What if? Ian's Rural Ramblings

I’ve already covered the big global risk the big R, the European Referendum in another part of the paper so I thought I would look at another referendum that took place recently that didn’t get quite the same media coverage.

On Sunday, June 5 voters in Switzerland rejected by 78 per cent to 22 per cent a proposal to give citizens a universal basic income (UBI) of around $3,072 a month for each adult and £1,157 for each child, irrespective of whether they were working. Money for nothing if you will. Workers who already earned more than that would not be eligible but presumably if they lost their jobs or earned less they could fall back to the basic income.

Under the Swiss system if a petition gets 100,000 votes then the country has a referendum on the measure. It’s not surprising that the idea was voted down but the fact that it got any support at all is interesting.

I’ve often thought with all our economic woes and the human tragedies that go with them wouldn’t it be simpler to shut down the benefit apparatus and just give citizens a living income?

This is not a shot in the dark. I’ve read that the Dutch cities of Utrecht, Tilburg, Groningen, and Wageningen are considering a trial UBI program and Finland is apparently researching the concept.

I believe we are at the start of another major industrial revolution led by technology and especially robotics. Global corporations are running out of places they can relocate to for cheap labour. Asia, Mexico, Eastern Europe and I guess Africa may be the last. Labour is a prime cost for business and often a prime headache too. That leaves technology. Robots don’t strike or take breaks, not yet anyway.

Robotics have already been deployed in manufacturing but the technology to go forward into other human dominated work areas has been lacking. Until now. In May 2016 the BBC reported that Foxconn, a supplier to Apple and Samsung, had laid off 60,000 workers and replaced them with robots. The same report cited a Deloitte report that suggested 35 per cent of jobs could be lost over the next 20 years.

The widespread introduction of technology sparked job losses and riots over two hundred years ago before people endured the misery of the industrial revolution. I would not rule out such a thing, especially in the more historically volatile nations such as China, as the age of technology truly gets under way.

In that scenario I would suggest that a UBI scheme could actually turn out to be rather beneficial and head off civil unrest at the pass so to speak. Quite likely it would be cheaper too.

There will undoubtedly be issues. Difficulty getting workers, cue the robots I guess. Maybe inflation as suddenly everyone gets a shot in the bank balance. Maybe a lot more economic growth too. Maybe people would be happier. Maybe people didn’t need to be homeless. Maybe people could follow a dream rather than struggle to subsist. Maybe people could be haves and not have nots.

People will still pay taxes one would presume through excess earnings, business taxes, sales and property taxes. Governments would be an awful lot leaner without benefit assessment departments and pensions Just think. What if?