A tale of two provinces
All-party committee failed to consider alternatives to the basic income
Editor, in recent months two provinces released reports on a universal basic income (UBI). The special all-party committee of the P.E.I. legislature recommended in its Nov. 27, 2020 final report that the province of P.E.I. begin immediate negotiations with the federal government for the development and implementation of a UBI at an annual net cost of $259,958 million. If the federal government is not supportive, they recommend that the government of P.E.I. initiate the development and implementation of a UBI pilot for Prince Edward Island involving a minimum of 3,000 people for at least three years.
On the other side of the country, an expert panel was appointed by the British Columbia government to explore the idea of a basic income guarantee for British Columbia.
The panel was composed of Dr. David A. Green of the Vancouver School of Economics, Dr. Jonathan Rhys Kesselman, School of Public Policy, Simon Fraser University and Dr. Lindsay M. Tedds, School of Public Policy, University of Calgary. The panel received 40 research papers, 16,000 simulations and wrote a 529-page report.
While the P.E.I. committee began with the bias of exploring how to establish a UBI and how to cost it, the B.C. panel had a much broader mandate and wider input. Their report is philosophical, inspired by the words of the great Nisga’a leader, Joseph Gosnell.
It focuses on ways to improve society as an integral part of eliminating poverty. The authors wrote in their Dec. 28, 2020 final report,
“We have concluded that moving to a system constructed around a basic income for all as its main pillar is not the most just policy change we can consider. The needs of people in our society are too diverse to be reflectively answered simply with a cheque from the government.”
They noted that the basic income (BI) is a very costly approach to addressing any specific goal such as poverty reduction, but also in the way it would try to accomplish those goals.
For them, the BI approach supports only one element of their set of just characteristics and does it to the exclusion of approaches that emphasize social interactions and cooperation. The BI is more individualistic, placing too little emphasis on communities in which the recipients live.
The B.C. panel refuses a pilot project concluding that it is not an effective use of government money. They contend that a pilot of three to five years cannot fully evaluate the situation and that a longer pilot is unlikely to survive for political reasons. They state that waiting for results before policy changes, would delay too long-needed changes and that the pilot cannot include the changes needed to finance a realworld basic income.
The P.E.I. Coalition for a Poverty Eradication Strategy and the MacKillop Centre for Social Justice question the conclusions of the allparty committee of the P.E.I. legislature. Granted, they were following a vote in the P.E.I. legislature to establish a guaranteed income, but later some MLAs explained that they did not fully understand what a guaranteed income was and their vote was in favour of doing something about poverty. Furthermore, the community was not fully consulted.
The all-party committee failed to consider alternatives to the basic income, some of which would be less costly, could be implemented more quickly, would be more effective in eradicating poverty and would build healthy communities while respecting the dignity of work and the worker. The P.E.I. approach was narrow from the beginning.
The job guarantee (JG), which was presented to the committee, is proving to be a popular and effective program in Europe, India, South Africa, Argentina and especially the U.S.A. where the majority of voters and politicians prefer it to the BI.
A job guarantee for P.E.I. would cost around 1 to 1.5 per cent of gross provincial product but once established it would be close to revenue neutral.
The job guarantee is a component of the Green New Deal (GND), and has been called its most crucial component. The GND insists that a green transformation requires basic economic security for all. Its demands are strongly supported by many corners of civil society. It offers decent jobs at decent pay to the most disadvantaged of society and to all who wish to work. It also offers hands-on training. Green jobs are, “those that address all forms of destitution and neglect of our most valuable resources, both natural and human.” (Dr. Pavlina Tcherneva)
Tcherneva states that the GND calls for a wholesale transformation, necessary to produce a rapid and robust answer to global warming.
It is an all-hands-on-deck industrial strategy that has been called the “moonshot of our time” and linked to “wartime mobilization.” It results in economic security for all. Green projects rehabilitate the environment, strengthen communities, and improve the social determinants of health.
“Every climate solution and the manner of its implementation will have deep economic, social and political ramifications.”
A bill to eliminate poverty on P.E.I. will have to go way beyond the narrow perspective of the all-party committee of the legislature. It requires shared public dialogue rather than inviting like-minded witnesses and ignoring other alternatives. It is surprising that all of the party representatives on the committee agreed to the Legislative Committee report.
If we repeat this we will be leaving P.E.I. behind the more progressive movements everywhere.
The solution to poverty is urgent.