Wednesday, September 30, 2015

Karl Widerquist — Nobel Laureate, Joseph Stiglitz, Endorses Unconditional Basic Income

Joseph Stiglitz, during the question and answer session after his talk at the World Summit on Technological Unemployment in New York on February 29, 2015, was asked whether he supported an Unconditional Basic Income as a policy response to technological unemployment. He replied, “Yes, that’s part of the solution. He quickly went on to say that Basic Income is not….
Stiglitz joins a long list of Nobel-prize winning economists who have endorsed some form of Basic Income Guarantee, including James Tobin, Milton Friedman, James Buchanan, James Meade, Paul Krugman, F. A. Hayek, Herbert A. Simon, and Robert Solow.
Bien — Basic Income Earth Network
UNITED STATES: Nobel Laureate, Joseph Stiglitz, Endorses Unconditional Basic Income
Karl Widerquist

5 comments:

NeilW said...

It always amuses me that these people state we have to take into account 'political considerations' when talking about bond markets, fiscal policy and 'expectations'. (Hence why we can't move to functional finance).

And then they start advocating Basic Income ideas, which is just unemployment benefit that cripples your spending side auto-stabiliser and has precisely the same 'political considerations' as unemployment benefit.

In other words people need to see you doing something for your money. You don't get it for nothing.

Matt Franko said...

"He quickly went on to say that Basic Income is not all. He talked about other financial reforms, “predistribution”–changing the rules of the market economy, eliminating the peculiar system in which land speculators are taxed at a lower rate than other people, and so on.

In other words, Stiglitz endorses it, but does not emphasize it. This is somewhat of an unusual position;"

Its not that unusual if you realize he doesnt fully understand how it would be funded...

Calgacus said...

In other words people need to see you doing something for your money. You don't get it for nothing.

Neil, it is not that people "need" to see you doing something, it is that the real world "needs" to "see" you doing something. This "need" is entirely rational; it couldn't be any other way. The societies of a social animal that didn't have this "need" would quickly collapse and die. (Living wage, Universal) Basic Income can't work because it can't work, for it is spectacularly inflationary, the most inflationary idea ever seriously proposed - not because of psychological reasons. No society now or in the future could afford a UBI. A targeted, restricted BIG is just another name for "welfare". We already have it, every society ever has had it. It isn't new or a much of solution to anything.

Luke said...

The "other societies" of animals have yet to invent automation or artificial intelligence. The analogy doesn't hold up.

Luke said...

The "other societies" of animals have yet to invent automation or artificial intelligence. The analogy doesn't hold up.