Talk:Basic income

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I don't understand what is vague or controversial about the implementation of a Basic Income. If an income tax already exists, then it is simply a matter of making it a refundable tax credit. It is very similar to the Earned Income Tax credit (which exists in the USA), except that you don't need to work to get a Basic Income. -adam

I don't know about that, but can we please at least say what country this is referring to in the article? I assume it's the US, but really don't know. I'm thinking of the reference to the "Green Party", by the way - maybe the idea of a "Basic Income" as used in this sense in international (though I doubt that somehow). --Camembert
Green Parties exist in many nations. I heard that the Irish Green Party was making a good push for Basic Income a couple of years ago (I'm in the USA). It has also been on the platform of Green parties in areas that I live. Anyway, that might have been a unnecessary comment, and I wouldn't object to its removal.

The "high cost" argument is very much a matter of opinion. I could make the case that basic income is a subsidy to employers and thus reduces the costs of employing people, (in the same general way that income tax increases the costs of employing people). Looked at in this way, it becomes clear that basic income can be implemented at no cost to the economy as a whole, since the cost of paying employees is merely switched from a headcount-related charge on employers' payrolls to a profit-related charge on their tax bill. However by reducing the direct costs of employing people it should increase the number of people in employment, reducing welfare payments and therefore reducing the cost to the economy as a whole. -- Derek Ross

[edit] Revived

I have revived the article to distinguish basic income form guaranteed minimum income, which is really a much broader term. Both articles still need a lot of work. Guido den Broeder (talk) 17:50, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

That seems reasonable. -- Derek Ross | Talk 17:55, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
Re-merged. From what I could tell the difference between the two concepts is eligibility only. I've added a sub-section at GMI on basic income and edited the lead to reflect this. otherwise the page was a nearly total content fork from guaranteed minimum income - the section were identical from what I could tell, right down to the external links. Please draft a new version on a sub-page that clearly demonstrates the difference between the two. WLU (talk) 16:31, 29 April 2008 (UTC)
The difference is a lot bigger than that. A basic income is an income just large enough to be on the poverty line. It has an agreed value but there is no commitment on anyone's part to provide it to anyone else. It's really just a yardstick which can be used to gauge whether someone is above or below the poverty line in a given environment. A guaranteed minimum income on the other hand is an sum of money which a government has agreed to pay to its citizens. It may be above or below the basic income for that country. All countries have a basic income. Only one or two have a guaranteed minimum income. -- Derek Ross | Talk 17:00, 29 April 2008 (UTC)
It looks like the concept you are discussing is different from how it was used on the old page. You seem to be talking about a threshold, below which someone could not survive (like a poverty threshold, but at the point of 'able to survive' rather than 'maintain a standard of living' as discussed in that article). Basic income, at the point I merged [1] and its recreation from a redirect [2], was about providing individuals with an unconditional sum of money.
Can the basic income be expanded with reliable sources before re-redirecting? My main problem with the old BI page was that it was a near-duplicate content fork of this one; as it was it didn't make sense to have two separate, but nearly identical articles. Right now BI is differentiated from GMI from the information I've seen in the one section (an unconditional rather than conditional sum supplied); if the section expands to the point it's unweildy, then it can and should be spun off into a main article again. Otherwise if it's moved back to the BI page, it'll be a three-sentence introduction, a see also leading to this page, and a stub notice. At least here there's overall context of the general topic and an explicit comparison. WLU (talk) 17:49, 29 April 2008 (UTC)
I have undone WLU's remerging as this destroys an article without due process and against consensus.-Guido den Broeder (talk) 18:43, 29 April 2008 (UTC)
Destroys is a bit much considering all the material is in the history function. The page is a content fork of GMI. And the content is a duplication anyway - I don't see how the two articles differ aside from the criteria used for eligibility. WLU (talk) 18:47, 29 April 2008 (UTC)
Work is in progress. When finished, the two articles will be completely different. Guido den Broeder (talk) 18:48, 29 April 2008 (UTC)
Good, source it. WLU (talk) 18:50, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

My point is that "Basic Income" can be used in the "Poverty Threshold" sense or in the "Guaranteed Minimum Income at the Poverty Threshold" sense. It's a rather ambiguous term. "Universal Basic Income" and "Basic Income Guarantee" are attempts -- successful ones -- to lose that ambiguity and thus preferable terms. -- Derek Ross | Talk 19:32, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

Basic income has two main ways of implementation, one a guarantee and the other a transfer (see article); GMI usually has several more (not yet included in article). 'Universal basic income' is the same as 'global basic income'. Note further that the poverty treshold is not a firmly connected notion; bi is rather at subsistence level which in western countries is slightly lower. Guido den Broeder (talk) 19:46, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] External links

A reminder that external links should be kept to a minimum. Links should be useful world-wide, and the BIEN link is an excellent one for this reason. Linking to every single country's BI network is not needed. If the links contain information, they should be used as footnotes, not dumped in the external links section. Linking to a single country's legislation, and a non-english text at that, is not a good idea. Non-english sources are not accessible, and a single country's legislation isn't really useful or informative. Put it in as a citation that Brazil has a BI, don't dump it in the EL section. Advocacy sites are also poor choices. These can be sources for the presence of advocacy in the separate countries, but are bad choices for external links. There is a fundamental difference between a source, and an external link. WLU (talk) 14:49, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

I am in the middle of addressing this concern; the list is already much shorter than it was. It is not helpful, however, at this time to remove almost all the links. Be patient; Wikipedia does not need to be finished today. Guido den Broeder (talk) 15:19, 30 April 2008 (UTC)