Traditional NGO/charity consists of giving money/stuff/services to the poor. The problem with this is that if you are a poor person who depends on that money/stuff/services, and you manage to find a job to get yourself out of poverty, then the money/stuff/services you've been depending on will no longer be available to you.
This is a problem, because those NGOs are much more stable then your marginal getting-out-of-poverty job. So the person in poverty is faced with a choice: do you trade the certainty of the NGO hand-outs for the hard work and the increased uncertainty that comes with a paying job? The rational decision, in this case, is to stay poor and continue to rely on hand-outs. This is how people get into the "business of being poor". They're not being stupid. They're making a rational choice based on the fact that they've been given a reason not to work.
But Basic Income is different, as I say -- because it is unconditional. It should never be withdrawn. If you are poor, you get the basic income. If you get a job, you still get the basic income. So there is no downside whatsoever to getting a job. This is a profound difference from traditional NGO hand-outs.
In every place where an unconditional Basic Income has been experimented with, it has resulted in an (often quite significant) net increase in economic productivity. That is very different from traditional NGO hand-outs. So please don't think that they're the same thing. I'd urge you to research the subject more deeply.
Higher-level jobs require a more educated populace -- but it's been shown that when a Basic Income is given, people will naturally seek out greater education -- either travelling to find it remotely, or paying for education services locally. The jobs can't be "brought in" before the populace has the education to fulfil them.
One thing which Basic Income doesn't address, however, is infrastructure creation (or at least infrastructure which can't be sensibly paid for by end-user fees). So there's definitely still a need to address that, Basic Income or no. But for various reasons that should really be done by the government, rather than an NGO.
But naturally, The Pareto principle [1] made that 20% of clever households acquired business minded practices and they're economically independent now. But the rest is still begging and waiting the return of NGOs.
Giving aid is the worst thing possible if its given to the state. But giving it to the citizens is perhaps better, because they can directly improve their lives by investing in their children, in better tools, and in things like cattle that can directly generate sustainable income.
Free money won't destroy your society. It's how that free money comes into your society that is disruptive. If the money comes in top down it distorts the economy. But if its given from the bottom, then perhaps things can get better. Its not an experiment that has been tried before.
For example, if a poorer country raised minimum wage too much it could destroy the economy whereas the same raise in a more developed country will have better short term effects.
This could end up being unethical economic experimentation.
Giving people money allows them to buy livestock, supplies for their children or food and shelter. This will help to improve their quality of life and spur the local economy. I'm hard pressed to see how this could be considered unethical.
This is true, but given the evidence we do have (GiveDirectly's previous programs and previous basic income programs in developed countries) I see no reason to believe the effects will be anything but positive.
This is a sincere question, I'm fully aware that a lot of NGOs intend to do good but do more harm :(
I have a problem with neither paying taxes, nor helping raise up the underprivileged. However, I believe that the former should facilitate the latter, rather than feeding some official's offshore account.
I think that if external funding were withdrawn, then we'd see a lot more done to fairly distribute government revenue and our government would be motivated to increase that revenue by improving our balance of trade.
I'm a little biased towards capitalism... so I believe in equal and opposite reactions. The developed world deserves to eat what it's worked for too. Maybe we need a little negative pressure to see that.
These economies were 'allowed' to develop into rich industrial economies was because America provided privileged access to the US domestic markets in spite of their protectionist policies.
They allowed that because they saw the value of having these countries developed into 'westernized' bulwarks against the USSR's sphere of influence.
They could all easily have remained poor under different circumstances.
People's Republic of China has followed. India, not quite.
Nor is South Korea a model of freedom; it was authoritarian, it was and still is protectionist. But it did integrate to world economy. Compare it to North Korea, which started off as equally poor, and which has real, concrete, deadly famines in recent memory.
Same applies to R.O.C. Taiwan; autocratic, even corrupt, but reached out to world market (and as a consequence forced the mainland China to follow).
Singapore and Hong Kong: very free trade all the time, and way ahead of others in the region.
In all of those cases those countries were given tacit approval by the US to enact protectionist trading policies and yet maintain their access to US markets.
However, the mentioned countries integrated more to world trade then most other countries in their region, and as a result they are now among the most developed.
Compare South Korea and North Korea, compare Taiwan R.O.C. to P.R.China prior to impacts of Deng's policy change, compare China and India.
There are clearly ways to exploit globalization to become prosperous - e.g. the asian tigers. But it's not clear to me that historical examples are as useful. There's no way to know but I suspect the American colonies would not have prospered in the current economic regime.
I guess the best argument along those lines you could make is that the US depended on imported slaves.
—Adults more likely to work, even five years later.
—Children are healthier and get more education.
—Adults do not spend the extra money on things like alcohol or tobacco.
—Adults make significantly more when surveyed years after receiving the cash grant.
GiveWell, which has spent a lot of effort evaluating GiveDirectly, does have some lingering concerns [1] that programs like GiveDirectly's might worsen inflation or hurt people who don't receive a grant and live nearby. Research on these questions isn't conclusive, but suggests some minor, short-term effects. I suspect broadening programs to more recipients will mitigate the latter problem.
[0]: https://givedirectly.org/research-on-cash-transfers
[1]: http://www.givewell.org/international/technical/programs/cas...
Update: Fixed formatting and added to final paragraph.
I am a Kenyan too and this is not true. Everyone pays taxes. Though a poor jobless Kenyan should not be paying income taxes, the same group of people still pay VAT for everything else they purchase, bar a few exceptional goods and services.
These schemes create opportunities whilst reminding people that poor decision-making has consequences. The only reason that this works is because these schemes are run by banks rather than non-profits. Perhaps there's a little room for more regulation around the margins these institutions should make off of these loans... but at the same time they're opening up credit lines to people who would have never had them.
>elect governments that will create sustainable wealth.
Some people would say that individuals create wealth, and the governments are systems that exist because of the existing levels of wealth in a society. If you want a "generous" government, then you first need a "prosperous" society. Which governments are you thinking of that create sustainable wealth? I'm curious to get a Kenyan perspective on private property rights (i.e. do you think that is a crucial step for creating a "wealthy" society).
Africa doesn't need the American cult of the individual to develop. It needs (among other things) America to stop covertly supporting the illegal and corrupt transfers of wealth to tax havens.
Would that be enough to change your mind that they are "giving people livelihoods they can't sustain"?
I pay 30% tax as a lower-middle income worker but I see very little of this used productively. The majority of voters don't pay taxes and rely on aid for everything from farm inputs to school fees. As a tax-payer who understands what taxes should do for me... I live with very poor infrastructure and amenities while the government squanders away money. If developed countries keep propping up our poor majority, they'll never learn to find innovative solutions to their problems and elect governments that will create sustainable wealth.
- Frustated Kenyan