14 articoli pubblicati
Written for people who have to make up their minds, not for specialists. One argument at a time, with the objections included and every figure sourced.
They are treated as rival proposals, one from the left and one from the right. Designed properly, they produce the same economic result. The real differences lie elsewhere, in timing, visibility and politics.
European social protection systems were built between the late nineteenth century and the post-war decades, around a precise idea of how people work. That idea no longer describes reality, and the result is a structure protecting fewer and fewer people.
A minimum wage sets a floor by law. A basic income sets one through bargaining power: nobody is forced to accept, so whoever is offering has to persuade. They are different instruments, and the second reaches things the first cannot.
It is the strongest political argument for universality, and it has nothing to do with generosity: a measure received by a minority has nobody to defend it when the time comes to cut.
If everyone has more money and the housing stock stays the same, part of the benefit ends up with landlords. It is the technically strongest objection to basic income, and the honest answer is that without housing policy the problem is real.
One million signatures from at least seven member states in twelve months. It is the instrument that can force the Commission to answer, and it is also an instrument that almost always fails. It is worth understanding why.
Since 1982 every Alaska resident, children included, has received an annual payment with no conditions attached. It is the longest-running unconditional programme in the Western world, and it was created by a conservative majority.
The objection you hear in every conversation about basic income, and the one the available evidence supports least. But the answer has to be given in full, including the parts that do not confirm the case.
Raising a child, caring for a parent, holding a household together: work without which no economy stands, unpaid and therefore invisible. A basic income does not pay for it, but it stops punishing it.
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