KERRE McIVOR
You will have heard the news this week. Gareth Morgan’s Opportunities Party has promised a $200 a week hand out to young people, the Unconditional Basic Income (UBI).
They don’t have to turn up to work. They don’t have to need the money. They don’t have to be drug tested. They’d get $200 in their bank account every week if they’re 18-23. All they have to do is turn out on election day and vote The Opportunities Party into a position of power.
You can tell we have a general election on the horizon. Parties are offering all sorts of bribes to voters, so Top isn’t singular in its blatant bid for votes.
Their shameless attempt to lure the apathetic young ’uns out of their student flats and into the polling booths has precedent — Helen Clark and the Labour Party resorted to bribery, pure and simple, when they promised interest-free student loans in 2005.
It takes an awful lot to galvanise anyone under 30. In the 2014 election, less than 50 per cent of the 18-29-year-old cohort bothered to vote.
But according to them, it’s not their fault they’re absenting themselves from the democratic process. They blame old people. Politics is, like, boring, man. Politicians are uninspiring. The system is rigged.
It’s like The Dude, Jeff Bridges wonderful character from the movie The Great Lebowski, has infected young voters with a terminal case of lethargy. The system sucks and the man oppresses but, hey, light a joint and let the Dude abide.
I’m not sure even a $200 a week Universal Basic Income will motivate young New Zealanders. Countless parties have tried to woo these voters with little success.
Parties offer up groovy, hip, young candidates only to see them roundly rejected.
Which stands to reason because what a 67-year-old electorate chairman sees as young and relevant is almost certainly not what a 21-year-old sees as being relatable.
Besides, it’s incredibly patronising to believe that young people will vote for a politician simply because they’re contemporaneous.
Look at Bernie Sanders and Jeremy Corbyn — young voters loved them, despite their advanced years.
If a politician has a message worth hearing, young people will heed it. It’s not the age of the candidate — it’s the rage of the candidate.
Gareth Morgan claims the payment he’s offering to youth is no more ridiculous than the universal pension paid to superannuitants. But most superannuitants have paid taxes for decades in the expectation of receiving a pension at the end of their working lives.
Young people, for the most part, have just left their (taxpayer-funded) schools and have yet to contribute anything towards the country’s upkeep.
Just for the record, I don’t believe in universal superannuation either — it should be means tested.
As was to be expected, there’ve been accusations that young people will only blow their money on fripperies. I sure as heck would have.
But even if they don’t — even if sensible young ones out there will save their money or use it to improve their bodies and their minds — what about the kids who will have the money extorted from them by vile family members and/ or partners? It happens with the DPB, why wouldn’t it happen with the UBI?
But the most compelling reason I see against a no-strings-attached handout is that you don’t appreciate something for nothing.
It’s part of the human condition. Unless you earn a reward, you don’t value it.
So, fine. Set the kids to work as volunteers cleaning up parks or planting natives or killing cats, if you want to give them money, Mr Morgan.
There are plenty of young people already giving their time and talents to charities and good causes — this might encourage a few more of them to follow suit.
But for heaven’s sake, don’t ruin their lives by making them state dependents before they’ve had the opportunity to forge their own destinies. Kerre McIvor is on NewstalkZB Monday to Friday, 9am-noon.
Politics is, like, boring, man. Politicians are uninspiring. The system is rigged.