Yearly Archives: 2015

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3 October 2015, BIEN, SWITZERLAND: Parliament rejects basic income initiative, but poll shows popular support. Last week (Sept 23rd 2015) the Swiss Parliament voted for a motion calling on the Swiss people to reject the Popular Initiative for Unconditional Basic Income. After hours of debate, the National council (the lower house of the Federal Assembly of Switzerland) voted for a recommendation by the ruling party to reject the popular initiative for unconditional basic income after six hours of debate. The motion was passed with a large majority (146 votes), with only a minority of 14 MPs supporting the initiative and 12 abstentions (see the detailed vote report here). “The most dangerous and harmful initiative ever” Basic income was opposed by all political groups, but the harshest critics came from the Centre and Right-wing parties. Sebastian Frehner (Centrist) described the initiative as “the most dangerous and harmful initiative that has ever been submitted,” mentioning the risks of immigration, disincentive to work, and that the basic income proposed would not be financeable anyway. For similar reasons, the Liberal party spokesman Daniel Stolz described the initiative as “intellectually stimulating,” but that it is also a “cocked hand grenade that threatens to tear the whole system to pieces.” His party colleague Ausserrhoden Andrea Caroni spoke of basic income as a “bomb in the heart of our society and our economy.” The most noticeable supporter of basic income was probably the Socialist MP Silvia Schenker who argued that basic income was the answer to the complexity and loopholes of the current welfare system and a better way to integrate the people “who have no place in the world of work.” This was not enough however to convince the Greens and other Socialists. “The Greens support the objectives of the Popular Initiative for an Unconditional Basic Income, but as it stands, it endangers our social system,” said Christian van Singer, spokesperson for the Greens. He argued that while one goal of the initiative is to simplify the social system, “it could level down the benefit system to the detriment of those who do not find work or cannot work.” Read More here

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2 October 2015, BIEN, UNITED STATES: Leading economists and business people discuss Basic Income at the World Summit on Technological Unemployment. Basic Income was a primary topic of discussion at the World Summit on Technological Unemployment at the Time Life Building in New York City on September 29th, 2015. Basic Income was endorsed at the event by leading economists and business people, including former Labor Secretary, Robert Reich; Nobel Laureate and Columbia economist, Joseph Stiglitz; principal software engineer for Tesla Motors, Gerald Huff; and several others. The conference, a one-day event organized by the World Technology Network, was not directly about basic income. The main topic was the labor market effects of automation, but nearly all of the participants who discussed policy responses to automation endorsed basic income. Most of the participants agreed that automation is a good thing with negative side effects. People lose their jobs; sometimes they can only find jobs and lower incomes; sometimes they do not find new jobs at all. At the rate at which jobs are being automated now many participants were concerned that the need for human labor in the production process is permanently declining. In a world where most people are dependent on their jobs for their livelihood, it can lead either to permanently lower wages or permanent unemployment. Perhaps new technology will always create more demand for labor, but there is no law saying that it must. Harvard President, Lawrence Summers, mentioned the observation by the Nobel Prize winning economist, Wassily Leontief, “The role of humans as the most important factor of production is bound to diminish in the same way that the role of horses in agricultural production was first diminished and then eliminated by the introduction of tractors.” For many of the participants, basic income was the obvious solution. If everyone received an unconditional cash income sufficient to meet their needs, everyone would share in the benefits of automation even if they were unable to find jobs in the new economy. Read More here

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1 October 2015, , State of the World Report World Institute, Land “Grabbing” Grows as Agricultural Resources Dwindle. As global agricultural resources shrink or shift, countries are crossing border to obtain new farmlands. Since 2000, more than 36 million hectares—an area about the size of Japan—has been purchased or leased by foreign entities, mostly for agricultural use. Today, nearly 15 million hectares more is under negotiation (www.worldwatch.org). “Farmland is lost or degraded on every continent, while ‘land grabbing’—the purchase or lease of agricultural land by foreign interests—has emerged as a threat to food security in several countries,” writes Gary Gardner, contributing author of the Worldwatch Institute’s State of the World 2015: Confronting Hidden Threats to Sustainability. About half of grabbed land is intended exclusively for use in agriculture, while another 25 percent is intended for a mix of agricultural and other uses. (The land that is not used for agriculture is often used for forestry.) Land grabbing has surged since 2005 in response to a food price crisis and the growing demand for biofuels in the United States and the European Union. Droughts in the United States, Argentina, and Australia, has further driven interest in land overseas. “Today, the FAO reports that essentially no additional suitable [agricultural] land remains in a belt around much of the middle of the planet,” writes Gardner. As a result, the largest grabbers of land are often countries that need additional resources to meet growing demands. Over half of the global grabbed land is in Africa, especially in water-rich countries like the Congo. Asia comes second, contributing over 6 million hectares, mainly from Indonesia. The largest area acquired from a single country is in Papua New Guinea, with nearly 4 million hectares (over 8 percent of the country’s total land cover) sold or leased out. Read More here

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28 September 2015, The Guardian, Shell abandons Alaska Arctic drilling. Oil giant’s US president says hugely controversial drilling operations off Alaska will stop for ‘foreseeable future’ as drilling finds little oil and gas. Shell has abandoned its controversial drilling operations in the Alaskan Arctic in the face of mounting opposition. Its decision, which has been welcomed by environmental campaigners, follows disappointing results from an exploratory well drilled 80 miles off Alaska’s north-west coast. Shell said it had found oil and gas but not in sufficient quantities. The move is a major climbdown for the Anglo-Dutch group which had talked up the prospects of oil and gas in the region. Shell has spent about $7bn (£4.6bn) onArctic offshore development in the hope there would be deposits worth pursuing, but now says operations are being ended for the “foreseeable future.” Shell is expected to take a hit of around $4.1bn as a result of the decision. The company has come under increasing pressure from shareholders worried about the plunging share price and the costs of what has so far been a futile search in the Chukchi Sea. Shell has also privately made clear it is taken aback by the public protests against the drilling which are threatening to seriously damage its reputation. Ben van Beurden, the chief executive, is also said to be worried that the Arctic is undermining his attempts to influence the debate around climate change. His attempts to argue that a Shell strategy of building up gas as a “transitional” fuel to pave the way to a lower carbon future has met with scepticism, partly because of the Arctic operations. Read More here