GMI + JG = paid work as a choice for all

@1 Because paid work is better paid, and some paid work is better work/activity. The question is how many, by percent etc. The distribution devil is in the empirical quantitatively details!

It’s interesting to see the way the JG forces seized on reciprocity and dignity of work arguments once BI started being touted as an alternative (or indeed equivalent). At least in the domestic (i.e Aus) version of the argument, it was once quite different.

I remember a Centre of Full Employment and Equity conference back in the day where the argument that JG jobs would be richer and more fulfilling than private sector jobs, involving less de-skilling and more rewarding techniques, was challenged in the context of the macro stabilisation aspect of the plan. According to the ‘buffer stock’ concept, governments could use aggregate demand management to move people in and out of the JG ‘stock’ without inflationary consequences. The problem identified was the implications for the porousness of the membrane if the skills in use in the JG stock (and the desirability of the work involved) were radically at odds with those in use outside it, and the resulting complications for demand management.

At one point Bill Mitchell declared, with some degree of exasperation, that the purpose of the JG was not to replicate capitalist wage labour and that perhaps the notion of what constituted ‘work’ needed to be revisited. In relation to the latter point, his example was ‘perhaps they could be paid to go surfing’.

That was surprising given his subsequent anti-BI stance – after all it is precisely the example used by van Parijs in his famous defence of a UBI! It was also rather amusing in that we were in Newcastle and without doubt at that very moment there were plenty of people out surfing, with some proportion unemployed and being paid by the government :)

One of their problems has been that the more they try to differentiate the JG from a UBI, the more they make it sound like work-for-the-dole (another comparison they hate).

a payment conditional on some form of social contribution, including voluntary work, study and childcare

… and what do you do with the people who don’t “make a contribution” and don’t get paid? Do they just become homeless and starve…?

Any kind of conditionality on a basic income / minimum income / negative income tax results in people falling through the safety net, who then, ironically, wind up costing more money and time from police, social workers, doctors, and charities than if they had just been in receipt of benefits in the first place.

Secondly, minimum income schemes start to look a lot like workfare unless the wage paid is guaranteed to be the minimum wage. And that of course undermines the labour market for people already in minimum wage employment, as workfare drones undercut their rates – ironically, making them unemployed, and seeking a mincome job.

The details of these schemes matter.

Agree very much with main point and thanks the link.

Atkinson’s proposal seems like a way of redefining the boundary between deserving and undeserving destitute, rather than anything to do with UBI. Not sure why studying is always a ‘social contribution’? Is it okay if I’m studying serialism? Financial engineering?

Shortening the work week would be a simple way to increase the number of jobs available.

A jobs guarantee should include jobs for youth. If they don’t want years of student poverty to gamble on a degree’s future value as credentials? Raise the student stipend.

It is too often forgotten that some high-stress, high responsibility jobs, such as elder care and child care, would benefit from a higher number of workers, who would relieve each other (or supervise each other, if you want to be cynical.) What passes now for greater efficiency is lower quality of service.

That is, a payment conditional on some form of social contribution, including voluntary work, study and childcare.

We tried that. It was called “Work for the dole” and it didn’t work.

There’s nothing wrong with the idea. The idea is fine. But any idea can only work if it’s implemented by people who have a capacity to admit mistakes and a capacity to comprehend that the experience of others differs from their own. And pretty much by definition that’s not something you’ll ever find from the Right.

All social problems are, at heart, mental-health problems. And I don’t mean the mental health of the downtrodden.

And who gets to decide whether any given activity is socially useful? I’m on the job guarantee side of this discussion, but I think the definition of job has to be narrower — someone needs to be willing to pay for the service, and it needs to be of value to someone outside the recipient or their immediate family.

I like the paper because it at least gestures to some of the obvious problems in ways that most proponents don’t (like what does a job guarantee mean if you are always pissing off employers or what happens if you take the job but won’t work).

From a Burkean conservative perspective I’m a little concerned because it’s almost impossible to try it out somewhere. In theory you could target it for whatever your economy and population is now, but if implemented it would cause inflows that would almost certainly swamp the program(s). It suffers all the immigration/economy concerns of a generous welfare state times ten. That seems remediable by instituting strict immigration controls, which would be an odd position for a liberal program. (Something like the multi generation non citizen guest worker scheme that Germany only just recently abandoned). Or if you had non working residency requirements spanning years it would seem to incentivize a nasty underground market while establishing residency. And in places like the US, are we going to force families to move long distances for it? (That would be more palatable if we ever got housing costs under control by allowing building more in rich cities but that’s probably adding too much complexity for one topic).

Assuming the effectiveness of the programs, I guess the question is whether or not proponents are willing to bite the bullet on immigration issues.

‘If we free our slaves we won’t be able to force them to clean our toilets anymore’

someone needs to be willing to pay for the service, and it needs to be of value to someone outside the recipient or their immediate family

So if Baker, Conway and David mow their own lawns they’re not contributing members of society (and deserve to starve).
But if Baker pays Conway to mow Davis’s lawn, and C pays D to mow B’s, and D pays B to mow C’s, for the same pay they’re all contributing members of society.

Awesome

‘If we free our slaves we won’t be able to force them to clean our toilets anymore’

This is the kind of pithy comment I expected-and I would expect at an academic conference, after which, when there is a scheduled break, everyone goes to use the toilet-which someone else will be cleaning.

anon

– and about the ”cleaning toilets” –
in countries which have too yuuuge of so called ”Service” Industries there are a lot more ”worst” jobs than just cleaning toilets or picking up the trash.
There are a majority of jobs which are so psychological degrading that they (supposedly) take away ones ”purpose” – or ”love for life” – and only can be done with drugs.

Who do you expect to clean your toilets (outside of your home) under any guaranteed income scheme?

Under guaranteed income, some pleb who has effectively been compelled into working to earn minimum wage regardless of how convenient that is to their personal circumstances (in the UK, I forsee people being forced to take 2 buses 1.5h each way to work a literally shitty job for a close-to-nil net cash benefit, once elimination of non-working benefits have been factored in). You will wind up with shitty, poorly cleaned toilets.

Under a basic income scheme, where toilet cleaning pays (a perhaps lower) minimum wage *in addition* to the BI, I imagine you’ll get people who actually want to work for the money. Your toilets will be less shitty this way.

What’s interesting (to me) is that nobody needs to wait for any government policy to implement this scheme.

Those who think sitting around getting money for nothing bestows the same dignity on individuals could get together with others willing to support the money for nothing gang and implement the policy to demonstrate how easy and simple it will be to make the plan work.

Doctors keen to give free medical care to loafers, and engineers keen to design and build homes for the unwilling to work will be delighted to participate in a plan that respects everyone equally regardless of their contribution to the common pot. Fact is, a significant percentage of folks who can work, don’t, out of choice. The jobs are beneath them evidently.

I expect my wife would divorce me on the spot if I ever ‘decided’ work wasn’t for me. As she aptly puts it: ‘who’s going to show the kids how to get up and put in a good day’s work, if not you? She’s up at 5:00 most days. I expect I’ll be between the shafts in some form, or another until I drop, with no regrets. I like work. I can understand that others don’t, but I see no reason to subsidize their choice when they’re clearly unwilling/unable to return anything like a return in any kind.

One of my mentors in a particularly cut-throat capitalist enterprise decades ago boasted that he’d steal before he’d go on the dole. He also liked guns. Off to the re-education camp for him, I suppose.

Who do you expect to clean your toilets (outside of your home) under any guaranteed income scheme?

Robots.

@24
”As she aptly puts it: ‘who’s going to show the kids how to get up and put in a good day’s work, if not you?”

Me? –
as I love to work too – which make it very hard to understand that people who love to work could believe that there are ”others” who are ”unwilling to work”?

It could be one requirement of a job that people desire because of its other features, as, for example, if you want to be an intern in the White House you will be required to do some bathroom-cleaning as part of your job duties or, for another example, if you want to be Chief Justice of the United States you will be required to do some bathroom-cleaning as part of your job duties.

This is a good solution imo

@34
”This is a good solution imo”

Doubtful – as it actually shows the same kind of thinking which made the ”GMI experiment” in Finnland so ”envious”.

There are still far too many people in this world who absolutely hate it if anybody else get’s some so called ”Free Lunch” -(like – without cleaning some toilets before?)

That’s why the GMI reality some American Indian Tribes are practicing – already since years might be most preferable?

Firstly Indian Tribes whose income comes mainly from ”Gambling” or ”Casinos” understand that fact – unlike most Gamblers on Wall Street or the general US-Casino.

And whereas other gambling institutions may do as their stakeholders please with their net profits, tribal nations must follow strict rules. Per IGRA (25 USC 2710), gaming net profits may be used only to:

1) Fund tribal government operations or programs;

2) Provide for the general welfare of their members;

3) Promote tribal economic development;

4) Donate to charitable organizations; and

5) Help fund operations of local government agencies

This means the tribe must use gaming revenue to improve its infrastructure, develop education opportunities, and provide social programs for the people.
BUT on top of it a tribe also can decide to distribute per capita payments to the tribal members – AFTER having developed a “revenue allocation plan” and gain approval of the plan from the DOI Secretary.

But even then – sometimes the same ”Envy Problem” as in Finland might appear – as a 2008 report found out ”that tribal leaders don’t like to disburse cash, contending “large per capita payments lead to citizen dependence on tribal governments, undermine the work ethic, and discourage young citizens from finishing their educations.”

@37

Not really

…In Finland, where the social safety net is famously generous, a structure like Britain’s could yield the very thing basic income is supposed to deliver: a guarantee that every member of society can be assured of sustenance and shelter.

This may be the main reason that basic income has lost momentum in Finland: It is effectively redundant.

Health care is furnished by the state. University education is free. Jobless people draw generous unemployment benefits and have access to some of the most effective training programs on earth.

“In a sense,” said Mr. Hiilamo, the social policy professor, “Finland already has basic income.”

it actually shows the same kind of thinking which made the ”GMI experiment” in Finnland so ”envious

No: creating a fair distribution of unpleasant work (eg by bundling it with desirable jobs) doesn’t have same motive as forcing everyone to work and/or forcing the least advantaged to do that work

The notion that people exist to work hard is a staple of conservativism as it really is

Also large parts of the American hipster-left, judging by Twitter

MFB: “In fact we do have something similar to a basic income via the social grant system (although I doubt anybody reading this blog would consider social grant money anything like enough).”

I’m standing on a street corner in South Africa right now (in PE) and based on what I see, I’m certain it isn’t enough.

engels@24 Hipster-left is not a thing. My view only, I suppose, but I can’t help but thinking judging by Twitter just leaves you Twitterpated.

– and just as a reminder – ”social democrats” AND ”socialists” always worked on making ”work”… shall we say: More enjoy-fully AND better payed!

Norway and a few other countries already have a combination of welfare programs and/or universal transfer programs that in practice can be labelled as a GMI-function or Basic Income Guarantee function. There is also a very expanded public sector which functions like a conditional but aggregate Job Guarantee. It’s just that people with low grades from school or no higher education will not be offered public sector jobs in the way the JG scheme is usually framed.

ph: “Ack! How was I to respond, other than with a ‘do you really think so?’ ”

Probably the right thing to do at that point was to ask a taxi driver what he/she thought. But do you have a serious mustache? That’s the important question.

@ #37 Wylie Bradford:

Yeah, that NYC put out a factually incorrect, rhetorically spurious pieice is a small inconvenience. Good then that some have already set the record straight.

http://peoplespolicyproject.org/2018/04/25/the-nyt-gets-the-finland-basic-income-story-wrong/
https://yle.fi/uutiset/osasto/news/finlands_basic_income_organisers_correct_inaccurate_media_reports_of_trials_premature_death/10177476

Questions to John Quiggin after a quick read of the linked FitzRoy & Jin article.

You wrote “while still maintaining the widely-held principle of reciprocity”.

But the linked article gives no sustained argument or explication of such a principle. They use the term reciprocity only once, briefly. The most reciprocity-ish content is a sketch of two arguments on page 5: “A modest BI combined with a JO is more likely to be achievable than just a generous BI, partly by attenuating widespread opposition to ‘something for nothing’, and importantly, because BI alone would fail to provide the widely-recognised and documented, essential second component of psychological wellbeing for most people (Mitchell and Fazi, 2017), namely ‘dignity of work’. ”

Since you state agreement with the article I have two questions:

Question 1: What is the evidence for the “more likely to be achievable” claim? That is, what is the evidence for thinking that a policy push that adopts and fuels an (most often very selective!) “anti something for nothing” mentality is more effective than a policy push that resists, argues against and debunks that mentality?

Question 2: what is the evidence for the claim that “dignity of work” is *essential* for psychological well-being?

I ask since effects on psychological well-being from being in/out of formal work per se can easily be confounded with other, currently in place but really separate and contingent causal factors. Such as:

(1) a culture that heavily guilts and blames anyone not in formal work

(2) an UBI-less economic system where a person not in formal work has a hard time to satisfy their basic material needs without submitting to humiliating workfare with coerced activations and intrusive inspections.

@55
”Note that their real examples of laziness are two different kinds: of kids who want to play, and of people made hopeless (and even substance-abusing) in a treadmill society that always shorts your efforts.”

That’s why it is so important NOT to call it (or see it) as ”laziness” –
as in reality it is… NOT ”laziness”.
It is pretty rational and natural reaction to ”any indecent offer one only can refuse”.

And people who always come up with all of these examples – about how
”this or that person doesn’t like to work” –
or –
”get’s pregnant instead of working” are actually might hate work –
as they might always firstly expect ”others” hating work too?

BUT on the other hand – and taking it more seriously – the main problem might be – that people like Mr. Arnold and the average Gaggia worker -(in Milan) live in two completely different worlds?

Like some US Ex-proud steel worker compared to a German car mechanic who still has his job.
As if y’all ever had to interview US Ex-proud steel worker compared to German car mechanics who still have their job you get so much evidence for the claim that “dignity of work” is *essential* for psychological well-being? – that you even don’t need an erection of Trump to realize – Whassup?

@
”What are the two completely different worlds?”

One world which makes sure that not only ”the barest necessities are covered for everyone” – but that there is also a job market – where it is possible to chose jobs which actually give you a sense of “dignity of work” or an understanding that without work – the might have a problem – Houston?
-(and as this thread hinted this ”nice working world” is NOT in Houston)

– and then there seems to be this ”other world ” -(Houston?) – which seems to create ”the basic premise that the vast majority of human endeavor is unpaid or underpaid. –
-(which it is – but NOT in any so called ”successful social democratic countries”) and so we actually ”have solutions” – we just have to adopt them – the way we could adopt ”successful” and payable European Health Care systems.

And then – as mentioned before we even might NOT need some ”GMI” or job guarantees – as how did Mr. Hiilamo, the social policy professor from Finland say:

“Finland already has basic income.”

“…a payment conditional on some form of social contribution…”

This is a bold proposal, since it means that as a society, America would immediately stop employing Pentagon generals, weapons contractors, anyone in the insurance or advertising industry, most soft-science tenured academics, most police, almost all mid-level managers (including those magisters of mystery like “supply chain consultants” and “HR diversity coordinators” and “Title VI enforcement officers” and “DOD defense contractor liasons,” to see nothing of congressional pages, K-street lobbyists, military contactors and think tank employees), and the vast majority of salespeople at all levels.

Impressive agenda, but that would leave a couple of hundred thousand Americans still receiving a salary in the USA. Some engineers, scientists, a few hard science tenured academics, and lots of social workers. Pretty much everyone else would be out of luck.

Ambitious, but impractical.

I say we just implement the same program for everyone that already works for Ivy league grads–a permanent job guarantee, where you can screw up, recommend invading Iraq or deregulating the banks or blow up the economy on Wall Street, and still get promoted. Hey…it works for Harvard grads like Larry Summers! They wrecked the entire Russian economy and the U.S. economy, gave us both Putin and Trump, and in punishment Summers gets named president of Harvard University and came within a hairsbreadth of being named Treasure Secretary by Obama.
https://www.thenation.com/article/harvard-boys-do-russia/

https://www.counterpunch.org/2011/03/04/how-harvard-deep-sixed-its-russian-scandal/

If it works for the Ivy league, why not use the same program for anyone else?

and about:
”people not wanting to work” or stories about somebody getting ”pregnant in order not wanting to work”.

As mentioned before – we once had to do a lot of interviews with workers in the so called ”US Rust Belt” and if these workers weren’t lying – their wishes for (satisfying) work was overwhelming – and we know – we know – there might be this (American?) attitude that ”satisfying” is just another one of these s-words like ”social” or ”socialistic” – BUT if we ALL could have agreed from the get going – that – actually these wishes to get some (satisfying) work are ”the universal truth” and not some ideas of (some) workers trying to get some ”free lunch” – a conversation about GMI might be far more… constructive?

McLaren said it better

@72: The quote is from FitzRoy & Jin. As I made clear in my initial comment (56 above, with quote context) after which I wrote: “Since you state agreement with the article I have two questions …”. Your initial post didn’t caveat your enthusiastic endorsement of the article so I assumed you agreed also with that paternalistic claim made in it. But I’m happy if you like me disagree with the paternalistic claim.

“As you say, most people are voluntarily social but this activity is currently seen as radically different from formal work. Again, as you say, giving it bureaucratic status will break down that distinction, and therefore the resistance to giving financial support to those engaged in such activity.”

I don’t think the decades of workfare policy have eased folk resistance to giving financial support to the poor. On the contrary, workfare policy seem to have normalized and fueled sentiments of prying, hostile suspiciousness about “undeserving poor” who should not “get something for nothing”.

Why think it would be different if the policy and its administrative system of inspections expands from workfare to work-and/or-social-fare? More prying, more aspects of poor people’s lives to administratively measure up. And for others to pass judgment on.

But perhaps I’m missing out on something re social activity conditionality. What is in your view the best proposal for how it should operate? Including how to administratively quantify and rule on individual cases.

May I also point out that it is far from clear at this point in humanity’s history that having and raising children is a public-spirited act…

@77 SusanC:
“There’s a hint, I think, of the idea that having _other_ people working is a good in itself. To put it really bluntly, that there is an “other regarding” preference such that if person A who is employed is given a choice between (I) person B gets paid BI and does nothing; (II) person A pays additional tax in order for the government to create a job with negative productivity — it consumes more value than it creates — which person B will do; then person A will vote for the political party that is promising to implement (II). i.e. knowing that person B is working has positive utility to person A, such that person A is willing to give up some tangible things in order to have the pleasure of knowing that B is doing some work. Well, maybe…”

Where is the step from other regarding preference to good in itself here?

Some people might be so entrenched in the “no poor person should get nothing without doing something” mentality that they would feel a warm nice feeling and have a preference satisfied if a poor person was forced to dig up and refill holes for 8 hours as a condition for basic needs provision. That would be the other regarding preference.

Now, *if* one accepts a theory of wellbeing where *any* warm nice feeling or any preference satisfaction whatsoever (no matter its hierarchical or sadistic source/nature) is part of what is good in itself for a person A then forcing other poorer people B to dig holes would in one way be an instrumental good for A. Though not a good in itself. The good in itself would be the (cause/content agnostic) preference satisfaction or pleasant feeling in A.

But that theory of wellbeing seems implausible precisely because of its admissions to hierarchical sentiments. I think very few on philosophical reflection would find reason to accept it.

To the extent some people have such other regarding preferences I’d argue that they, not the poor, are the problem. As we move further into a tech reality where it takes less and less total work for everyone to thrive, if we just allow it, getting people to get over the extreme work ethic mindset that until recently has been so crucial is a big challenge. Perhaps we should force those stuck in that mindset to dig holes for 8 hours a day until the experience in their aching bodies, and the feeling of humiliation in their minds, inform them that useless hole digging and refilling isn’t all that great.

and here – zum ”Tag der Arbeit” (1.May) the latest from German Unions:

“Menschen mit einer Stillhalteprämie aufs Abstellgleis zu stellen, weil ihnen keine Perspektive in der Erwerbsarbeit angeboten werden kann, ist keine Lösung”,
(“Providing people with a standstill bonus because they can not be offered any perspective in paid work is not a solution”) said DGB-Vorsitzende Reiner Hoffmann – and I-Metall-Chef Jörg Hofmann declared:
“Humans are not happy if they have to sit at home – being alimented”.

Humans are not happy if they have to sit at home – being alimented

Maybe, but they don’t starve to death
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2014/feb/28/man-starved-to-death-after-benefits-cut