A NAFTA Dividend: A Guaranteed Minimum Income for North America
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Michael W. Howard
This paper explores the desirability and feasibility of a minimum income for the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) region. I review arguments in support of a basic income or a negative income tax for the European Union (EU). Then I examine ways in which the NAFTA countries do and do not resemble the EU in aspects relevant for the desirability and feasibility of a regional basic income. I argue that a case can be made for a North American guaranteed income, grounded, with respect to desirability, in a globalist theory of justice, and with respect to feasibility, in the necessity of moderating the flow of labor migration. A universal regional basic income is a useful tool for regional development that is fair and that insures better than does the current NAFTA that cooperation benefits the least advantaged.
©2011 Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co. KG, Berlin/Boston
Articles in the same Issue
- Front Matter
- Content
- From the Editors
- List of Contributors
- Research Article
- A NAFTA Dividend: A Guaranteed Minimum Income for North America
- Why Left Reciprocity Theories Are Inconsistent
- Streams, Grants and Pools: Stakeholding, Asset-Based Welfare and Convertibility
- Research Note
- Targeting Benefit Levels to Individuals or Families?
- A Monetary Reformist Road to Universal Basic Income
- Debate
- Basic Income and Labour Market Conditions: Insights from Argentina
- Basic Income and Employment in Brazil
- From Survival to Decent Employment: Basic Income Security in Namibia
- The Inconsequentiality of Employment Disincentives: Basic Income in South Africa
- Basic Income, Occupational Freedom and Antipoverty Policy
- Book Review
- Review of John W. Hughes, Major Douglas: The Policy of a Philosophy
- Review of Keith Dowding, Jurgen De Wispelaere, and Stuart White, The Ethics of Stakeholding
- Review of Guy Standing, Income Security as a Right: Europe and North America
- Review of Stuart White, The Civic Minimum: On the Rights and Obligations of Economic Citizenship
Articles in the same Issue
- Front Matter
- Content
- From the Editors
- List of Contributors
- Research Article
- A NAFTA Dividend: A Guaranteed Minimum Income for North America
- Why Left Reciprocity Theories Are Inconsistent
- Streams, Grants and Pools: Stakeholding, Asset-Based Welfare and Convertibility
- Research Note
- Targeting Benefit Levels to Individuals or Families?
- A Monetary Reformist Road to Universal Basic Income
- Debate
- Basic Income and Labour Market Conditions: Insights from Argentina
- Basic Income and Employment in Brazil
- From Survival to Decent Employment: Basic Income Security in Namibia
- The Inconsequentiality of Employment Disincentives: Basic Income in South Africa
- Basic Income, Occupational Freedom and Antipoverty Policy
- Book Review
- Review of John W. Hughes, Major Douglas: The Policy of a Philosophy
- Review of Keith Dowding, Jurgen De Wispelaere, and Stuart White, The Ethics of Stakeholding
- Review of Guy Standing, Income Security as a Right: Europe and North America
- Review of Stuart White, The Civic Minimum: On the Rights and Obligations of Economic Citizenship
