Until recently, Canadian austerity proponents have not paid a lot of attention to basic income. But now that governments are taking it up, things are changing.

The one influential study from the right, the Fraser Institute Report (January 2015), has become a major resource for conservative policy analysts appearing in the media these days. They are repeatedly defining basic income in its right wing version, as if that’s what it must be. There has been no comparable study from progressive analysts to help us counter this trend.

Ontario is about to launch a basic income pilot; Quebec is exploring ways to implement basic income provincially; the PEI Legislature has voted unanimously to urge the Provincial Government to seek a partnership with the Federal Government to begin a trial project for the entire Province; a few Federal MP’s, Senators and government officials are talking about studies and pilots.

Without a doubt, there will be pilots designed over the next while and they will affect the shape of future Canadian programs. The risk of a perverse conservative vision of basic income coming to dominate public discourse is growing, but designs conforming to austerity approaches will be disastrous.

Austerity policies don’t work. Even the IMF itself has finally acknowledged that. Yet austerity thinking continues to influence our governments. Without strong push-back, it will frustrate the potential for humane, sensible and effective basic income designs, kyboshing all anticipated positive outcomes.

Many studies have demonstrated basic income’s power to rejuvenate local economies as well as to provide significant downstream savings in, for example, health and security among other expensive social costs. These objectives are shared by conservative thinkers, but we won’t see those results if the upcoming trials are conceived in austerity and brought forth in stinginess.

Austerity versions of basic income would ‘marketize’ virtually all social services now available to those receiving social assistance, substituting a single cash payment for them.  This is wholly unrealistic and would be catastrophic for those receiving social assistance now. Fear of this result has caused some influential anti- poverty activists  to argue against basic income itself lest people end up still worse off than they now are. This fear is not foolish. But the answer is not to settle for an increase in rates or minor improvements in the current system, but to join forces to see to it that effective and humane values govern the pilot designs. The last thing we need is to leave it to right wing thinkers to define what basic income is or should be. Canadians must be able to hear and read confident and competent progressive articulations of basic income, solidly based in evidence with careful analyses of design issues in the context of Canadian federalism.

I coordinate the Kingston Action Group for a Basic Income Guarantee. We are part of a nationwide grassroots movement, affiliated with the Basic Income Canada Network, which is, in turn, affiliated with the Basic Income Earth Network. Basic income campaigns have grown quickly over the last few years, both here and abroad.

In Canada, basic income is backed by many local, provincial, and national health care, food security and social justice organizations, as well as by mayors, municipal councils, a variety of Members of Parliament and Members of Provincial Parliaments from all parties, as well as the drafters and supporters of the Leap Manifesto.

A wealth of research is available detailing positive results of many basic income experiments conducted abroad, and of course there’s Dr. Evelyn Forget’s seminal work on Canada’s Mincome experiment in the 1970s in Manitoba. But more work on design challenges is needed, especially work tailored to the contemporary world and Canada’s multi jurisdictional income security systems.

An adequate, fairly funded and well designed basic income will improve life not just for welfare recipients, but also for the working poor, people with disabilities, low income seniors, disadvantaged children, and those in part-time or precarious work. Income sufficiency, though only one strand in an adequate safety net, is a necessary one.

Furthermore, automation is taking over more and more workplaces. Robots don’t get sick and need no pay, but they also have no money to spend.  Humans will need to find other ways to provide for themselves, and businesses other ways to generate demand for what they supply. So, business leaders are beginning to see the importance of basic income as well. We all need to adjust to a world where more and more jobs are taken over by robots. The “work ethic” can no longer drive our sense of social and moral worthiness or govern our social support programs.

Progressive thinkers who resist basic income, choosing instead to argue for more and better jobs, or increases in welfare rates, seem unable to move past time worn positions that have produced little in the way of real advances either for workers or for people receiving benefits.  Nor do those thinkers come to grips at all with automation.  They are undermining the progressive campaign for basic income, leaving the austerity discourse to occupy the terrain.

The more and better jobs argument, while important of course, is now inadequate to the need. Precarity and technological unemployment are restructuring the world of paid labour beyond the power of any government to reshape fundamentally.

Capital is well served by these changes and people could be protected from, and to a large extent served by them, so long as the new forms of work are firmly regulated and livable wage levels are legislated. But what of an adequate and reliable source of income apart from the jobs being lost so rapidly to automation? What alternative other than basic income is there to deal with galloping technological unemployment?

As for the welter of differing Provincial welfare programs,  even with better rates their punitive, humiliating, and ineffective approach to social assistance can’t be a path to a future any of us wants to see unfold. Even improved welfare rates and services will do nothing for underemployed people. Nor will they relieve the ongoing stress of Canadians who realistically fear they’ll lose their jobs and tumble right into the welfare maw.

Basic income – the progressive, forward-thinking version – will be transformative and must be the version to prevail in the months and years to come.

— Toni Pickard is coordinator and co-founder of the Kingston Action Group for Basic Income Guarantee.

Fifty years ago, MPP Cheri DiNovo’s father was involved with the Basic Income movement in Canada.

That shows the longevity of an idea that has refused to die, she says, as Ontario and other jurisdictions in Canada and around the world contemplate moving forward with some kind of minimum income guarantee.

While the NDP’s DiNovo is very supportive of the idea of a Basic Income for Ontarians, she is adamant it must bring people over the poverty line and that it be created in tandem with stronger workplace standards.

The new norm of precarious work in Ontario – defined as part-time, contract, or temp work, often without benefits – is “not serving us well,” she says.

“People are desperate. The rich are getting richer, the poor are poorer, and this kind of precarious work is terrifying for people,” she says.

“It’s no way to build a life.”

DiNovo, who serves as the NDP’s critic for Community and Social Services, also points out the “epidemic of poverty” in the province. Toronto is the child poverty capital of Canada with 133,000 children living in poverty, according to a report released last year. She says there are also too many people who are under-housed or homeless.

The MPP says that’s why she favours bringing in a Basic Income that brings people over the poverty line – about $20,000 per year – and then changing the landscape in which businesses operate. This includes making it easier for people to unionize, bringing a halt to so-called ‘scab’ labour, bringing in a minimum wage that begins at $15 per hour, and providing tax incentives for businesses to choose to hire people for full-time, permanent jobs.

“We don’t want a Basic Income to act as a subsidy for bad employers,” she explains.

The MPP isn’t worried about a Basic Income creating any kind of ‘work disincentive.’

“Nobody wants to sit at home making the poverty rate if they can make double that. People do want to work – it’s often what gives them satisfaction. They don’t want jobs that grind someone into the ground or employers that treat them like crap.”

When asked if jacking up the minimum wage, in tandem with a Basic Income and creating new workplace standards, would make Canada less competitive, she says this is the climate of fear that many multinationals try to stoke.

“It’s all based on fear. I’m just not that worried that McDonald’s or Tim Horton’s will pack up and leave” if we have better workplace standards, she says.

She points out that the Nordic nations and Germany have excellent labour standards compared to Canada’s, and that they have “solid economies.”

“Ontario can do better.”

Ultimately, DiNovo says that some form of minimum income is needed in Ontario. But she wants no part of a Basic Income that simply becomes a way for government to do social policy “on the cheap.”

“If it’s a tool in our toolbox then that’s great.”

Retired Conservative Senator Hugh Segal provided the Ontario government with recommendations for setting up a Basic Income in the province. In his report, Segal recommends a monthly payment of at least $1,320 for a single person which is about 75 percent of the province’s poverty line. For those with disabilities, Segal suggests a top-up of at least $500 a month.

The Ontario Liberal government is expected to announce details this spring about the basic income pilot it is setting up. It is currently conducting consultations across Ontario to get feedback on the pilot.

Although he counts himself lucky not to have experienced poverty firsthand, the Green Party leader of Prince Edward Island, Peter Bevan-Baker, has many friends who haven’t been as fortunate.

When he rose in the P.E.I. Legislature last week and got all-party support for a Basic Income project to be set up on the island, he may have had them in mind when he introduced his motion. The Legislature agreed unanimously to have the province work with the federal government in the hope of running a Basic Income pilot on the island.

Bevan-Baker’s motion had its origins in the island’s May 2015 election. At an all-party leaders’ debate, it was the Green Party leader then, too, who brought up the issue, given it is prominently featured in all Green Party platforms across Canada. What he didn’t expect during that debate was to hear widespread openness toward the idea.

“I discovered, to my delight, that they all thought Basic Income was at least worthwhile exploring. It was a pleasant surprise, this unanimity.”

Bevan-Baker brought it up at least on “a dozen occasions” in the Legislature when opportunities arose. “There were all sorts of possibilities to do so, since Basic Income has the potential to make an impact across all departments,” says the Green Party leader.

He says if a Basic Income were to go into effect, it would have far-reaching ramifications. The obvious one is the virtual elimination of poverty.

“It’s the right thing to do from that standpoint.”

But there are far greater effects it may have to create a thriving society, he notes.

“It would remove the tremendous stress that people feel. It would provide people with enough income to meet their basic needs. It would help with the great mental stresses that people endure.”

Bevan-Baker says there are tremendous collective benefits, and that it’s important to go beyond considering only the economic when measuring. Everything from reduced health care costs, fewer law and order issues, increased civic participation, and better educational attainment are but a few areas of life that should be measured under a Basic Income to see if these improve.

“I believe a pilot project will show that Basic Income is going to improve the collective well-being of our society.

Now, the ball is in the federal government’s court. They would have to work out a partnership with the maritime province in order to make it happen. So far, there’s been no word whether or not federal involvement might happen.

In Ontario, which is embarking on its own Basic Income pilot, Ontario’s Minister Responsible for the Poverty Reduction Strategy, Chris Ballard, told Leaders and Legacies that Jean-Yves Duclos, Minister of Families, Children and Social Development for Canada, “is certainly interested in the pilot, as are my provincial colleagues across Canada.”

When it comes to P.E.I., Bevan-Baker says he met with Family and Human Services Minister Tina Mundy personally many times and he knows she has had discussions with her federal counterparts.

The Green Party leader says this is “an enormous opportunity for the government” for an issue that has widespread momentum across Canada.

“There’s a compelling case for involvement. We don’t even need to use the whole island. We could use smaller pockets, different communities with a rural-urban mix and…it would be a drop in the bucket in federal terms.”

Bevan-Baker says islanders love to refer back to that historically-important week in 1864, when the so-called Charlottetown Conference marked the beginning of discussions to create a united Canada. To this day, P.E.I. is considered the ‘birthplace’ of Canada. They like to draw all sorts of parallels, he says, when there’s a chance for the small province to do something grand.

“But that parallel is well drawn here. It would be lovely symmetry if we were the place to give birth to a Basic Income. We’re less than half of one percent of the national population. We are our own jurisdiction. You can do a really solid pilot project here.”

Bevan-Baker came to Canada at age 23, having grown up in a middle class family from the highlands of Scotland. They didn’t have a lot of material possessions, and he points out that he had “a real sense of the value of things growing up,” which helped to shape him.

Politically, it is that sense of what matters in people’s lives which may have served Bevan-Baker well here — especially if his role in kick-starting a Basic Income project for P.E.I. soon bears fruit.

When he was a young man, just leaving high school, Jason Hartwick always pictured himself in front of a classroom. He saw himself as a high school teacher, helping to inspire young people and to guide them along their lives’ paths.

There are “two sources of benefit” inherent in a Basic Income Guarantee, according to the executive director of the famous Mincome project in Winnipeg and Dauphin, Manitoba.

Ron Hikel, who served as executive director of Mincome from 1972 to 1977, says the first source of behavioural influence is the simple no-strings-attached receipt of the money itself. The second is “the psychological certainty of regularly having enough to live on.”

Hikel was speaking to Basic Income advocates at a meeting in Peterborough recently when he made the remarks. He says the psychological security of having money from month to month could “significantly reduce both individual and family anxiety.”

(In the current welfare system, recipients must submit to a high degree of invasive questioning, fill out copious amounts of paper work, and then face entrenched stigma – all for a much smaller amount of money that falls well below that of the poverty line.)

“There’s no doubt a properly designed and administered Basic Income could influence people’s lives for the better,” says Hikel.

“We’ve seen a significant increase in mental health challenges and I’m convinced that the certainty of income could lead to better physical and mental health,” Hikel explains.

The former Mincome executive director notes that of all the social determinants of health – those factors that shape the health of Canadians through the living conditions they experience – income is the most important enabler on this list.

Hikel points out that, at the level of the total population, those who have higher incomes are healthier, while those who are the most unwell in society have lesser ability to pay for health care. “And that’s why a general health system operating on exclusively private market terms is neither fair nor viable.”

Ontario’s new pilot on Basic Income

Retired Conservative Senator Hugh Segal’s report on a minimum income for Ontario was released recently, which will see Canada’s largest province set up a multi-year pilot to measure its effectiveness beginning in April, 2017.

In the report to Premier Kathleen Wynne’s government, Segal recommends a monthly payment of at least $1,320 for a single person which is about 75 percent of the province’s poverty line. For those with disabilities, Segal suggests a top-up of $500 more a month.

Hikel says that he would expect to see that the present rate of increase in health care system cost slowing after the introduction of a Basic Income, just as demand for care in Dauphin declined, according to research by economist Dr. Evelyn Forget. He says he would expect better population health in Ontario, too, after a basic income was in place in the province.

Hikel notes that in Dauphin — where Mincome helped establish a reliable income for about a third of the people – data indicated crime also went down during the experiment, including domestic incidences.

He says the big challenge for Ontario will be to get the design of the pilot right, with special emphasis on a top-notch IT system to calculate and deliver regular payments on time and in the right amounts for each family.

With Canada’s 150^th birthday year less than two months away, Hugh Segal is calling for the federal government to get involved in Ontario’s pilot project on Basic Income as a nation-building opportunity.

Retired Conservative Senator Hugh Segal’s long awaited report on a guaranteed annual income was released last week, which will see Canada’s largest province set up a multi-year pilot to measure its effectiveness.

In the report to Premier Kathleen Wynne’s government, Segal recommends a monthly payment of at least $1,320 for a single person which is about 75 percent of the province’s poverty line. For those with disabilities, Segal suggests a top-up of at least $500 a month.

The retired senator notes that while the federal government’s involvement is “not specifically within the remit of an Ontario pilot, it is nevertheless recommended that the federal government consider partnering with any willing province on any Basic Income pilots now being considered or contemplated.”

Segal writes that “a government in Ottawa that is committed to poverty reduction could see a meaningful nation-building opportunity in moving forward with a Basic Income project for the country as a whole.”

The pilot does indeed have worldwide ramifications, given Ontario’s sheer size, both in area and in population. The province is more than one million square kilometres — an area larger than France and Spain combined and it is the largest province by population in Canada, with more than 13.5 million people. This single province generates 37 percent of the national GDP of Canada.

Segal’s recommendation to the government would include strong work incentives built into the Basic Income pilot’s design. He told CBC’s Carol Off that in his vision for the program, “people would be able to go out and earn as much as they like and the normal tax rates of 20 percent or 30 percent would apply.”

“Once they reach an amount where they’re earning as much every month as they’re getting from the actual basic grant, then they would be taxed like the rest of us who earn enough to live without any assistance,” he tells Off.

To read Segal’s full report, click here.

Retired Conservative Senator Hugh Segal’s long awaited report on Ontario’s Basic Income pilot has been released, where he emphasizes the need to understand the full costs of poverty before fairly evaluating the new pilot.

Segal recommends a monthly payment of at least $1,320 for a single person which is about 75 percent of the province’s poverty line. For those with disabilities, Segal suggests a top-up of at least $500 a month.

The retired senator says any pilot project must understand poverty’s costs, not only in the present welfare and disability payments, “but also in terms of added pressures on our health system, and the Ontario economy as a whole, through its impacts on economic productivity and existing government revenues.”

He writes that measurable outcomes (from the pilot) should include the number of primary care visits (for psycho-social, mental and physical health), the number of emergency department visits, and prescription drug use.

Careful examination of participants’ life and career choices should also be made over the duration of the pilot by participants, “such as training, family formation, fertility decisions, living arrangements, parenting time.”

Other notes of interest for researchers should include education outcomes for participants and their children, and the nature and number of courses taken by adults, he says.

Work behaviour, job search and employment status

Segal says the public’s desire to understand how a basic income might affect work behaviours makes this area important to track, too.

According to Segal’s paper, measurable outcomes with regard to work behaviours should include:

• the number of hours of paid work
• the number of jobs held
• the income earned on the labour market
• the intensity and length of job search activities.

“The impact of a Basic Income on labour market participation remains one of the main concerns of the Canadian population,” he says, pointing to an August 2016 Angus Reid Institute poll, showing 63 percent of the country’s population believes that a Basic Income would discourage people from working.

Segal notes the introduction of a Basic Income pilot for individuals currently receiving Ontario Works would provide additional incentives to join the workforce, by allowing them to keep a substantial part of their earned income in addition to their Basic Income.

“…a careful evaluation of the impact of a Basic Income on people’s decisions regarding work, such as whether to work or not, their weekly hours worked, their job search activities, and the number of jobs they hold, is critical.”

The retired senator says the evaluation of the pilot should seriously explore how labour market behaviours vary across demographic groups, according to the amount in benefits received, and the rate at which they are taxed back, as income earned in the labour market increases.

— More analysis of the Segal report on Basic Income to come.

The Kingston Action Group for a Basic Income Guarantee is living up to its name — taking action in the form of a national letter writing campaign directed at the Minister of Families, Children and Social Development, Jean-Yves Duclos.

The hope is that a large number of people will simply copy and paste this letter, adding their own name, address, and signature, and send it off to the Minister. (No stamp is necessary when snail-mailing a letter to a member of parliament.) The letter should create additional pressure for the federal government to consider the merits of a Basic Income policy.

The letter begins by acknowledging the Ministry’s work so far, and then quickly pivots to calling for support for a Basic Income.

“I write to applaud your Ministry’s overarching goal to increase economic and social security for all Canadians, especially those among us who are most vulnerable. I am persuaded by the evidence that the most effective policy for realizing this goal will be a Basic Income Guarantee. I am writing to urge you to do all you can to make this happen.”

The Kingston group was careful to situate the Basic Income discussion within a larger context of social supports for all Canadians.

“In tandem with a broad social support system, including affordable housing, childcare, dental care, pharmacare, and programs that assist those with particular needs and vulnerabilities, a progressive basic income would make a crucial difference in the lives of those living in poverty.”

Later in the letter, the Kingston group acknowledges the federal government’s openness to provincial work in this policy area.

“I am pleased that your government has offered to support the governments of Ontario and Quebec with their proposed pilots for a guaranteed annual income. I trust that this will be the beginning of a federal-provincial collaboration that will see a basic income guarantee in place across the country. It is surely not an exaggeration to call this the most important policy initiative since the introduction of Medicare in the 1960s.”

Download the PDF of the letter in its entirety from the Kingston Action Group here.

In May 2016, Reza Hajivandi and a bunch of others interested in social issues ended up in the same space under the North York Community Housing Leadership and Community Engagement program in Toronto.

Through the course they were taking, they discussed and learned what community leadership and participation meant. As a last step of fulfilling the course’s requirements, they had to apply their skills and then both advocate and engage with the community on one issue. They chose Basic Income as their issue.

In addition to reaching out to communities on the street, emailing politicians, and the Prime Minister’s Office, they created a petition on change.org.

“Our goal was to get about a 100 signatures while different group members provided different estimates with the highest being 2,000,” says Hajivandi.

To their shock, in 24 hours they had over 20,000 petitions, with thousands of comments through their ‘Canadian Initiative for Basic Income.’

“It was encouraging and overwhelming at the same time,” says Hajivandi. “Given the reception, and our passion for social issues, we felt that we needed to go on, and continue with the project beyond the course. Here we are today, and we have been able to continue with our petition, make connections, advocate for an effective Basic Income policy, and currently, we are in the process of finishing up our draft policy proposal for a Basic Income.”

With his passion for learning within the social issues, Hajivandi also saw this as an excellent opportunity to actually apply his skills for a real, tangible cause.

“I think this is a very important issue because we may be at a critical juncture where changes to the welfare system are more necessary than ever before,” he says.

He says that poverty, unemployment, and to a certain extent, “precarity” have always existed in Canadian history. On the flip side, he notes that government policy to battle these challenges have also always existed.

“However, the high rates of poverty, precarity, expensive living conditions today coupled with an incapable welfare system means that more Canadians are suffering every day and expect change,” he says.

Hajivandi notes that under a neoliberal framework, governments usually seek to cut more and spend less on social services. He sees a Basic Income as a way to both appease people and reduce spending.

“At this critical juncture a radical reform of social security could have major implications,” he says.  If done effectively, Hajivandi says a Basic Income can help Canadians out of poverty and “remove the conditions and surveillance mechanisms” of the existing welfare security system, which have only exacerbated poverty.

A basic income (also known as a guaranteed annual income) would ensure no one ever drops below the poverty line. It ensures everyone an income sufficient to meet basic needs and live with dignity, regardless of work status.

Articles appeared on Benns’ independent, non-partisan news site, Leaders and Legacies, over a two-year period. After gathering all of the articles and question and answer sessions together, Benns says he realized he had more than 70,000 words and a 290-page book to share – Basic Income: How a Canadian Movement Could Change the World. The book is available exclusively through Amazon.

Featuring scores of interviews and articles with prominent Canadians, including federal Green Party leader Elizabeth May, Senator Art Eggleton, and retired Senators Hugh Segal and Michael Meighen, there are also interviews with MPs Scott Brison and Dan Blaikie, as well as big city mayors like Calgary’s Naheed Nenshi and Edmonton’s Don Iveson. Benns also interviewed researchers, academics, educators, and medical doctors, along with average Canadians — to get them to imagine what their lives would be like under a basic income guarantee.

“This is one of the most talked-about and compelling social policy initiatives being considered by Canadian politicians now,” says Benns, who also does communication work for the Basic Income Canada Network (BICN).

“Basic income is part of a vital conversation we need to have about inequality in Canada.”

He points out Ontario is about to announce an ambitious pilot project to test basic income policy over a multi-year period, with the federal government watching closely. Quebec is considering its own initiative, as is Prince Edward Island.

“If Canada, as a wealthy G7 nation, decides to kick-start a basic income program, this could have profoundly positive ramifications for inequality around the world.”

To purchase Basic Income: How a Canadian Movement Could Change the World, click here.