re: "A Guaranteed Monthly Check Changed His Life. Now He Sends Out 650." (The New York Times, November 7, 2020)
There is plenty of national wealth to go around in every developed nation, and guaranteeing all citizens a basic income would seem to have great potential to resolve a lot of divisive social problems.
Ensuring that all had basic security free of conditions other than being a citizen would allow them to seek other opportunities, to improve their skill set for employment, to pursue education, to risk starting a business, to pay to join the cultural or other social events that they deem worth supporting, to enter into relationships with a degree of basic equality rather than financial desperation, and so on.
Yes, it would require some rejigging of the tax and other distributive justice systems, but it certainly seems an experiment worth pursuing to test whether the promised benefits are truly delivered or not.
Who knows, perhaps people who were freed from chronic stress and demeaning poverty would be less likely to abuse alcohol and other drugs, and more likely to fashion themselves into responsible members of society able to contribute productively as they expressed their voice in a fashion consistent with basic democratic principle.
How could this not be worth putting to the test?
And no, compassionate caring for and sharing with others in your community is not communism. It's human decency.
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The above comment was submitted by Felix Qui to The New York Times article.
It is published there at https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/06/world/europe/bohmeyer-berlin-basic-income.html#commentsContainer&permid=110007606:110007606
Also a reply
ReplyDelete@Meredith
Well said. It is not just "a nice thing to have." It's also the just thing to provide. All that currently unpaid labour also props up the social systems that enable some to make vast fortunes, just as some have traditionally made vast fortunes by gobbling up limited natural resources and poisoning the environment of the planet we must all live on, or die with. It is perfectly just that what has been acquired, whether by hard work or sheer luck, by taking to reduce a limited resource or by using lucky gifts of unearned intelligence, education, diligence or whatever that can only work when propped up by society should contribute to the well being of all in that society.
At:
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/06/world/europe/bohmeyer-berlin-basic-income.html#commentsContainer&permid=110006616:110007780