Basic Income Empiricism: What about Qualitative-Reconstructive Research?

This year’s World-Congress on Basic Income (23-26 August 2023) in South-Korea will feature an online roundtable focusing on the role of qualitative-reconstructive approaches in Basic Income Research. Our network supports this event. It will take place on Friday 25 August, 20:00-21:30 local time, 11:00-12:30 GMT. CS 24. (English) (Roundtable) Basic Income Empiricism: What about Qualitative-Reconstructive Research? Moderators: Manuel Franzmann (Kiel University) and Hanna Ketterer (Jena University) Panelists: Victoria Boelman (Former Director of Research at The Young Foundation), Minseo Cho (University of Wisconsin-Madison) and Ravi Gokani (Lakehead University)

Guaranteed Income as Economic Justice

Sept. 29, 2022 | Public Roundtable | Panelists: Halah Ahmad (Vice President for PR and Policy Communications, Jain Family Institute), Mark Levinson (former Chief Economist, Service Employees International Union), Premilla Nadasen (History Department, Barnard College), and Melody Webb (Executive Director and Founder Mother’s Outreach Network/DC Guaranteed Income Coalition), Moderator: Marcia Chatelain (Department of History, Georgetown University) >>https://vimeo.com/783052958 Joint Event by GHI Washington, the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor (Georgetown University) & the Blum Center on Poverty, Inequality, and Democracy (University of California, Santa Barbara). The event is endorsed by the American Historical Association (AHA). In recent years proposals for a guaranteed income have gained considerable traction in the United States, whether in the form of expanded child Read More …

International historical conference on basic income in Washington

From September 30 to October 1, 2022, the German Historical Institute Washington (GHI) will host an international conference entitled “Beyond Work for Pay? Basic-Income Concepts in Global Debates on Automation, Poverty, and Unemployment (1920-2020).” The conference is organized by Manuel Franzmann (Kiel University), Axel Jansen (GHI Washington), Alice O’Connor (University of California, Santa Barbara). The preliminary program can be found at the following internet address: GHI Conference Program

Historical UBI-debate in North America – a short collection of videos and books:

A number of historical videos and books on the historic UBI debate in North America in the 1960s and 1970s (see post) are accessible on the Internet. A selection of them is gathered here. Book by U.S. economist John K. Galbraith, 1958: U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson declares “War on Poverty” in 1964: Robert Theobald, Michael Harrington, Gunnar Myrdal, H. Stuart Hughes, Linus Pauling, John William Ward, Everett C. Hughes, et al., 1964: Open Memorandum of “The Ad Hoc Committee on the Triple Revolution” sent to U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson and its government, 1964 Robert Theobald’s Reader, 1966: With contributions from Theobald, Erich Fromm, Marshall MC Luhan, et al. Speech by Martin Luther King, Jr., 1967: Studs Terkel’s radio interview with Dr. Read More …

North American debates and social experiments on a ‘guaranteed income’ in the 1960s and 1970s

In recent years, interest in the idea of a UBI and its empirical testing has been growing rapidly in numerous countries around the world, and it seems to be increasingly spreading into politics. Some Examples (click to expand): >>See a list of past, present, and planned UBI-pilots in the world Looking back into history, one discovers that there was already a time of intense debate and social experimentation about a universal basic or “guaranteed” income. Not everywhere in the world, but in North America. Its story is worth knowing for contemporaries interested in the topic. With World War II, North American economies eventually left the depression era and moved toward the postwar period, which became the epoch of prosperity for Read More …