Labour’s universal basic income would leave the poorest worst off

Google the words ‘Universal Basic Income’ and you will be find high praise and excitement from a wide-ranging collection of people. Richard Branson, Mark Zuckerberg and now John McDonnell have all announced they believe that ‘free money for all’ is a good policy. UBI has fans on both the left and the right. Dutch author Rutger Bregman published his bestseller Utopia for Realists earlier this year that championed a basic income for all; while American Conservative author Charles Murray has also supported the roll-out of a similar programme.

Understood simply as a single cash transfer to each individual, regardless of how rich or poor they are, it would guarantee a minimum income and economic security for all. The idea is nothing new. Thomas Paine proposed a citizen’s dividend in the eighteenth century and Richard Nixon proposed a negative income tax in the seventies. Finland, Ontario, Canada and California have all launched UBI trials recently (with varying degrees of success).