What would society look like with universal basic income?

What would society look like with universal basic income?

Postby Oscar » Sat Apr 16, 2016 9:00 am

What would society look like with universal basic income?

[ http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/we ... sic-income ]

By Laurie Penny 15 April 2016

EXCERPT:

Basic income – the proposal to give a flat, non-means-tested payment to every citizen – is an old idea. It has been around for centuries, and for centuries its proponents have largely been dismissed as utopian, or insane, or both. This year, however, that insanity is gradually becoming a political reality. Finland is considering giving its citizens an unconditional stipend of €800 a month and the Dutch city of Utrecht is carrying out a similar experiment. Switzerland will hold a referendum on basic income in June.

Campaigns to get the idea taken seriously are sprouting like mushrooms around the world. In the US, the tech start-up funder Y Combinator is earmarking money to test the theory. In Germany, a crowd-funding initiative called Mein Grundeinkommen (“my basic income”) to give a basic wage to as many people as possible has attracted over a quarter of a million contributors.

Basic income is an idea that manages to be simple, practical and wildly, unthinkably radical at the same time. It’s simple because it is the only concrete, even vaguely workable solution that has so far been offered to tackle advancing inequality, an ageing global population and the encroaching end of wage labour as we know it. It’s practical because basic income is that rare thing, that socio-economic unicorn: a compromise that has received positive coverage from almost everyone, from Financial Times columnists to feminist campaigners, from libertarian techno-millionaires to young, left-wing organisers. And it’s radical because, in its simplicity, in its pragmatism, unconditional basic income is a proposal that requires us to rethink the economic and ethical framework of neoliberal capitalism that has governed our lives for generations. All that it requires is that we trust one another.

The organising principle of modern economics is that without the threat of starvation, homelessness and poverty, people will not be motivated to work. There is no such thing as individual gumption or community spirit: human beings, left to their own devices, will inevitably sit on the sofa and eat crisps until the species collapses into a quagmire of entropy and episodic television. Fear, therefore, is necessary.

The notion of an economic system based on trust and mutual aid rather than fear, shame and suffering still sounds like a fairy tale. But as more and more jobs are automated away, as mandatory wage labour collapses as a method of organising society, even the most conservative governments may find themselves with no other option.

We have a choice, not just as a society, but as a species. We can choose to let fear and suspicion run our lives as we all struggle harder each year to survive in a collapsing economic system on a smoking planet. Or we can choose to trust each other enough that everyone can share in the rewards of technology. It is blasphemous, unthinkable – but it may also be the only practical choice we have.

- - -

Laurie Penny is a contributing editor to the New Statesman. She is the author of five books, most recently Unspeakable Things.
Oscar
Site Admin
 
Posts: 9079
Joined: Wed May 03, 2006 3:23 pm

Return to MONEY MATTERS

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 2 guests

cron