A Dutch city is giving money away to test the basic income theory

That implies that being poor is a product of a personal 'failure'. Sometimes it is. From what I understand though, the vast majority of times it's not. Much like the vast majority of wealthy people aren't wealthy because they really worked at it, but because maybe they worked at it and mostly they were given opportunities that the less fortunate weren't.

Here's a quick translation (I tried to do it correctly, but didn't want to spent too much time on it)

Utrecht starts experiment with basic income.

16-06-2015 • 10:15

Everhardt2

After the summer holidays Utrechts starts an experiment around the basic income. Counciller Victor Everhardt from "Work and income" likes to see if a basic income principle works in practice. "It would be more simple if the system is again based on trust."

Why this experiment?

I have been counciller "Work and Income" for a year and I think that it's a sign of civilisation that people who, usually temporary, but sometimes also longer, cannot take care of their income get social security benefits. At the other end of that system we have built up a huge verification system, often based on mistrust.

People with benefits usually have to take into account a large number of rules, like welfare, special welfare, rent assistance, children welfare etcetera. All these systems have their own verification mechanisms. There's a forest for the trees amount of rules and verification methods. It's quite easy to get stuck here. It would be a lot simpler if we could base the system again on trust.

People could abuse this and not go to work?

From our data it appears that less then 1.5 percent abuses the welfare payments system. However, before we get into all kinds of principle debates about should we do this or not, we would like to research how a basic income system works.

What happens if somebody gets a monthly payment without additional rules and verifications? Will such a person go sit at home passively or is that person more motivated to develop him/herself and make a meaningful contribution to our society with paid or voluntary work?

How are you going to research that?

Together with the University of Utrecht we have designed an experiment at which people who live on welfare get to meet specific regimes. For example a group that works with rewards and 'jobs' for a payment, another group with a basic income without any additional rules and of course a control group that lives by the current rules.

And are you allowed to do this from the minister?

We have verified this at official level to see if an experiment with a basic income is possible and we have not yet heard "njet". In addition, minister Plasterk of internal affairs has announced that cities should get more room to experiment with existing law. We think the basic income is very suitable for this.

When does the experiment with basic income start?

End of June we have an expert meeting about basic income with other cities that also have plans into the same direction, like Nijmegen, Wageningen, Tilburg and Groningen. Together we can make our call for more room of possibilities for cities stronger. In addition we like to start with the experiment in the second half of this year.

(deStadUtrecht.nl – Mario Gibbels)

edit: spelling, readability and line spacing

Looking at populations of people who have gone from being very poor to being very rich overnight does not support that statement. Most of the time the money is more of a curse than anything else. I believe the same goes for people who go from very poor to receiving an annuity from things like legal settlements, but I am only guessing at that.

(I'm not arguing against it, I think it's an experiment worth having)

I think there is are a few hidden premises here that need to be called out: the premise that having more money is better for everybody than having less, the premise that not struggling at all in life -- whether for personal goals or paying the rent -- is better than struggling, the premise that everybody will respond in a positive way to the same external stimulus, and so on.

I find many of these premises dubious, but I cannot deny the fact that I personally feel better the more folks in the world that go to bed without being hungry or sick. The trick is separating my personal desire to feel good from what actually may be happening with various policies I would support. That's why we need more data here. It's very easy to grandstand something like this either way. There's a lot of smoke but very little light.

I think in Norway it would end up with much worse results than in the US. I think Norwegians in this case would vote for some kind of nazi stuff. It's enough for you to have a few immigrants here and there to become extreme right.

So, please don't compare and don't think you are any better. You are not.

The second doesn't disincentivize working, as you still get increased rewards if you work or work harder.

* Unless you are in a position of power of course, then you deserve more.