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2008-11-16

国际第12届“按人发钱”大会于2008年6月20日在爱尔兰都柏林举行,主题是:“经济全球化下的不平等与发展——按人发钱是一个选择”。

The 12th BIEN Congress on Basic Income will be held on 20-21 June 2008 in Dublin, Ireland.

The theme of this World Congress will be: "Inequality and Development in a Globalised Economy - The Basic Income Alternative".

 

Van Parijs, P. (ed.), 2000, Basic Income: A Simple and Powerful Idea for the 21st. Century. Background Paper BIEN Conference Berlin 6-7th. October. BIEN Web Site

“按人发钱是21世纪一个简单而有力的思想。”

下面是诺奖得主西蒙狂挺“按人发钱”的文章,原文发表在2000年10-11月的美国《波士顿评论》上published in the October/ November 2000 issue of Boston Review。若有错漏,敬请谅解。

UBI and the Flat Tax

“按人发钱”和单一税制

哈伯特A.西蒙

A response to "A Basic Income for All"by Philippe van Parijs.

Herbert A. Simon

I am in strong general agreement with Philippe Van Parijs’s argument for a UBI or "patrimony"–a portion of the product of a society that should be shared by all of those who inhabit that society. To establish such a patrimony is equivalent to recognizing shared ownership of a significant fraction of the resources, physical and intellectual, that enable the society to produce what it produces. As the essay makes a very strong case for the UBI and its feasibility, I will limit my comments to just two issues: (1) why a UBI (or patrimony) would be just; and (2) some problems of incentives that such a system poses and that need to be handled effectively.

总的来说,我强烈支持Philippe van Parijs的关于UBI(注:普遍基本收入,就是按人发钱)或“遗产” 的论点——社会的产品的一部分应该由所有那些居住在该社会的人分享。 建立这样的“遗产”就是等于认可资源、自然和知识的很大一部分属于共享所有权,它使得社会生产它生产的。 因为是随笔,对UBI及其可行性做非常有力的支持。我将限制我的评论到二个问题: (1)为什么UBI (或遗产)是正义的; 并且(2)这个系统要面对的一些激励问题,以及需要它有效地去把握。

Justice
When we compare average incomes in rich nations with those in Third World countries, we find enormous differences that are surely not due simply to differences in motivations to earn. Laziness is not a principal cause of poverty. A more plausible explanation for the differences, in fact the explanation that is universally put forward, is that much greater resources per capita are available to some countries than to others. These differences are not simply a matter of acres of land or tons of coal or iron ore, but, more important, differences in social capital that takes primarily the form of stored knowledge (e.g., technology, and especially organizational and governmental skills).

正义

当我们拿富有的国家平均收入与那些第三世界国家相比时,我们发现有巨大的差距,这不能简单地归因于在赚钱动机上的差异。懒惰不是贫穷的主要起因。 对于这种差距,一个更加振振有词的解释(实际上它被普遍地提及)是:某些国家比其他国家有更加巨大的人均可用资源。这些区别并非简单地是土地英亩数、煤炭吨数、或铁矿,更重要的差距是社会资本,它是存放知识(如技术,尤其指组织和政府的技能)的主要形式。

 

Exactly the same claim can be made about the differences in incomes within any given society. In large part, these differences must be attributed to differences in capital ownership, of which the largest part is social capital: knowledge, and participation in kinship and other privileged social relations. In addressing the question of justice, therefore, we are assessing the justice of inheritance of such resources along bloodlines. This is a question of value, not of fact. I personally do not see any moral basis for an inalienable right to inherit resources, or to retain all the resources that one has acquired by means of economic or other activities.

在所有特定的社会,关于收入的差距一致要求能够正确地提出。在很大程度上,这种差距必须归因于资本所有权的差距,其中最大的部分是社会资本,它包括知识、裙带关系和其他特殊社会关系,因此,我们依照血统评价这些资源继承的正义。 这是价值的问题,不是事实问题。 我个人认为,没有任何道德基础支持不可分割的资源继承权利,或者保留全部资源——它已被通过经济或其他活动所取得。

The usual argument for such a right is based on the assumption of perfectly competitive markets where factors of production are paid their marginal values and where there are no externalities. But this assumption does not hold to any reasonable degree of approximation in real societies. Access to the social capital–a major source of differences in income, between and within societies–is in large part the product of externalities: membership in a particular society, and interaction with other members of that society under practices that commonly give preferred access to particular members.

一般认为,这样的权利是根据完全竞争市场假设,(在这个假设下,)生产因素被支付给他们的边际价值,并且没有外部性(注:可以理解为对其他人带来的好处)。 但这个假定在真正的社会中没有任何合理性。 有权使用的社会资本(是在社会上产生收入差距的重要根源)的大部分产生外部性: 特殊社会的会员资格、在实践中与那个社会的其他成员一起活动(一般提供成功的实践给特殊会员)。

 

How large are these externalities, which must be regarded as owned jointly by members of the whole society? When we compare the poorest with the richest nations, it is hard to conclude that social capital can produce less than about 90 percent of income in wealthy societies like those of the United States or Northwestern Europe. On moral grounds, then, we could argue for a flat income tax of 90 percent to return that wealth to its real owners. In the United States, even a flat tax of 70 percent would support all governmental programs (about half the total tax) and allow payment, with the remainder, of a patrimony of about $8,000 per annum per inhabitant, or $25,000 for a family of three. This would generously leave with the original recipients of the income about three times what, according to my rough guess, they had earned.

如此巨大的外部性,必须认为由整体社会的成员联合拥有? 当我们把最穷与最富有的国家比较时,很难做出社会资本能产生小于90%收入的结论——对美国或西北欧洲而言。 于是,在道德基础我们赞成把90%的单一所得税退回给它真正的所有者。 在美国, 即使70%的单一税将支持所有政府项目(大约总税的一半)和给与支付(?),剩下的,大约每个居民每年$8,000的遗产,或者三口之家每年$25,000。 这将慷慨把大约他们挣到的三倍的收入(根据我粗略的估计)留给原始的接收者处理。

 

Incentives
Economists are always quick to point out that people must be properly motivated to be productive. If average returns to effort were uniformly reduced by a factor of three, it is not clear why motivation to earn more would be reduced. The behavior of two-income families in the United States suggests that the desire for income is related much more to processes of social comparison than to the real wage rate after taxes or the relative desire for goods and leisure. Similar questions may be raised about savings and capital accumulation, but in discussing them, private savings should not be dissociated from social saving (either by government or by the processes of social exchange themselves), which commonly produces externalities that are not evaluated by the market and appear nowhere in the social accounts. In any event, the questions about incentives to work and save are empirical questions that should be settled by experimentation and observation and not by philosophical debate.

经济学家总是迅速地指出,人们必须适当地被刺激是有益的。 如果努力的平均回报通过三要素之一一致地减少,就不清楚为什么将减少赚钱的动机。 在美国,双收入家庭的行为暗示收入的欲望更多的与社会攀比的进程(processes of social comparison)有关,而不是税后真实工资率或对财物和闲暇的相对欲望。 相似的关于储款和资本积累的问题也许被提出,但在谈论他们,私人储蓄不应该与社会储蓄分离(通过政府或社会过程交换它们自己),它同样产生外部性,这是不能通过市场和并不存在的社会帐目来估值。 无论如何,关于工作和储蓄的激励问题是实证问题,它必须经由实证和观察来解决,而不是经由哲学辩论。

I have focused on a UBI within a single nation. Let me leave aside questions of justice in reallocation of income among nations, and simply observe, as has been observed by many developmental economists, that reallocation can be accomplished at a relatively low cost by the export of knowledge rather than tangible resources. It is true that per capita income in wealthy nations might decline with increasing competition from those thereby endowed, but again, these effects of export of know-how need to be evaluated empirically and not simply posited by fiat. Meanwhile, the spread of multi-national corporations, with their power to allocate capital throughout the globe, may settle the question, for better or worse, before our empirical inquiries are complete. The historical record suggests that attempts to keep technological advantages within national boundaries are not usually successful for long.

我把焦点集中在一个国家内UBI(按人发钱)。 让我搁置一个国家的收入再分配的正义问题,简单地观察,很多发展经济学家观察发现,重新分配可以被实现于经由知识出口的低成本,而不是有形的资源。 这是真的,国民平均收入在富裕国家也许随着他们竞争的增加而下降,从而被资助。但是另外,这些技术秘诀出口的效果需要被实证评估,不是简单地由命令假定。同时,跨国公司的蔓延,以他们的力量在全球调拨资本,也许解决问题,是更好或者更坏,在我们实证调查之前就完成了。历史纪录暗示企图保留技术优势在国界之内通常不是常胜之道。

No discussion of income redistribution should conclude without considering its impact on resource conservation and population. Sustainability must be a central concern in all questions of national and global social policy. Increase in income has, in recent centuries, been the most potent means that has been found for stabilizing populations, but at the cost, alas, of increased energy production, which aggravates the problems of maintaining the quality of life on our Earth. (Bringing the Third World up to Western energy levels would multiply the carbon dioxide problem by a factor of at least ten!) We must focus on converting income and savings to forms that are more benign in this respect.

关于再分配的讨论不应该结束在不考虑它的对资源保护和人口的冲击的情况下。 可持续性在全国和全球性社会政策的所有问题中必须是一个核心问题。 近百年来,在为稳定的人口被找到了的收入的增量,是最有力的手段,但在能源生产成本的增加,它使在我们的地球上维护生活水平的问题恶化。 (带来由第三世界直到西方的能级水平将增加二氧化碳问题至少十倍!) 我们必须专注于转换收入和储款的方式到更加良性的形式。

Herbert A. Simon is University Professor of Psychology and Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University. In 1978, he received the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences.西蒙是卡内基梅隆大学教授,1978年诺贝尔经济学奖得主。

Click here for other New Democracy Forum articles.

Originally published in the October/ November 2000 issue of Boston Review

 

[此贴子已经被作者于2008-11-16 13:49:14编辑过]

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2008-11-16 12:32:00

基本收入——21世纪的一个朴素而伟大的思想

菲利普派瑞斯

成福蕊 译 (载于《国外理论动态》 2008年第6期)

    内容摘要:基本收入(或人头基金)是指一个政治共同体向其所有成员支付的一项收入,这种收入是以个人为基础的,没有经济状况审查或工作要求。本文概览了基本收入计划所采取的各种形式,并找出其共同的联系;将基本收入的核心原理整合为一种应对贫穷和失业的策略;考察了普适性的基本收入是否支付得起并且在何种程度上是可支付的;讨论了在南方和北方,基本收入的下一步最有希望的计划。

    关键词:基本收入;福利国家;最低收入;负所得税;贫穷。

    给每个公民一笔适当的、无条件的收入,作为他们其它收入的补充。这个非常简单的思想有着极其深远的渊源。在过去两个世纪中,人们发明的很多概念中都隐含着它的影子——例如,区域分红国家红利人头基金公民工资全民利益基本收入”——但大多数都没有成功实现。在60年代末70年代初,这种观点突然在美国流行起来,而且居然由一位总统候选人提出来,但是不久便被搁置,几乎是被遗忘。然而,在过去二十年里,此观点逐渐成为整个欧盟中史无前例并迅速扩展的公共议题。有些人将其视为许多社会痼疾的良药,包括失业和贫穷。另一些人则指责其为疯狂的、有经济缺陷的、反伦理的计划,应尽快遗忘并扔进历史思想的垃圾箱。

    为澄清这些争论,我开篇较多地探讨基本收入是什么,不是什么,及其与现有的保障性收入计划有何区别。在此基础上,会更容易理解为什么基本收入最近受到了如此多的关注,为什么会面临较大的阻力,以及最后该如何克服这些阻力。作者坚信基本收入不会被遗忘,更不会被抛弃。基本收入是硕果仅存的、定将影响新世纪理论和现实的几个基本思想之一。

    基本收入的内涵和外延

    基本收入是指一个政治共同体向其所有成员支付的一项收入,这种收入是以个人为基础的,没有经济状况审查或工作要求。下面简单剖析一下每个要点。

    一项收入

    现金支付而不是实物支付。我们可以设想一种福利,它具有基本收入的其他一切特征,但是以实物形式支付,例如,采取标准食物组合的方式或某块土地使用权的方式;或者这种福利是以带有限制性用途的专门货币形式提供,例如,食品券或住房补贴;或更广义的,仅能在当期消费,没有任何储蓄的可能性。相反,基本收入是以现金提供的,没有任何消费或投资的用途和时间方面的限制。在多数情况下,它是作为现存实物转支(如免费教育或基本健康保险)的补充而非替代。

    周期性支付,而非一次性赠与。依据不同的计划,基本收入由一组周期性的购买力构成,如每周、每月、每期、或每年。我们可以再设想一项福利,其具有基本收入的所有其他特征,但是一次性支付的,如在某人成年时。周期性的基本收入和这种基本赠与有很大的差别。然而,我们不能夸大其词。首先,基本赠与可以被投资,产生相等价值的年度或月度收入,直至受益者死亡,这也可以算是一项周期性基本收入。如果放入保险市场,年金的水平将与受益人的预期寿命成反比。例如,女性要比男性的年金低。其次,虽然除转为年金外,基本赠与还可以有其它用途,但如果基本收入的受益者能够对其未来基本收入流进行自由借贷,二者的最终差异将被基本抵消。

    由政治共同体支付

    从定义中看出,基本收入是由政府从公共资源中支付的。但是这并不代表一定由国家政府支付。也不一定从再分配的税收中支付。

    国家政府,内含或外延。在大多数计划中,基本收入被认为是由国家政府筹集和支付,正如国家红利全国分红公民工资等名称所代表的那样。然而,原则上,它也可以由国家内的部分政治组织筹集和支付,如省或社区。实际上,根据定义,唯一的真正引入基本收入的政治体就是美国的阿拉斯加州。基本收入还可以被想象为由超国家的政治体支付。欧盟已经提出了几种计划,甚至联合国也提出了一些计划。

    再分配。基本收入可以但不一定必须由特定的或指定的方式筹资。它完全可以随着其他的政府支出一样从各种收入来源的公共资金库中筹集。那些支持从特定方式筹资的人大多是考虑某种专门的税收。有人希望从土地税或自然资源税中筹资,有人偏好一种税基非常广泛的专门税收或大大提高增值税。一些考虑全球基本收入的人强调新的税收工具的潜力,如对投机性资本活动所征的托宾税或对信息转让所征的比特税。

    分配。然而,再分配税收不一定是筹资的唯一来源。阿拉斯加的分红来自于风险分散化的投资基金的收益,此基金是政府用阿拉斯加的大量油田的租赁收入建立的。同样的,詹姆斯米德规划的公平、效率的经济中包括从公有生产性资产的收益中的社会分红。最后,还有一系列计划从货币创造方面为基本收入筹资,从梅杰道格拉斯的社会信贷运动,到更复杂的(也更适度的)约瑟夫胡伯的建议

    给所有成员

    非公民?政治共同体的成员是个包罗万象的概念。有些人,尤其是喜欢公民收入名称的人,将成员设想为限于法律意义上的国民或公民。基本收入的权利与全部公民身份的权利和义务相一致,如同法国的哲学家Jean-Marc Ferry的概念一样。然而,大多数基本收入的支持者,尤其是将其视为反排他性政策的人,不想对基本收入冠以限制性权利从而加深劳动市场的二元化。他们因此倾向于将成员设想为更广义上的,包括所有合法的永久性居民。操作原则可能是对于非居民设定一个最低居住期限,或者可简单的以现在的纳税居民作为提供条件,或者将二者结合起来。

    儿童?成员的概念在年龄维度上也是包罗万象的。有人将基本收入限定于成年人中,但往往并列的提出普适性的——即没有经济状况审查的儿童福利计划,福利的水平不一定与儿童的等级有关(正相关或负相关),或与儿童的年龄有关(正相关)。另有人将基本收入设想为一种从出生到死亡的权利,因此看作是儿童福利体系的完全替代品。福利水平必须独立于儿童的家庭状况,尤其是他或她的等级。在某些较慷慨的计划中,有人还希望儿童计划与成年人一样,不考虑年龄,像阿拉斯加分红计划的实际运作一样。但是大多数提出将儿童计划和基本收入机制融合的人依据年龄划分基本收入的等级,最大等级享受者必须在成年或以后。

    领退休金者?类似的,一些人将基本收入限于没有达到退休年龄的人,然后将其视为对个人的、没有经济状况审查的、在较高水平发放的无需缴纳的基本养老金的自然补充,这在一些欧洲国家已经存在,如瑞典。然而,大多数计划中,基本收入对老人的发放额度与年轻成年人相同或更高。在所有情况下,老年人的基本收入都可以从公共或私人的养老金计划或者私人储蓄及就业中得到补充。

    监狱、医院等机构中的人?即使给成员一个最贴切、最广泛的定义,仍然有可能将一些人口排除在基本收入之外。将罪犯拘留入狱对社会造成的成本远远大于给与他们适当水平的基本收入,即使算上他们可能从事的全部生产性劳动。因此,很明显监狱里的人在其监禁期间应该失去他们的基本收入福利,除非监禁是没有确实依据的。但是一旦他们被释放,他们就恢复了领取基本收入的权利。这同样适用于其它机构中长期居住的人,如疯人院、养老院等,只要其全部居住成本是直接由共同体支付的,而不是其自己支付的。

     以个人为基础

    付给每个人。基本收入支付给共同体内的每一个成员,而不是像现有的大多数最低收入保障计划那样支付给每个家庭整体或其户主。
统一性。即使福利支付给每个人,其水平还是会受到家庭组合的影响。考虑到人均生活成本随着家庭的规模而缩小的事实,现有最低收入保障给一对夫妇的人均收入少于一个单身者。因此一种公平有效的计划的运行假定管理者有能力审查收益人的居住情况。相反,基本收入是严格以个人基础支付的,这有两层含义:不仅共同体的每个成员都是接受者,而且其收益的多少独立于他或她所属的家庭类型。因此,基本收入计划的运行不需要任何居住形式的控制,它保留了人们通过与他人共住而减少居住成本的全部好处。正是由于其严格的个人性质,基本收入更容易摆脱孤独陷阱,有益于互助生活。

    没有经济状况审查

    不考虑收入。相对于现存的最低收入保障计划,基本收入的最惊人的特点无疑是支付给穷人和富人同样的金额,不管其收入如何。即使最简单的现存计划中,对每种类型的家庭(单身成年,无孩夫妇,一个孩子的单亲家庭,等等)都规定了最低收入水平,要评估家庭来自其它来源的所有收入,家庭只得到总收入与规定的最低收入之间的差额。在这个意义上,现存计划是依据事前评估的受益人的收入,对符合条件者进行事后补偿。而基本收入计划是事先偿付,没有任何收入审查。收入超过规定最低水平的人和收入达不到最低水平的人都得到相同的支付额。在决定一个人应被赋予的基本收入水平时也不考虑任何其它资格:不论是个人的非正式收入,还是他可以从亲戚中得到的权益,还是其财产的价值。为了提供基本收入可能需要较高的平均税率,但是税收和福利体系不再依赖资格进行二分。

    没有使富人更富。穷人和富人得到相同的基本收入,不能得出基本收入计划会使富人和穷人都变得更富裕的结论。基本收入需要资金来源。

    1. 如果基本收入简单的加入现存的税收和福利体系中,很明显较富的人将不仅为其自己的基本收入支付,而且支付穷人的大部分的基本收入。如果资金是通过累进税筹集,这明显成立。但是在直接税和累退税制下,也同样成立。基本收入对穷人的经济优势,关键条件显然是相对于其人数(不一定是其收入),富人将比穷人贡献更多的资金。

    2. 然而,在大多数计划中,基本收入的引入是与取消部分现有福利和税收减免相结合的。如果计划的改革仅仅是将现在集中于穷人的非常有限的非缴费性福利分散给更多的人,那穷人境况明显变差了。但是没有人会提出这样一个荒谬的计划。在大多数依靠直接税的计划中,基本收入不仅取代了非缴费性收益的低端部分,而且取代了每个纳税人较低收入框架下的税收减免。在适度的基本收入下,收入分配的直接影响被限制在非常窄的范围内。但是其水平越高,所得税的平均税率越高,从富人到穷人的再分配就越多。

    同时给与富人,对穷人会更好?因此,给所有的富人和穷人,不意味着富人的境况变好。但是,是否有理由相信给定水平的最低收入比带有经济状况审查的保障性收入对穷人更好?是的,至少有三个相互关联的原因。首先,在普及性计划下,穷人的受益比率可能比带有经济状况审查的计划高。穷人中没有被通知但有资格领取其福利的人会减少。其次,作为公民每人收到一份福利没有羞辱感。因为耻辱效应会影响受益人比率,所以这与第一条也间接相关。再次,基本收入计划下的周期性、可靠的收益不受工作的影响,然而在标准经济状况审查计划下很可能受影响。这相当于从一个方面跳出了与传统福利体系密切相关的失业陷阱。

    创造了新的工作?经济学家更加关注的是失业陷阱的另一方面,即在没有工作和低收入工作之间没有明显的收入差异。在收入分配的最底端,如果每单位收入都能被失去的一单位福利所抵消,或者抵消得更多,那么即使不是非常懒惰的人也会放弃这种工作,也没有动力去寻找这种工作。因为考虑到额外成本、交通时间或照顾孩子的问题等,一个人在这样的条件下不会接受工作。而且,雇主设计和提供这样的工作通常也没有任何意义,因为希望被解雇的人们不可能成为尽责的、可靠的员工。最低工资法可能在某种程度上遏制了对全职工作提供低于最低保障收入的工资,但对于兼职工作仍然存在。普及性基本收入计划代替经济状况审查的保障性收入计划也通常被认为是解决失业陷阱的途径。如果人们收到一种普及性的基本收入,但是对所有不超出最低收入保障的收入份额课以100%的税收,那么失业陷阱与经济状况审查的保障性收入计划是一样的。但是只要最低收入水平的税率低于100%,那么下面的结论成立:由于无论工作与否,无论穷富,你都能够获得基本收入的全部额度,那么工作一定会比不工作变得更好。

    相当于负所得税?然而要注意的是,失业陷阱的第二个方面似乎也可以通过经济状况审查计划有效的解决,使福利减少的速度小于收入增加的速度。这也被称为负所得税,是一种统一的、可补偿的税收扣除。负所得税的概念最初出现在法国经济学家奥古斯汀克诺特的作品中,米尔顿弗里德曼曾经简要的提议将其作为削减福利国家的手段;詹姆斯托宾及其同事更深入地研究将其作为反贫穷手段并同时保持工作激励。在直接税制下,税收可以(但不一定必须)是线性的,没有任何收入被课以100%的重税,负所得税相当于将每个家庭(给定组合)的所得税债务减少一个固定数额,当然如果固定数额超过税收债务就以现金支付福利。假设固定数额的税收减免与基本收入计划的水平相当,人们既没有基本收入,也没有所得税债务,这与得到一定金额的基本收入效果一样。随着收入的上升,福利将降低,正如传统的经济状况审查计划一样。但是在较低的水平时,实际上使得税后转移支付的数额与基本收入的发放数额相等。负所得税的差异仅仅在于税收和福利的净差额。在基本收入计划下,负所得税的税收减免所需资金被收上来又返还回去了。在负所得税计划下,转移支付都是单向的:在盈亏平衡点以下的家庭收到正的支付(负的所得税);在超过盈亏平衡点的家庭收到负的支付(正的所得税)。

    没有工作要求

    不考虑当前的工作绩效。最低收入保障计划的权利在定义上不受过去工作年限的限制,也不受社会保障计划中所交保险金的限制。但是,早期通常以履行一些苦役为条件。无条件的基本收入大大不同于这些形式的与最低就业密切相关的最低收入保障计划。它也不同于那些要求家中至少有一人处于有偿就业状态的工作福利,如美国就业收入税收减免和英国近期的工作家庭税收减免计划。因为突破了失业陷阱,也就是提供一种有工作激励的净福利,基本收入(或负所得税)计划可以被理解和应用为一种工作福利或收益的补充,无条件的特点使其不同于任何形式的就业补贴。

    不考虑工作意愿。它也有别于传统的往往将权利限定在有工作意愿的范围内的最低收入保障计划。基本收入计划根据权利支付,不需要任何人工伪装,包括家庭主妇,学生,罢工者,和永久流浪者。一些折中性计划,如参与式收入,加入了一个广义的社会贡献条件,可以是全职或兼职有偿工作或自我雇佣;教育、培训或积极寻找工作;婴儿护理或照顾老年人;定期在一个被认可的机构志愿工作。条件越广泛,其与基本收入的差别越小。

    为何需要基本收入?

    如果不需要经济状况审查,那么重要的是放弃工作审查。将所讨论的后两种无条件情况放在一起——没有经济状况审查和没有工作审查——可以简单总结出在现有条件下基本收入计划最重要的核心所在。由于经济状况审查与失业陷阱密切相关,取消审查会出现新的低收入工作。但是,这些工作有的可能是污秽的、不体面的和无出路的,是不应被鼓励的。有的工作可能是舒适的、长见识的和有利于自我提升的工作,这即使在工资较低的情况下也是值得从事的,因为其内在价值或提供了培训。只有受雇者自己有识别工作的能力,但不总是有这样的权利。无工作条件的基本收入赋予弱势群体讨价还价能力,而这是有工作审查的保障性收入计划所不能及的。因此,取消工作审查是防止取消经济状况审查后污秽工作扩张的关键工具。

    如果没有经济状况审查,工作审查也不需要。同时,取消经济状况审查后的工作激励使得工作审查变得不具有吸引力,因为工作审查本身就是为了避免供养懒惰人群。基本收入的两项关键无条件逻辑上互相依赖,但是他们作为一项强有力的计划的要素在本质上是相联的。

    虽自由但积极。这两种无条件的结合是基本收入解决贫困和失业问题的核心。相对于传统的保障性收入计划,支持基本收入的关键依据在于其广泛共享的思想——社会正义不仅是对收入的权利问题,而且是参与性问题。最有效的兼顾收入和参与性的方法是无论个人行为如何,保持收入转移这种积极福利,使其由强制的非工作状态变为低收入的积极工作状态。可能有人认为工资所得税减免或就业补贴等计划运作得更好,更节约成本或保证低生产率工作的活力并为底层群体提供有酬工作的目标。但是,如果关注点不是使穷人不惜一切代价变得忙碌起来,而是让他们有机会从事有意义的有酬工作,基本收入的无条件特点就具有至关重要的优势:它(可持续的)使得弱势群体获得谈判能力,使他们能够识别有吸引力的或有前途的工作和那些污秽的工作。

    基本收入和社会正义。前面的讨论已经将社会正义作为人们追求实现真正自由的美好生活的条件。作者在所有人的真正自由中提出并论述了这个概念。对基本收入的可替代性原则正义提出的较少,但提出了很多实用正义作为简单的可达到更复杂的理想政策工具的次优。然而,我相信任何将基本收入作为最优的有力证据都必须采取某种真正自由(不仅是权利,而且是人们根据自己的意愿行事的方式)的概念作为社会正义的分配原则,并将它与某种很强的平等主义原则相结合。我提出真正自由意志者这个专门的概念对下列观点有关键作用:我们的真正自由根基实际上存在着极大的不平等,这是在我们生存的过程中所收到的各种恩赐的集合,包括使我们每个人拥有自己工作的机会。因此,我们工作中存在大量的就业租金,这可以而且必须(部分地)通过可预测、可持续的所得税收入最大化来解决,其收入用来支付普及性的无条件基本收入。我提出的模式无疑是可以改进的,但是我可以肯定,如果基本收入可以达到最优结果,那么它就一定与我的提议非常接近。

    基本收入可支付吗?

    一个有待说明的问题。这个非常宽泛的问题本身没有意义,有意义是只有在人们确定了基本收入的水平并规定它将取代哪种现存福利,才能开始转向可支付性问题。因此,基本收入计划是否具有可支付性因不同的计划而异。

    因为无工作审查而成本更高?基本收入是对所有人发放的,无论他们是否愿意工作,然而传统的保障性最低收入都要经过工作意愿审查。因此,与传统的保障收入相比,更多的穷人会收到基本收入,基本收入计划似乎将耗费更大的成本。但我们稍后将看到,建立基本收入这样的一种机制是昂贵的,但是工作审查机制并不会降低成本。因此,取消工作审查,不是危及基本收入支付能力的原因。

    因为收入无条件而更昂贵?

    经济状况审查和普及性计划的等价。基本收入的支付性问题更多来源于其对穷人和富人支付相同的福利的事实。原则上基本收入可以获得与传统的最低收入保障计划相同的总额和净额收入关系(见原文附录)。如果这种关系是相同的,它意味着对那些对计划作出净贡献的纳税人的成本在两种情况下是相同的,也就意味着两种情况下任何收入水平的边际税率都是一样的。

    给予富人是经济的。当传统的保障性最低收入在我们财富之内时,基本收入是支付不起的。但是转移支付不是净支出。他们是购买力的重新分配。净贡献者的分配成本和负激励产生的经济成本在任何计划下都可能是一样的。而且,还有管理成本。但是,现代计算机和有效的税收和转移支付技术在普及性的事前计划中很可能比在经济状况审查的事后计划中成本低,至少在有效性上。因此,给予所有人比专门给穷人不会更昂贵而可能更便宜。

    一个例子。为了使改革预算中性同时保证能够支付每个人的基本收入,我们必须提高较高收入阶层的税率以补偿较低阶层收入税率的下降。虽然每个赚钱者都有最低水平的收入,但不是每人都有较高水平的收入,所以说收入水平越高的层级,人数越少。假定将月收入在0-500元之间的平均税率降低20%,需要提高较高收入层级的税率来弥补。但是提高多少?这要看被提高税收的收入层级中有多少纳税人。如果是在500-1000元范围内征收,那么大多数收入还是会受到提高税率的影响,预算平衡可能要求那个范围中的税率提高25%。但是如果在2000-2500欧元范围内,受影响的人会少得多,但是预算平衡可能要求税率提高50%以上。一旦我们意识到这一点,下面的结论就是必然的了。如果我们想把最低收入层级的税率大幅度降低,我们必须把较高层级的税率提高很多。

    低收入者的过重负担和部分基本收入。在基本收入的计划中有两种方法来应对这种提议。一个是修正线性的甚至是累进的税收体系,使基本收入的净受益者加重负担,如詹姆斯米德所建议的那样。另一个如荷兰政府政策科学委员会所提出的部分基本收入,这在荷兰和其他欧洲国家都有很详细的研究。部分基本收入会比现在给单个人的保障性最低收入少,但是它会接近或超过目前给予一对夫妇的保障性最低收入的一半。它将与保留的带有经济状况审查的最低收入保障计划相结合。

   
因为严格的个人基础而更昂贵?

    个人化的魅力。基本收入计划成本问题的另一个直接来源是严格的个人意义而非家庭意义。和别人共享住房、耐用品和一些服务对个人来讲是经济的。但与家庭人数为基础的福利计划必然不鼓励规模经济,而是鼓励了假的独立居住证明,从而导致审查居住条件成为必要之举。基本收入的最大优点正是避免了这个弊端。人们会利用共同居住所产生的一切优势,却不需要任何审查。当然,在短期情况下,充分的个人基础只能得到不充足的基本收入,与根据家庭规模发放收入,二者之间必须取舍。但长期来看,考虑了计划的执行成本,会发现基本收入的优势所在。

    往哪个方向走?

    一只眼看远方,一只眼看脚下。

    一般性的、没有家庭审查、经济状况审查和工作意愿审查的最低收入保障计划在多数欧盟成员国都已存在(包括最近的葡萄牙),这是朝正确方向迈出的关键一步。但正如为普选权而战一样,为基本收入而战不是一件一蹴而就的事。如果不能与基本收入计划完全一致,目前提出三种最有希望的下一步计划,即个人税收减免、家庭为基础的累退所得税和合理的参与收入(详见原文)。

    值得一提的是两个有趣的国家。在南非,自从种族隔离体制以来已经建立了一套综合的非缴费性养老金计划,将福利分配给绝大多数符合年龄区间的南非黑人,无疑构成了非洲大陆上最有力的再分配计划。在此背景下,一个令人吃惊的普及性基本收入运动蓬勃兴起,有来自工会、教会和许多其他组织的支持。另一个国家是巴西,工党的首席议员从九十年代初就开始从事引进综合性的负所得税形式的保障性最低收入运动,数不清的家庭收入支持计划和义务教育计划已经在市政一级被引入,许多人已经越来越将今天的试验和需求放在为巴西人民争取最后实施无条件基本收入计划的框架内。

    在基本收入成为普遍现实的过程中,最艰难而关键的斗争显然是在更长远的方面展开:保证公共管理的效率和问责制,监管移民,合理的选举体制和重构超国家组织的权力。但是在一个公正、自由的社会中,清晰而一致的核心分配制度能够给予这种斗争方向和力量。
 

 

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2008-11-16 12:37:00

BIEN CONGRESS, JUNE 2008

 2008年爱尔兰都柏林第12届全球 “按人发钱/基本收入” 网络大会论文/演讲稿

 

“Moving to Basic Income (BI) - A left-wing political perspective”

走向基本收入——左翼的政治观点

 

Speech by Katja Kipping(德国左党副总裁、德国议会议员)

(Vice-president of the LEFT Party and member of the German parliament)

   

 

  First of all, I would like to thank you very much for being invited to the 12th BIEN Congress and thus having the opportunity to give you a left-wing political perspective on the idea of Basic Income (BI).

  In order to discuss the question of how a BI can be achieved, we first of all need to analyze what our position is within the hegemonic political struggles. That’s why I propose to give you a brief survey of the debates in Germany before answering the questions on how a BI can be put into practice and achieved.
    

  首先,我要感谢邀请我参加第12届“基本收入全球网络”大会,因而有机会向您介绍关于基本收入思想的左派的政治观点。

   为了讨论如何才能实现基本收入的问题,我们首先需要分析我们在霸权政治斗争中的位置。
   所以我在德国提议,在回答如何使基本收入付诸实施的问题之前,给出您争论的一个简要概述。

 

 

I. Overview of the debates in Germany

 

 

Over the last five years, the idea of Basic Income has gained in popularity. The BI has become a topic for discussion both in talk shows and in newspapers. Political foundations with very diverse backgrounds are putting this topic on their agendas.

 

1.德国争论的概述

  在过去的5年间,基本收入的思想逐渐受到欢迎。基本收入成了“脱口秀”和报纸讨论的话题。虽然它们的政治背景和基础各不相同,但都把这个话题提上了议事日程。

 

The development of the German Basic Income Network is an example of the growing interest. 德国基本收入网络的发展是一个富有价值的例子

 

The network was founded in July 2004 at the Social Science Research Centre in Berlin, at the same time as the Hartz IV package of unemployment benefit reforms was adopted by the Bundesrat (upper house of the German parliament). This setting was very symbolic! While the political class was adopting a package of legislation increasing the repression and exclusion of the unemployed, some representatives of the civil society came together to support the idea of a BI.
    

  这个网络于2004年7月在柏林社会科学研究中心建立,同时,作为失业救济金改革的Hartz IV议案被德国议会的上院采纳。这个设置是非常象征性的! 当政治阶层采纳了逐渐抑制和排除失业的立法议案时,民间社团的一些代表聚集起来支持基本收入的思想。

 

At its foundation, the network comprised around 50 members with very different backgrounds: representatives of the jobless-movements, church groups, scientists und various political parties. In 2008, i.e. only 4 years later, the network has more than 1500 members. And regional network groups are being founded in more and more cities.

  在它创建时,这个网络包括50个成员,他们有不同的背景:失业运动的代表、教会组织、科学家及各种不同的政党。到仅仅4年之后的2008年,这个网络有1500会员,地区网络团体在越来越多的城市被创建。

The German network is not in favour of a special model of BI. However, when establishing the Basic Income Network, the founding members agreed on four criteria which must be fulfilled by any model worthy of the name UNCONDITIONAL basic income:

It has to provide livelihood security. We don’t mention a specific amount, but there is rough guidance: a Basic Income should at least prevent people from living a life in poverty.

There must be an individual entitlement.

No means testing at all! Nobody should have to prove that he or she is poor in order to receive the BI.

No requirement to work in return for the BI!

这个德国网络并不是倾向于一个特殊类型的基本收入。但是,当建立基本收入网络时,创立成员商定了以下四个标准(这些标准必须被任何类型的基本行收入所履行,它也被叫做“无条件基本收入”):

1.它必须提供生计安全。
   我们不提及具体数额,但是有概略的目标:基本收入至少要保证人民脱离贫穷。

2.必须是针对个人的权利。

3.完全不需核查财产状况。任何人不需说明他(或她)是穷人,因此需要接受基本收入。

4.不要求去工作以便回报基本收入!

 

To a certain extent, the growing interest has been caused by Götz Werner, a successful businessman, owner of a chain of drugstores. His way of arguing against the requirement to work is very convincing. But from a left-wing perspective his role is also ambivalent. I mention this not in order to put blame on him, but just in order to make it easier for you to understand some of the debates ongoing among left-wing people. In a talk-show, he was once asked, whether – after the introduction of a BI – he expects to pay his employees lower or higher wages. His answer was:” Of course lower.” As you can imagine, from a left-wing perspective, it is very alarming when a businessman is planning to pay lower wages.
    

某种程度上,兴趣增长是由Gotzz Werner(一个成功的商人、药房连锁店的所有者)造成的。
   他反对不要求去工作的辩论方法是很有说服力的。
   但从左派的观点来看,他的角色也是矛盾的。
   我提及此为了不怪罪他,而是为了让您能更容易了解一些正在进行的辩论(包括左派群众之中的)。
   在访谈节目,他曾经被问道,在实行基本收入之后,他准备支付给他的雇员更低或更高的薪水?
   他的答复是:“当然是更低的”。
   您可以想象,从左派的观点来看,这是非常令人惊心的——当商人计划支付更低的薪水时。

 

Situation in social organisations

There are some organisations which support the idea of basic income as a whole organisation, e.g. the Catholic employers' movement and the Catholic Youth and the Green youth organisation. However, in most of the organisations, the basic income is a topic of heated debates and even polarizing conflicts. In the same organization you will find people totally convinced, that a basic income is the ONE AND ONLY solution to our problems and you will find people convinced that BI is worse than the devil.

   有一些组织是整体支持基本收入思想的组织,如天主教雇主运动、天主教青年及绿色青年组织。但是,在很多组织中,基本收入是一个热烈辩论的主题、甚至有不同看法的冲突。在同一组织中,你会发现有人完全深信基本收入是一个(也是唯一的)解决我们的问题的途径,同时,你也会发现有人深信基本收入比魔鬼还坏。

 

The trade union officials are fighting against this idea. Sometimes, it seems that in this fight they are following all the advice given by Machiavelli in his book “Il Principe”. Nevertheless, one could say that even within the trade-unions the number of BI-advocates is growing – especially within the trade-union youth organisation and the groups representing the unemployed within the trade-unions. If you want to familiarize the trade-unions with the BI, contact the youth organizations. They are usually more open-minded than the officials.

  工会官员反对这个思想。有时,在这种反对中,仿佛他们遵循了马基雅弗利(Machiavelli)在他的书《君主论》中给他们的所有建议。(译者注:作者借此“典故”来讽刺工会官员为了保住他们的既得利益而不择手段)尽管如此,我们可以说即使在工会内部,基本收入的倡导者在增长,特别是工会中的青年组织和工会中的失业者代表。
   如果您想让工会熟悉基本收入,就与青年组织联系,
   他们通常比官员虚心。

 

Situation within the German parties

In the 80s, it was the Green party which discussed BI. But then this idea was forgotten for many years. After many years of silence, it was the former PDS, the Party of Democratic Socialism, one of the main sources of members of the new LEFT-Party, which put this topic back on the political agenda. We did not push the debates to a decision. So it is hard to say whether the majority within in the PDS was for or against it.

德国政党的形势

在80年代,绿党就讨论过基本收入。但是接着就把这个思想遗忘了很多年。沉寂了多年以后,著名的自由社会主义党(它是新绿党的成员的主要来源之一)把这个话题提到了议事日程。我们没有就此辩论作出决定,因此,很难说自由社会主义党的大多数成员支持它或者反对它。

Over the last few years, more and more Green politicians have re-discovered their fascination for the idea of BI. Maybe this development was also encouraged by the fact that I, as a representative of the PDS, was associated with the idea within the German basic-income scene. Anyway, it is fine if the competition between the parties helps in promoting the idea of BI. We now have friendly co-operation between the left-wing and the green supporters of the BI.

   最近几年,越来越多的绿党政治家重新发现了基本收入思想的魅力。
   可能这些发展是被事实鼓励的。我作为自由社会主义党的代表,把这个思想与德国基本收入的背景联系在一起。
   不管怎样说,如果政党之间的竞争有助于推动基本收入的思想,是非常好的。
   现在,基本收入的左翼支持者和绿色支持者之间就有很友好的合作。

Within the Social Democratic Party, there are a few local branches which are advocating the idea. But I have not found a Social Democratic member of parliament who openly supports the idea of BI. While in my parliamentary group there are six convinced supporters and several interested people and in the Green parliamentary group there are as many as 10 supporters. That is progress. However, we are a long way from having a majority in the German parliament in support of the idea of BI.

  在社会民主党内,有几个地方分支倡导这个思想。但我未找到公开支持基本收入思想的社会民主党议员。而在我的议会小组中,有6位确信的支持者和几位感兴趣的人。在绿党议会小组中,有多达10位支持者。这是可喜的进步。然而,我们离德国议会的多数支持基本收入思想的目标,还差得很远。

 

Situation within the LEFT Party

I consider the foundation of the LEFT Party to be good for left-wing aims in general. But, due to the rising influence of old-school trade unionists, the arguments against the BI have become tougher. Nevertheless, we have managed to ensure that the idea of BI is mentioned in our founding programme as an issue worthy of discussion. In the founding programme you will find the sentence: “We will further discuss the issue of BI with various social groups.”

To be honest, I doubt whether, at a party convention, the majority would approve a proposal for the BI. And even if 51 percent were to vote in favour, the other 49 percent would consider such a decision a reason for leaving the party. To sum it up: The BI is a very polarizing topic. That is a pretty challenging situation for BI-fans.

Within the Left Party, there is a very active Federal Study Group dedicated to the idea of Basic Income.

左党的形势

  一般来说,我认为左党的基础对左翼的目标是有益的。但是,由于老牌工会主义者的影响上升,他们变得粗暴地反对基本收入。然而,我们设法确保在我们建立规划时,基本收入的思想是一个值得讨论的议题。在我们制定的规划中,你会发现这样的句子:“我们将进一步与各社会团体讨论基本收入的思想。”在左党内部,有一个非常活跃的联邦研究组织致力于基本收入思想的研究。

 

 

II. BI-Concept of the Federal Study Group as an example of a left-wing perspective

 

2 联邦研究组织的基本收入概念是左翼观点的一个例子

I would now like to introduce the BI model which the Federal Study Group on Basic Income within the Left party is in favour of. I personally am in favour of this concept, too. But keep in mind that is not the position of the whole of the LEFT Party.

现在我介绍这个基本收入模型,这个模型是左党的基本收入研究组织喜好的,我也倾向于这个概念。但请记住,这不是整个左党立场。

 

At the final stages, this concept provides a basic income of 950 euros to every person aged 16 or over. The amount is based on the poverty risk threshold.在最后阶段,这个概念给每位16岁(含)以上的人950欧元的基本收入。这个数量是基于贫穷风险的门槛。

The basic income can be combined with all other income sources without being reduced in its amount.

 基本收入兼容所有其它的收入来源,不需要减少这些收入的数量。

The BI will be financed by an additional tax of 35 % on all sources of income + a tax on luxury goods + a primary energy tax. To sum it up, the richest third part of the population will pay for the introduction of a BI, while the middle and the lowest third of the population will profit from the introduction of a BI.

基本收入的资金来源是:对所有形式的收入征35%的附加税+奢侈品税+主要能源税。总的看来,全民中最富有的第三部分为基本收入的导入而付费,而中间阶层和全民中最穷的第三部分将从基本收入的导入中受益。

The key factor determining whether an individual is entitled to claim the BI or not is place of residence rather than citizenship.

决定一个个人是否有资格要求基本收入的关键因素是居住地而不是公民身份。

In the context of gaining the support of a majority of socially committed people, we should point out that the introduction of a BI is combined with the following additional conditions.

  在取得大多数人民支持的背景下,我们需要指出,基本收入的导入与下列附加条件兼容:

The BI needs to be combined with general minimum wages of at least 8 euros per hour. We want working people to earn good wages. The BI is not meant to be a substitute for wages.

基本收入必须兼容于每小时至少8欧元的最低工资。我们希望劳动人民挣得较高的工资。基本收入并不打算取代工资。

The BI needs to be combined with a reduction in working hours in order to promote the redistribution of the work which still exists.

基本收入必须兼容于工作小时缩减,以便促进现有工作机会的再分配。

The BI should be embedded in a general struggle for gender equality. Today, women are still responsible for the major part of social reproduction work. This has to be changed! We want at least 50 percent of social reproduction work to be done by men. Social reproduction work has to be equally distributed. On the subject of the politics of time, I have to mention a theory which I found really fascinating: the four-in-one perspective developed by the left-wing feminist Frigga Haug. According to this perspective, the working week should consist of four parts: 1. labour, 2. social reproduction work, 3 social or political activities, 4. time for creativity, love or self-qualification.

基本收入必须与性别平等的一般斗争紧密联系在一起。今天,妇女负责大部分的社会再生产工作。这必须改变! 我们要求社会再生产工作的至少50%由男性来完成。必须均等地分配社会再生产工作。
   关于时间的政治学,我必须提及一个理论,我发现它非常迷人:
   左翼女权主义者Frigga Haug提出了一个“合四为一”的观点,
   根据这个观点,工作周应该包括四部分: 1劳动, 2社会再生产工作, 3社会活动或政治活动, 4创造的时间,爱的时间,以及自我实现的时间。

Without doubt, the BI would replace several of the existing social benefits, for example social assistance or student assistance. However, in the interest of parity and solidarity in burden sharing, social insurance should remain in place after the introduction of the BI. From a left-wing point of view, the BI is not meant to be a replacement/substitute for the existing forms of social insurance, such as pension, health, nursing-care and unemployment insurance systems. The BI which I support is meant to be an addition to the existing forms of social insurance.

 
  毫无疑问,基本收入将取代现有的社会公益制度,如社会救济或助学金等。然而,为了在分摊费用上对等和团结,社会保险应该在基本收入导入以后依然保留。
   从左翼的观点看,基本收入没有被认为是现存的社会保险(如退休金、健康、护理以及失业保险系统)的替换或替补。
   我支持的基本收入被认为是增加在现存的社会保险之上的。

  

For people with special needs, such as the disabled, we still need additional forms of assistance to be available which reflect their specific circumstances.

对于人们的特殊需要,例如残疾,我们仍然需要能够反映他们具体情况的格外救助形式。

The struggle for a BI should be embedded in the struggle for BI as a global social right.

为基本收入的奋斗,应当包含把基本收入当作全球社会权力的奋斗。

The BI should be combined with new educational ethics. The existing educational system is still very much dominated by the methods of pressure and compulsion. What we need instead is an educational system encouraging self-determination.

基本收入应当兼容于新的教育伦理。现存的教育系统仍然很大程度上受制于压制与强迫的方法。我们应该用一个鼓励自我决定的教育系统替代它。

 

We only have a chance to win a majority in the parliaments if we first of all win a majority within civil society. If the majority of the population were convinced, then we could rely on the tendency towards opportunism within the parties. In order to win over civil society, we need to underline the advantages of the BI. That is what I would like to do from a left-wing perspective.

  要想赢得议会中的大多数,我们只有一个机会,那就是首先赢得公民社会的大多数。如果大多数的人民被说服了,则我们就可以依靠政党内部的机会主义倾向。
   为了赢得公民社会,我们需要强调基本收入的好处。这就是我希望从左派的角度去做的事情。 

 

III. Advantages of the BI from a left-wing political perspective

3、以左翼的政治观点看基本收入的优点

 

In political debates, equality and liberty are often considered to be in contradiction with each other. But the BI is a project that brings both aims together. A BI would liberate everyone from hardship. The humiliation of having to ask for assistance would fall away. And the BI brings about the right to self-determination.

  在政治辩论中,平等和自由经常被认为是互相矛盾的。但基本收入是一个能让两者协调起来的方案。基本收入将所有人从苦难中解放出来,让大家彻底摆脱必须乞求援助的屈辱,带给大家自我决定的权利。

The existing social benefits are considered to be stigmatizing and repressive. The BI is the opposite of this, neither stigmatizing nor repressive. As a result of this, the problem of hidden poverty, or what might better be termed "ashamed poverty" will be resolved.

现存的社会福利被指责为是无价值的、残暴的。基本收入与此相反,既不会无价值,也不残暴。因此,它可以解决隐形贫穷问题,还可以解决被叫做“害羞的贫穷”的问题。

Liberation from the fear of hardship puts people in a better negotiating position towards their bosses. Nowadays, low wages and additional working hours – even unpaid – are often accepted. Since those people who still have a job are afraid of becoming unemployed. And being unemployed still means falling into a system of poverty, exclusion and repression. The introduction of a BI would therefore strengthen the position of employees; it would strengthen their bargaining-power. The improved negotiating position could lead to higher wages and a reduction in working hours and could even start a process of democratization of working conditions.

   将人们从苦难的恐惧中解放出来,让他们在与老板谈判时处于一个更有利的地位。今天,低工资和加班(有时甚至是不付报酬的)常常被接受,因为这些仍有工作的人害怕失业。失业仍然意味着陷入到贫穷、排斥及压制的泥沼中。基本收入的导入,将加强雇工的地位、加强他们议价的力量。谈判地位的改进会带来较高的工资及工作时间的减少,甚至启动劳动条件民主化的过程。

As already mentioned, the BI makes a general reduction of working hours easier. It allows people to spend more time in qualifying themselves further or to take sabbaticals.

  如前面提及到的那样,基本收入使工作时间的普遍减少更加容易。它让人们有更多的时间进一步提高自己、或者享受假期。

The security afforded by the knowledge that an income is provided in every life situation has the potential to encourage forms of solidarity-based economic activity. By guaranteeing a minimum level of financial security, the BI makes people less vulnerable to extortion.

由知识提供的保障是提供给任何生存环境下的一份收入,它倾向于鼓励基于团结的经济活动形式。通过保证最低水平的财政安全,基本收入使得人民免遭勒索。

Will the BI act as a Trojan horse and lead to the collapse of capitalism from within, or can it comfortably be incorporated into the capitalist framework? This is a contentious issue. What is certain, however, is that it breaks with the "usefulness" logic inherent to capitalism. The introduction of a BI is no guarantee of systemic transformation, but it would create far better conditions for economic forms which look beyond the profit motive.

  基本收入计划究竟是一个让资本主义崩溃的特洛伊木马,还是会顺利地成为资本主义框架的一部分?这是一个容易引起争论的议题。然而,它无疑会打破资本主义内在逻辑的“有效性”。基本收入的引入并不保证全面地扭转资本主义的本质,但它会给经济创造一个更好的条件,使之超然于狭隘的利润动机。

 

IV. Step by step

I doubt whether we will achieve the introduction of BI straight away. I therefore recommend a dual strategy: We should continue advocating the idea of BI in general and try to convince more and more people. And in the political field we should fight for concrete first steps towards introducing a BI.

  我怀疑我们是否能立刻实现基本收入的导入。因此,我推荐一个双重策略:我们应该继续支持一般的基本收入思想,以及设法说服越来越多的人。在政治领域,我们应该努力实现一些朝向于基本收入的初级目标。

 

Maybe BI for children, for pensioners or for students could be first introductory steps? A next step could be the introduction of a sabbatical with full pay. Furthermore the existing social benefits for the unemployed have to be improved, have to be developed in the direction of BI. This means sufficient conditional transfer. This means limiting means testing as much as possible and also eliminating the requirement to work.

  或许第一步就是把基本收入发给小孩、或者是退休者、或者是学生?下一步就是采取全薪的假期。此外,对现存的失业社会福利进行改良,使之发展成直接的基本收入。这意味着转变条件已经成熟。这意味着尽可能限制财产状况的考察,意味着可以忽略必须工作的要求。

In this way, step by step, we can achieve a situation where the majority already lives in circumstances close to BI. And it would then be easier to introduce BI for the rest.

这样,一步一步地,我们就能够实现这样一种境况:大多数人已经生活在接近于基本收入的环境中。于是就可以很容易的实现基本收入的剩余部分。

 

And so I have a dream. One day people will tell each other: "Just imagine, once upon a time, a time long ago, people could not imagine life with BI. Now we can not imagine life without BI."

That is a day I am looking forward to.

  并且,我有一个梦想。有一天,人们之间谈论道:“如同梦幻,很久以前,人们无法想象有基本收入的生活。而今天,我们无法想象没有基本收入的生活。”

  这就是我们期盼的那一天。

 

Thank you for your attention!

谢谢您的关注

 

[此贴子已经被作者于2008-11-16 12:43:46编辑过]

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2008-11-16 20:01:00

一个“钱”字,让许多人在货币政策与财政政策中迷失——留下了许多混淆的空间。

说到底,就是弄清楚income与money的关系。

处理(控制)不好money,让每个人都至少有某一水平的income的理想,也会落空。

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2008-11-17 12:31:00

顶起。

by Richard C. Cook

“The Basic Income Guarantee and Monetary Reform: A Tale of Two Ideas”
A speech to the U.S. BIG Network Annual Conference in New York on February 23, 2007, by Richard C. Cook


Today I am here to talk about another of my interests—the link between proposals for a Basic Income Guarantee and monetary reform.

Before I worked at NASA in the mid-1980s, I was a policy analyst at the U.S. Civil Service Commission, the Food and Drug Administration, and the Jimmy Carter White House under his special assistant for consumer affairs, Esther Peterson. After NASA, which I left soon after the Challenger tragedy, I spent twenty-one years with the U.S. Treasury Department. I retired in January 2007 after thirty-two years of federal experience.

While I am new to the U.S. BIG Network, my interest goes back a long time. When I worked at the Carter White House, I was organizing a study group on monetary reform, which was to include income policy, when Carter was voted out of office in favor of Ronald Reagan in 1980.

The election of 1980 was a watershed in U.S. history. It was a takeover of the policy apparatus of government by the extreme right-wing. This affected every aspect of American politics and culture. Those of us who remained in government but still believed we had a positive role to play in supporting the progressive aspirations of the American people thereafter kept a low profile.

Later on, even the Clinton administration made many accommodations to the conservative attitudes which had entered public life with the Reaganites and with the Republican takeover of Congress in 1994. Some Democrats tend to romanticize the Clinton years, forgetting that the economic recovery of the 90s was fueled by foreign capital and ended with the bursting of the dot.com bubble and a stock market crash. From the standpoint of overall government policies, we have lived in an atmosphere dominated by the conservative ideology for a full generation.

I believe that today we are finally seeing the pendulum swing back in the direction of more progressive attitudes as the conservative ideology crashes into ruins. What that ideology has left us with are economic, ethical, fiscal, and military disasters.

My experience in government long ago led me to the conclusion that the most important economic issue facing the world is income security and that it is the job of government, acting as the custodian of what you can call the commonwealth of American citizens as defined in our Constitution, to safeguard it.

 
I said income security, not job security. People in this room know the world of difference between the two, as few others do. As many have come to realize, real job security is extremely difficult to achieve in an era where technology has made so many jobs obsolete and where the rapid pace of change has destroyed the typical career patterns of a generation ago. Lately I have been reading articles by a man named Marshall Brain who says that by 2030 robots will take over fifty percent of the jobs in the U.S. economy, and I agree that the potential is certainly there.

So a basic human right to income security cannot and should not be linked with an imperative that everyone be engaged in earning a living all the time. While more can always be done to foster job creation, it will never entirely solve the income security problem. Welfare-to-work is not the answer.

I believe, as I think many of you do here, that the right to income security must be viewed as an absolute. This right, I believe without apology, is ultimately based on a spiritual value, that every human being who comes to life on the planet has a right to a minimally secure existence, which governments exist to ensure. I believe that income security is what people must have to express their right to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” Without income security, that is a hollow phrase.

These values are being threatened in today’s political, economic, and social environment as never before in U.S. history. Conservatives have wanted us to believe that eliminating much of the social safety net in favor of unbridled economic license, sometimes called “market fundamentalism,” would “lift all boats” and allow individuals to prosper in ways not possible under the shelter of the welfare state. This has obviously not happened.

We have more than forty-five million people without health insurance, thirty-five million without enough to eat, increasing poverty, and a declining standard of living for all but the most wealthy. After a period of decline, violent crime is increasing. The housing bubble has burst, leaving millions of people facing possible loss of their homes. The federal government, with a current debt approaching $9 trillion and $44 trillion in unfunded liabilities, has been declared bankrupt by economists close to the Federal Reserve. Meanwhile, our public infrastructure is crumbling, with a maintenance deficit of over $2 trillion.

After a generation of conservative rule, and in spite of three years of a balanced budget at the end of the Clinton presidency, public finance in the United States today is in crisis, if not total collapse. A quarter century of politics devoted to the dismantling of social welfare programs, privatization of public assets, huge tax cuts for the wealthy, continuing export of manufacturing jobs, deregulation of the financial industry, and gigantic expenditures on the war machine have eroded the ability of the federal government to do anything meaningful about income security.

If you set this crippling of government against such facts as the $53.4 million 2006 bonus given to the CEO of Goldman Sachs last December and the ongoing attempt by the Bush administration to conquer the Middle East by military force, you get a vivid impression of a society racing over a cliff.

The article by Paul Krugman, the New York Times’ economics columnist, in Rolling Stone magazine last December entitled “The Great Wealth Transfer,” portrays a society that has fallen from its status as the world’s greatest industrial democracy to one that is beginning to resemble a banana republic oligarchy, with a ruling class that is unbelievably rich and a population that is sinking toward a state of debt slavery and economic peonage. The facts are undeniable and well-documented.

So where does the Basic Income Guarantee fit into this gloomy picture? In the near-term, Congress, having returned to Democratic control, may raise the minimum wage a dollar or two an hour. The ongoing fall of the dollar will promote exports and so be a factor in job creation, though these jobs are low-paying and have few benefits. A Basic Income Guarantee is not on the horizon.

Yet I don’t believe the situation is hopeless in the long run. We have some examples to point to that over time could get people’s attention. One is the Brazilian experiment.

The other ray of hope is that the dire economic situation can act as a stimulus for progressives to start challenging economic fundamentals. Here is where I think the Basic Income Guarantee movement could benefit by looking at what is going on in monetary reform, because any push to enact a Basic Income Guarantee through income redistribution is likely to face insurmountable obstacles. We are not going to get middle-class citizens to give up their mortgage deductions, for example, so the poor can get a break, when they know that what Lou Dobbs calls “the war on the middle class” is real and that it threatens their own financial existence.


Of course there are potential tax sources that could pay for at least a partial Basic Income Guarantee. Obviously, one would be to roll back the Bush tax cuts altogether. Another would be to slash defense spending a couple of hundred billion dollars a year. Another could be to shut down all offshore tax havens, as suggested by economist Michael Hudson, the ones that effectively reduce or eliminate taxes paid by corporations, the wealthy, or organized crime. Another would be a universal land use tax as advocated by the Henry George movement. Yet another would be to raise taxes on capital gains and interest income.

If one took the matter seriously, raising a quarter of a trillion dollars or more annually through restructured taxation to pay for a modest negative income tax would be no trouble at all. Not only would it not detract from the economy, it would produce a huge economic boost by injecting purchasing power at the consumer level where it would be spent on goods and services rather than inflating more asset bubbles. But can this be accomplished in today’s political environment? Probably only if the voters elect a truly progressive president and Congress in 2008. 

But we should also examine where the monetary reform movement can enter into the picture. Monetary reformers challenge the dogma that the only ways government can acquire money to disburse are through taxes and borrowing.

The thrust of the monetary reform movement, as least that segment of it not devoted to the introduction of local currencies, is to shift the power of influencing the creation of wealth back toward the government.

One way to do this would be to create a federal authority charged with rebuilding the nation’s physical infrastructure through long-term low-interest loans. This is what Roosevelt did during the New Deal with the Reconstruction Finance Corporation. The current LaTourette/Kucinich bill for a federal infrastructure bank would allow for the insertion of money for investment at the state and local levels and would also create new jobs. Such a bank would act as a major economic stimulus.

On the side of money and credit, the Federal Reserve System has long operated by alternately stimulating and slowing the economy through its regulation of fractional reserve banking and through actions affecting interest rates, but never in ways that have proved truly effective. This is because attempts to use liquidity to manipulate economic growth are always tied to the creation of credit that must be repaid with interest.

In my opinion, it would be much more effective for the Federal Reserve simply to give away money, as it went a long way toward doing with the slashing of long-term interest rates leading to the housing bubble. Hundreds of billions of dollars were pumped into the economy, but now the bill is coming due because of the enormous inflation of housing prices that have left society as a whole much worse off than when the bubble began. But the bubble can be viewed as an income program for homeowners and speculators with a substantial multiplier effect for the entire economy. According to investment analysts, fifty percent of U.S. economic growth in 2005 was due to the stimulation of the housing market.

As I indicated, it would have been simpler if the Federal Reserve, or the U.S. Treasury, simply gave away money, and what I would like to suggest is that we begin to think about issuing a Basic Income Guarantee without charging any cost at all to the federal budget through what has been called a National Dividend.

This is not a frivolous suggestion. It was proposed by Major C.H. Douglas and the Social Credit writers of the 1920s and began a political movement which has continued through today in Great Britain, Canada, and New Zealand. This would be money creation at its simplest and most direct, similar to the Greenbacks legislated by Congress during the Civil War. Then, Congress authorized expenditures in the amount of $450 million, and the government simply spent the money into existence.

It was a system that worked remarkably well, one which the bankers have propagandized against ever since. Greenbacks still made up a third of the U.S. currency into the early years of the 20th century. Few people know that FDR also had Greenback authority, though he never used it. It was money supposedly created out of thin air, a true fiat currency, and if people tell you that the Greenbacks caused inflation, they are wrong. What is truly inflationary is debt-based money created by the Federal Reserve. In fact, since 1965, the dollar has lost over eighty-five percent of its value.

I would strongly recommend that Basic Income Guarantee proponents study the Social Credit ideas carefully. This is what first got me interested in monetary reform back in the late 1970s. What C.H. Douglas was saying was that in a technologically advanced economy, production is always ahead of the income available for consumption. He said that there is no way that the population of a nation can ever earn enough money to purchase what industry can produce. There is lag time and there are many inefficiencies in the distribution system. Also, there must be provision for household and business savings. This was why Keynes advocated government deficit spending in order to reconstruct the economy on the demand side. 

In other words, in order to consume the production base and keep the nation’s workforce employed, the government must introduce purchasing power. Simpler, more direct, and less prone to inflation would be to issue what Douglas called a National Dividend at the start of each year to everyone, without means tests, without distinction as to whether you work or not. It is a Basic Income Guarantee. Remember, this was suggested in the 1920s. In fact, Douglas had succeeded in reconciling the capitalist system to principles of economic democracy in a way that all previous European thinkers had failed to do, including Marx.

Douglas’s ideas also had a strong ethical underpinning in that they postulated that the production of wealth was not just a result of the utilization of private resources or capital but of the brainpower and labor of the entire nation. People make things in a social context. All members of society contribute in some small way to the cultural fabric within which wealth is generated. So all should share in the benefits of a National Dividend.

Of course Social Credit was opposed by conservatives of every stripe whose highest value was private property, private ownership of everything of value, private creation of money through bank loans, and the exclusive claim to the profits from private enterprise.

Keynesianism did not last. It was succeeded by the attempt by the Federal Reserve to manipulate the economy through targeting of the money supply, a practice known as monetarism, one which has failed miserably, the latest fiasco being the aforementioned housing bubble. Reagan-era supply-side tax cuts, along with those of George W. Bush, were an attempt to compensate for the failure of monetarism to boost demand, but the problem again was that there has not been sufficient purchasing power except through increased household debt, a fact every economist recognizes.

So I would conclude this brief presentation by suggesting to the Basic Income Guarantee community to look seriously at monetary reform, especially the Social Credit ideas, for a theoretical underpinning of Basic Income Guarantee proposals that I believe can work in tandem with meaningful tax reform. Again I mention the writer Marshall Brain, who advocates an annual stipend for every citizen as their share of societal wealth. A figure of $10,000 per year would likely be adequate.

Such a stipend can be issued to individuals as a credit or voucher against future production. It would be a simple, effective way to introduce liquidity into the economy, far better than the debt-based system of fractional reserve banking that leads to profits for the banks at the expense of everyone else.

At the same time, it is important to keep the pressure on Congress and the political system to think about a Basic Income Guarantee when they think about income and tax policy. Any progress in this direction is worthwhile. It is also critical to work toward making a Basic Income Guarantee part of the progressive political agenda. See, for example, an article in The Progressive a few months ago by editor Matthew Rothschild entitled, “Our Sinful Economy.” It is essential to have workable proposals ready as our economy continues to stumble into the crises that are inevitable given the huge problems that exist with income maldistribution, the continuing decline of the social safety net, rising crime statistics, and the collapse of the ability of the federal government to meet the needs of the nation through the budget process.

It can be pointed out to progressives that the monetary reform movement can show that a Basic Income Guarantee is not only ethically and spiritually the correct attitude of society but that it is also an economic necessity. Two books on the subject which I strongly recommend are The Lost Science of Money by Stephen Zarlenga, head of the American Monetary Institute, and The Grip of Death, a Study of Modern Money, Debt Slavery, and Destructive Economics by the British author Michael Rowbothan.

Books such as these can provide help for the badly needed progressive consensus of what coherent alternative we can offer to the disastrous state of the nation and the world today. We are clearly witnessing a worldwide class war, where, as U.S. billionaire Warren Buffet has said, "There’s class warfare, all right, but it’s my class, the rich class, that’s making war, and we’re winning." I believe that a Basic Income Guarantee, combined with monetary reform, shows this war to be totally unnecessary.

One final note. You might reasonably ask why haven’t such monetary reform concepts as Social Credit and the National Dividend been adopted or even seriously studied by mainstream economics? The answer is obviously political. Mainstream economics is dominated by concepts favorable to control by the private financial industry. The last thing the bankers want is money in the hands of the rank-and-file of society that is not tied in some way to a monetary debt. That this can be done easily and simply is the best-kept secret in economics history. But there are economists who support these ideas. In fact, during the Depression, a majority of U.S. economists supported something called the Chicago Plan that would have revolutionized banking and finance in this country. Monetary ideas that may seem revolutionary and that would be characterized as such by the financial establishment, to real monetary reformers look simple, logical, and fair. 

And there have been times in American history when people were bolder and understood much better the consequences of our being what President Martin Van Buren called a “bank-ridden society.” Jefferson saw control of the economy by banks as the death-knell of freedom. In an 1802 letter to Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin he said:

I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around [the banks] will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered. The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs.

Then during the last third of the 19th century we had the Populist and Greenback parties which focused on monetary issues. There was William Jennings Bryan’s “Cross of Gold” speech when he ran for president in 1896. But with the passage of the Federal Reserve Act of 1913 the door of monetary progressive politics was slammed shut and has remained tightly fastened for almost a century. Progressives everywhere should be prying that door open again if not resolutely kicking it down.

Thank you for the opportunity to meet with you at this important forum, and I look forward to many future encounters.
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2008-11-17 16:25:00
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