Universal income and feminism

[ConstantlyCold]

Bit of a thread about a thread.

There’s another thread about sahm’s and Feminism. The topic of universal income has come up. It could be hugely beneficial to sahm’s and low earners.

I can’t get my head around it myself. But I was wondering what people’s opinions are?

Would universal income benefit women? How would it work practically?

There's the obvious problem that a UBI would pay a working man the same as an unemployed mum.

BUT there's the obvious advantage that a woman could move up from unemployed to get a part time job without losing income, which is what happens in our current system. Women are far more likely to need part time work in our society as it is.

Also, while we remain in the EU a UBI would not be possible. So we'd need a definite Leave government.

"There's the obvious problem that a UBI would pay a working man the same as an unemployed mum."

Why is that a problem? That's the whole point, everyone gets the same basic income.

Also, while we remain in the EU a UBI would not be possible

Why is that?

What I don’t understand about UBI is that surely it would always be slightly under what you needed to live off because prices would rise to reflect the fact that everyone had a set amount of income.
I’m probably just not understanding it though.

I think it has the potential to take away financial pressure, the stigma and sheer time invested claiming benefits. This would free up people to improve their skill sets and actually look for work in a more thoughtful way than currently happens.

This would be good for women who have taken career breaks whilst raising their children. Good for women and men in enabling them to take a paid part time role which fits around caring for their families and raising children.

What I don’t understand about UBI is that surely it would always be slightly under what you needed to live off because prices would rise to reflect the fact that everyone had a set amount of income.

Would they, though? People still would have an equal need for products. Just more buying power in order to obtain them. So perhaps prices would go down as long as it was possible to have enough product available.

Its been successfully tested in Finland, it takes away the stigma of claiming benefits so for that alone it seems worth while.

''participants are reporting lower stress levels and a greater incentive to work.'' That's a very interesting result. Maybe it would help to curb some of the abuses we have to put up with from employers.

www.independent.co.uk/voices/finland-universal-basic-income-uk-needs-to-start-testing-it-a7871596.html

This is where I’m at tea - surely it will be inflationary.

I’d be fine as I can work to top up UBI but loads of people don’t have that opinion.

What I don’t understand about UBI is that surely it would always be slightly under what you needed to live off because prices would rise to reflect the fact that everyone had a set amount of income.

Yes, me too - I don't understand how you can get around that.

I know they're testing it in Finland - but it's for 10k people isn't it? It's not for everyone, so those people are just a drop in the ocean, and wouldn't raise the prices.

The only way I can see it working is if so many other things were regulated - I lived in Singapore for a while, and their equivalent of council houses are available to anyone, there's always somewhere you can rent at a reasonable rate (there are some rules around having to accept what you're offered - but then there's also rules about the ethnic mixes, etc. so they do what they can to prevent ghettos) - I think that you'd need that at a bear minimum, because housing costs are going to be the first thing to rise and sop up the money I would think.

It's been piloted in a Scandinavian(?) country. And did have some positive outcomes - some people set up businesses that they wouldn't have, others moved from unemployed to employment.

The idea is that everyone gets just enough for housing,food and utilities, but is less than unemployment benefits. It takes the stigma away from claiming, there is the insensitive to work because nothing is taken away from you if you as you earn more, and the rich see it as a tax rebate.

It is expensive though, and the people who need more (eg disabled) are disadvantaged and wasn't rolled out permanently.

I’m not against UBI but I’m wary of using it as an alternative to other benefits, I think that we would still need to top up some peoples incomes.

Oh, once again, I'm made to look stupid by my slow typing...

Yes this is what I mean art I can see it being fab for people in the middle and awful for people at the bottom.

The idea is that it solves that problem of requiring everyone to work for free or little while not distributing food, housing for free. Think of it this way: the basic goal of an economy, ignoring all the middle and upper class extras and minor issues like money, is to provide the basic needs: food, housing, shelter, water. We now have an economy where food is produced largely by machines, where only a few people can feed millions, where only a few people are allowed and enabled to grow food. All that extra is not more good for the few who produce it. Basic Income enables a better distribution.

As far as it being expensive, I wonder really... it wasn't that long ago that the dole was given out to anyone who needed it, pretty much no questions asked. All these extra benefits and checks must cost in themselves.

There's a good video about all the issues involved at deredactie.be/cm/vrtnieuws.english/videozone_ENG/1.2253270

I suppose it's a bit like rolling out the state pension to everyone. If you are happy or able to live off say £12k, you can. If you want more, and are able to, you work to top up your income.

The problems come when you aren't able to work, or your landlord puts up your rent to £12k a year.

How did they select the 10k people in Finland?

Did they just pick a small town as a trial?

dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/media.blubrry.com/99percentinvisible/dovetail.prxu.org/96/2dccfa46-bd53-4a18-90fb-9084262598ef/99pi-0276-thefinnishexperiment-1.mp3

This is a podcast about it.

The people were picked randomly and they weren't allowed to refuse the money.

Picking at random is a shame as it doesn’t really let you see what happens in a community when you introduce UBI.

Would it impact housing costs? Etc

What you're asking is whether it would cause inflation, or even hyperinflation. If you google universal basic income and inflation there's a lot of research that comes up. It's also mentioned somewhere in that video I linked, although I know it's long. It is the big question and sticking point.

What I think is that we're seeing inflation now. Housing prices? Well they've never gone up at all in the last 30 years have they (something widely blamed on those bloody uppity women getting jobs too)? The current system is broken. We need something else.

Is the universal income going to come from the magic money tree. No it isn't. It's going to come from the taxes of working people. No to that.

And it's going to be given to the working people! Go and watch that video or something.

We are all working harder for less than we ever have before. As that video says, GDP per capita has actually doubled, trebled or more since the 60s, yet so many of us are worse off. The issue is distribution.

"And it's going to be given to the working people!"

That's the whole point - it's like the pension, everyone would get it and be able to work on top. But it's not being seriously considered. The tax burden would be high, so unlikely to be popular.

We do pay a high percentage of our taxable income on benefits and pensions, though, so it may not be that different to the current rate.

The current system is broken. We need something else

But what else?

Very interesting thread, OP! I think the universal basic income could make an enormous difference to sex equality. For one thing I imagine it would significantly reduce the number of women doing sex work. If applied properly it might also mean far fewer women would feel trapped in abusive relationships for financial reasons. It would increase social mobility for both sexes by giving people more opportunity to pursue training that would improve their employment prospects. It would also mean people who don't have the education or the confidence to work out their own entitlements, or who may have chaotic lives, don't miss out (a lot of people entitled to benefits currently don't claim).

Obviously a lot would depend on the amount given and how it was implemented. For the poster complaining about it coming out of taxes, my understanding is that having a single benefit for everyone rather than a patchwork of means-tested benefits would massively reduce costs. Means-testing anything always ends up with really high admin costs and this would eradicate those. It's a common misconception that universal benefits are more expensive than means-tested ones when in reality the opposite is usually the case.

I wonder if within the next few decades or even years this discussion will feel redundant? There's a school of thought that a shift to a universal basic income system is inevitable as automation means most jobs as we currently understand them are soon to cease to exist. Possibly the discussion should be about HOW we implement this system (especially in a way that benefits women) rather than whether we implement it?

Thank you to the poster who shared the link to the Finland podcast. Looking forward to listening to it later with a cup of tea

So in effect it wouldn't be enough to live on. So people would still either have to rely on state benefits or a better off working partner. Back to square one.