Basic Income - wait! It's a trap!
Over on Andrew Ducker's page there was this discussion:
http://andrewducker.livejournal.com/3439694.html
I have pulled one of my responses (& tidied the typos) because I want to be able to find it again:
I think getting rid of the means testing for economic assistance is good - as long as it isn't also used to get rid of social services such as mental health care and other services for assisting those who have barriers that prevent them from navigating the system - or even knowing there is help. We need those even if every person on the planet can have exactly what they want as soon as they want it.
Also, this sounds like the minute Basic Income is in place, there will be a massive sigh of relief, a dusting of hands, and a collective, "well that's a job well done" - and then a collective relaxation. But, minimum needs calculated today won't be the same price tomorrow. As someone who is planning for her old age, & has started to pay attention to how much this work pension will pay, & how much my private savings will pay, & how much the public pension will pay - and who has lived through some pretty exciting inflationary times (my first student loan was paid off at a "best" interest rate of 15% - mortgages were higher), I know that enough pension payments to cover our monthly expenses when I start retirement will not continue to be enough.
Here's a fun calculator:
http://www.bankofcanada.ca/rates/related/inflation-calculator/
If I select 1996, the year I got married & the year after I have finished my degree & was making payments on my second student loan & the year I turned 40, then things that cost me $100.00 then, now cost me nearly twice as much. This time frame, by the way, does not include the years of outrageous inflation during which I paid off my first student loan - these figures are for a period covered by strict manipulation of the economy to prevent such inflation.
I still think that Basic Income is like School Uniforms - an attempt to stem human hierarchy with a superficial fix - and it will lead to increased anger at the poor because "we already gave you enough, you greedy shiftless scum."
Um. In Canada there was a similar thing as the proposed Basic Income - the baby bonus. For every new baby, the mother was issued a monthly cheque for a certain amount of money, and it was paid until the child was 16. Interestingly, in a country that up until the 50s didn't permit a woman to own a farm, or get her own bank account without her father's/husband's/son's signature, the cheques were issued in the mother's name, and it was accepted as cash for any kind of purchase. Every mother got it for every every child (oh - I bet First Nations mothers did not), and so there was no stigma to receiving it or cashing it - other than the sotto voce view that women who used it to purchase things, rather than banking it, either couldn't manage their money or couldn't trust their spouses. I think it was about $8.00 when I was 10 - which the handy calculator says is now nearly $60.00 so not nothing - but it wouldn't cover much. There was the belief that women who couldn't manage that money "properly" shouldn't be given access to further assistance because they would just "waste" that, too, even though we all know that you can't feed, clothe, and educate a child for $60.00 a month.
Ooo - there are other possible motives for its beginnings:
http://news.nationalpost.com/news/canada/a-history-of-the-baby-bonus-tories-now-tout-benefits-of-program-they-once-axed
And, you know, if there are going to be resources given to parents for children - isn't the Finnish Box so much more inclusive and appealing? Everybody gets the same one each year; it becomes a symbol of new parenthood; it has nostalgia features - and really, it is so appealing it makes you sorry you aren't Finnish.
So, if you want to give people an equalizer, you need something that everybody gets, everybody wants and which has mostly null status issues about it. Here's my idea:
Four years of free housing, free food, and free education, for everyone, no matter whether they are taking a four year bachelor's, a four year apprenticeship, or a four year figuring out what to do, or remedial studies for developmental delays. You get to a certain age, and you automatically move into the dorms and engage in the options. Maybe somebody needs five years because they've discovered a better choice than their first. Maybe somebody only wants to stay for two because there is a whole big world out there that needs to be tasted. Maybe somebody stays there for years because they never grow beyond that step.
It needs to be something desirable, fun, flexible, and something meant to be a launcher but not everything.
http://andrewducker.livejournal.com/3439694.html
I have pulled one of my responses (& tidied the typos) because I want to be able to find it again:
I think getting rid of the means testing for economic assistance is good - as long as it isn't also used to get rid of social services such as mental health care and other services for assisting those who have barriers that prevent them from navigating the system - or even knowing there is help. We need those even if every person on the planet can have exactly what they want as soon as they want it.
Also, this sounds like the minute Basic Income is in place, there will be a massive sigh of relief, a dusting of hands, and a collective, "well that's a job well done" - and then a collective relaxation. But, minimum needs calculated today won't be the same price tomorrow. As someone who is planning for her old age, & has started to pay attention to how much this work pension will pay, & how much my private savings will pay, & how much the public pension will pay - and who has lived through some pretty exciting inflationary times (my first student loan was paid off at a "best" interest rate of 15% - mortgages were higher), I know that enough pension payments to cover our monthly expenses when I start retirement will not continue to be enough.
Here's a fun calculator:
http://www.bankofcanada.ca/rates/related/inflation-calculator/
If I select 1996, the year I got married & the year after I have finished my degree & was making payments on my second student loan & the year I turned 40, then things that cost me $100.00 then, now cost me nearly twice as much. This time frame, by the way, does not include the years of outrageous inflation during which I paid off my first student loan - these figures are for a period covered by strict manipulation of the economy to prevent such inflation.
I still think that Basic Income is like School Uniforms - an attempt to stem human hierarchy with a superficial fix - and it will lead to increased anger at the poor because "we already gave you enough, you greedy shiftless scum."
Um. In Canada there was a similar thing as the proposed Basic Income - the baby bonus. For every new baby, the mother was issued a monthly cheque for a certain amount of money, and it was paid until the child was 16. Interestingly, in a country that up until the 50s didn't permit a woman to own a farm, or get her own bank account without her father's/husband's/son's signature, the cheques were issued in the mother's name, and it was accepted as cash for any kind of purchase. Every mother got it for every every child (oh - I bet First Nations mothers did not), and so there was no stigma to receiving it or cashing it - other than the sotto voce view that women who used it to purchase things, rather than banking it, either couldn't manage their money or couldn't trust their spouses. I think it was about $8.00 when I was 10 - which the handy calculator says is now nearly $60.00 so not nothing - but it wouldn't cover much. There was the belief that women who couldn't manage that money "properly" shouldn't be given access to further assistance because they would just "waste" that, too, even though we all know that you can't feed, clothe, and educate a child for $60.00 a month.
Ooo - there are other possible motives for its beginnings:
http://news.nationalpost.com/news/canada/a-history-of-the-baby-bonus-tories-now-tout-benefits-of-program-they-once-axed
And, you know, if there are going to be resources given to parents for children - isn't the Finnish Box so much more inclusive and appealing? Everybody gets the same one each year; it becomes a symbol of new parenthood; it has nostalgia features - and really, it is so appealing it makes you sorry you aren't Finnish.
So, if you want to give people an equalizer, you need something that everybody gets, everybody wants and which has mostly null status issues about it. Here's my idea:
Four years of free housing, free food, and free education, for everyone, no matter whether they are taking a four year bachelor's, a four year apprenticeship, or a four year figuring out what to do, or remedial studies for developmental delays. You get to a certain age, and you automatically move into the dorms and engage in the options. Maybe somebody needs five years because they've discovered a better choice than their first. Maybe somebody only wants to stay for two because there is a whole big world out there that needs to be tasted. Maybe somebody stays there for years because they never grow beyond that step.
It needs to be something desirable, fun, flexible, and something meant to be a launcher but not everything.