Search the archive.

3. The Increased Privatization of Care If a BI will lead, as some critics fear, to a serious shortage of labour supply in the caring professions, care might become increasingly (re)privatized. Given current cultural norms, it is likely that women will be expected to shoulder the burden of private care, especially if they will indeed gradually be more excluded from the market. The privatization of care and the confinement of more women to domesticity fare badly for gender justice for a number of reasons. Economically, women will lose skills and social capital, making their re‐entry in the market increasingly difficult – ultimately, many will have no substantive exit right from domesticity. Socially and culturally, the privatization of care may lead to the perpetuation of domestic violence and gender stereotypes. Psychologically, all blame for bad care will (continue to) go to women and this, in turn, will perpetuate the misrecognition of women. A general consequence of the privatization of care will be that the economic, social and psychological costs of individuals engaging in gender‐symmetrical lifestyles will become increasingly higher. It is important to emphasize that the costs of leading a particular lifestyle are economical but also psychological. Social expectations, together with oneʹs own internalized expectations, as well as even more elusive factors such as peopleʹs ability to respect women and whatever is associated with the “feminine,” carry the imprints of and perpetuate gender injustice. A discussion of BI’s effects on gender justice will benefit from feminist psychology theories that locate the origins of women’s misrecognition in the traditional social arrangements – in particular the feminisation of child care – and their valuation and representation, which structure our earliest human interaction, our moral emotions and our ability to value women and the feminine (Benjamin, 1988). Feminist theorists have shown how the feminisation of childrearing combined with the generally low status and social powerlessness of women is at the root of womenʹs misrecognition (Ruddick, 1989). Far from being a merely individual choice devoid of any social implication, womenʹs domesticity, particularly when work and family conflict structurally, is a significant symptom and future cause of gender injustice (Williams, 2000). If many women drop out of the labour market and care becomes more privatised, this will generate self‐perpetuating spirals of gender discrimination. A BI would eliminate the economic dependence that spouses with precarious careers would have on their working partner. Such dependence is one of the main incentives women currently have against centering their lives on marriage and (domestic) caregiving. If some women would continue to be expected to marry and center their lives around care‐giving, and this choice would be perceived as less risky than it is now, some parents would have incentive to invest more resources in furthering the careers of boys.

A basic income could potentially reduce unhealthy dependencies both within personal relationships and with employers. A worry however is that a basic income might be seen to reinforce barriers to the labour market for those who might most benefit from it (drawing upon the universal model of inclusion). Linked to this, there might also be less political pressure to safeguard routes into training essential for social mobility and integration (e.g., of migrant workers) (Hassel, 2017). Gender income gaps related to the differential return to work of mothers following childbirth may also become less of a political concern. This may also enhance social class and other differences between groups in any given society, calling for an intersectional analysis. Whilst individualised basic income payments could well be an instrument of freedom to live individually for some, it is likely that many of us would still be living in households, and that many decisions (such as the division of paid and unpaid labour) would still likely be made at the household or wider extended family level. Whilst a basic income would provide women with unconditional income and thus recognise the social value of (gendered) caregiving (Fitzpatrick, 1999; McKay, 2001, 2005; Zelleke, 2011), it might also risk reinforcing gendered practices, and thus further entrench gender inequalities and maintain financial dependency within personal relationships (Robeyns, 2001). A basic income could contribute to poverty alleviation and personal independence for some, but it might also reinforce withdrawal from the labour market and public life for certain groups, such as mothers of young children, in so far as financial decisions were still taken at household level (Fitzpatrick, 1999).

Basic income seeks to support our ambitions, without dictating what these should be. It makes the assumption that the power differential would be sufficiently shifted by the individualised payment to women for them to negotiate different domestic arrangements, and that norms would be flexible enough to accommodate a greater—and less gendered—range of ‘life options’. The experience of the Belgium time credit scheme does not bode well in this regard. The time credit scheme allowed people a limited amount of paid time away from work, for any purpose. It was a seemingly gender-neutral scheme. However, it has seen extremely gendered use in practice. Mothers (but not fathers) in Belgium have overwhelmingly used their time credit account to care for children, in effect as an extension of parenting leave (Deven & Merla, 2019). Perhaps another example is the completely gender-neutral parental leave in Sweden: despite there being individual parallel rights for two parents, gendered practice endures, with women using the lion’s share of leave. These experiences suggest that for a basic income to have an impact on the gendered practices of parenting, further thought would have to be given to how to achieve that specific goal. Gender equality is not a primary aim of a basic income, but it is a hoped for secondary consequence. Parental leave scholarship suggests that gender equality is most efficiently a consequence when it is an explicit policy aim, but that, as described above, even then it might fail to materialise. Perhaps considering the distinction between gender equality and gender equity is helpful here. Gender equity is the value-laden concept that stems from the socially constructed expectations of female and male behaviour, which is based both on gender stratification and gender roles (Fraser, 1994). Gender equity is thus based on the experience of fairness and whose values are valuable, whereas gender equality would be easier defined by quantitative measures of gendered division of time and rewards of paid and unpaid work. Fraser (1994) would say that gender equality depends on female behaviour becoming the norm. Basic income has the potential to change the meaning of gender equity, either reversing back towards traditional gendered expectations, or alternatively liberating us from such stratifications and norms that limit our behaviour. There are many factors in hypothesising is such outcomes, but it seems clear that a basic income set at too low a payment rate would reverse development by necessity. Firestone (1970, p. 1) observed that: Sex class is so deep as to be invisible…the reaction of the common man, woman, and child—That? Why you can’t change that!....This gut reaction, the assumption about changing a fundamental biological condition, is an honest one….That so profound a change cannot be easily fit into traditional categories of thought, e.g., “political,” is not because these categories do not apply but because they are not big enough: radical feminism bursts through them. 8 As with other big political movements, the basic income project does not appear to be ‘big enough’, remaining relatively conservative and essentialist with regard to its understanding of gender equalities. Perhaps it is precisely because a basic income would be such a revolutionary expansion of freedom, that this core unchallenged gender binary worldview is all the more disappointing. An independent source of income is a good start on the road to freedom, but, it is not a sufficient condition to challenge the persistent norms and prevailing gendered structures. To the extent that gender is based on norms and structures, which have to be challenged, basic income, as a gender-neutral idea that hides gender, could be argued to be a necessary condition, but not a sufficient condition to see female behaviour becoming the norm, thus leading us towards gender equality (Fraser, 1994).

Assume, as Zwolinski advocates, that such a program would displace all 126 federal antipoverty programs and all state and local government antipoverty programs. Later, I challenge that assumption, but for now imagine that it is true. Notice what would happen. A $2.068 trillion program would replace programs whose total expenditures in 2012 were $952 billion. Even rounding up the $952 billion to $1 trillion, the program that Zwolinski advocates is more than twice as costly in budgetary terms as current antipoverty programs. How would such a program be funded? Let's grant for now Zwolinski's assumption that all other antipoverty programs would be eliminated. How would the federal government obtain the additional $1.068 trillion?2 Before considering that question, let's put the number in perspective. Federal government spending for fiscal year 2014 will come in at about $3.576 trillion (U.S. Joint Economic Committee and Council of Economic Advisers 2014, 32). So if the federal government were to implement a $10,000 BIG today, spending by the federal government would increase by 30 percent. This amount is actually an underestimate. I am assuming that Zwolinski would want the BIG to be a federal program. So the $284 billion that he estimates would be saved by state and local governments would not be automatically remitted to the federal government. Rounding up the $668 billion spent by the feds in 2012 to $700 billion, I conclude that the federal government would spend not an additional $1.068 trillion, but rather an additional $1.368 trillion.3 This would be a whopping 38 percent increase in federal spending. How would Zwolinski fund this major increase in federal spending? If his goal were to keep the already bloated half-trillion-dollar federal deficit constant rather than increasing it, he would need to have the federal government increase taxes from their estimated $2.993 trillion to $4.361 trillion, an increase of 45.7 percent. One of the most well-established facts in the economics literature on govern ment finance is that raising a tax rate by x percent raises the revenue from that tax by less than x percent.4 The reason for this relationship is that the higher tax rate discourages the activity being taxed, so the tax base on which the tax is levied is smaller than otherwise. So if the federal government were to raise all tax rates by the same percentage to generate the revenue needed, it would have to raise all tax rates by more than 45.7 percent and probably substantially more.

Moreover, as the Roosevelt Institute’s Mike Konczal has noted, eliminating Medicaid, SNAP, the EITC, housing vouchers, and the like would still leave you far short of what’s needed to finance a meaningful UBI.[2] Would we also end Pell Grants that help low-income students afford college? Would we terminate support for children in foster care, for mental health services, and for job training? Ed Dolan, who favors UBI, has calculated that we could finance it by using the proceeds from eliminating all means-tested programs outside health care — including Pell Grants, job training, Head Start, free school lunches, and the like, as well as refundable tax credits, SNAP, SSI, low-income housing programs, etc. The result, Dolan found, would be an annual UBI of $1,582 per person, well below the level of support most low-income families (especially working-poor families with children) now receive. The increase in poverty and hardship would be very large.[3]

THE FISCAL AND ECONOMIC COSTS OF BASIC INCOME Though the effects of a universal basic income on employment are important, the costs associated with a UBI are equally crucial to understand. Andrew Yang, for example, estimated that his proposed UBI of $1,000 monthly for all American adults would “permanently grow the economy by 12.6 to 13.1 percent… and would increase the labor force by 4.5 to 4.7 million people.”7 While the phrasing of Yang’s plan makes a UBI appear attractive, it ignores the issue of fiscal costs. Such a proposal would likely never be budget neutral. Figure 3 gives the estimated costs and revenues of Yang’s UBI as determined by the Tax Foundation. According to the Tax Foundation, Yang’s proposal would cost around $2.8 trillion with his proposed taxes only bringing in $1.3 trillion. Additionally, the Tax Foundation concludes that “it is very unlikely that it [Yang’s proposal] would be able to produce significant [economic] growth on a persistent basis.”8 This is because Yang’s proposed taxes to pay for a UBI would disproportionately target U.S. oil and gas operations, increasing costs and displacing workers in those industries as a result.

INCREASES TAXES OR FEDERAL DEFICIT? In the U.S., the Roosevelt Institute think tank says that a $1,000 a month payment would grow the economy by $2.5 trillion by 2025 if paid for by increasing the federal deficit. On the other hand, if the UBI were paid for with taxes, there would be no net benefit to the economy. However, net wealth is not created by simply redistributing money from one class of people to another. Wealth is created by increased labor, trade, and innovation. As such, I have difficulty believing that UBI could grow the economy by $2.5T. As stated earlier, Bridgewater Associates conducted a study in 2018, which found the cost of a $1,000/mo stipend to every adult in the U.S. would run approximately $3.81T per year. The simple math of taxing Americans $3.8T annually to gain zero economic boost does not add up.

The final argument to consider is the inflationary effects of this policy. A fundamental concept here is the separation between production and income. Economists argue that income is earned by people because they are essentially selling their labor on the labor market as a contribution to the production of goods and services for the economy. Increases in income that aren’t directly related to correlating increases in production tend to result in higher prices so the two sides of the equation can balance. For this reason, many argue that income and economical production can’t be separated without dispatching macroeconomic effects for the whole country. In this case, the particular concern is that UBI will increase the inflation rate, which would lead to workers’ wages being valued even lower than in a pre-UBI world. Interestingly, if the participation in the workforce actually decreases, this inflation would be compounded and be even more detrimental for the country.

Acc 6/14/23 TA]

Higher Prices and Inflation A UBI would essentially transfer wealth away from higher earners toward low earners. This spurs higher consumption because those with lower incomes have a higher propensity to consume. On a macro basis, this may not necessarily create any inflation, as there is no new money entering the economy. However, it will create inflation on a micro basis. Rather than money going toward investment, it is going toward consumer goods. Instead of inflation occurring through a wide variety of areas, it is being concentrated. Importance of Velocity Yang says this is just using the existing money in the economy. In part, he is right. However, he fails to consider the velocity of money. One of the reasons the US did not experience significant inflation after quantitative easing was due to a slowing of consumption growth. If we put $12,000 into everyone's hands, consumer demand will rise, and so, too, will velocity. When velocity increases, the same $1 exchanges hands at a quicker rate. For example, A may buy a television from B for $100. B will then buy a used iPhone from C for $100. C will then buy a used sofa from D for $100. The initial $100 has circulated around the economy at a value of $300. This sends demand signals to the relevant parties, who then respond with higher prices.

One way in which the United States government finances its spending is through the use of the money printing press. The “print more money” argument, in general, is illogical, especially when applied to financing UBI. At the core of the coronavirus pandemic, the United States passed extensive economic stimulus to “stimulate” the American economy. In 2020, the Fed partook in actions which brought about the printing of more money, increasing the possibility of rampant inflation. This has seemingly been the case, as the latest CPI numbers increased by an astounding 8.3%, near a four-decade high. Printing more dollars for the purposes of UBI will increase inflation further. Borrowing Throughout the past few decades, American spending projects have been financed by borrowing. A likely scenario is that UBI would be financed through borrowing, the same way American COVID relief bills were funded. While unpopular, in recent years, American politicians have run up a budget deficit in the trillions, reaching an astonishing $3.13 trillion in 2020. In 2021, the United States allocated 5% of its total federal spending to paying the interest on its debts, for a total of $352.3 billion. As a reference point, the United States allocated $234.3 billion to pay for Veterans Benefits and Services. Is UBI important enough to accumulate more debt and interest, when 5% of the yearly federal budget is already used to pay interest accumulated on debt? Conclusion Undoubtedly, inflation is a significant issue facing the American public. For a nation that religiously relies on car travel and fossil fuel production, coronavirus spending and the energy price increase exacerbated by the Russia-Ukraine war has been disastrous for the economy. The cost of food and other essential goods will continue to rise, providing an additional cost on the average American. During this inflationary crisis, with nearly 15% of Americans living in poverty, inflation has caused significant suffering for the American people. While supporters argue that UBI will alleviate these pains, further spending will aid further inflation as American spending bills have done in recent years. As a result, Yang’s UBI plan does not make sense from an economic perspective, given its propensity for increasing inflation.

PESKY INFLATION If UBI were to be financed by increasing the federal deficit, it would most undoubtedly fuel inflation. As a reminder, inflation is caused by a more rapid increase in the quantity of money than the quantity of goods or services produced during the same time period. In other words, if the nation’s printing press produces money at a greater rate than its economy can produce, the result will be higher inflation levels. Printing an extra $3.8T yearly will surely cause inflation to roar. If our irresponsible fiscal spending habits during 2020 and 2021 taught us anything, it is that handing out money to anybody and everybody does not contribute to low inflation levels.

The Cost There are over 300 million Americans today. Suppose UBI provided everyone with $10,000 a year. That would cost more than $3 trillion a year — and $30 trillion to $40 trillion over ten years. This single-year figure equals more than three-fourths of the entire yearly federal budget — and double the entire budget outside Social Security, Medicare, defense, and interest payments. It’s also equal to close to 100 percent of all tax revenue the federal government collects. Or, consider UBI that gives everyone $5,000 a year. That would provide income equal to about two-fifths of the poverty line for an individual (which is a projected $12,700 in 2016) and less than the poverty line for a family of four ($24,800). But it would cost as much as the entire federal budget outside Social Security, Medicare, defense, and interest payments. Some UBI proponents respond that policymakers could make the UBI payments taxable. But the savings from doing so would be relatively modest, because the vast bulk of Americans either owe no federal income tax or are in the 10% or 15% tax brackets. For example, if you gave all 328 million Americans a $10,000 UBI and the cost was $3.28 trillion a year (about $33 trillion over ten years) before taxes, then making the UBI payments taxable would reduce that cost only to something like $2.5 trillion or $2.75 trillion (or $25 trillion to $27.5 trillion over ten years). Paying For It Where would the money to finance such a large expenditure come from? That it would come mainly or entirely from new taxes isn’t plausible. We’ll already need substantial new revenues in the coming decades to help keep Social Security and Medicare solvent and avoid large benefit cuts in them. We’ll need further tax increases to help repair a crumbling infrastructure that will otherwise impede economic growth. And if we want to create more opportunity and reduce racial and other barriers and inequities, we’ll also need to raise new revenues to invest more in areas like pre-school education, child care, college affordability, and revitalizing segregated inner-city communities. A UBI that’s financed primarily by tax increases would require the American people to accept a level of taxation that vastly exceeds anything in U.S. history. It’s hard to imagine that such a UBI would advance very far, especially given the tax increases we’ll already need for Social Security, Medicare, infrastructure, and other needs.

COST OF UBI UBI is expensive. Very expensive. As an add on, without simultaneously trimming government programs, it would require a significant tax increase. Following the Finnish study results, Kari Hamalainen, chief researcher at the VATT Institute for Economic Research, said implementing a universal basic income for all citizens “would be expensive. If we had a universal basic income, we’d have to incorporate taxation”, and based on these results, “it would be unsustainable.” Bridgewater Associates conducted a study in 2018, which found the cost of a $1,000/mo stipend to every adult in the U.S. would run approximately $3.81 trillion per year. This amount represented 21% of US GDP or 78% of tax revenue in 2018. (Source: CNBC) Yes, the stipend would help to make people feel more financially secure, but as the Finnish study proved, it would not meaningfully increase employment or production. It would merely be an enormous expense, one that would likely cripple the U.S. economy.

n 1966 the Black Panthers released their Ten Point Platform, a series of demands and calls to action that offered a clear statement of their political orientation. The second point of the program demanded that the federal government provide either full employment or a guaranteed income. In 2016 this call was renewed by the Movement for Black Lives. What the Panthers understood in 1966 is what the Movement for Black Lives understands today: capitalism in the United States functions by creating, maintaining, and exploiting class and racial differences to produce antagonistic forms of security. Antagonistic security is security that is created for some people by processes that work against the ability of others to access resources such as wealth and political power. For those on its receiving end, it often generates precarity, from barbed wire fences to predatory police patrols. A basic income that supplemented existing welfare structures could make everyone safer while ending the most pernicious forms of policing. In the right context, basic income has the potential to expand cooperative security, which is security with others: the kind of security that a dam provides a nearby village, or that mass vaccination schemes provide a community that develops herd immunity. However, a basic income advanced as a replacement for labor regulations and other security-enhancing government programs—“UBI-,” we call it—will only further exploit those whose lives are made most precarious by this system. Conversely, a basic income that supplements existing or new welfare structures—“UBI+”—could radically redistribute security, remove incentives for the most pernicious forms of policing, and create the conditions for a more thorough overhaul of the current political system. In the absence of a stable and equitable distribution of wealth, the government has long advertised the welfare state as a partial citizens’ security that defends its recipients from extreme poverty. President Franklin Roosevelt proclaimed “freedom from want” as an executive mandate in his 1941 State of the Union address, less than a decade after his administration’s New Deal redefined the character of the U.S. state as a guarantor of security. The New Deal federalized schemes to provide insurance against bank runs and bad crop years, and expanded access to homeownership by establishing the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, the Federal Crop Insurance Corporation, and the Home Owners Loan Corporation. Although the New Deal has been well documented as racially inequitable, it was progressive in that it established a state responsibility to make its citizens secure, primarily by protecting their economical well-being. But the discriminatory development and implementation of state security was not an unintended consequence or accidental imperfection. It was a manifestation of the state’s interest in maintaining racial hierarchy. Given this goal, the state secured the interests of white people even when it meant the exclusion and dispossession, and precarization of others. In the ensuing years, many good-paying jobs moved to the exclusively white suburbs that had been made possible by government policies and regulatory schemes. Meanwhile, in the wake of the hundreds of race riots in the 1960s and the associated anti-authoritarian consciousness developing in cities, increasingly large and professionalized police forces were tasked with preventing and responding to urban unrest, partially aided by counter-insurgency strategies developed in Vietnam. For many working-class communities, especially those of color, the government has been simultaneously a last line of defense against the most serious forms of poverty and the first line of attack against their basic dignity and autonomy, offering security with one hand and taking it with the other. True collaborative security requires not only that a government provide all its citizens with resources to survive through tough times, but also that it does not engineer the conditions for those tough times in the first place. Our criminal justice system largely functions to insulate the powerful from the risks of their decisions. The criminal justice system in the United States largely functions to insulate the politically powerful from the risks of their decisions, at both the literal and figurative expense of working-class communities of color. Overpolicing and an increasingly broad set of plunderous police activities, ranging from creative “enforcement” of fine-generating traffic laws to civil asset forfeiture, sits awkwardly next to chronic underpolicing of corporate predation. The everyday shakedowns of working-class people bring a very real risk of bodily harm and can even cause death: Philando Castile was murdered during a routine traffic stop, SWAT stormed Korryn Gaines’s house over unpaid parking tickets. But what is also important are the much more reliable effects: increased revenue for government coffers, arrest statistics that provide police unions and elected officials with the useful illusion of effective law enforcement, and opportunities for incarceration that destabilize communities and provide a political pretext for politically and economically disenfranchising millions. These tactics, taken together, provide antagonistic security for a handful of political elites at the expense of endangering the lives, livelihoods, and political power of entire swaths of the population. Incremental adjustments to our capitalist society—such as means-tested welfare benefits, anti-gentrification, and policing reform—are important and should be fought for. But many of these approaches are perceived, sometimes accurately, to pit exploited groups against each other in zero-sum games. Taxpaying people who are not targeted by specific welfare programs represent welfare recipients as being supported by their dime; efforts to protect neighborhoods from newcomers further constrict an increasingly unaffordable housing market for outsiders; and many view the police as necessary to protect them from intimidating populations, especially youth of color. When these ways of generating antagonistic security dominate political discussions, they support the dangerous and mistaken idea that social groups must primarily protect themselves from other groups, This neglects the hidden framework of false choices that seem to constrict the viable possibilities to only various forms of antagonistic security. The result is a political climate that fails to imagine how we might build cooperative security together. UBI- capitulates to exactly these kinds of forces by secretly serving as an offensive against welfare programs and other forms of government-provided security. UBI+ asks instead that we find ways to struggle together for forms of cooperative security—security that does not sacrifice the lives and liberty of vulnerable people. Only when this is our orientation will we be in a position to dismantle racial capitalism.

The design features necessary for a feminist universal basic income Debates remain largely hypothetical given that there are so few full-fledged UBI schemes, and because where they do exist they are usually not evaluated for gender impacts. It is clear that the extent to which UBI’s potential for reducing gender and other inequalities will be realized depends critically on its specific design features, including the level of benefit provided, its financing mechanism and its interaction with existing tax and social security systems.38 Without parallel investments in quality public services and strengthened support for workers’ rights, UBI could have detrimental effects for gender equality and social justice. However, well-designed UBI that is integrated into a comprehensive system of social protection, public services and labour market regulations could strengthen women’s and transgender and genderdiverse people’s income security, lower poverty rates and go some way to redressing inequalities in wealth and income. This will be perceived by many as a high standard to live up to, and any UBI will have to be rolled out carefully and progressively. Extending the reach of existing social protection schemes aimed at particular groups—such as social pensions and child and disability benefits—and ensuring that these are unconditional and universally available could be an important stepping stone towards achieving universal income security for all. The main recommendations for States considering UBI are as follows: • Follow a rights-based approach to social protection when designing UBI schemes. This includes following the principles of progressive realization and non-retrogression to safeguard against the rollback of existing social security and labour protections. Like all other social protection schemes, UBI should be anchored in national legal frameworks. • Ensure that UBI is accompanied by parallel investments in quality public services, including care services, health care, education, housing and food security, and with attention to the rights of women and transgender and gender-diverse people working within these sectors.

Incremental adjustments to our capitalist society—such as means-tested welfare benefits, anti-gentrification, and policing reform—are important and should be fought for. But many of these approaches are perceived, sometimes accurately, to pit exploited groups against each other in zero-sum games. Taxpaying people who are not targeted by specific welfare programs represent welfare recipients as being supported by their dime; efforts to protect neighborhoods from newcomers further constrict an increasingly unaffordable housing market for outsiders; and many view the police as necessary to protect them from intimidating populations, especially youth of color. When these ways of generating antagonistic security dominate political discussions, they support the dangerous and mistaken idea that social groups must primarily protect themselves from other groups, This neglects the hidden framework of false choices that seem to constrict the viable possibilities to only various forms of antagonistic security. The result is a political climate that fails to imagine how we might build cooperative security together. UBI- capitulates to exactly these kinds of forces by secretly serving as an offensive against welfare programs and other forms of government-provided security. UBI+ asks instead that we find ways to struggle together for forms of cooperative security—security that does not sacrifice the lives and liberty of vulnerable people. Only when this is our orientation will we be in a position to dismantle racial capitalism. More radical challenges to racial capitalism are possible. UBI+, by guaranteeing everyone an income sufficient to live on, reframes the way society treats labor and provides security to its citizens. For example, this kind of guarantee recognizes that the labor of raising children and caring for the elderly—work done disproportionately by women—is valued as work. Currently much of this work is uncompensated, and as a result we economically and socially marginalize those who do it. In a capitalist system where economic value and overall value are often conflated, this reinforces the idea that caregiving is not an important contribution to society and penalizes people who try to do this work alongside paid work (e.g., child-unfriendly work policies, expensive child care, lack of clear leave policies for caring for children or elders). UBI- would provide a guaranteed income but eliminate programs that respond to these specific concerns, such as those provided by Social Security that target the needs of elderly and disabled people. This would effectively offer security with one hand while taking it with the other.

This review reveals that the focus identified in the literature on BI's role varies in different socio-economic contexts. In a developed country with a well-established welfare state and tax system, BI is considered a redistributive policy at the national level alternative to the current costly and complex welfare system, which is often dysfunctional to pull people out of the poverty trap. BI supporters advocate its potential to release the government's financial burden by integrating various welfare benefits as an essential advantage to implement BI. Change of labor market supply and work incentives accompanying BI's implementation are fundamental in theoretical discussion and empirical cases. Meanwhile, in a developing country with a high level of informality, BI is perceived as an approach that practically addresses absolute poverty in local areas. The impacts of BI on an individual’s quality of life and community economy explicitly draw scholars’ concerns in BI's debates in the above context.

Feminist notes of caution Others have been more cautious about the implications of UBI for gender equality. The potentially high costs could preclude public investments in other areas, including care services. One estimation of the costs of UBI paid at 100 per cent of the national poverty line to every adult and child for a sample of 130 countries found that this basic level would require a significant fiscal outlay of 20 to 35 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP) for most world regions, making this a very difficult proposition for most countries and out of reach for those that are highly indebted.24 The question of how the substantial level of resources necessary for UBI set at this level could be mobilized raises important questions about sustainability and equity, with implications for gender equality. For UBI to be within reach for highly-indebted countries, debt relief would be an essential first step. In the context of fiscal tightening and austerity, there are fears that UBI is being promoted to replace social security—which tends to provide higher levels of protection and promotes social solidarity—with a minimal social safety net plus individual private insurance schemes for those who can afford them. This runs the risk of exacerbating inequalities given that, in determining premiums and entitlements, private insurance schemes tend to discriminate by sex, age, pre-existing conditions that are affected by structural determinants of health, and other factors, rather than pooling risks and resources as is the case in solidarity-based social insurance schemes.25 A flat-rate UBI for all would also fail to address specific gendered risks throughout life, such as childbirth, unemployment and old age, and may also erode existing provisions for groups such as women with disabilities or single mothers.

Conservatives would backlash at a UBI – they oppose redistribution of their wealth.

Because the idea of introducing a UBI enjoys ‘support from the both the left and right’ (Murphy, 2019: 13), a la Brexit, it is possible that a coalition of populist forces could be united to rally to the call. The promise of a left UBI would appeal broadly and the power of the neoliberal media could succeed, again, in obtaining the necessary support to propel the idea. However, once initiated, the proclaimed ‘capitalist road to communism’ could echo post-Brexit developments in the United Kingdom: the policy could be pushed hard right and could actually serve to normalise right-libertarian values (see Dearden, 2020). What may start as a UBI accompanying the welfare state may slowly shift to the idea of UBI enabling expedited privatisation. As Martinelli (2017: 5) notes, for right-libertarian supporters of UBI, crucially the idea is not to supplement the welfare state, but to ‘replace it’. With a dismantled welfare state, the next logical step for the neoliberal elite would be the gradual reduction of the UBI payment. This would likely occur in two ways: one, creeping conditionality, through conduct policing – targeting activists and those who oppose neoliberal norms, and two, reducing the UBI level to the minimum needed to enable repressive desublimation. As the Bank of England sets interest rates in the United Kingdom today, UBI would be similarly adjusted to optimally inculcate public support and repress dissent, while providing only the smallest possible redistribution of wealth. When van Parijs was writing of UBI as the ‘capitalist road to communism’ in 1986, my political-strategic consideration above may rightly have been deemed deeply dystopian. However, in the populist, Trumpian world, with ever-decreasing space for critical judgement (see Thompson, 2022), such a calculated rejection of UBI on this political basis may now appear a more rational and sensible course to adopt.

Yet many in the labour movement have been unsure how to approach the topic. This is why our trade union federation, Public Services International (PSI), has been working with the New Economics Foundation to produce a detailed labour analysis of the issue. Examining 14 trials from India to Alaska, the report found that although UBI trials provided valuable insights into the nature of work and welfare there is little evidence to suggest that UBI is the best tool to address the core challenges of our time: inequality, wealth redistribution, precarious work and digitisation. What the studies do demonstrate is that giving cash payments to the poorest helps improve their lives and does not increase wasteful spending or laziness as many right-wing politicians would have us believe. This gives strong weight to the argument that our social welfare system needs an overhaul: we must do away with punitive activity testing and demonisation of the poor. Choices inevitable But government spending is inevitably about choices—and, compared with funding better universal, quality public services, UBI doesn’t stack up. Providing a single mother with a cash payment to fend for herself in an inflated housing market is not as effective as providing quality public housing. Giving people more money to fill up their cars is not as progressive as offering free public transport. When it comes to UBI, the models that are universal and sufficient are unlikely to be affordable, and models that are affordable are not universal. The International Labour Organization estimates the global average cost for UBI, as a proportion of gross domestic product, would be 32.7 per cent. Current global average government expenditure is 33.5 per cent of GDP. Until we manage to dramatically increase public revenue—something which the mega-rich have been fighting tooth and nail—then it is clear any UBI programme would necessitate huge cuts to key public services. Whilst many in the UBI movement point to administrative savings and preventative measures generated as a result, there is little evidence these will be enough to fund the UBI, considering the large amounts of funding that will still be required to finance public health, education and infrastructure. The fact is free public services, such as health and education, are one of the strongest weapons in the fight against inequality. They benefit everyone in society, but the poorest most of all. According to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, publicly provided universal services give the poorest the equivalent of an extra 76 per cent on their post-tax income and are strongly progressive.