In his article “Reconsidering the Exploitation Objection to Basic Income”, Stuart White confronts the interesting challenge of answering the following objection to BI: (In my phrasing) “Oh yes, sure, I’m going to be working, while people watch TV all day on my expense!?”
Stuart White’s main three answers are:
“Well yes but, think that:
1. Overall, society will be fairer this way
2. Overall, society will be less exploitative, more reciprocal, this way
3. Its his property, he inherited it, so he can do with it what he wants. And so do you”
I hereby would like to add, four more answers to such an objection:
1. We don’t really know at any given time if an act is a contribution to society or not.
What is a contribution to society? Can we really tell?
A man working in an arms factory is contributing to society? An artist making strange paintings few people like is contributing? An executive in a transnational corporation?
First, we don’t have a consensual goal for society against which we could measure our advances.
Second, even if we had such a consensual goal, is not easy at all to assess whether an act leads us to it or not, specially in a complex society like ours.
Third, an act in this context, cannot be judged disregarding the Time dimension: John Doe is indeed doing nothing all day, but his mind is working, maybe it is restructuring itself, maybe it is planting the seeds for a great contribution to society in a few years. We really don’t know what consequences a moment has over time.
If we were 4 persons starving in an island, it would be easy (or easier) to solve the above uncertainties. Indeed it would be hard to justify any behaviour that does not directly leads towards getting food. But in a complex enough society that is not starving, it is not easy, if not impossible, to know what acts contribute to its well being and what acts don’t.
Notably, from an ecological point of view, there is an excess of production in our society, so someone not producing would contribute more to society than someone producing.
2. When left free, people eventually begin to do something with their lives.
This assertion should be confirmed by scientific studies, but in my experience and observations, inactivity comes mostly from a reaction to previous ‘bad’ activity. It is a rest and purification from it. After a few years, we naturally begin to want to do something with our lives.
If a persons’ motivations for doing something were usually ‘external’, to the person and to the act, it takes a few years to develop, or find again, internal motivations for doing something.
3. Contributing to society should be seen as a good in itself for the contributor, the reward is in the act itself.
The exploitation objection’ is based on the premise that contributing to society is a sacrifice, but that needs not be the case, specially in a BI society. You might want to contribute because you feel good doing it, not because you have to, or because you’ll get a reward from it.
People usually want to feel they are ‘good’, so if they do a ‘good’ act, they will feel good doing it. Thus if a person is not contributing to society right now, well, too bad for him.
4. Work under BI should be justified by measuring satisfaction plus payment, minus effort plus sacrifice.
Should the satisfaction of doing something good not be enough motivation, let us not forget that under BI, acts are still payed for. So the exploitation objection is mitigated by the fact that the active get paid more than the inactive.
If satisfaction from action plus payment is not enough to compensate an effort, then let it not be done.
To summarize, if someone argues against BI saying: “Oh yes, sure, I’m going to be working, while people watch TV all day on my expense!?”
One could further answer:
1. “Are you sure your own actions are contributing to society? Are you sure his inactivity is not seeding a future contribution? How can you tell?”
2. “Oh give him some time, eventually he’ll start doing something, and best of all, stemming from the right motivations this time”
3. “Well that’s just too bad for him, he won’t enjoy the satisfaction of contributing to society as you do”
4. “Besides, he won’t get paid above BI, and you will. If satisfaction from action plus payment is not enough to compensate your effort, then don’t do it. You are free to watch TV all day too, if that’s what you want.”
What if too many people end up not doing anything all day for too long and BI cannot be maintained? Well that would be a different problem. Perhaps society could address it through all kinds of work incentives and education. But it is my personal belief, that few people enjoy inactivity for a long time, even if they are free to do it. We seem to have a deep need to justify our own existence, at least to ourselves, and that is hard to achieve not doing anything.
Barcelona, 01/07
