On the June 6th edition of Your Call, what if everyone were guaranteed a basic income? Yesterday, Switzerland residents voted to provide everyone in the country the equivalent of $2,500 a month, with no strings attached. More than 100,000 signatures landed the initiative on the Swiss ballot, but it only gained 23 percent of votes.
Here in the US, the idea has become popular with both tech and labor leaders. Supporters say it would alleviate poverty and spark entrepreneurship.
How politically and economically feasible is a guaranteed basic income in the US? It’s Your Call with Rose Aguilar, and you.
Guests:
Andy Stern, senior fellow at Columbia University's Richard Paul Richman Center for Business, Law, and Public Policy and co-author of Raising the Floor: How a Universal Basic Income Can Renew Our Economy and Rebuild the American Dream
Karl Widerquist, Associate Professor of Philosophy at Georgetown University-Qatar and author or co-editor of A Theory of Freedom as the Power to Say No, Basic Income: An Anthology of Contemporary Research, and Exporting the Alaska Model
Web Resources:
Raising the Floor: How a Universal Basic Income Can Renew Our Economy and Rebuild the American Dream
Selected works by Karl Widerquist
The Alaska Model as a Menu of Options
The U.S. Basic Income Guarantee Network
The Atlantic: Welfare Makes America More Entrepreneurial
CNBC: What you need to know about the Swiss basic income vote
Tech.Mic: Can Basic Income Bring About the Next Creative Renaissance?
The Washington Post: The most conservative way to fight poverty is to send everyone a government check
