Basic Income and the Labor Contract

Claus Offe

doi:10.2202/1932-0183.1100

Article

Basic Income and the Labor Contract

Claus Offe

Published/Copyright: July 11, 2008

Published by

Become an author with De Gruyter Brill

Submit Manuscript Author Information Explore this Subject

From the journal Basic Income Studies Volume 3 Issue 1

The paper starts by exploring the negative contingencies that are associated with the core institution of capitalist societies, the labor contract: unemployment, poverty, and denial of autonomy. It argues that these are the three conditions that basic income schemes can help prevent. Next, the three major normative arguments are discussed that are raised in opposition to basic income proposals: the idle should not be rewarded, the prosperous don't need it, and there are so many things waiting to be done in the world. After demonstrating that proponents of basic income stand in no way empty-handed when facing these objections, a third part considers basic income in functional terms: would its introduction help to resolve problems of social and economic order that are unlikely to be resolved in more conventional ways?

Keywords: Keywords – autonomy; basic income; full employment; labor market; politicization of income distribution; poverty.

Published Online: 2008-7-11

You are currently not able to access this content.

Articles in the same Issue

https://doi.org/10.2202/1932-0183.1100

Keywords for this article

Keywords – autonomy; basic income; full employment; labor market; politicization of income distribution; poverty.