10 Basic Benefits of Basic Income
The most fundamental benefits of Basic Income are often overlooked.
Debates about Basic Income frequently focus on some of the myths that opponents of the idea spread around the internet — such as that it is unaffordable or that it would destroy work incentives. These claims are nonsense and I do a lot of work explaining why they’re nonsense. And I think that’s important work.
Nevertheless, there is a risk that such myth-based concerns can so dominate the overall Basic Income debate, that the principal benefits of a Basic Income system are largely ignored. Sometimes even some avid participants in Basic Income debates are rather sketchy about what the key benefits of a Basic Income system are supposed to be.
This confusion often becomes visible when I explain to people that Basic Income is perfectly affordable and is not likely to cause either inflation or mass worklessness. I explain that Basic Income will replace many other welfare payments and some tax allowances. Consequently, it doesn’t necessarily involve giving people any more money, on average, than they get now.
A typical response is for people to say something like,
“Well, if that’s true, what’s the point of it?”
