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The Liberal premier of Ontario announced details of the Ontario Basic Income Pilot. The provincial government issued a press release saying
Three regions will take part in the study. Pilots will start in late spring in Hamilton, including Brantford and Brant County; and in Thunder Bay and the surrounding area. The third pilot will start by this fall [autumn] in Lindsay.
The Basic Income model Ontario has developed will ensure that eligible participants receive:
Up to $16,989 per year for a single person, less 50 per cent of any earned income
Up to $24,027 per year for a couple, less 50 per cent of any earned income
Up to an additional $6,000 per year for a person with a disability.
[...] The three test regions will host 4,000 participants eligible to receive a basic income payment, between the ages of 18 to 64. By late spring, people in these areas will begin receiving information about the pilot and how to participate. The province is partnering with these communities and other experts to make sure that the Ontario Basic Income Pilot is fair, effective, and scientifically valid.
additional coverage:
- Canoe (editorial)
- The Globe and Mail
- globalnews.ca
- The Guardian
- Business Insider
- BBC News
- Canadian Press via City News
- Reuters via NASDAQ
- Toronto Star
- CHCH-TV
- CBC
- CNN Money
related story:
Ontario is Starting a Universal Basic Income Pilot
(Score: 2) by jmorris on Wednesday April 26 2017, @02:02AM (4 children)
Again, misunderstanding of basic economics abounds here.
The minimum wage is best understood as the floor below which it is illegal to hire an American. So because the work isn't worth the minimum it must be outsourced, done off the books by an illegal or replaced by a robot. What will not happen longer than it takes to arrange for one of those other options is pay someone more than the work produces in value to the employer. Just won't happen. You are not required to like this. Reality is what is still there after your best efforts to disbelieve it, to not like it, etc. Math is a bitch like that.
The question is why we want to ban people from trading with each other? It is not required that every single job pay a 'living wage'. Students should be encouraged to work, at least part time for example. Will they earn enough to even pay for their school? Probably not, but that isn't the point. Earning beer money is. Greeters at Walmart are typically retired and only wanting to get out a bit and still feel like they are part of the world. If you force Walmart to pay them $15/hr they will just eliminate the greeters. Stay at home moms often want a part time job when the kids enter school, they can't all be school teachers.
Let people be free to offer their labor on the market for what the traffic will bear. If the welfare state insists that redistribution must take place, that is an entirely unrelated question. Your employer is NOT your mom, it isn't taking you to raise when it hires you. How many children you have does not impact what they are willing to pay you in the slightest, other than down since your work schedule is almost certain to be less reliable if you are a single mom. How much school debt you accumulated isn't going to make them want to pay you more either, what you learned that was useful might make them pay more. Moral is to learn something useful.
(Score: 2) by rondon on Wednesday April 26 2017, @01:01PM (3 children)
So we have X number of people, and Y number of jobs that pay a living wage of Z. If X is greater than Y, what is your answer for the sum of X - Y?
I'm honestly interested, because I have thought about this many times. My personal favorite is "workfare" where the government provides an essentially unlimited number of jobs building infrastructure for people who are willing to work for the amount Z. Not a perfect solution by any means, but its the best I came up with.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Wednesday April 26 2017, @06:29PM
I'd like that too. Especially because the infrastructure has gone to shit. Time for another CCC if you ask me. J-Mo, of course. doesn't actually want this solved; he wants to see people suffer because somehow it vindicates him.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by jmorris on Wednesday April 26 2017, @08:52PM (1 child)
So many things wrong with the premise it is hard to even see where to start.
Let us begin with 'living wage.' Define it. Most of the inhabitants of Planet Earth live on a lot less than I suspect you will define the term as. Provide your logical argument for why your greatly expanded definition should be considered a requirement for someone else to provide it to you gratis.
Now we can question your assumption that there are only Y jobs, that they come from some mysterious and unknowable place and that unless this strange power offers you a job that you are doomed to wander the wilderness as a homeless bum. No, the number of jobs is not fixed, they do not have to involve some stranger offering you money in exchange for labor. YOU can create jobs, somebody created every existing job so why can't you? And if the economic situation where you are at is truly so terrible why are you still there? Show me the graven tablets saying you have an absolute right to live exactly where you are and that if there isn't a job for you there then damnit somebody has to cut you a check!
You are not special. You are not entitled to anything beyond Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness. Catching happiness is all your problem.
(Score: 2) by rondon on Monday May 01 2017, @02:00PM
I didn't define living wage, you just assumed that I did. I simply proposed it as a variable. Since you seem pretty hung up on it, lets define it as enough money to feed, house, and clothe two persons (yourself, and one child) along with transportation for one to work. This transportation could be bus, a horse, a car; whatever you want that is cost effective for the distance traveled.
Also, I never said gratis. I never backed any type of basic income or welfare. I specifically mentioned workfare, in fact.
I also never assumed the number of jobs was "fixed." However, at any given point in time there are X number of people and Y number of jobs. That is simply a fact. My question is, if X is substantially greater than Y, what is your solution. My long term fear is that automation is driving our society towards a state where the demand for jobs is greater than the demand for the output from those jobs, which would seem to lead to the situation where X is greater than Y.
BTW Jmo, I have moved for work. I have taken a job outside my chosen field of study. I have done what I consider necessary to reach my definition of success. My concern is for those less fortunate than myself, and those who come after me who won't can't follow the same route I did due to the work I have done automating in my field. Your questions to me quickly display the broad brush you use to paint everyone who even so much as asks you a question.