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Ireland rolls out basic income scheme for artists

reuters.com

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Re: Ireland rolls out basic income scheme for artists

#481

Post by YesBox »

misja111 wrote: post #431
jimnotgym wrote: post #351

There are some pretty revealing comments here. People seem to think only money has value. Then there are people who see art only as a rich person's pursuit. It can be, but it doesn't need to be. I am reminded of Daniel James also known as Gwyrosydd, his bardic name. He was a Welsh language poet, who wrote probably the greatest Welsh language song, Calon Lân (means 'a pure heart'). People throughout Wales sing this so…

> People seem to think only money has value. Your either don't understand or don't want to understand what people are commenting about here. Of course nobody thinks that only money has value. If only money had value, why would anybody exchange money for, say, a bread? What many people are wondering about, is whether the value of the money paid by tax payers to artists, equals the value of what they give to the tax pa…

Unlike baking bread, It can take decades for an artist to become experienced enough to create something of value.

Some art, like classical music composition, is and has been propped up by grants and wealthy donors since forever.

Whether that’s a good allocation of resources is of course entirely subjective :)

Re: Ireland rolls out basic income scheme for artists

#482

Post by badgersnake »

jimnotgym wrote: post #351

There are some pretty revealing comments here. People seem to think only money has value. Then there are people who see art only as a rich person's pursuit. It can be, but it doesn't need to be. I am reminded of Daniel James also known as Gwyrosydd, his bardic name. He was a Welsh language poet, who wrote probably the greatest Welsh language song, Calon Lân (means 'a pure heart'). People throughout Wales sing this so…

What did you expect from a forum for VC fanboys?

Re: Ireland rolls out basic income scheme for artists

#484

Post by closewith »

BryantD wrote: post #398
closewith wrote: post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Society has not disintegrated. Obviously not because of this income scheme and not complete disintegration, but Irish society is under extreme strain from housing pressures, rising living costs, and growing polarisation that is tearing at social cohesion. It's frustrating to see funds allocated to this scheme when health, housing, transport, etc are all failing apart.

All true, but let's not lose track of relative costs. The income program provides €33,800,000 a year (2000 participants, €325 a week, 52 weeks in a year). Double that to account for cost of managing the program -- that seems too high to me, but I want to err on the side of caution for this analysis. Some percentage of that money flows right back into the economy, of course. Meanwhile, ignoring windfall corporate taxe…

The allocation this year is €18m and it goes live in Q4. On a steady-state basis we are likely in the €60–70m range annually. That's not a rounding error.

This is an eight-figure recurring commitment. It represents the total lifetime income tax contribution of well over 100 ordinary Irish workers per year. That's not an abstract, it's decades of PAYE from real people.

Public finance is about marginal allocation. Many high-impact projects sit in or below this band:

* St Christopher’s Hospice rebuild in Cavan – €13.5 MM

* Cork Educate Together Secondary School in Douglas – €45 MM

* NAS Ambulance Centre in New Ross – €0.5 MM

* CAMHS national annual opex budget – €180 MM

So these aren't symbolic sums. They're the difference between capacity and waiting lists.

“Money flows back into the economy” applies equally to nurses, SNAs, paramedics, construction workers, carers, etc. Recirculation is a property of all domestic public spending. It is not a defence of any specific programme.

Comparing this to the national deficit is also wrong. Almost every discrete programme looks small beside a multi-billion euro figure (whether it's the structural deficit or the €29 BN DSP budget). That does not mean it should escape scrutiny. Budget decisions are made at the margin. €60 MM for artist basic income competes with all these other €5-100m line items, not with the entire deficit.

Exponent blindness is real, but it is not relevant here. The question is:

Is this the highest-value use of €60-70 MM per year in a system with delayed scoliosis surgeries, SNA shortages, and overstretched mental health services?

Re: Ireland rolls out basic income scheme for artists

#485

Post by closewith »

jmmcd wrote: post #435
TheSpiceIsLife wrote: post #408

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This program has nothing going for it. That 33 million could have built, let’s say, 66 houses and housed, let’s say, 264 people (66 families of four) for a generation before needing much in the way of maintenance. But no, fuck the working poor , let’s fund artists. Myopic.

You didn't read the article. The scheme gave positive return on investment.

> It also recouped more than the trial's net cost of 72 million euros ($86 million) through increases in arts-related expenditure, productivity gains and reduced reliance on other social welfare payments, according to a government-commissioned cost-benefit analysis.

I'd love to see the breakdown on this, because in my experience with Government comms, if it was a straightforward economic win like an FDI or industrial announcement, they'd headline the figure. Unquantified phrases like "reduced reliance on other social welfare payments" are usually spin at best.

Re: Ireland rolls out basic income scheme for artists

#486

Post by philipallstar »

gamma42 wrote: post #422
qualitylearing wrote: post #420

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[dead]

"Paying for the world to run". The world goes regardless of those who steal wealth.

Of course. The objection is only to the stealing of wealth being increased to give it to certain blessed artists.

Re: Ireland rolls out basic income scheme for artists

#487

Post by angiolillo »

misja111 wrote: post #431
jimnotgym wrote: post #351

There are some pretty revealing comments here. People seem to think only money has value. Then there are people who see art only as a rich person's pursuit. It can be, but it doesn't need to be. I am reminded of Daniel James also known as Gwyrosydd, his bardic name. He was a Welsh language poet, who wrote probably the greatest Welsh language song, Calon Lân (means 'a pure heart'). People throughout Wales sing this so…

> People seem to think only money has value. Your either don't understand or don't want to understand what people are commenting about here. Of course nobody thinks that only money has value. If only money had value, why would anybody exchange money for, say, a bread? What many people are wondering about, is whether the value of the money paid by tax payers to artists, equals the value of what they give to the tax pa…

> one might wonder why they apparently are not able to sell their art for the same amount of money

"Public goods" like parks, museums, bridges, roadways, transit, nature preserves, community spaces, and public safety services produce both direct value to their immediate users as well as substantial diffuse value to their community. Direct value can be captured by user fees, tolls, subscriptions, etc but capturing diffuse value is challenging. A park raises surrounding property values even for people who do not visit the park. Good transportation infrastructure increases the value of surrounding land and and productivity per capita even for nonusers. Relying solely on user fees may force some of these entities to close or fall into disrepair, thereby reducing overall value by substantially more than it would have cost to maintain them. And in some cases shifting the cost burden to direct users substantially lowers the diffuse value, for example back when fire fighting companies would let houses burn unless their owners paid them, ultimately resulting in more overall community fire damage.

In these cases, subsidizing these public services with taxes (optimally Georgist land-value taxes) is an economically rational decision.

One could plausibly argue that artists similarly produce diffuse value e.g., raising the profile of their nation or culture, making their neighborhood a more desirable place for people with money. Not only do artists typically struggle to collect a share of this diffuse value, as renters the very value they create often ends up pricing out of their community. I could imagine cases where it is a net benefit for a government to subsidize such entities if such subsidy is less than the fraction of the diffuse benefit that ends up being collected by taxes.

I have no insight as to whether this scheme in particular is net positive, please see sibling posts for that. I'm just explaining that such arrangements are both economically rational and extremely common in high-functioning societies.

Re: Ireland rolls out basic income scheme for artists

#488

Post by lucideer »

BSDobelix wrote: post #379
jimnotgym wrote: post #351

There are some pretty revealing comments here. People seem to think only money has value. Then there are people who see art only as a rich person's pursuit. It can be, but it doesn't need to be. I am reminded of Daniel James also known as Gwyrosydd, his bardic name. He was a Welsh language poet, who wrote probably the greatest Welsh language song, Calon Lân (means 'a pure heart'). People throughout Wales sing this so…

>Go Ireland, great scheme. I wish we had it over here in the UK. It's a bad scheme, it divide's your population into people who have to create "wealth", and people who create "art". Yes creating art (or preserving rare potatoes[1]) should be supported by your government if it's not survivable in a capitalistic society, however having different rights because of your occupation is not better then the middle ages. [1]…

I agree with your sentiment but in practice that criticism only shows that this measure is insufficient, not that it's a net negative.

I think it should go a lot further than it does but it seems unambiguously positive even by your own framing.

Re: Ireland rolls out basic income scheme for artists

#489

Post by akudha »

jimnotgym wrote: post #351

There are some pretty revealing comments here. People seem to think only money has value. Then there are people who see art only as a rich person's pursuit. It can be, but it doesn't need to be. I am reminded of Daniel James also known as Gwyrosydd, his bardic name. He was a Welsh language poet, who wrote probably the greatest Welsh language song, Calon Lân (means 'a pure heart'). People throughout Wales sing this so…

People throughout Wales sing this song 130 years later

I wonder how far are we from a song that is entirely generated by AI and becomes as loved as a song created by a human, and is still sung/played by people decades later? It feels weird to even think about it.

If AI does get as good as humans at creating art (I think it might), what happens then? Will human generated art be still as respected/valuable? Will humans even bother creating art at that stage?

On the topic of basic income - people seem to have strong opinions on both sides. I guess time will tell, but there isn't anything wrong in experimenting, at minimum. To those who strongly oppose UBI - don't we already give bailouts, huge tax breaks, subsidies to entire industries etc, to the extent of rewarding bad behavior (criminal behavior even) - like the one that caused 2008 crash? Why is corporate handouts okay but not UBI?

Re: Ireland rolls out basic income scheme for artists

#490

Post by closewith »

AdamConwayIE wrote: post #480
misja111 wrote: post #431

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> People seem to think only money has value. Your either don't understand or don't want to understand what people are commenting about here. Of course nobody thinks that only money has value. If only money had value, why would anybody exchange money for, say, a bread? What many people are wondering about, is whether the value of the money paid by tax payers to artists, equals the value of what they give to the tax pa…

You don't have to wonder whether or not it returns value to the tax payer. The Irish government already monitored the pilot program for two years, publishing all of the details and findings. [1] "The headline finding from this social CBA is that for every €1 of public money invested in the pilot, society received €1.39 in return" This came about as a mixture of greater economic activity from participants, cultural im…

Thanks for linking the CBA. I hadn't seen that before

> "The headline finding from this social CBA is that for every €1 of public money invested in the pilot, society received €1.39 in return"

Okay, so if you read the CBA, the net fiscal cost of the pilot was:

* Gross pilot cost (2021–2025): ~€114 MM

* Tax revenue: ~€36 MM

* Social protection savings: ~€6.5 MM

* Net fiscal cost: ~€72 MM

So for every €1 of public money invested in the pilot, society received 37¢ in fiscal return. So it's an unambiguous fiscal cost, a net loss.

Of the "Total monetised benefits", €80 MM of the benefit was in "wellbeing gains", as measured by the WELLBY test, which is calculated based on a single survey question:

> “Overall, how satisfied are you with your life nowadays, where 0 is "not at all satisfied" and 10 is "completely satisfied"?

The €80 MM in "wellbeing gains", which is the sole decided of whether this pilot was a net positive or a net negative to society, is because on average, the 2,000 pilot scheme participants had a very approximate 0.7–1.1 increase in score when asked the above question during the pilot as compared to before the pilot. Each 1 point is deemed to be worth €15,340.

That's it. There's no economic return - it's a proven economic cost. There's no proven social benefit. No demonstrated effect on art prices or availability.

The pilot was successful - if you consider it to have been - solely because the artists who received payments as part of the pilot had an improvement in Wellby satisfaction score when they were asked via survey. If you remove this factor, the pilot was an abject failure.

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