Basic Income: and how we can make it happen

8th May 2017

Speaker: Professor Guy Standing (SOAS; Basic Income Earth Network)

Discussants: Professor Lord Desai (Department of Economics, LSE), Barb Jacobson (Basic Income UK) and Dr Malcolm Torry (Citizen's Income Trust; Department of Social Policy, LSE)

Chair: Professor Mike Savage (International Inequalities Institute)

All pilots have shown that basic income makes people more productive, not less.

Shouldn't everyone receive a stake in society's wealth? Could we create a fairer world by granting a guaranteed income to all? What would this mean for our health, wealth and happiness?

A basic income is a regular cash transfer from the state, received by all individual citizens. It is an acknowledgement that everyone plays a part in generating the wealth currently enjoyed only by a few. Political parties across the world are now adopting it as official policy and the idea generates headlines every day.

Guy Standing has been at the forefront of thought about Basic Income for the past thirty years, and in in his latest book he covers in authoritative detail its effects on the economy, poverty, work and labour; dissects and disproves the standard arguments against basic income; explains what we can learn from pilot studies across the world and illustrates exactly why a basic income has now become such an urgent necessity.

Watch below:

Basic Income: and how we can make it happen Basic Income: and how we can make it happen