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*[http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/eo20060903a1.html 47 percent of Germans receive social assistance] |
*[http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/eo20060903a1.html 47 percent of Germans receive social assistance] |
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*[http://www.BLACKLISTEDfreiheitstattvollbeschaeftigung.de/en/index.htm German Initiative "Freedom, Not Full Employment] |
*[http://www.BLACKLISTEDfreiheitstattvollbeschaeftigung.de/en/index.htm German Initiative "Freedom, Not Full Employment] |
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*[http://www.basicincome.org Basic Income Earth Network (BIEN)] |
*[http://www.basicincome.org Basic Income Earth Network (BIEN)] (in Dutch) |
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*[http://www.BLACKLISTEDusbig.net U.S. Basic Income Guarantee Network (USBIG)] |
*[http://www.BLACKLISTEDusbig.net U.S. Basic Income Guarantee Network (USBIG)] |
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**[http://www.BLACKLISTEDusbig.net/about.html About Basic Income] |
**[http://www.BLACKLISTEDusbig.net/about.html About Basic Income] |
Revision as of 22:13, 29 April 2008
A basic income is a proposed system of social security, that periodically provides each citizen with a sum of money that is sufficient to live on. Except for citizenship, a basic income is entirely unconditional. Furthermore, there is no means test; the richest as well as the poorest citizens would receive it.
A basic income is often proposed in the form of a citizen's dividend (a transfer) or a negative income tax (a guarantee). A basic income less than the social minimum is referred to as a partial basic income. A worldwide basic income, typically including income redistribution between nations, is known as a global basic income.
The proposal is a specific form of guaranteed minimum income, which is normally conditional and subject to a means test.
Arguments
The Basic Income Earth Network (BIEN) describes one of the benefits of a basic income as having a lower overall cost than that of the current means-tested social welfare benefits.[1] However critics have pointed out the potential work disincentives created by such a program, and have cast doubts over its implementability.[2]
Examples of implementation
The U.S. State of Alaska has a system which provides each citizen with a share of the state's oil revenues.[3]
The city of Dauphin, Manitoba, Canada had an experimental guaranteed annual income program ("Mincome") in the 1970s.[4]
A negative income tax, proposed by Milton Friedman, came close to implementation in the United States under Richard Nixon [citation needed]. Also, the USA has the Earned income tax credit for low-income taxpayers.
Methods of implementation
One proposed method of offsetting the cost to the Treasury of this tax expenditure lies in its coupling with a flat tax, a type of federal income tax in which all taxpayers are subject to a single tax rate. The current model of progressive income taxes used throughout the western world could be eliminated, but the system would still be progressive, since those at the lower end of the wage scale would pay less in taxes than they would receive in guaranteed income.
Advocates
The world's most noted advocate of a basic income system may be the Belgian economist Philippe van Parijs. Other advocates include Keith Rankin (New Zealand), Andre Gorz (France), Saar Boerlage (Netherlands), Eduardo Suplicy (Brazil), Osmo Soininvaara (Finland), Gunnar Adler-Karlsson (Sweden), Herwig Büchele (Innsbruck, Austria), Götz W. Werner (Germany), Hans-Werner Sinn (Germany), Dieter Althaus (Germany), Daniel Raventós (Spain), Hans A. Pestalozzi (Switzerland), Ayşe Buğra (Turkey), and Charles Murray (USA).
Other advocates are winners of the Nobel Prize in Economics, including Paul Samuelson, James Tobin, Herbert Simon, Friedrich Hayek, James Meade, Robert Solow, and, depending on how one regards his negative income tax proposal, Milton Friedman.
Mike Gravel, a former candidate for the 2008 Democratic nomination for President of the United States and currently a candidate for the 2008 Libertarian nomination for the President of the United States, advocates for a guaranteed annual income, which he terms a "citizen's wage," of $5,000 per person.-->
In his Robotic Nation essays, Marshall Brain argues that the growing amount of automation in the workplace will eventually displace a large percentage of workers, and that in order to be able to maintain the economy, an annual stipend will be needed.[1] A similar argument was made by Jeremy Rifkin, in his book The End of Work.
Funding
Many different sources of funding have been suggested for a guaranteed minimum income:
- Income taxes
- Sales taxes
- Capital gains taxes
- Inheritance taxes
- Wealth taxes, e.g. property tax
- Luxury taxes
- Elimination of current income support programs and tax deductions
- Repayment of the grant at death or retirement
- Land and natural resource taxes
- Pollution taxes
- Fees from government created monopolies (such as the broadcast spectrum and utilities)
- Collective resource ownership
- Universal stock ownership
- A National Mutual Fund
- Money creation or seignorage
- Tariffs, the lottery, or sin taxes
- Technology Taxes
- Tobin Tax
See also
External links
- A.Gorz, Basic Income,Proposal
- Basic Income Network (Red Renta Básica)
- Brazil Garanteed Minimum Income Law (in Portuguese)
- 47 percent of Germans receive social assistance
- German Initiative "Freedom, Not Full Employment
- Basic Income Earth Network (BIEN) (in Dutch)
- U.S. Basic Income Guarantee Network (USBIG)
- Basic Income Studies: An International Journal of Basic Income Research
- Global Basic Income (GBI) Foundation
- Canadian pro-GMI advocacy site
- New Zealand UBI paper
- Marshall Brain FAQ
- Articles on the topic written by internationally renowned experts (in English and German)
- "Social minimum" in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
- Effortless Economy, an environment without labor
- ^ BIEN: frequently asked questions
- ^ [http://eis.bris.ac.uk/~plcdib/imprints/vanparijsinterview.html Interview with Phillippe van Parijs
- ^ See Alaska Permanent Fund Dividend; the fund's revenues are no longer only from oil.
- ^ Story of Manitoba