Basic Income for Ireland?

"The standard objection to a Basic Income is: 'You mean you're giving money to people to do nothing!' But I have sufficient faith in the human spirit to believe that we all want and need to do something - whether it be making music, writing poetry or philosophising. I think it would release a lot of pent-up creative energy."

-- Conall Boyle

POSITIVE NEWS, No.16, Summer 1998

The Irish Government is seriously considering adopting a Basic Income. If they go ahead, Ireland will be the first country to implement the idea, which has been advocated by new economists for decades.

A Green Paper has been promised next year and a Committee, chaired by a member of the Prime Minister's Office, is looking at the viability of such a strategy and its implications for the wider economy.

The beauty of the Irish scheme is its simplicity. Basic Income would be paid to all citizens of the Republic whether or not they had a job or a private income. Then, all additional personal income would be taxed at one rate. This gets round the problem of welfare dependency and the poverty trap which countries like Ireland and Britain have created where people cannot earn more than a small amount, without losing their entitlement to a whole range of benefits.

Father Sean Healy, who is on the Basic Income Working Group, says a Basic Income system could be introduced over a 3-year period.

"A Basic Income strategy would have a positive effect. Individuals would be better off and it would be good for the economy as a whole."

Father Healy is Director of the Justice Commission of the Conference of Religious of Ireland, which has done a great deal of research and published a number of books and papers, and a video on the subject.

Conall Boyle, an economist from the Citizens Income Trust in Britain, says:

"The really positive part of the Basic Income scheme is that it encourages the maximum amount of socially useful work and allows people to decide whether they want to contribute through paid employment or through mutually beneficial work within the family, neighbourhood or larger community."

"The standard objection to a Basic Income is: 'You mean you're giving money to people to do nothing!' But I have sufficient faith in the human spirit to believe that we all want and need to do something - whether it be making music, writing poetry or philosophising. I think it would release a lot of pent-up creative energy."

Contact: Father Sean Healy,
CORI, Justice Office, Tabor House, Milltown Park, Dublin 6, Ireland.
Tel: 00 35 31 269 7799
Tel: 00 35 31 269 8887

Contact: Citizens Income Study Centre,
St. Phillip's Building, Sheffield St, London, WC2A 2EX
Tel: 0171 955 7453
Fax: 0171955 7534

[POSITIVE NEWS, No.16, Summer 1998]

See also: Basic Income Schemes