Activity

[...] This could be the first technological revolution that is generating more work, even though it is disrupting and replacing paid labour. But it is contributing to the growing inequality of income. Tim Berners-Lee, inventor of the World Wide Web, says he supports basic income as a tool for cor…

A libertarian might regard that quasi-Darwinian prospect with equanimity; the rest of us might not.

The idea of giving money directly to people to boost growth was put forward in a famous 1969 article by Milton Friedman, who used the parable of scattering dollar bills from a helicopter for the public to pick up. 'Helicopter money'--printing money to distribute to the public--has been proposed by American bond investor Bill Gross and by the economics journalist Martin Wolf, among others.

[...] had the UK's £375 billion of QE been diverted to pay a basic income, everyone legally resident in Britain could have received £50 a week for two years. Instead, QE has enriched the financiers, worsened income inequality and hastened the alarming oncoming crisis of underfunded pension schemes.