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The right to a basic income is defined as one of the new emerging rights, the aim of which is to put an end to poverty and social exclusion.
Underpinning the claim for a basic income as a right is the idea that all people, regardless of their place in the productive sphere, should be guaranteed a regular income allowing them to cover their basic material needs, merely because they are citizens. Such basic income would be personal, universal and non-transferable not contributing to and independent of the labour market. That is, all individuals would receive exactly the same basic income, set at the established poverty threshold, regardless of any other income they may have.
Basic income would replace almost all other social benefits and would mean that unemployment benefit (dole) and state pensions, for example, would not rely on having had a paid job. In this regard, the right to a basic income is defended not only as a means of combating poverty, but as fundamental in exercising true citizen freedom. Those who defend this idea as a citizen right argue that if there is need, there is no true freedom, and that a basic income would remove any obligation or imposition of the right to work.
Issue:
The economic system with its capitalist foundations is effective in creating wealth but not as effective in sharing it out. The differences in both wealth and opportunities between the haves and the have-nots are continuing to get bigger and the so-called welfare states social benefits are no longer enough to cover the basic needs of growing amounts of people who seem to be excluded for life from this social system.
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Proposal:
- Basic income is possible with the right political will.
Basic income is a clear social investment if we take the case of people who have to support children or elders. Detractors of this idea point to the danger of creating an incapable society by promoting incentives for people to comply with what should be their duty.
The Principle of Reciprocity should be applied. Basic income should always be granted in exchange for some socially beneficial work or act rather than an unconditional requirement.
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Stances:
- How can we consider the right to a basic income when there are so many other social needs to cover?
- Lo Vuolo: It will not be possible to achieve a basic income in Latin America until policies at the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund are changed. Stuart White: The idea of a basic income is ethically problematic because it undermines the principle of reciprocity between an individual and society. Basic income could encourage people not to give anything to society, either in terms of effort and work or political participation. Rights should not detract from peoples duties.
- Gösta Esping-Andersen, Pompeu Fabra University: Basic income could discourage people from acquiring skills needed to work, thereby exacerbating the problems of social exclusion and poverty by making them endemic. Watts and Mitchell, economists: In the long run basic income would not bring down unemployment levels. They propose a Keynesian solution: ensuring citizen income by creating public employment posts and low inflation.
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Best practices:
What is known as Minimum Insertion Income differs considerably to the concept of basic income, although their goals are rather similar. In the Basque country 18,000 people receive a Minimum Insertion Income as part of the Basque government's scheme to combat extreme poverty, long-term unemployment, marginalisation and social exclusion. Only a further 8,000 people in the rest of Spain, many in Catalonia, receive the same. The Minimum Insertion Income is an amount of money paid by the state as part of its benefits programme rather than a right bestowed upon citizens as is the case with basic income.
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RS Congress of the Basic Income European Network (BIEN). First and second days.
IF Public health systems free riders
AS City and Citizenship for the 21st Century