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mark61
05-06-16, 12:11
De initiatiefnemers gaan verliezen, maar zijn blij dat het onderwerp zo op de agenda komt.

Swiss vote on proposal to give basic income to every adult and child

Agence France-Presse in Geneva

Sunday 5 June 2016 10.28 BST

Switzerland is voting on Sunday on a radical proposal to provide the entire population with enough money to live on.

Voters are being asked whether they want all Swiss citizens, along with foreigners who have been resident in Switzerland for at least five years, to receive an unconditional basic income, or UBI.

Supporters say providing such an income would help fight poverty and inequality in a world where good jobs with steady salaries are becoming harder to find.

The idea is controversial, to say the least. The Swiss government and nearly all the country’s political parties have urged voters to reject the initiative – advice which 71% are inclined to follow, according to the latest poll.

Critics have called the initiative “a Marxist dream”, warning of sky-high costs and people quitting their jobs in droves, to the detriment of the economy.

“If you pay people to do nothing, they will do nothing,” said Charles Wyplosz, economics professor at the Geneva Graduate Institute.

Proponents reject that, arguing that people naturally want to be productive, and a basic income would simply provide them more flexibility to choose the activities they find most valuable.

Ralph Kundig, one of the lead campaigners, said: “For centuries this has been considered a utopia, but today it has not only become possible, but indispensible.”

The amount to be paid has yet to be determined, but the non-political group behind the initiative has suggested paying 2,500 Swiss francs (£1,765) a month to each adult, and Fr625 (£445) for each child.

That may sound a lot, but it is barely enough to get by on in one of the world’s priciest nations – leaving plenty of incentive to work, campaigners say.

Authorities have estimated an additional Fr25bn (£17.6bn) would be needed annually to cover the costs, requiring deep spending cuts or significant tax hikes.

Supporters of the initiative, however, suggest that the UBI could replace a range of other expensive social assistance programmes and could be easily financed through slight increases in sales tax or through a small fee on electronic transactions.

There is little chance of the initiative passing, but Kundig said that “just getting a broad public debate started on this important issue is a victory”.

Swiss vote on proposal to give basic income to every adult and child | World news | The Guardian (http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jun/05/swiss-vote-give-basic-income-every-adult-child-marxist-dream)

mark61
05-06-16, 12:15
State handouts for all? Europe set to pilot universal basic incomes

Switzerland is poised to hold a referendum on introducing the concept, and Finnish and Dutch pilots are set for 2017


Philip Oltermann
Thursday 2 June 2016 11.47 BST

To its acolytes, it is the revolutionary policy idea whose arrival is as urgently needed as it is inevitable. In a future in which robots decimate the jobs but not necessarily the wealth of nations, they argue, states should be able to afford to pay all their citizens a basic income unconditional of needs or requirements.

Universal basic income has a rare appeal across the political spectrum. For those on the left, it promises to eliminate poverty and liberate people stuck in dead-end workfare jobs. Small-state libertarians believe it could slash bureaucracy and create a leaner, more self-sufficient welfare system.

In an increasingly digital economy, it would also provide a necessary injection of cash so people can afford to buy the apps and gadgets produced by the new robot workforce.

Crucially, it is also an idea that seems to resonate across the wider public. A recent poll by Dalia Research found that 68% of people across all 28 EU member states said they would definitely or probably vote for a universal basic income initiative. Finland and the Netherlands have pilot projects in the pipeline.

This weekend the concept faces its first proper test of public opinion, as Switzerland votes on a proposal to introduce a national basic income.

The model on which Swiss citizens will vote on 5 June sits at the left-liberal end of the spectrum. The wording on the ballot paper is vague – it calls for the country’s constitution to be changed to “guarantee the introduction of an unconditional basic income” that guarantees “a humane existence and participation in public life for the whole population” – but the proposed scale is ambitious.

The referendum’s initiators suggest a basic monthly income of 2,500 Swiss francs (£1,750) for adults and 625 Swiss francs for children as a “working example”. Given the high cost of living in Switzerland, the initiative’s co-founder Daniel Straub says this would be the rough equivalent of giving people living in central Europe between €1,000 and €1,500 a month, or between £900 and £1,300 in the UK.

In a book published ahead of the Swiss referendum, Straub and his co-authors argue that a basic income pegged at such a level would not only free people up to do important work that is currently not incentivised by markets, such as care and climate change research, but also lead to higher wages for unloved and low-paid “dirty work”.

“If these jobs are really indispensable, then they have a social value and should be appreciated more,” he says. “If no one else wants to do them, they should be more highly paid. Work conditions would have to be improved so that people do these jobs.”

Set at such a level, a universal basic income would require an increase in Switzerland’s current social welfare budget. Even if it were to replace some benefit payments altogether, the country’s federal assembly has calculated an annual funding shortfall of 25bn Swiss francs, which it suggests would have to be bridged by tax increases. Some basic income activists have proposed a financial transaction tax.

Straub rejects some of the federal assembly’s calculations, but acknowledges that introducing a unconditional basic income would cost around a third of the country’s GDP. Switzerland currently spends 19.4% of its GDP on welfare, less than the OECD average.

Latest polls suggest that more than 60% of Swiss voters are likely to reject the proposal, but Straub is optimistic that the initiative has already achieved some of its aims. “Five years ago, only about a hundred people in Switzerland had heard the term ‘universal basic income’. Now everyone is debating it, and acceptance levels are rising,” he says.

Unlike the Swiss initiative, Finland’s basic income experiment enjoys the political support of the government, a coalition of conservatives, liberals and the populist rightwing Finns party.

The framing of the Finnish initiative is also markedly different. The prime minister, Juha Sipilä, formerly a successful IT businessman, has commissioned the country’s social insurance body, Kela, to carry out experiments to establish whether a basic income could “make the system more participatory and strengthen work incentives, reduce bureaucracy, and simplify the now complicated benefit system in a way that ensures the sustainability of public finances”.

A preliminary report published at the end of March suggests the government is already scaling the initiative back from a full basic income model, which its authors note would be “quite expensive”, to a partial one. According to Roope Mokka, the founder of the Nordic thinktank Demos Helsinki, the Finnish experiment, which will take place in 2017, is likely to involve a maximum of 180,000 Finns being paid a basic income of €500 to €700 a month – considerably less than the average Finnish income of €2,700.

Given that Finland’s welfare state is comparable to that of other Scandinavian economies, introducing a universal basic income model similar to that used in Kela’s experiment would involve shrinking the country’s social security spending, which currently stands at about 31% of GDP.

Basic income experiments also scheduled to start in the Netherlands in 2017, and lie somewhere between the Swiss and Finnish models. According to Rutger Bregman, the author of Utopia for Realist: The Case for a Universal Basic Income, the appetite for such initiatives in cities such as Utrecht has grown mainly out of frustration with workfare programmes that turned out to be “hugely expensive and humiliating for those involved”

Utrecht will begin its experiment with a universal basic income on 1 January 2017

In the Utrecht experiment, which will start on 1 January 2017, one group of benefit recipients will remain on the old workfare regime, under which people who live alone get €972.70 and couples €1,389.57. Another group will receive the same benefits unconditionally, without sanctions or obligations.

A third group will also receive the same benefits unconditionally, plus an extra monthly bonus of €125 if they choose to do volunteering work. A fourth group will be obliged to do volunteering work. If they fail to do so, they will lose their €125 bonus. A fifth group will receive unconditional benefits without the bonus, while being allowed earn additional income from other jobs.

Similar experiments will be conducted in other Dutch cities such as Wageningen, Tilburg, Groningen and Nijmegen, most of them with the aim of finding ways to get rid of the sanctions and the obligation to apply for jobs.

The fact that political intentions behind Europe’s basic income movements vary so wildly should not discredit the basic idea, Mokka says. He likens the idea to the space race during the cold war. “Moonshot was never about getting to the moon. There was nothing in the moon. Kennedy and his administration knew that. The point is that each generation must have their mission, something that encapsulates their vision.

“Unconditional basic income is best seen as a platform on which several different political views can come together to deliberate beyond tweaking of old systems and to create something entirely new.”

State handouts for all? Europe set to pilot universal basic incomes | World news | The Guardian (http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jun/02/state-handouts-for-all-europe-set-to-pilot-universal-basic-incomes)

Wist ik niet eens.

Eke
05-06-16, 14:58
Het spreekt me aan dat Nederland meerdere varianten uitprobeert. Over een half jaar al !!!!!


Wat ik zou willen is dat er bijvoorbeeld meer eenvoudige casco-woningen gebouwd worden daarnaast zodat mensen hun eigen huizen kunnen afbouwen.(scholing en wederzijdse coaching daarbij)
Dat er grond is voor kippen, groentes, fruit, enz. De grootgrutters verdienen toch wel. En er is en wordt nog veel meer bedacht...

Alleen geld en vrije tijd krijgen is één ding, maar een bevredigend leven in een betrokken samenleving opbouwen is een andere zaak.

Eric de Blois
05-06-16, 15:37
Het spreekt me aan dat Nederland meerdere varianten uitprobeert. Over een half jaar al !!!!!

Wat ik zou willen is dat er bijvoorbeeld meer eenvoudige casco-woningen gebouwd worden daarnaast zodat mensen hun eigen huizen kunnen afbouwen.(scholing en wederzijdse coaching daarbij)
Dat er grond is voor kippen, groentes, fruit, enz. De grootgrutters verdienen toch wel. En er is en wordt nog veel meer bedacht...

Alleen geld en vrije tijd krijgen is één ding, maar een bevredigend leven in een betrokken samenleving opbouwen is een andere zaak.

Mee eens. Vooral ook veel kleinere woningen. En veel meer diversiteit. Bijvoorbeeld natural homes en tiny homes. Niet die betonnen standaard meuk van nu. Wat een doffe ellende in die wijken. Niks gezelligheid. Vooral ook veel meer groen in de stad. Alsof je in de natuur woont.

Eke
05-06-16, 21:14
Alsof je in de natuur woont.

Ik begrijp wat je bedoelt. Je zult het in de stad in vertikale tuinen moeten zoeken en bv. in daktuinen. Hoewel ik ook al gehoord heb van boerderijen in een flatgebouw. Verdiept horizontaal boeren. Hahaha.
Grondprijs rijst overigens de pan uit in stedelijk gebied.

Ik hou het topiconderwerp in de gaten:

Zwitsers basisinkomen -zoals verwacht- weggestemd. Voorlopig.

super ick
06-06-16, 09:21
Ja, laten we met zijn 17 miljoenen ons eigen vee gaan houden en groenten verbouwen. Plek zat.

Eke
06-06-16, 11:42
Ja, laten we met zijn 17 miljoenen ons eigen vee gaan houden en groenten verbouwen. Plek zat.

Ben je vandaag een grapjurk of heb je je niet verdiept in het verschijnsel basis-inkomen, Superick ? :)

Ibrah1234
06-06-16, 11:57
Meer dan 3/4 van de kiezers (http://nos.nl/artikel/2109295-zwitsers-wijzen-basisinkomen-vierkant-af.html) heeft het afgewezen.

Eric de Blois
06-06-16, 18:11
Ja, laten we met zijn 17 miljoenen ons eigen vee gaan houden en groenten verbouwen. Plek zat.

In Nederland wonen er iets meer dan vier mensen per hectare. Dat is inderdaad erg krap wonen. Zelfs de helft is al veel te veel.

Marsipulami
06-06-16, 20:14
Ik snap al dat gedoe over een basisinkomen niet. In België en ik veronderstel in de meeste andere EU landen bestaan er al 124 soorten uitkeringen voor elk wat wils. Waarom dan nog een basisinkomen ?

super ick
07-06-16, 07:56
Ben je vandaag een grapjurk of heb je je niet verdiept in het verschijnsel basis-inkomen, Superick ? :)

Wie begint er hier over boeren?