New power for the underemployed
As 40% of the GTA faces job insecurity, an influential economist argues for a guaranteed income
Some 800 years ago, a group of disgruntled barons rebelled against a bad king. The result was the Magna Carta, a document that radically redistributed power in medieval Britain.
The new baron class, argues influential economist Guy Standing, is you. In a world where an increasing number of people face insecurity in their employment and private lives, he says it’s time for a new charter of rights to reflect a rapidly changing economic reality. Unpaid interns, contract workers and temp employees, unite!
Standing, a professor at the School of Oriental and African Studies in London, is in Toronto to speak at the Spur Festival, taking place until Sunday. His book The Precariat Charter: From Denizens to Citizens
articulates his vision for a better society.
The precariat consists of a growing proportion of our total society. It is being habituated to accept a life of unstable labour and unstable living. Often they’re unable to say what their occupation is, because what they’re doing now might be quite different from what they were doing three months ago. (They) have to do a hell of a lot of work that doesn’t get counted (i.e. job training, travel time or job applications).
People in the precariat find themselves in the situation where the level of their education and qualifications is almost always higher than the sort of labour that they’re going to be able to obtain. This is the first time in history when an emerging part of our citizens are losing rights. (With) many of the benefit cuts, there is no due process. I think that leaves scope for tremendous amounts of injustice.
You warn that the precariat is also vulnerable to poverty traps.
People in the precariat rely very heavily on money wages. You cannot apply for benefits until two weeks after you’ve lost a job, for example. The gap between losing a job can be months, not weeks or days. Now, if you think about it, that means there’s very little incentive to take a lowpaying job, especially as you could then subsequently be unemployed again.
For you, a big part of the answer is a guaranteed basic income for all. Why?
In terms of social justice you could say, ‘Look — everybody should receive a dividend from the investments of past generations to give us the security to develop our capabilities.’ But in addition, a basic income would be a modest way of redistributing income, because we’ve got chronically unequal societies. There is no other way in which the precariat could obtain basic security.
Is it affordable?
It’s affordable in the sense that you’d be converting a lot of existing benefits and subsidies . . . in order to be able to afford it. You would increase the incentive for people to take low-wage jobs, not reduce it, because you’ve removed the poverty trap. People who have basic security and feel more in control of their lives (also) tend to be healthier. If you’re healthier, you tend to have a lower demand for health services.
Wouldn’t it be a disincentive for people to work?
The evidence is that people (with) basic security work more, not less. And when they work, they tend to be more productive, not less.
How would it affect job quality?
You come along and offer me a crappy wage for a dirty job, I can say no. Then you say, ‘All right — I’ll offer you something decent.’ Or if (employers) suddenly find they can’t find someone to do those jobs, they’ll automate them, do without them or do it themselves.
How attainable is all of this?
There have been more mass protests in this period (since 2011) than any other time in history. Huge numbers of people now say, ‘I’m part of the precariat.’ And we now have, in southern Europe in particular, a sudden emergence of political movements that make no bones about it — they are precariat movements. Syriza (the governing party in Greece) have basic income in their platform.
So does Canada need a new political movement?
I think so. There is an energy that I’ve not seen in my lifetime, and it’s very exciting. I’m not sort of expecting a revolution or anything like that, but there is a lot of energy.