The Case for a

Universal Basic

Income

A U NIVERSAL B ASIC I NCOME If you know someone who is unemployed, underemployed, or without job security, you may want to look into an idea whose time is coming: the idea of a universal basic income or UBI. Polls have shown that a majority of the general population in a number of countries find themselves unable to accept the idea of a UBI. Raised to revere the work ethic they fear that a UBI, if set at a level to permit a decent life, would reward idleness and create legions of free riders. The fact that empirical studies undertaken in Canada and the U.S. suggest that the incentive to work is not significantly weakened by income security hardly seems to make a dent in such entrenched attitudes. These attitudes often find expression in the phrase, “I don’t believe in handouts.” It’s essential to understand that a UBI in no way rules out full-time, adequately paid employment, but rather softens the loss of its availability to all. A UBI provides the security of a bare living. Moreover, if it could be shown that the well-to-do receive “handouts”—although they’re not called handouts, and they take forms that disguise their true nature even from most of those who benefit from them—far in excess of anything describable as a UBI, would you be prepared to reconsider your opinion? On what basis would you deny to the poor what society unquestioningly, though without fully understanding, grants to the rich? At www.basicincome.com you will find the case for a UBI, as well as a summary of the simple UBI model for Canada presented in the book Basic Income: Economic Security for all Canadians by S. Lerner, C. M. A. Clark, W. R. Needham, 1999. You will also find a fact sheet entitled ‘Canadian Economic Data.’ A study of this data should convince you that the rich receive very generous handouts indeed (courtesy of tax loopholes and, more subtly but more importantly, the system of money creation known as fractional reserve banking). The English journalist G. K. Chesterton said that too much capitalism doesn’t mean too many capitalists, but too few capitalists. Unregulated capitalism and state socialism are twin blunders, capitalism because it concentrates wealth in the hands of the few thereby undermining democracy, and socialism because it concentrates power in the hands of a class of state officials who proceed to appropriate the lion’s share of the meagre output of a socialist economy for themselves. Of the two systems capitalism is infinitely preferable, firstly because the chief safeguard of personal freedom in a democratic society is the anarchy and disorder of capitalist individualism, and secondly because capitalism produces so much more wealth. Nevertheless, the great and growing economic inequality in the world today, both within nations and among nations, should be seen as a very dangerous ongoing crisis. But we must be very careful to avoid the blunder of blaming the rich instead of the true culprit—human nature. We have no reason to suppose, if rich and poor could trade places, that the poor would behave any better. They might well behave worse, as commonly happens when the exploited suddenly find themselves in a position to exploit. No, the rich take full advantage of the fact that our economy and tax system are organized and managed to their advantage—most of them don’t lose a moment’s sleep over it either—because that’s a very human thing to do. It was ever thus, and it’s a sign of maturity not to be scandalized by it. Capitalism is based on the principle of competition. People must work hard in order to succeed. But many people, through no fault of their own, are ill-equipped to live in such a competitive world. If we think it wrong to discriminate on the basis of race, creed or colour, why do we tolerate economic discrimination on the basis of energy, academic aptitude, or the motivating desire for wealth? It’s up to the victims of our economy, and their sympathizers in the middle class, to point to the obvious injustice in much of modern economic practice, as well as to the historic change underway in the nature of work. Though it may be delayed the day is coming when our society will agree with John Kenneth Galbraith, ‘Everybody should be guaranteed a decent basic income. A rich country...can well afford to keep everybody out of poverty.’

