Gaylene Middleton:
Have you looked at the Te Utu Tika Hei Oranga I Aotearoa, Basic Income New Zealand Facebook page? Updated regularly by Karl Matthys, this page is a tremendous resource, gathering up to date articles and research around Basic Income.
It is disappointing to all of us Basic Income advocates that Basic Income, which emerged as a viable proposition in a Covid-19 Pandemic world, has disappeared below the radar again as we move toward a post Covid-19 world. Te Utu Tika Hei Oranga I Aotearoa continues to be absolute in its resolve that Basic Income must be adopted right now in Aotearoa. Experiences globally and here in New Zealand with the most recent findings in the report Income support in the wake of Covid-19: interviews by Louise Humpage and Charlotte More, 20 April 2021, are a case in point.
The stories relayed by twelve Income Support recipients on three themes; material well being, engagement with Work and Income, and the Impact of the Covid-19 Income Relief Payment, was compelling evidence that a major overhaul of income for benefit recipients and of the administrative system is needed. Furthermore, Dr Humpage suggests the recommendations made by the Welfare Expert Advisory Group in 2019 must be implemented. What is very pertinent from the twelve interviews is the suggestion that their stories will be similar to the stories of thousands of other beneficiaries!
Te Utu Tika Hei Oranga I Aotearoa agrees with the Child Poverty Action Group comment on the Labour Government's Unemployment Insurance Scheme recently announced in May. Economics spokesperson for Child Poverty Action Group Susan St John says "The problem with social insurance is that it entrenches and ensures that there is special treatment for some newly unemployed, in times of every day unemployment." The Unemployment Insurance Scheme sets up a two-tier system. Those in work receive protection from the uncertainties of employment while those without work are not helped. As Basic Income is a one-tier system, all people will receive it.
A recent Facebook article posted 18 June 21 writes about the Stockton Economic Empowerment Demonstration, SEED, which ended in February 2021. This project gave $500 monthly, with no restrictions, to 125 residents of Stockton, California, for two years. In March 2021, the first-year results were released. Recipients had improved mental health, were more economically stable, and were even more likely to find full-time work. "I sleep better," said one SEED participant. "My mind's not racing all the time thinking about next month's rent."(1)
Another article posted 19 June 2021 is about Wales where a Basic Income Pilot is about to be launched. We are familiar with the definition of Basic Income in this article - "Universal Basic Income (UBI) is an idea in which every citizen or resident of a given country or area would be given an unconditional sum of money on a regular basis - regardless of their social or economic status."
We are familiar too with the sentence- "Proponents of Universal Basic Income argue that it would provide a solution to the welfare and benefits system, help alleviate poverty, and support people through unemployment or insecure work." And again, we are so very familiar with this old chestnut often expressed in New Zealand - "critics say that the programme could cost the state too much money and remove the incentive for people to work."( 2 )
In 2016, Eric Crompton wrote in a Spinoff article - "A UBI that pays enough to leave current beneficiaries no worse off would be phenomenally expensive and would require substantial tax increases, if it were not combined with a very high claw back rate." ( 3 )
Numerous Basic Income pilots have shown that with a Basic Income more people move into employment reducing the cost of a Basic Income scheme while increasing the tax income.The Basic Income advocates in Wales conclude that the -"Universal Basic Income trial in Wales could help solve the nation's 'broken' welfare system - and be 'our generation's NHS' " It is also the contention of Te Utu Tika Hei Oranga I Aotearoa, BINZ, that a Basic Income could go a long way towards solving NZ's broken welfare system. Ganesh Nana, appointed in January 2021 as the head of the Productivity Commission, said in a Stuff article 19 June 2021 ( 4 ): "On Rogernomics, we got sold a lemon. The story we were told was that the market would provide the solutions, that wealth would drip, fairly, through the fingers of those generating it." But Nana concedes the painful economic reforms of the 1980s did not deliver what was promised. Nana continues "It has delivered for some of us ... but for a reasonably broad section of the community, it hasn't delivered; it's actually made things worse." "The world has changed" says Nana, "we need to interrogate the models." Ganesh Nana we hope that Basic Income is a model interrogated.
The understanding of Basic Income requires a re-thinking of the concept of 'work'. For a number of centuries 'work' has been seen as a calling. Work for its own sake is seen as ennobling and linked to human dignity. Hard work is the basis of a just and moral society. Anything that undermines work undermines social order. Those who do not work are suspect. This veneration of work may have contributed to the success of neo-liberalism, which has led to the consequences of inequality that a broad section of our society is now experiencing.
Guy Standing co-founder of Basic Income Earth Network (BIEN) says we need to reconceptualise work. Article 1 of the suggested Precariat Charter -Redefine work as productive and reproductive activity- says "All forms of work should be recognised and valued, not just paid labour. Much valuable work, such as care for relatives and voluntary work, is unpaid and uncounted. So are many labour-related tasks that people are expected to do in their own time. Meanwhile, labourist policies aim to maximise the numbers in jobs, no matter how pointless, demeaning or resource-depleting". (5)
( 1) https://progressive.org/magazine/money-for-the-people-thomhave/?fbclid=IwAR1HttXSueDeiPOm-MkuvUrEq99KR9ftYodyOJA1Pr7lReAUOpAIuVP9-JM
( 2 ) https://redactionpolitics.com/2021/06/09/universal-basic-income-wales-nhs-welfare-benefits/?fbclid=IwAR2xJxg74alg4wnWw6hw9vnsCeLGTLDRo9BSuIqMV9kMrhXwtS9rj7p4al8
( 3 ) https://thespinoff.co.nz/featured/31-03-2016/i-love-the-idea-of-a-universal-basic-income-but-heres-the-problem/
( 4 ) https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/300333582/rogernomics-not-on-the-watch-of-ganesh-nana-new-head-of-the-productivity-commission?cid=app-android&fbclid=IwAR0l4yvmFxvbM1YRlQCctS4QZWVrN0WLbprJOgHL_Q1e34_YFFGfDOIHpLw
( 5 ) A Precariat Charter From Denizens to Citizens Guy Standing Bloomsbury 2014