The citizen's income is the only solution to inequality/ the poverty trap/ social immobility.

[weatherall]

The concept of the citizen's income is a universal benefit everyone receives.

It provides a basic standard of living eg housing/food/clothes/fuel.

Any income earned above this is kept. There is no taper.

If as a couple we could get 20k a year without working we'd both give up work tbh.

I think that both sides are right on some points and wrong on others!!

Theos side. Yes she has some points. I too dont like the ideological, barely thought out ideas on this thread. I too think they are sixth form common room stuff.
I also admire people who have get up and go, and think outside the box.

Her minuses. Agree with Jux and Fideliney.
There is no way on earth that all can do what you have done. They dont have the brains quite frankly. Not their fault. Or some other given characteristics. Good health etc.
No one is ever finacially safe even if they think that they are.

I teach in a secondary school and reckon about 50% of Y11 wouldn't have turned up to their GCSE exams if they thought they could get £10k pa for doing nowt.

No I am not bitter, I just can't bear the endless hypocritical champagne socialist smuggery bandied about by people who don't really know what it's like to be really poor. Or really rich for that matter.

I totally fail to see what that (or any of your posts) have to do with the subject of this thread. Point to me to where anyone (except you) has been smug or hypocritical? What is there to be smug or hypocritical about - the discussion is about an entirely hypothetical scenario.

I do always find it interesting on these threads, or ones like them, that those who disagree with the concept are so venomous. If you think it would never work, that's fine. In this country at least, it probably wouldn't, to be honest - it would never be acceptable to many for reasons already outlined.

Loving the idea of Bertrand Russell, Martin Luther King and Milton Friedman all sitting round in the sixth-form common room, though. Wonder whose turn it is to make the cheese toasties?

You are, of course, entitled to your opinion. But it just that, as is mine. I don't really care enough to carry on so let's leave it at that.

Theodorus - your syntax shrieks 'arrogant'!

You probably take that as a compliment.

But you are interesting - you don't get many people willing to admit that they place more value on hard cash than on playing a part in society. Not that there aren't a lot like you, at the top and at the bottom of the income scale.

Out of interest, Theodorous. Are you content?

Yes.

I don't think however that I am at the top of the scale. Between us we earn about 223k a year tax free. Hardly oligarchs or bankers.

Are there sacrifices you have had to make?

I am just being nosy btw. I like to ask questions of people that are happy to answer them!

Yes of course there are. We have lived in some scary places for a start, my siblings have borne the brunt of parent care because they live nearby. The worst by a long shot is having to live and work with Western expats. Not all of them but there is a strong racist and colonial undertone and I hate being lumped into the same group. And there is practically no such thing as a friend. They are just people. My husband is a headmaster so is around a lot in the holidays which is important because I have to travel regularly. One of the reasons I wanted to leave the UK was the NHS. I worked in it. I walked out after finding a elderly patient in the corridor where I had been told to leave her the night before still there and had passed away sometime in the last 12 hours and nobody had noticed. There are lots of good and bad things about life but access to clean and safe health and quality apolitical education motivate us to keep on travelling.

And to add, expat children can become absolute colonial monsters, it's tedious to have to be so strict but essential. I have seen a British kid in the supermarket slap the "maid" for not walking fast enough and then the mum scream at her to walk faster rather than tell the child off. Luckily have an inhouse bossy teacher who has seen it all.

Theo, lots of people I work with are moving offshore in their droves at the moment (RAF engineers). Not a job I could do tbh (I have the Q's, but I wouldn't want the lifestyle), but fair play to you getting off your arse and changing your entire career direction.

I agree with you re 6th form politics and champagne socialism too. The real world, and real people do not generally fall into line with the hypothetical dream. People are inherently selfish and self-serving, very few are genuinely all about the greater good - their primary motivation is themselves and their families and the least difficult,most effortless way possible. There's no shame in that, I will always put my family and myself ahead of everyone else and I want as little hardship as poss; if I had access to a living wage, with no requirement to work, I would do it in a heartbeat.

That is the thing isnt it.
I dont think that many are prepared to make those sacrifices.
I used to wonder what made the sports people reach the top of the tree so to speak. And realised eventually that it was not merely talent or even money to help them through.
It also involves huge sacrifices. Such as virtually giving up all time, having virtually no social life. Basically giving up most of the other things in life.

I think that it comes down to priorities for most people.

Of course it does. It doesn't make one side more selfish than the other though in my opinion. How I live is selfish but so are people who live on a low wage, human nature makes us both put our families and selves before the greater needs of society. There was once a poster here who said she wouldn't use private healthcare ever on principle, even if it was the only way to save her child. Easy to say on the internet to look right on, should such a terrible choice be needed in real life I don't think many would really refuse it.

There have been studies done, I'll try to find the links later, that show that a minimum income for all adults can work. Without the stress of worrying about money, people are free to pursue passions, continue education, start businesses etc. I know that if DH and I didn't have to work all the hours god sends just to survive, we would be much happier. DH would probably run performing arts workshops for kids (something he did when he was younger, but had to give up because of finances) and I would write full-time. And if these things didn't work for us, we could just try something else!

It's never going to happen in the UK though.