Universal basic income (UBI) is a more effective kind of freedom than temporary welfare systems – John Michael and Geoffrey Williams

NOVEMBER 4 — Universal Basic Income (UBI) is a form of social empowerment with five key features: paid to individuals in cash on a regular monthly basis and offered unconditionally to everyone universally.

Beyond these foundations, a UBI has a broader impact by encouraging individual choice, the freedom to make those choices, a commitment to trust between government and the public, less intrusive bureaucratic requirements and costs, and less waste, leakage, and corruption.

A UBI recognizes and supports the idea of ​​individual choice. Its unconditional nature empowers recipients to decide how best to use the money, giving them the freedom to make important life decisions.

This gives people the freedom to say no, in whole or in part, to exploitative work or relationships.

Because they do not have an independent source of income, people often have to take on low-paying jobs to make ends meet. They have no power to press for higher wages and are faced with “take it or leave it” options where there are no options when they cannot afford to refuse.

Many UBI pilot programs show that it helps middle-income groups as well as the poorest.

When a regular income can be counted on during the start-up phase of a small business, the opportunity arises to quit your job and start your own microenterprise.

This fosters creativity, innovation, self-reliance and economic growth, especially in local communities.

With changes in the working environment due to new technologies, the gig economy and freelancing opportunities, and the replacement of once secure jobs, there is increasing insecurity in employment that affects everyone.

With changes in the working environment due to new technologies, the gig economy and freelancing opportunities, and the replacement of once secure jobs, there is increasing insecurity in employment that affects everyone. — Image: Firdaus Latif

Even Elon Musk acknowledged this and suggested that UBI helps people respond to these changes.

This also allows people to reconsider abusive relationships and finally address long-standing personal decisions that may have previously been postponed due to income insecurity.

Women, in particular, have more authority to make their own decisions because having the monthly UBI paid directly to them makes them less dependent on the money their partners give them.

UBI’s approach to personal and social empowerment also reflects the government’s trust in its people; It allows individuals to make their own decisions rather than being nudged by paternalistic policies that assume the government knows better about their lives than citizens do.

It also reduces the administrative burden of social empowerment by providing income as a right, rather than having people repeatedly apply to multiple agencies for endless forms and proof of their eligibility for assistance.

This not only reduces costs in administration, but also eliminates subjective and often arbitrary approvals by civil servants about who “deserves” or “does not deserve” aid.

In many social welfare systems, people fail because they do not have proof of eligibility or even do not know that the programs for which they are eligible actually exist.

In other systems, eligibility can be secured through corruption by making small payments to the bureaucrat who approves your application.

Since UBI is universal, it will also benefit people in Malaysia by allowing them to overcome the bureaucratic difficulties of the current social system.

These challenges often require extensive paperwork and lead to exclusion errors in targeted programs, leaving many people in need of support without assistance.

Universality is important because it creates a sense of unity and inclusivity. Everyone gets something, and if they don’t need it they can reject it or pass it on to others who need it more. The choice is theirs.

Progressive reforms to welfare assistance in Malaysia are moving towards a UBI approach, and momentum could pick up faster if UBI is embraced as a path to individual freedom.

* John Michael is the Asia-Pacific Center Director of the Basic Income World Network (BIEN) and Professor Geoffrey Williams is an economist and policy expert. The opinions expressed are those of the authors.

**This is the personal opinion of the author or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of others. Malay Post.