The arguments are not new but they are still relevant. Even more so now perhaps, as the push toward controlling the labour force through social policy is even more refined. A coveting eye has been placed upon the welfare recipient as a cheap source of labour, and coercing them to take any job at any pay rate under any condition, is now a major thrust of welfare policy.

Five reasons to be critical

Without going into a long diatribe, the reasons we oppose an emphasis on GI as the organizing and analytical approach by poverty activists at this juncture, and why we do not support most GI schemes includes:

    1.  No real poverty relief

    There is no way an annual income guarantee will provide a decent amount, as welfare does not now and the idea of work incentives is entrenched.

    2. Corporate subsidy

    The low amount considered basic will provide a subsidy to the industrial corporate sector, as the pressure will be off to provide a decent living wage for employees. This is the same idea behind wage subsidies to     individual employers if they hire poor people. It is an extension of the same idea only on a more universal level. Why should the employer pay over a tiny hourly rate, when the government takes up the slack?

    3. Equality issues quashed

    Free marketers such as Friedman like the GI concept because the free market could rule and never have to deal with complaints of inequality again. It will also please them as it will comprise a cutback in government safety program expenditures.

    4. Workplace rights undermined

    The program will undermine workplace rights - we can’t forget that it will not be implemented as a completely different paradigm when it is to occur under the current neo-liberal thrust - no way! It will further dominant corporate interests at the expense of the people at the lower rungs of society. Decent jobs, housing and social programs are the answer to poverty, not this scheme.

    5. An excuse to cut other needed services

    Proposal for a basic income have usually included the elimination of all government bureaucracies and variety of programs that presently dispense welfare benefits - this would result in further cutbacks and homogenization of a wide variety of programs saving the government money at the expense of the needs of the people The money to fund the universal GI will come from some other programs. As Andrew Jackson of the CLC states: "In the past, advocates of basic income guarantees (e.g. the Macdonald Royal Commission; then Minister Lloyd Axworthy in his 'Green Paper' of 1995) have favoured cuts to Unemployment Insurance (now EI) to free up funds for a new program. Part of the argument has been that EI regular benefits are an 'inefficient' tool for fighting poverty since unemployed workers can collect benefits even if their annual income is above the poverty-line, and since many unemployed workers have employed partners."

     "… In 1971, the Special Senate Committee on Poverty produced a report, known as the Croll Report, which recommended that Canada replace its existing welfare programs with a single basic income, set at 70 percent of poverty levels (about C$16,000 in today’s dollars for a family of four) and limited to families or individuals over forty years old. In 1985, the Royal Commission on the Economic Union and Development Prospects for Canada - the MacDonald Commission - proposed a below-subsistence basic income (about C$10,000 in today’s dollars for a family of four) with work conditions, and limited to families or individuals     older than thirty-five. Where the Croll Report had been focused on fighting poverty, the MacDonald Commission was more interested in scrapping social programs that interfered with the free market and replacing them with a safety net that would catch those who might suffer from the liberalization agenda. The Commission’s other major recommendation, free trade with the United States, was, of course, adopted by the Mulroney government, but basic income was ignored." (from Butler, Dissent, summer 2005).

"Slogans" don't match reality - Stanford

Political economist, Jim Stanford (CAW) cautions against allowing “the GI movement’s slogans about providing basic coverage to every Canadian to be used to bring about a ratcheting-down of hard-won and already-threatened social benefits,” and instead calls for a “living wage” through collective bargaining, minimum wages, and other forms of labor market regulation.

Despite all this, what is the problem of simply trying to get a guaranteed income on the books? The struggle over what amount GI would consist of, what scheme would be put in place, and how it would be funded, will take a huge amount of energy and time. It will focus anti-poverty activists in this direction to the exclusion of other strategies.

And in the end, if it comes into place at all, what in the world makes people think it will be a progressive version of the GI policy that wins?! History shows us that since the 1970’s none of the GI schemes have been implemented, not even the Right wing versions.

And the people who can wage this battle, often must have at hand a sophisticated analysis of social policy and taxation schemes in order to argue the complexities of a GI program if they are not to fall into simplistic solutions. The people who actually make up the minimum income and unemployed sector, are not likely to be part of determining the answers to the situation of poverty in Canada if this is the direction the movement takes.

- Kathleen Donovan and Garson Hunter

Comments

Written by wagmitfam on 2007-06-13 13:24:35 I can't argue with any of the points made here. But I have to ask, if not GI, then what?

Written by pelliott on 2007-06-13 13:53:35 How about collective bargaining, a minimum wage you can live on, affordable child care and housing, and social assistance that supports people instead of punishes them? And a more equitable economic system. For starters.

minimum wage Written by mamafrosty on 2007-06-16 00:08:04 for information purposes, Napo (National Anti-Poverty Organization has just written a letter to the Saskatchewan Minimum wage board, in support of a 10 to 11 dollar an hour min wage, dont know if this will happen or not, and there is still a whole gamit of issues as you mentioned, will give an updated comment when i find out more, if it goes through it would bring min wage not quite but close to the cost of living and inflation costs,

Why those who do not support a GAI are w Written by www.livableincome.org on 2007-06-16 12:15:41 See CAPITALILIZED FOR RESPONSE.    Five reasons to be critical    Without going into a long diatribe, the reasons we oppose an emphasis on GI as the organizing and analytical approach by poverty activists at this juncture, and why we do not support most GI schemes includes:    1. No real poverty relief    There is no way an annual income guarantee will provide a decent amount, as welfare does not now and the idea of work incentives is entrenched.    WHY WOULD A GLI (GUARANTEED LIVABLE INCOME) OR GAI NOT PROVIDE A LIVABLE INCOME?? IT WOULD BE SET BY A PROGRESSIVE GOVERNMENT THAT WOULD REALIZE THE RAMIFICATIONS OF PUTTING IN A LOW INCOME (REOLUTION AND CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE). PEOPLE ON WELFARE ARE DUMPED ON BECAUSE THE WELFARE PROGRAM ONLY HELPS THE POOR AND NOT EVEN THOSE PEOPLE GET ADEQUATE ASSISTANCE, BUT MAKING A UNIVERSAL PROGRAM LIKE MEDICARE OR THE GLI WOULD ALLOW ALL IN SOCIETY TO BE GIVEN EQUAL TREATMENT.    WORK INCENTIVES RIGHT NOW ARE "WORK OR STARVE/SUFFER"...    2. Corporate subsidy    The low amount considered basic will provide a subsidy to the industrial corporate sector, as the pressure will be off to provide a decent living wage for employees. THIS IS DEFINITELY WEIRD THINKING. RIGHT NOW CORPORATIONS PAY PEOPLE TO DO THEIR DIRTY WORK. IF YOU ARE DEEMED LOWER CLASS YOU WILL WORK IN A DEADEND JOB. BUT UNDER A UNIVERSAL GLI, THE CORPS/EMPLOYERS WOULD HAVE TO PAY YOU MORE IN ORDER TO RETAIN STAFF BECAUSE OF THE GLI WORKERS COULD QUIT THEIR JOBS AND BE SECURE IN KNOWING THAT THE RENT STILL GETS PAID AND SUPPER STILL GETS SERVED. This is the same idea behind wage subsidies to individual employers if they hire poor people. NO IT ISN'T THE GLI WOULD GO INTO PEOPLES POCKETS NOT THE BUSINESSES! It is an extension of the same idea only on a more universal level. Why should the employer pay over a tiny hourly rate, when the government takes up the slack?  DO YOU UNDERSTAND THAT EMPLOYERS WOULD BE AT THE MERCY OF THE WORKERS (NOT TO MENTION POWERFUL UNIONS) WOMEN ESPECIALLY, PEOPLE LIKE MY WIFE WHO WAS A SINGLE MOM, WOULD ESPECIALLY BENEFIT. NO MORE FEAR, EXCEPT FOR THE BAD EMPLOYERS IN THE WORLD.    3. Equality issues quashed    Free marketers such as Friedman like the GI concept because the free market could rule and never have to deal with complaints of inequality again. EVEN WITH THE GAI/GLI CANADIANS WOULD STILL HAVE THE CHARTER OF RIGHTS AND FREEDOMS, THE HUMAN RIGHTS BOARDS, UNIONS, FRIENDS AND EACH OTHER; HOW WOULD PUTTING IN PLACE A GLI REMOVE 'COMPLAINTS OF INEQUALITY'???It will also please them as it will comprise a cutback in government safety program expenditures. AS dr. YANNICK SAID IN HIS PRESENTATION MANY GOV. PROGRAMS WOULD STAY IN PLACE AND EVEN BE ENHANCED NOT CUT BACK.    4. Workplace rights undermined    The program will undermine workplace rights - we can’t forget that it will not be implemented as a completely different paradigm when it is to occur under the current neo-liberal thrust - no way! THAT IS WHY WE HAVE THE "SOMEHAT" PROGRESSIVE LIBERAL PARTY, THE WORKER FRIENDLY NDP, AND THE STUPENDOUS GREEN PARTY WOTH ELIZABETH MAY LEADING THE CHARGE ON THIS VERY ISSUE. It will further dominant corporate interests at the expense of the people at the lower rungs of society. ????? HOW???? Decent jobs, housing and social programs are the answer to poverty, not this scheme. YES, IAGREE WITH THESE IDEAS, BUT EMPLOYERS CREATE JOBS WHEN THEY FEEL IT IS NEEDED NOT WHEN GOVERNMENTS DICTATE THEM TO DO SO. AFFORDABLE HOUSING IS COMPLEMENTARY TO GLI, NOT EXCLUSIONARY!!! AND SOME SOCIAL PROGRAMS THAT DO NOT PAY OUT TO WORKERS (LIKE EI) should BE SCRAPPED IN FAVOUR OF A GLI!!!    5. An excuse to cut other needed services    Proposal for a basic income have usually included the elimination of all government bureaucracies and variety of programs that presently dispense welfare benefits - this would result in further cutbacks and homogenization of a wide variety of programs saving the government money at the expense of the needs of the people MY WIFE WHO LIVED ON WELFARE FOR MANY YEARS AND HER FRIENDS WHO WERE TRAPPED AS SINGLE MOTHERS ON THIS SHITTY SYSTEM DISAGREE! THE GLI WOULD ENSURE NEEDED MONEY GETS TO THE CITIZEN RECIPIENT AND NOT BE HELP UP BY A HIGH PAID UNIONIZED BUREUCRAT WHO THINKS PLAYING 'god" WITH PEOPLES IVES IS HIS/HER PEROGATIVE...ENUFF SAID...The money to fund the universal GI will come from some other programs. As Andrew Jackson of the CLC states: "In the past, advocates of basic income guarantees (e.g. the Macdonald Royal Commission; then Minister Lloyd Axworthy in his 'Green Paper' of 1995) have favoured cuts to Unemployment Insurance (now EI) to free up funds for a new program. Part of the argument has been that EI regular benefits are an 'inefficient' tool for fighting poverty since unemployed workers can collect benefits even if their annual income is above the poverty-line, and since many unemployed workers have employed partners."    "… In 1971, the Special Senate Committee on Poverty produced a report, known as the Croll Report, which recommended that Canada replace its existing welfare programs with a single basic income, set at 70 percent of poverty levels (about C$16,000 in today’s dollars for a family of four) and limited to families or individuals over forty years old. In 1985, the Royal Commission on the Economic Union and Development Prospects for Canada - the MacDonald Commission - proposed a below-subsistence basic income (about C$10,000 in today’s dollars for a family of four) with work conditions, and limited to families or individuals older than thirty-five. Where the Croll Report had been focused on fighting poverty, the MacDonald Commission was more interested in scrapping social programs that interfered with the free market and replacing them with a safety net that would catch those who might suffer from the liberalization agenda. The Commission’s other major recommendation, free trade with the United States, was, of course, adopted by the Mulroney government, but basic income was ignored." (from Butler, Dissent, summer 2005).    "Slogans" don't match reality - Stanford    Political economist, Jim Stanford (CAW) cautions against allowing “the GI movement’s slogans about providing basic coverage to every Canadian to be used to bring about a ratcheting-down of hard-won and already-threatened social benefits,” and instead calls for a “living wage” through collective bargaining, minimum wages, and other forms of labor market regulation. I AGREE WITH LIVING WAGES, BUT FOR THE POOR AND THE MENTALLY ILL A GLI WOULD WORK ALOT EASIER FASTER AND BETTER THAN FORCING THOSE WHO CANNOT WORK NORMALLY INTO THE SO CALLED FREE MARKET TO EARN THOSE 'LIVING WAGES' AND WHAT MAKES YOU THINK THAT CORPS. LIKE TO PAY LIVING WAGES ANY MORE THAN PAYING A GLI THRU THE TAX SYSTEM????    Despite all this, what is the problem of simply trying to get a guaranteed income on the books? The struggle over what amount GI would consist of, what scheme would be put in place, and how it would be funded, will take a huge amount of energy and time. REALLY??? NO KIDDING, SHERLOCK? GETTING CIVIL RIGHTS FOR BLACK PEOPLE TOOK A LONG TIME IN THE US (AND EVEN CREATED SOME MARTYRS WHO BELIEVED IN A GLI , DR. MARTIN LUTHER KING); GETTING THE TRADE UNION ACT PASSED IN SASK. TOOK A LONG TIME (AND MANY WORKERS SHED THEIR TEARS AND BLOOD TO DO SO); TO GET GAY MARRIAGE PASSED TOOK A LONG TIME (BUT IT WAS WORTH IT WASN'T IT?) I STRONGLY BELIEVE THAT WHAT IS WORTH FIGHTING FOR IS WORTH DYING FOR AND THAT IT IS HIGH TIME THOSE OF US ON THE LEFT WHO TRULY VALUE OURSELVES AND OUR FELLOW COLLECTIVE HUMANITY MUST BE READY AND PREPARED TO FIGHT FOR SOMETHING GREATER THAN JUST povert allievATION, WE MUST FOCUS ON POVERTY ELIMINATION. It will focus anti-poverty activists in this direction to the exclusion of other strategies. THERE IS NO EVIDENCE OF THIS TO DATE AND I THINK THIS IS A FALSE ARGUEMENT TO DISTRACT US FROM THE REAL GOAL. AND BY THE WAY "WHY SHOULDN'T THE POOR SPEND THEIR OWN GLI ON WHATEVER THEY WANT"? DO WE, IN THE LEFT, KNOW BETTER HOW TO SPEND THEIR MONEY, SHOULD WE BECOME BIG BROTHER???    And in the end, if it comes into place at all, what in the world makes people think it will be a progressive version of the GI policy that wins?! (SEE ABOVE FOR HISTORICAL FIGHTS THAT THE LEFT HAS WON) History shows us that since the 1970’s none of the GI schemes have been implemented, not even the Right wing versions. I WOULD ARGUE THAT IS BECAUSE THE LEFT HAS NOT BEEN FOCUSED ON GLI, BUT INSTEAD HAS BEEN DIVIDED ON 'HELPING THE POOR THRU CHARITABLE PROGRAMS AND NOT BEEN OUTRAGED AS POOR PEOPLE HAVE BEEN ENOUGH TO demand GLI.    And the people who can wage this battle, often must have at hand a sophisticated analysis of social policy and taxation schemes in order to argue the complexities of a GI program if they are not to fall into simplistic solutions. GUARANTEED LIVABLE INCOME. PERIOD. HOW COMPLICATED CAN THIS BE??? The people who actually make up the minimum income and unemployed sector, are not likely to be part of determining the answers to the situation of poverty in Canada if this is the direction the movement takes. ARE YOU SAYING THE POOR SHOULD HAVE "NO SAY" OR THAT THEY ARE TOO DUMB TO COMPREHEND THE IDEA OF GLI????    FIORINDO AGI , IF HE WERE ALIVE, WOULD SHAKE HIS FINGER AT ALL YOU SO-CALLED LEFTIES THAT TALK A GOOD LINE, BUT LIVE A MIDDLE INCOME LIFESTYLE.    JIM STANDFORD , I CHALLENGE YOU TO COME TO REGINA, SASKATCHEWAN AND GO WITH ME DOOR KNOCKING IN SOME OF THE POOREST NEIGHBOURHOODS AND SEE IF THOSE PEOPLE WOULD CHOOOSE A GLI OR BETTER WELFARE / BETTER HOUSING / BETTER GOV. PROGRAMS THAT MANY WOULD RATHER BE GOT RID OF IN FAVOUR OF TRUE FREEDOM - ENTITLED FREEDOM.    HEY JIM; I'LL EVEN BUY YOU SUPPER : )    306-737-5345 CALL ME.

Livable or Unlivable Written by Jack Saturday on 2007-06-19 17:13:52 Mr. Donovan and Ms. Hunter: your arguments as presented seem to be essentially one argument, based on the “unlivability” of the GI you envision.     To work toward a Guaranteed Income without including the “L” word (“livable”) is, as you say, to subsidize the corporate sector by the specific leverage of that unlivability. To say there is “no way” to provide a decent amount is, as well as being wrong, to declare defeat before the fight. Tommy Douglas said not long before his death: “we have the industrial capacity, the technical ability, the economic power to give everyone in this country a decent standard of living.”    A Guaranteed Livable Income would be livable by definition. That is what many of us are working for, not a Guaranteed Unlivable Income, (GUI-- gooey) which idea you are critiquing.     So, because of the importance of GLI, I reply at the risk of arguing at cross-purposes.    “There is no way an annual income guarantee will provide a decent amount”—    REPLY: This is starting out on the wrong foot. It is not a critique of an idea to say “it won’t happen.” (check out the Foresight Institute’s list of erroneous predictions http://tinyurl.com/28vdf )    If “work incentives” are entrenched in you, some of us would gladly help you dig them up for examination in the 21st century.    “Why should the employer pay over a tiny hourly rate, when the government takes up the slack?”    REPLY: Simple: because if there was a GLI, people would not be forced by the “lash of need” to accept low wages. So they could refuse. A Livable income would put instant bargaining power in the hands of anyone seeking to sell their labor. As it is, the obvious fear of the streets, with our institutionally sustained population of homeless to model that for us, has given life-or-death bargaining power to exploitive employers.    Furthermore, men and particularly women could refuse harassment, because they would have a real “safety net”—secured by the word “guaranteed.” “Safety nets” today are not safe at all. With a basic livable income, people could refuse to work in unsafe environments, period.    “Decent jobs, housing and social programs are the answer to poverty, not this scheme.”    REPLY: Sorry, the road does not go back. The job system itself is teetering, and, according to prognosticators like Marshall Brain (http://marshallbrain.com/robotic-freedom.htm#sec6 ), about to collapse as the service sector goes down in large measure to automation in the next decades. There are not enough jobs, never mind “decent” jobs, to go round. In the west, five percent of the population is all that is needed to produce everything we consume, arguably 15% can cover essential services (Gatto, 1985). Never mind Paulo Frieire’s comment: “Any purchase or sale of labor is a type of slavery.”    “MacDonald Commission, $10,000 for a family of four.”    REPLY: Again, this is a plan for a Guaranteed Unlivable Income. $10,000 a year may arguably be suitable today for one person.    "Slogans" don't match reality – Stanford    “...calls for a ‘living wage’ through collective bargaining, minimum wages, and other forms of labor market regulation.”    REPLY: Right, the old “chosen few”, the trail of elites through history. “Full employment” with a “living wage” doesn’t match reality, Jim, hasn’t for over 30 years. Matches it less and less.    “…what amount GI would consist of, what scheme would be put in place, and how it would be funded, will take a huge amount of energy and time. It will focus anti-poverty activists in this direction to the exclusion of other strategies.”    All kinds of ideas and models have been proposed. Why do people addressing such a problem think they have to start from scratch on it?    “…what in the world makes people think it will be a progressive version of the GI policy that wins?! History shows us that since the 1970’s none of the GI schemes have been implemented, not even the Right wing versions.”    REPLY: Curious argument: don’t work for a basic income because it might not turn out as we want? That's a good argument to not work toward anything. As for “hasn’t been done before,” nobody stepped on the moon til July 1969. The “it has never been done so therefore cannot be done” argument would eliminate all invention and innovation.    “And what direction might the movement take to involve the unemployed in answers?”    REPLY: Please check out the GLI reader, to see how some non-academics make a contribution (http://pacificcoast.net/%7Eswag/WEJreport.htm ).    I think that this insistence on the complexities is a distraction and an excuse. The ”hows” of democratic wealth distribution have been modeled by many, and as soon as a GLI is implemented, it will eliminate labyrinths of complex expensive bureaucracies. It's the "unlivability" option that crrates gooey complexity. “Simplistic” is a screen expression, like “socialism” and “conspiracy theory” to dismiss the natural model: a tree’s roots and trunk are “simplistic”, but need to be in place before the branches, which are “complex.”     We need a little pattern-recognition in the information overload, as McLuhan said. Academics, some say, run from the obvious. If things were in fact simple, where would that leave them in their professional ambitions? Solutions might indeed be simple, all they need is a consensus. Hearts and minds. The patterns can be discerned by those willing to face the obvious:    Simple fact: People are dying of exposure in winter in a country which is richer than at any time in history.    Musical chairs is structurally designed to create “losers.” So is corporate capitalism in an age of automation.    There is enough wealth to include everyone in a liberal democracy, and in fact, there is no liberal democracy until everyone is included. Included means, to start with, fed, sheltered, clothed.    Welfare has always practiced coercion, threat, patronizing, direct insult, and harassment, the lash of need driving people to that absurd musical chairs game, perpetuating the continuance of a scapegoat underclass. The stigma that goes with welfare is the other face of worker’s ressentience (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ressentiment ), nothing else.   Workers should admit that they blame the poor to displace the fact that they hate their jobs, and, in general, are right to do so. Let’s open our eyes to a great sunset on the system which ran on selling oneself to a master and calling that a good thing.    “Dream no little dreams.”  Tommy Douglas,   Guaranteed Income advocate      --Jack Saturday        livablenullLivablenullLivablenullForesight InstituteRobot Nation FAQLGLI ReaderressentienceRessentimentThe World Owes You A Living

Attention: JACK SATURDAY ! Written by www.livableincome.org on 2007-06-27 00:19:11 Love your comments, jack.    Would you like to meet face to face?    Call me 737-5345.    I'm active with the provincial/federal Green Party.    Cheers and all the best.

More good news. Written by www.livableincome.org on 2007-06-29 17:32:06   4. FINLAND’S PRIME MINISTER SPEAKS FAVORABLY OF BIG    NewsRoom Finland reports that the prime minister of Finland, Matti  Vanhanen, of the Centre Party, said that the structure and level of  basic security should be reappraised, and that the current wide range of  benefits could be replaced by a basic income guarantee of about 600 or  700 euros per month. He argued, however, that BIG should be supplemented  by incentives to encourage those capable of work to enter the labor  market. According to NewsRoom Finland, “Mr Vanhanen's comment comes amid  a clash between the Social Democratic Party [SPD], the Centre's main  government partner, and the opposition Green League over guaranteed  minimum income.” The Finnish Greens accused the Social Democrats of  using made-up arguments to reject basic income. NewsRoom Finland  reported on February 26, “Finland's opposition Green League on Monday  accused the SDP of deploying trumped-up and populist arguments to reject  the idea of a guaranteed minimum income. The Greens' critique was a  response to a report by the Kalevi Sorsa foundation, an SDP-leaning  organization, faulting a basic income scheme as promoted by the Green  League. The leaders of the Green League said in a joint statement that  the foundation's report played down problems related to social security.  Ville Kopra, a researcher, says in the foundation's report that basic  income could endanger both universal validity on the labor market and  earnings-related unemployment security. The Greens say the Social  Democrats' resistance to change is dividing people into two classes  where only those in regular employment should enjoy sufficient basic  security.”    Two reports are on line at:  http://newsroom.finland.fi/stt/showarticle.asp?intNWSAID=15100&group=Politics  http://newsroom.finland.fi/stt/showarticle.asp?intNWSAID=15103&group=Politics        8. SEVERAL GERMANS ENDORSE BASIC INCOME    Several Germans have recently endorsed basic income. Ulrich Beck,  prominent sociologist in Germany and author of "The Risk Society," and  Kayja Kipping, chairperson of the left party PDS, have both endorsed  basic income as a way to give workers greater negotiating power to  demand more meaningful work. According to Kipping, many leftist are  uncomfortable with BIG because they suffer from “work fetishism.” Asked  to explain she replied, “Many think only paid work is a valuable  contribution. The ideology ‘whoever doesn't work should not eat' is  malicious. To me, this is a completely strange understanding of  contribution. Persons in the arms industry do social harm through paid  work. On the other hand, many activities that are not paid are important  for society.” Vienna. Should basic security be only for persons willing  to work and the needy? Ronald Blaschke , a philosopher, sociologist,  educator, and spokesperson of the German Basic Income Network also  argued for BIG and against work fetishism in an interview with Beate  Lammer on diepresse.com.    German businessman Gotz Werner argues has been arguing for basic income  in recent years. He renewed his support for BIG in an interview with the  daily die Tageszeitung, last November. The BIEN Newsletter published the  following excerpts from the interview:  Journalist: You speak very positively. You own over 1700 drug stores.  You have annual sales of 3.7 billion Euros. You are one of the 500  richest Germans.  Werner: That is untrue. Like almost all entrepreneurs, I wanted more and  more in the past. Today maximizing meaning is my top priority.  Journalist: Do you see the world with different eyes?  Werner: I have read the classics, Goethe, Schiller. I understand my own  success is not everything. I want to help others succeed. People are  central, not business. I try to imagine a positive world.  Journalist: "Nothing is stronger than an idea whose time has come," you say.  Werner: Victor Hugo said that. I only quoted him.  Journalist: Is the time right for your idea?  Werner: At least the idea could be discussed at last. Two years ago that  was something for a few experts. The halls are full when I give lectures  today.  Journalist: What has changed?  Werner: The old political slogans have nothing to do with the world  where people live. Unemployment grows despite temporary announcements of  success. Unbridled growth damages our resources. If Angela Merkel would  say "full employment" is possible, nobody would believe her any more…  Journalist: The unconditional basic income already has supporters in the  parties - from left to right. Why is this?  Werner: Because this is the most radical form of socialism and the most  radical form of capitalism. After one of my addresses, a listener wrote  to me: "Your basic income model has reconciled my socialist heart with  my neoliberal mind."    The full interview in German is available at:  http://www.taz.de/pt/2006/11/27/a0146.1/textdruck  An English translation is available at:  http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2006/12/14/18337615.php  Other articles on BIG in Germany are on the web at:  http://portland.indymedia.org/en/2007/02/354533.shtml  http://portland.indymedia.org/en/2007/02/353198.shtml  http://portland.indymedia.org/en/2007/01/352187.shtml  http://www.diepresse.com/textversion_article.aspx?id=607979  http://www.mbtranslations.com  http://www.commondreams.org  http://www.freitag.de/2006/50/06501501.php.      9. EDUARDO SUPLICY OPTIMISTIC ABOUT BASIC INCOME IN CHINA    Brazilian Senator Eduardo Suplicy, one of the strongest supports of  basic income in any ruling government in the world, recently visited  China and reports substantial hope for the future of basic income in  China. Senator Suplicy spoke about basic income with several  highly-placed officials in the Chinese government. He found that  elements of universal, unconditional support exist in some current  Chinese anti-poverty programs, and that there is some hope the China  will move further in that direction. Suplicy also spoke with Professor  Tian Xiaobao, who is considered to be the first economist in China,  author of a 2006 book on Social Security in China.  According to Suplicy, “It was with Professor Tian Xiaobao that I had my  longest and very productive three hour conversation. After explaining  all the advantages of an unconditional basic income to him, after  describing experience of the Alaska Permanent Fund Dividend System and  the perspective of having such a system in Brazil, I asked him whether  he considered possible to think about having the institution of an  inconditional basic income for all 1 billion and 300 million or more  Chinese in the future. Professor Tain Xiaobao answered that he  considered the Basic Income a very sound and rational proposal, making  sense and being consistent with the objective of building a harmonious  society, such as advocated by Confucius 520 years before Christ. It is  also consistent with the objectives of today's Chinese government. He  told me, however, that to attain the objective of paying a basic income  to all Chinese, it would be required a time of preparation for the next  three quinquenal plans. Thus, a Basic Income would be desirable and  possible in 2020.”

Re: Attention JACK SATURDAY! Written by Jack Saturday on 2007-07-10 13:55:39 I think we’re too far apart to meet face to face. But I’m approachable by email:         My blog:    http://jacksatu.blogspot.com/    My blog, by the way, is of service to anyone who struggles with "entrenched work incentives."

Guaranteed Livable Income--Sheep in Wolf Written by GLI NOT PROZAC on 2007-07-25 02:24:11 There is contradiction in everything. Cliche you say? All of the responses of the authors of "Guaranteed Livable Income (GLI)--Wolf in Sheep's Clothing?" assume strict neoliberal economic conditions without political mobilization to challenge that. The struggle for GLI already posits the capacity of people to organize into a conscious and politically mobilized force. Talking about GLI and new social contexts are the first steps.     Thankfully we have beloved visionaries on our side--unless the authors call Dr. Martin Luther King a "Wolf in Sheep's Clothing":    "The solution to poverty is to abolish it directly by a now widely discussed measure: the guaranteed income."     --Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Chaos or Community, 1967    Ms. L'Hirondelle has vividly and satirically shown that GLI already exists: "The model for a Guaranteed Livable Income has long been in place: all religious organizations, charities and academics--and many others who do not sell a product for a profit--already have a Guaranteed Income."    Conflicting interests support the Guaranteed Livable Income for very different reasons. That doesn't mean it won't help the poor--and everybody else. The Guaranteed Livable Income is called just that to distinguish it from the far less adequate right wing versions promoted by investor/corporate/capital interests. Their desire is to maintain consumption at the lower income and unprivileged end of the working class.     Because our system is capitalist, means there is intense pressure to continue consumption, regardless of the social/environmental costs.     More consumption=more profit for those industries that are more dependent on purchases from the working and unemployed poor. So of course economists like Friedman will support it. Not all right wingers are equally venal anyway. Contradiction.    The key term is "Livable": Not one of the institutions or people mentioned by Donovan and Hunter invoke the concept of "Livable" in their articulation of Guaranteed Income. Here is what Ms. L'Hirondelle means by it:    Livability de-linking income from the coercion of forcing people to struggle for the permanently scarce supply of jobs. Livability must apply to all people--work or no work. To date, all other concepts to describe GLI have omitted the concept of livability.    Livability includes sufficiency without consumption. Other phrases are still tied to the history of consumption. This assumes scarcity of necessities, proliferation of created desires, jobs for the sake of jobs and the collapse of leisure time for the majority.     So livability will make sure people have enough to rent in quiet, clean, well-maintained places, surrounded by natural habitat. Livability will ensure enough pesticide-free, locally grown, lo-carb, humanely produced food, low on the food chain. It means enough income to educate oneself and children--as defined by the GLI recipients, not the academic institutions. It means enough income to access public transportation and the means to travel to vacation recreation without increasing the planetary carbon load. GLI will help bring dramatic increases in investment for public transit.     Why? Many heavy industrial workers will opt for less but sufficient income and more leisure time, forcing auto-oil capital to shift from carbon based products to inherently more carbon-free/efficient products such as trains, bicycles, clean buses, wind turbines and solar panels.     Of course this implies visionary just transition policies of labour unions involved in these industries. They already made such visionary demands shortly after World War II in logging and armaments industries. An end to clear cutting was demanded by the Industrial Woodworkers of America and newly unionized armaments workers were demanding conversion to civilian products.     This came about more so in Canada, but anti-communist hysteria prevented a complete and just transition to fully civilian assembly lines. The point is that organized labour has the capacity to work toward the end of industries that are not socially nor ecologically useful.    An absolute distraction of the authors is the false dichotomy between social programs and Guaranteed Livable Income. People have the capacity to fight for the preservation and expansion of social programs, while making new demands for the bold new form of economic justice--GLI. The alternative is to accept the chronic tyranny of welfare, with its shame and insufficiency.     But if the authors of "Wolf in Sheep's Clothing" are on board with raising the welfare rates to at least $25,000/person/year--heck, we can still call it "welfare," if there's such attachment to the word. How about "Guaranteed Livable Welfare?" Most progressive people agree I hope that welfare is ominously inadequate. Let's just be honest and remove its brutal means test and raise it at least five times.     Subsidy to corporations? Let's focus on removing their personhood, and then see how long they coerce the workers into continued low-wage tyranny, through the vast subsidy called "army of the unemployed." A high GLI will force them to pay more for workers to bring them out of leisure time. We work 2 days a week for ourselves right now--and three for the bosses. That's the subsidy that high GLI will end immediately.     Some other myths: GLI a threat to "Decent jobs"? 50% of "work" does nothing useful for people, plants, animals and biohabitat. It's simply about amassing profits for the few. GLI a threat to affordable housing? I thought the current frenzy for nice west coast homes is because a small but sizable proportion of people are flooded in money these days.     Increasing everyones' income--and politically organizing to keep rents at smaller proportions of income--will force landlords to maintain housing stock that is more affordable and appealing for millions. 60% of us rent.     I certainly honour the historical struggle to create welfare--and it must not be dispensed with until a GLI is in place. But suggesting that the reason we should oppose GLI is because it will compete with all other social programs for funding is simply the voice of fear, ignorance and political vacuousness.     I find it very amusing that Jim Stanford's perspective was invoked to affirm the fears of GLI, whereas the poignant voice of Dr. Guy Standing is absent from the authors' discussion.     Anyone willing to read Dr. Standing's brilliant "Why unions should campaign for a basic income" will witness the evaporation of all of the given arguments against the GLI. It is here: http://www-ilo-mirror.cornell.edu/public/english/protection/ses/download/docs/transfer.pdf     Dr. Standing speaks with at least as much wisdom as Mr. Stanford--he is the senior economist at the International Labor Organization and Director of the ILO Programme on Socio-Economic Security.     Mr. Stanford sadly reveals with good intention I'm sure, the paralyzing problem in labour called business unionism. This is in spite of the CAW's important reputation for social justice unionism. Auto workers just may be enticed to slack off paying their union dues with the glimmer of GLI out the factory gates. Where does that leave the better paid union executives and their slightly more consumerist lifestyle?     I'm not saying they are all guilty of this, but it's time for labour leaders to do what Communists and Anarchists did in unions until McCarthyism--organize with a vision for radical social change, not just bargain over the table for the wages, benefits and working conditions of privileged workers--as important as bargaining is. GLI is just the start of things labour needs to agitate for. Even Tommy Douglas wasn't scared to say what we ultimately need--socialism.    Finally, about enough "money" for GLI: Maude Barlow, Council of Canadians founder, instructs us that in the '50's corporate Canada paid 25% of all tax revenue. Now they pay 8%. That's a shortfall of billions of dollars for all unmet human needs. Even accepting the false and religious construct of money, we know whose hiding and hoarding the money for everything. Let's politically organize to get it and start funding all urgent needs, including a carbon/mliitary/nuclear-free future and a GLI.

Hi GLI Not Prozac! Written by www.livableincome.org on 2007-07-27 12:46:10 Hey dude,    Can you get in touch with me.    I'm building a list of Pro-GLIers.    I'd like to include yourself.    Thanks for the beautiful article above. It certainly silences the critics.    My e-mail: or cel # 306-737-5345    Thanks alot and Best Cheers, vic.

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