]

Full Post at www.ottawacommunitynews.com

By Tina Irgang

In 2017, several countries and at least one company are poised to embark on a major social experiment: What if people were simply handed a certain amount of money each year, no strings attached?

Silicon Valley has long advocated for the idea of a universal basic income, but startup accelerator Y Combinator is poised to launch an actual trial run. The company will select 100 families from Oakland, CA, and provide them between $1,000 and $2,000 a month for up to a year, according to The Guardian .“In our pilot [study], the income will be unconditional; we’re […]

Full Post at www.smartceo.com