I recall watching the early evening TV news in Jonesboro, Arkansas back in the mid-nineteen eighties and seeing footage of myself descending aircraft steps to the commentary “economist and professor, Mr Desmond Swayne flew into town to-day”. Well, it must have been a very thin day for news and they do use the term ‘professor’ very much more loosely than we do in the UK. Nevertheless, I was on a lecture tour of US universities, corporations and business organisations and the following morning I addressed a business breakfast at 7 AM, where most of the attendees had come from work, having already started an hour earlier -that’s productivity.
It is some now time since I passed myself off as an economist, but the facts of economic life are blindingly obvious. I am a member of the House of Commons Work and Pensions Select Committee and we recently produced a report, the Future of Work. Select Committees are encouraged to reach their conclusions by consensus from the evidence presented to them during an inquiry. I’ve never been persuaded that consensus is a virtue: It is often the lowest common denominator and gives rise to some rather bland conclusions. On this occasion however, we couldn’t reach a consensus and voted on party lines not to include a recommendation on UBI within the report.
No matter how slight your acquaintance with the science of economics, UBI -the provision of a universal basic income, has got to be amongst the daftest of ideas. That it has attractions, I have no doubt: I’ve spoken to lots of furloughed employees who, despite having only 80% of their income (compensated somewhat by no longer having commuting costs) have rather enjoyed being paid to stay at home without having to work at all.
Even Lenin insisted that “He who does not work shall not eat”. Who on earth would work if they were provided with an income that enabled them not to have to?
The argument advanced in favour of UBI is that it would not stop us from working but would provide a level of security against the possibility of a reduction in our earned income. But that is exactly what Universal Credit is there for. The difference is that UBI is to be paid to absolutely everyone where Universal Credit is only paid to those in need. It shouldn’t take an economics professor to spot that paying an income to absolutely everyone irrespective of their need, will mean you will have very much less available to concentrate on those who really are in need. Either that, or you tax everyone into to penury. .
They’d have understood this at breakfast in Jonesboro, even if they don’t in some parts of the Houser of Commons.
Sir Desmond Swayne TD
