Germany's Basic Income

From the DW:

“Money for nothing: Germany starts basic income experiment”

It sounds like an intriguing offer. For a period of three years some people get €1,200 a month for free. They only have to answer researchers' questions about how they're faring with this unconditional income. Interest in taking part in the experiment has been overwhelming. Within a week, more than 1.5 million volunteers have signaled their willingness to participate in a big study on unconditional basic income. The organizers are looking for a total of 1,500 participants, 120 of which will receive €1,200 ($1,420) per month for a period of three years. "They don't have to do anything for it except fill in seven online questionnaires during those three years," says a description of the experiment on the project's website. The money comes from around 150,000 donors right now and is tax-free for all recipients. In the end, every participant will get €43,200, adding up to a total of €5.2 million for the project. All of this has been initiated by a Berlin-based public charity.

Basic income just a pipe dream?  Officials from the Mein Grundeinkommen (My Basic Income) charity are convinced that an unconditional income for all citizens would solve many current problems. The assumption is that people get more creative and become freer and happier if they don't constantly face the pressure to earn enough money to get by. Whether this lives up to reality will be explored scientifically during the project. "We'll analyze what people are doing during a period of guaranteed material security," project chief Jürgen Schupp from the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW) told DW. Among the questions he'll look into are: Will the test persons spend all the money or will they save a certain amount? Will they stop working altogether or work less? Also, will they donate money to others? The experiment will give his team all the answers it needs, says Schupp. Even changes in people's stress levels can be identified with the help of hair samples, he argues.

Ideological barriers The debate about an unconditional basic income has been going on for years, and it's often been marked by people's ideological bias. The core question is what people do when they don't have to do anything. Opponents think it's the idea of left-leaning daydreamers who want to laze about at the expense of the whole community. By contrast, supporters view such an income as a tool to solve current and future problems. Education, nursing and helping neighbors would gain a higher social status they argue. On top of that, models could be developed for a time when more and more jobs would be slashed because of ongoing digitalization and automation.

Does money make you more courageous?  DIW's Jürgen Schupp also hopes to gain insights into aspects that opponents of a basic income emphasize a lot: innovation and entrepreneurship. "Maybe the recipients of such an income are willing to take more courageous decisions to become self-employed or try another career." "We want to know," reads a slogan of the German pilot project. The charity's Michael Bohmeyer concedes he's a bit nervous about the findings. "It may well be that the pilot project will not confirm the impact that we expect it to have," he says in a video on the project's website.  What remains to be seen, though, is whether the public debate about unconditional basic income will continue with fewer ideological blinkers in three years' time when the results of the study will be published. There are already critics who claim that the very idea of such an experiment lacks any sound footing. They argue that three years aren't enough to come to any reliable conclusions as to how people would behave if they had the security of a basic income for the rest of their lives.

Political parties keep a low profile   Add to this the many questions that the project cannot answer anyway: How will consumer prices develop? Would ill or needy people have less money at their disposal than now? And to what extent would taxes have to go up to finance such an income? "Our study will certainly not be able to answer all the questions surrounding basic income," Schupp concedes. But he's looking forward to getting an answer to what he believes is the core issue: How does money influence people's behavior? "That's a gripping scientific question, and there are no serious studies to date looking into this," he says.  There have already been attempts to find out more about the impact of unconditional basic income. The results of a labor-market-focused experiment in Finland turned out to be ambiguous. A similar and even bigger, publicly financed trial in Canada was halted after a short period because of exploding costs. So far, there's been a lack of political support for basic income schemes in Germany. None of the big parties has come out in favor of them. Only recently, German Labor Minister Hubertus Heil and Finance Minister Olaf Scholz indicated they were against it.

^ I am against a universal basic income for everyone. I believe there should be Minimum Wages (that are equal and not one amount for the disabled and one amount for the non-disabled or one amount for those who get tips and those who don’t.) I also believe there should be extra Local, State and Federal help for those who are disabled, Veterans, the elderly, the sick, those who need help after a Natural Disaster, or those simply struggling. If you are unemployed you should be given temporary help while you look for a new job. I also believe there should be limits and drug tests for the unemployed and those struggling that receive Government Assistance. ^

https://www.dw.com/en/basic-income-germany-tax-free/a-54700872