Volume 11, Issue 1 - Special Issue Title: Basic Income and Economic Democracy

Let us understand economic democracy as the fourfold capacity (i) to decide what social relations we wish to “enter” in order to work; (ii) to determine the (im)material nature of the space where we decide to stay and work, which requires the capacity of having a “voice” that is effectively listened to; (iii) to opt for “exiting” this space in case its nature and functioning go against what we wish for our lives; and (iv) in case we opt for leaving, to resort to an outside-the-previous-workplace offering tools for second and subsequent opportunities, that is, to effectively “restart” our (re)productive lives in other terms and conditions. Basic income can play a crucial role in fostering such capacity. Because of its unconditionality, and thanks to bargaining power deriving from it, basic income is a sort of income that is convertible in terms of (a) time to conceive of (and put into practice) projects of one’s own, be it individually and/or collectively; (b) a capacity to explore alternative options and take promising risks; and (c) the right to credit, in the twofold sense of the right to financial resources and the right to social trust. As noticed and appreciated by some post-crash social movements, there are some spheres where such democracy-enhancing bargaining power may unfold: wage-earning work, the decommodification of labour force and the possible subsequent constitution of cooperatives and other self-managed (re)productive spaces, the household, entrepreneurship, socio-political participation, etc. In sum, more flexible combinations of different kinds of work may emerge when individuals and groups enjoy an income stream that is guaranteed as a right, which echoes both classical and contemporary discourses on the need for humans to have the democratic right to autonomously choose and determine work(s) all along the life cycle.

A democratic economy matters for different reasons, depending on why we are concerned about authoritarian workplaces. Authoritarian work conditions violate overlap but distinct values, related to democratic government, meaningful work, non-domination, exploitation, and the quality of leisure time. To the degree that democratizing work is supposed to advance these values, a basic income is neither a necessary nor sufficient condition for eliminating authoritarian work conditions. It might, in some conditions, reduce some of the worst aspects of our current workplace relationships. But, by the same token, it might exacerbate them, especially if a basic income becomes a substitute for collective self-organization by workers. In nearly every case, the value that we seek to advance and the kind of democratized economy we might wish to have is better created and maintained by concerted class power than by welfarist social policies, like a basic income.

In this short paper I explore whether a pro tanto argument for an unconditional basic income can be developed from a specific normative basis: the idea of epistemic equality as applied to organizations. In a broad sense, epistemic equality describes the idea that every individual has an equal right to speak up and to be heard if she has relevant information or knowledge to share, questions to ask, or complaints to bring forward. Epistemic equality has moral, instrumental, and instrumentally moral value in organizations. Drawing on Miranda Fricker’s work on epistemic injustice (2009), I argue that we have good reasons to postulate epistemic equality as a normative ideal for organizations, even if – and precisely because – they are otherwise hierarchically structured. The hypothesis I then proceed to explore is that an unconditional basic income, by providing better opportunities for “exit”, might be a step that would strengthen epistemic equality in organizations.

Time has become a valuable asset within capitalism. “Time is money” is a well known and usually shared principle. As in regard to many other type of assets, the distribution of time is pretty unfair, as well as it is the value consideration of the time allocated for different people to different activities. The distribution of time, as well as what people can or cannot do with their time, is a key issue among feminist debates. The main argument is that time allocation to paid and unpaid work is very different and unfair between genders. Women allocate much more time to unpaid work, and men, on the contrary allocate much more time to paid work. This has a reasonable and direct consequence in terms of income generation. This unequal distribution of time (and work) represents the main obstacle to women’s economic autonomy and to overcome gender income gaps.

In this article, we present an anti-capitalist argument for basic income based on its predicted effects on the wage share dynamics and its relation with the working class’ bargaining power. Our considerations are located in the Marxist tradition and based mainly on contributions to the Marxist analytical framework made by Rosa Luxemburg and Michał Kalecki. We argue that basic income should lead to a rise of the share of wages in the GDP, by significantly improving workers’ bargaining position in various ways: through increasing the effective demand and investments by redistributing income to the advantage of the poorer groups of the society; through guaranteeing the realisation of basic needs outside the labour market; through positive influence on the collective bargaining power, especially during a strike; and through enhancing engagement in alternative relations of production as well as in political struggle for a better situation of working people. We also distinguish some necessary conditions in a realistic historical scenario where the positive, anti-capitalist dynamic launched by basic income could be set into motion.

A widespread argument in the basic income debate is that the unconditional entitlement to a secure income floor improves workers’ bargaining position vis-a-vis their employers. Basic income effectively grants all (potential) workers an exit option from an employment relation that fails to take her interests into account. It gives them the “power to say no”, as argued by Karl Widerquist. Surprisingly, given its importance, the exit argument itself has not been subjected to much systematic analysis by basic income advocates. In this paper we critically examine the exit argument and suggest that, under current economic conditions, an exit strategy might end up worsening rather than strengthening the opportunity set and bargaining position of the most vulnerable workers.