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UK: this is an attractive part of the basic income proposition. I think such a scheme might also promote risk-taking in employment in the sense that people mig
by keithpeter 11y ago
UK: this is an attractive part of the basic income proposition.
I think such a scheme might also promote risk-taking in employment in the sense that people might be motivated to try stuff they would not normally try e.g. setting up their own micro-business or working on temporary contracts.
Now, the OA is talking about a pilot. How do those work? How do you decide to ring fence the residents in the region you are trying it in? Why could not I just move over there for a couple of years during the pilot?
- anexprogrammer 11y agoI agree. It should have been done, and the benefits system mostly abolished, decades ago. Given the organisation of welfare in the UK it is so very, very easy to fall through the gaps. It's designed for the world of the 1930s-70s. There's no point in a safety net unless it's reliable, and it clearly isn't. If you had a simple 9-5 job and been made redundant, with P45, the system seems to cope. If you are self-employed, an ex-busines owner, or juggling multiple, possibly zero hour, contracts the system breaks utterly. Claiming seems to be an entirely manual process with various people employed to validate, check and ask questions, so it is very expensive to do. If you knew you were getting that £100 (or whatever) a week, every week regardless, you'd risk the uncertain project, or even the second attempt, learning from your mistakes. The system right now puts you off ever trying anything not 9-5 again, because you'll know it'll be months to get any help out of them. Of course, like talk of simplifying the tax system, I am not optimistic it will ever happen. Or it will be an ineffective token gesture that solves nothing.