Volume 4, Issue 1 - Debate: The Green Case for Basic Income

Feminists have long taken the position that society should commit itself to the support of individuals who care for others. In this view, governments should subsidize "caretaking units," consisting of adults supporting dependents in need of care and assistance. This article undertakes to assess a proposal for the public support of caretaking units, as set forth by Anne Alstott in her book No Exit, and to compare that proposal to the alternative of a guaranteed basic income for all. By using an illustrative example, the article concludes that the caretaker benefit is less desirable than a basic income program. Caretaker benefits reward people who engage in premature and irresponsible childbearing at the expense of those who take costly steps to prepare themselves to be good parents and to achieve self-support before having children. By flouting basic principles of fairness, the resulting perverse priorities become a serious shortcoming of Alstott's proposed caretaker benefit program. In contrast, a guaranteed income offers subsidies to parents and nonparents alike, and thus achieves greater neutrality among reproductive choices.

This article examines the implications of adopting differing versions of a Universal Basic Income (UBI) in Israel. While the findings of the analysis indicate a taxed version of UBI would contribute to a greater extent to a decrease in poverty and income inequality than if this benefit were not taxed, the high cost of an effective UBI program would appear to be a serious obstacle for its implementation. The article then examines the possibility of enhancing the trickle-down effect of economic growth by offering the dividends of growth to Israel's citizens. The assumption here is that if all citizens engage in economic activity, under conditions of economic growth the state should distribute a portion of its tax revenues among shareholders (i.e., its citizens).

In this article we explore the implementation of a European basic pension (BP) scheme as a means of combating financial poverty of Europe's elderly. As earlier contributions already outlined the practical and ethical arguments that favour a European basic income, we assume that a basic income is philosophically and ethically justified and that the European Union has a crucial role to play in its implementation. In this article, we broaden the scope of the discussion to examining the various (and often technical) options, difficulties and pitfalls associated with the practical design and implementation of a harmonised European minimum income scheme. We first offer an overview of minimum income guarantees for the elderly in Europe. Second, we make a detailed assessment of the issues involved in the design of a BP. Third, we shed some light on the European dimension of this proposal and conclude with a sketch of three possible BP scenarios. Our findings confirm that it is one thing to be in favour of BP, but another to design a realistic and politically feasible proposal.