Category Archives: Basic Income Guarantee

Imagine society as a ladder. At the top, youll find wealth and status. At the bottom, poverty and discrimination.

Where we start life on the ladder is largely a function of the ovarian lottery.

For almost everyone, there are rungs above you representing people with more wealth and status. There are also almost always rungs below you too.

People on lower rungs might be willing to trade positions with you in a heartbeat if it was an option.

Some people climb the ladder of society toward wealth and status with ease. Others struggle just to stay in the same spot, fighting not to slip down several rungs.

Meritocracy believers would say people who progress up the ladder do so thanks to talent, hard work and their performance. Some will tell you poverty is a personality defect.

Those who say meritocracy is a myth suggest human biases and our personal networks play a significant role in any movement on that ladder. Theyre more inclined to say poverty comes from a lack of cash, not a lack of character.

Whichever your opinion, it turns out the length of that ladder the distance between the top and bottom rungs matters.

It impacts your happiness. And perhaps not in the way youd think.

You might suppose that the more rungs there are the larger the gap between the top and bottom the happier youd be if youre near the top.

After all, the top of a longer ladder means youre better off, relatively speaking, than more people. Surely thats a little buzz of satisfaction?

If were measured against the metaphorical top rung which by most metrics in Australia would be a white man then that demographic must be happy as pigs in the proverbial, right?

Nope. At least, not as happy as they could be.

It turns out the inverse is true. A bigger gap means less happiness, not more.

The gap between the top and bottom rungs of that metaphorical ladder represents equity.

The smaller the gap, the more equity citizens enjoy. As the gap widens, a society becomes less equitable. And everyone in that society is less happy as a result.

Thats right: inequity is making you unhappy. Yes, you. Whoever you are.

That may seem a bold claim, but I dont need to know you for this to be true. Its that universal.

Whether youre on the uppermost rung which tends to be occupied by members of majorities or clinging to the very bottom, the more inequity in your community, the less happy youll be.

Those at the top are probably happy, or at least more comfortable in their misery. But theyre still missing out, because they could be happier.

Happiness is not a finite resource there arent limited units of happiness in the world. If you become happier, I dont have to give up some of my happiness.

In short, a more equitable society is in everyones interests. We all stand to gain from it.

This is no small task.

Listening to the Black Lives Matter movement in recent weeks, I gather the answer may include:

In short, its clear its time for some big changes.

Even if some of us are in denial (Im looking at you, Mr There was no slavery in Australia Morrison) it seems inevitable that change must come.

Yet, I find myself sceptical that lasting change can be achieved because Western societys track record for such change isnt great.

I hope Im wrong, but my fears are not unfounded.

For example, its been more than half a century since the womens rights movement began, yet the gender pay gap is 22% where I live in Western Australia and the gender retirement gap was 52% in 2013/14 in Australia. Weve had at best glacial progress in recent years.

Then theres racial inequity. As a white woman, I might earn less on average than a man but Im still a heck of a lot better off than an Aboriginal woman in WA. She can expect to earn 30% less than me. And thats 12 years after Kevin Rudd said sorry.

She can also expect to earn 30% less than an Aboriginal man, as it turns out non-Indigenous women and Indigenous men have similar earning expectations in WA4. The gender gap applies regardless of race.

I take from this that systemic change is bloody hard, to achieve and to maintain.

Machiavelli captured why beautifully in The Prince:

It ought to be remembered that there is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more uncertain in its success, than to take the lead in the introduction of a new order of things.

Because the innovator has for enemies all those who have done well under the old conditions, and lukewarm defenders in those who may do well under the new.

This coolness arises partly from fear of the opponents, who have the laws on their side, and partly from the incredulity of men, who do not readily believe in new things until they have had a long experience of them.

But does that make it impossible?

No.

When faced with a massive obstacle, you can chip away at it slowly or you can blow it to pieces. The former takes a long time; the latter risks collateral damage.

or you can look for a lever.

If we want swift systemic change that improves equity without risking collateral damage, we need to find a lever: the smallest change we can make to have the biggest impact in the shortest time.

And I reckon that lever is universal basic income (UBI).

The concept of UBI is:

Thats right. No exclusion questions. No maze of paperwork to get it. No threat of it being withdrawn at short notice.

Automatic handouts based on your age and your citizenship.

The aim: no one falls below the poverty line.

In Australia, thats an income of $23,764 a year for a single adult. In theory, thats enough to afford basic housing and food even if you didnt go to work. If that doesnt sound like much, please remember its about what age pensioners live on right now.

Was your first thought

Chalk that up as a point for capitalist brainwashing, but its not true.

I wont regurgitate all of Rutger Bregmans collated research findings on UBI in Utopia for Realists here. Suffice to say its well worth a read. He found most people still continue to work and earn an income when a UBI is in place.

In summary, his other findings were:

If youre curious about the stats, read chapters two to four of Utopia for Realists.

The upshot is that the free market model we base our economy on has reached its limits. The marginal good more can do our citizens and country is diminishing.

Weve got enough wealth. Now we need to improve access to it.

Which is why some people like the exceptional Eva Cox prefer the term social contract to UBI. This is about progressing as a society so no one need live in poverty. In a country as rich as Australia, that seems a total no-brainer.

I reckon UBIs got massive flow-on potential for race and gender equity because when your basic living costs are covered, you dont have to choose between a roof over your head and your morals.

In short, you can afford not to put up with inequitable treatment.

For example, you can leave an employer who doesnt behave ethically. You may be able to escape an abusive relationship. You can report discrimination. Because you wont end up completely broke if someone with more relative power decides to cut off your money supply whether thats a wage, an allowance or through damage to your reputation.

If more people felt secure enough financially to do these things, might we not see societal change as a result? I think so.

Even if you can do all of the above already, UBI can still benefit you.

My basic income has meant:

I did it the capitalist way.

I saved, bought assets, and now derive income from them.

Which is the premise of the Financially Independent, Retiring Early (FIRE) movement.

Or Financially Independent, Time Rich (FITR) as I prefer to call it, because indefinitely retiring early turned out to be good in theory only.

Anyone aiming for FI is doing the same thing. Theyre putting a floor under their income. No matter where they are, no matter what theyre doing, their living costs are provided by their assets, not their wages.

Like a proper capitalist, Ive played the hand Ive got at the metaphorical poker table of life. I chose a high-paying profession so I could get to FI quicker, and I spent less than my mates to add further speed.

But I had to do it myself.

A basic income guarantee is like a socialist version of FIRE or FITR.

Instead of having to go through the process of earning, saving and investing to generate enough income to cover basic living costs, its a gimme.

This can help level the playing field from age 18 on, bringing us closer to an equitable society.

So, how much will this cost?

As of September 2019, Australias population included 19,754,496 adults, ages 18 or over. Lets call it 20 million.

The official poverty line is $23,764 lets call it $24k5.

$24kpa multiplied by 20 million people = $480 billion each year.

So yes, this is expensive.

But you dont actually fork out $480 billion a year to achieve it.

You use tax exemptions and deductions to deliver the UBI to those earning above that $24,000 limit. In practice, that means raising the tax-free threshold from $18,200 to $24,000. That portion of the UBI becomes foregone tax revenue as opposed to cash you have to find. Remember: most people keep working. Income from wages dropped less than 5% in one long-term UBI study6.

Anyone who earns less than $24,000 gets topped up to that level. Hence the idea of a guarantee.

And we havent yet counted cost savings, remembering that UBI has delivered a net economic gain in its experiments and case studies. Cash handed out is offset by:

There are many other benefits with long-term upside for society, such as high school completion rates rising and teen pregnancy rates dropping. For the full rundown, again I recommend chapters two to four of Utopia for Realists6.

Do we really believe COVID-19 is our last lockdown?

Do we really believe we wont need JobKeeper, JobSeeker, and early super access plans if another pandemic happens?

If everyone had a basic income guarantee before COVID-19, perhaps we wouldnt have needed economic stimulus of such magnitude. We might not have seen 1.3 million people taking money out of superannuation early.

You could see a UBI as mitigating future potential losses. The risk of such losses seems quite high at the moment.

UBI is an idea whose time has come. Will we have the guts to consider it? I hope so.

We wont be the first, but we can be next.

View original post here:

Why a Universal Basic Income is the solution to inequity - Women's Agenda

LONDON, June 22, 2020 /PRNewswire/ --To educate Crypto-enthusiasts and prepare them for upcoming market conditions, a group of well-respected crypto experts brought together by Investoo Group has expressed their thoughts on the recent COVID-19 crisis, and its effect on the global crypto markets.

The COVID-19 pandemic has had an unprecedented impact on our daily lives, our ability to interact and our financial structures and security. Blockchain technology has been around for over a decade, and there are now thousands of projects that seek to utilize its limitless potential to solve some of the world's most pressing issues.

Coin Journal has assembled a veteran team of experts in the field of cryptocurrency and financial technology, to gain some valuable insights into what the world may look like after the COVID-19 pandemic has passed. Globally, we can only hope that containment of this danger is now within our grasp, but we can only speculate to the long-term impact that it will leave in its wake.

Heavyweight Opinion

The panel is headed by Yoni Assia, the CEO of the world's largest social investment network, eToro. Yoni also brought his market analyst and renowned crypto expert, Simon Peters to the table. The next to join the team, Ciara Sun, is currently employed as the Head of Global Markets at Huobi Group, a global blockchain financial asset service provider.The panel also has the founder of virtual currency platform, Coincurve, and CEO of Interlapse, Wayne Chen. Finally, the panel would not be complete without the 15-year veteran of Wall Street technology and CEO of BSV blockchain service provider, TAAL; Mr. Jerry Chan.

They discuss the potential effects of unlimited quantitative easing, the need for a Universal Basic Income (UBI), and how blockchain technology can be a tool for research teams to interact with transparency on a global scale. The team reveals evidence that shows how cryptocurrency stands resilient against the economic downturn caused by social distancing measures and the closure of businesses that have succumbed to the strain.

Article Excerpts

Speaking exclusively to Coin Journalon the idea of Bitcoin as a 'safe haven' asset, eToro CEO Yoni Assia noted that crypto and fiat markets moved in tandem at the start of the COVID-19 panic. Market Analyst Simon Peters then noted a shift, which he describes below:

"Interestingly, this is backed-up by eToro's platform data, which shows a 77% increase in new registrants whose first action was to invest in Bitcoin. As the price of Bitcoin is traveling in the same direction as gold, you could argue investors view it as a safe haven asset."

Other areas of the article speak about the survival of market segments, and the implementation of blockchain technology, especially across supply chains. TAAL CEO Jerry Chan had thoughts relating to limiting the spread of COVID-19 using blockchain technology:

"Pharmaceutical companies have realised the potential application of a scalable version of Bitcoin blockchain, which can be used to track COVID-19 testing and vaccination records, cross-state and cross-borders, in a way which could be used to corroborate or validate statistics submitted to global health organisations."

The full interview is exclusive to Coin Journal, and interested readers can find the full article containing the detailed discussion of the expert panel here:https://coinjournal.net/news/how-will-bitcoin-perform-after-the-covid-19-crisis-has-passed

Media Contact Details

Contact Name: Chris Roper,Contact Role: Senior Cryptocurrency Editor,Investoo Group

Investoo Group is the source of this content. This Press Release is for informational purposes only. Virtual currency is not legal tender, is not backed by the government, and accounts and value balances are not subject to consumer protections. Cryptocurrencies and tokens are extremely volatile. There is no guarantee of a stable value, or of any value at all.

About Bitcoin PR Buzz:Bitcoin PR Buzz has been proudly serving the crypto press release distribution needs of blockchain start-ups for over 8 years. Get your Bitcoin Press Release Distributiontoday.

Related Images

image1.jpg

View original content to download multimedia:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/crypto-experts-reveal-thoughts-how-will-bitcoin-perform-after-the-covid-19-crisis-has-passed-301081094.html

SOURCE Investoo Group

Original post:

Crypto Experts Reveal Thoughts: How Will Bitcoin Perform After the COVID-19 Crisis Has Passed? - Yahoo Finance

I thought Andrew Yangs political campaign might mark Peak UBI. First, the rest of the Democratic field seemed dismissive. Second, it seemed strange to call for a massive, new, and untried social program at a time of record low unemployment. Third, there really wasnt much evidence that robots were about to take all the jobs, as Yang argued.

Then came the coronavirus. Hey, as long as the government is cutting $1,200 checks because of the shutdown-affected economy, maybe it can, you know, just keep on sending them. Like, forever. Or so argued UBI supporters. As Yang said back in March, Certainly I would never hope that UBI gets adopted because of this terrible virus. But I will say its somewhat surreal to suspend my presidential campaign in February and see it potentially implemented [the following month].

Well, one or two checks arent infinite checks. And theres good reason for policymaker caution before ever implementing a UBI. One more bit of evidence on that front at least evidence of tradeoffs from the new NBER working paper Universal Basic Income: A Dynamic Assessment by Diego Daruich of the University of Southern California and Raquel Fernndez of New York University. From that paper:

We introduce the UBI policy as a lump-sum transfer made annually to all individuals once they reach adulthood. What are the benefits of a UBI policy? In an economy in which individuals are subject to both wage and employment shocks and in which credit and insurance markets are imperfect, UBI allows for greater smoothing of consumption and the guarantee of a minimum standard of living. It can also allow agents to undertake relatively expensive investmentsin our model, attend collegewhich might have large consumption costs associated with them given the inability to borrow against future income.

Furthermore, it can have beneficial intergenerational consequences from allowing parents to increase their investments in their childs skill formation. We find that a UBI policy that unconditionally gives all households a yearly income equivalent to the poverty line level ($11,000 per household per year as measured in year 2000 dollars) has very different welfare implications for generations that are alive when the policy is introduced relative to future generations. The policy is welcomed by poorer householdsthose hit by out-of-work shocks as well as those with low skills or without a college education. Average welfare for adults alive when the policy is introduced increases by 1.2 percent measured in consumption equivalence units and, indeed, if this policy were voted upon it would win against the status quo.

It is, however, a very expensive policy to implement. The higher tax rate required to finance this policy reduces investment in skills, leading to a less skilled work force and requiring even higher taxes over time. All future generations, operating behind the veil of ignorance, would prefer to live in a world without UBI and would be willing to sacrifice over 9% of consumption to do so.

Of course, if one believes in a world with few if any fiscal constraints on policy, maybe this study is less relevant.

Link:

A universal basic income is less attractive if it needs to be paid for - American Enterprise Institute

KAREN FOSTER

Last weekend, workers at the three biggest grocery store chains in Canada ceased to be heroes. The employees of Loblaws/Superstore, Sobeys and Metro, who have been cleaning, stocking, and serving the rest of us our vital necessities since COVID-19 was declared a global pandemic, were stripped of the $2 per hour pandemic pay premium that began in March.

The pay raise was always meant to end, eventually. In its March 2020 quarterly report to shareholders, Loblaws described the pay premium as a temporary way of supporting colleagues in stores and distribution centres. But the end of the raise, not even three months later, seems like it has come out of nowhere. In his letter to employees on Friday, June 12, the CEO of Empire Group (the parent company of Sobeys and Metro) explained that with daily life and commerce settling into a new normal, company executives felt that this was a natural time to end our Hero Pay program.

But what has really changed? Cashiers now have a plexiglass shield to protect them from customers, and other measures, such as the process of spraying down grocery carts and the directional arrows in the aisles, have been worked out. In many provinces, the curve has been flattened and the risk of infection is lowered, for now. But the fundamental danger of being in public during an outbreak one which will only be known after its spreading and the stress and anxiety employees must feel going to work, have not changed much. In many jurisdictions, cases are still rising, and everywhere, future waves of COVID-19 are probable. The essential nature of grocery store labour has not changed either.

Moreover, COVID-19 exposed the ugly, indefensible unfairness of how people are compensated for their work in Canada and most other places, and that has not changed at all.

In the first quarter of 2020, the grocers now rolling back pay premiums made record profits. Industry voices tell us that grocery stores have narrow margins and the pay premiums are unsustainable. But the margins are wide enough to pay shareholders handsomely. In return for steadily increasing dividends, the majority of those shareholders have greedily voted against proposals for a living wage for retail employees, as Loblaws shareholders did in 2018. The companys CEO, Galen Weston, has been a strong, loud opponent of even basic minimum wage increases.

It is not impossible to pay grocery store workers a living wage. It is only impossible to do it while also allowing the richest Canadians to get richer. By ending the pay premiums, we are merely rolling the rug back down over the unjustifiable inequalities the pandemic made visible for a moment.

When COVID-19 first started spreading around the globe, some observers said it was an equalizer it didnt care if you were rich or poor. But after only a few weeks, it was obvious that, like so many other things, the pandemic would exacerbate existing inequalities. The impacts it has had on workers vary dramatically, but not randomly. Statistics Canada has shown that the highest-educated and the highest-income earners are far more likely to be able to work from home and continue to collect their full salary. Those who are paid less, and paid hourly, are more likely to have to continue to put themselves at greater risk, in public, in order to get paid.

As the anthropologist David Graeber has pointed out, most of those higher-income folks the ones who are now working from home could fall off the face of the Earth tomorrow and you wouldnt notice for a long time. As he put it recently, Its hard to know what else to conclude when literally millions of highly paid office workers have been forced to stay away from the office, to reduce their work to 10 or 15 minutes a day, or often nothing at all, without having the slightest impact on those essential functions that keep the public fed, clothed, distracted and alive.

But if the grocery store workers stop showing up? What happens then? In March, their employers were willing to concede that they were essential, and deserved more, as retail workers advocates have been pointing out for decades. Nothing about grocery store workers role in the economy or importance in our lives has changed, but their claim to being essential has been stripped of them. It makes no sense unless our only objective is protecting private corporations profits.

In the stores where you and I buy our groceries, workers now make minimum wage or close to it. Thus, it is possible to work full-time and have difficulty affording the food on the shelves, while shareholders pore over their quarterly earnings reports and think of ways to make more money.

This isnt just a math or money problem. Its a moral problem. A boycott wont work, because grocery stores have consolidated until there are so few options were forced to choose the least worst among them. Still, there are many ways to solve it, from retail unionization to living wage legislation to a Basic Income Guarantee. But leaving it up to the benevolence of private corporations and their shareholders should finally be off the table.

Karen Foster is associate professor, sociology and social anthropology, Dalhousie University, and director of the Rural Futures Research Centre.

RELATED:

Read the original here:

KAREN FOSTER: Pandemic pay premium for grocery store employees a flash in the pan - TheChronicleHerald.ca

The study by the UNs office for the region, known by the acronym ECLAC, and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), proposes 10 measures to ward against increased hunger, including through an anti-hunger grant to support vulnerable people as well as food producers.

In Latin America, we may have a historic setback in the fight against hunger. In a matter of months, we may lose what we have achieved in fifteen years. Millions of people may end up going hungry. That is the gravity of the current problem, said Julio Berdegu, FAOs Regional Representative.

In English, the report is entitled Preventing the COVID-19 crisis from becoming a food crisis: Urgent measures against hunger in Latin America and the Caribbean.

The agencies said the pandemic follows seven years of slow economic growth in Latin America and the Caribbean, and could result in the biggest drop in regional Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in a century; a decline of -5.3 per cent.

This will push an additional 16 million more people into extreme poverty this year, in a region where nearly 54 million people were already experiencing severe food insecurity.

COVID-19 is also affecting food systems, with domestic food prices rising higher than other basic items. Increased unemployment means millions are unable to buy enough to eat, while many others are forced to find cheaper food that is less nutritious.

The major task we have ahead of us is to keep the health crisis from turning into a food crisis. That is why we are proposing complementing the Emergency Basic Income (EBI) with the provision of an Anti-Hunger Grant (AHG), said Alicia Brcena, ECLACs Executive Secretary.

The report recommends that the Anti-Hunger Grant could be given for six months to people living in extreme poverty.

The grant could be in the form of cash transfers, food baskets or vouchers, equivalent to 70 per cent of the regional extreme poverty line, or just under US $50 dollars per month, with an estimated overall cost of $23.5 billion.

The two UN agencies further propose that food producers should receive an increase of at least 20 per cent in the average credit portfolio from the last three years, for loans that would be financed by a special credit line from multilateral and development banks. Family farms should also receive a basic investment kit of $250, at a regional cost of roughly $1.7 billion.

The Anti-Hunger Grant is included in a series of 10 measures aimed at ensuring all households have access to the nutritious food they need, food companies can continue to carry out their work, and countries have enough food to guarantee supply at reasonable prices.

Other measures proposed include reinforcing school-based food programmes, supporting food assistance initiatives by civil society, and maintaining policies that have kept global food trade afloat.

Meanwhile, the World Food Programme (WFP) is calling for greater international solidarity to defeat COVID-19 in Latin America and the Caribbean and to protect the most vulnerable countries and communities.

WFP also warns against a hunger pandemic in a region where COVID-19 cases continue to rise, doubling to 1.6 million in the last week alone, according to the UN agency.

The warning applies to countries where WFP has a presence, such as Colombia, Honduras and Haiti, regional Director Miguel Barreto told journalists via videoconference on Tuesday. WFP does not operate in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Mexico and Venezuela.

Our projection paints a stark picture. Our region already has problems related to economic and climate shocks, as well as insecurity and displacement. Another issue is that between 50 and 70 per cent of workers do so in the informal sector, making them more vulnerable because they cannot access to work due to lockdown in most of the countries of the region, he said.

Mr. Barreto reported that several Latin American and Caribbean countries have already increased social assistance to millions living in poverty.

We recommend governments expand their programmes to include more vulnerable people and groups, like informal workers and migrants, he added.

WFP has so far dispatched nearly 70 metric tonnes of supplies to 27 countries in the region via its humanitarian hub in Panama.

More cargo flights from its international hub in China are expected in the coming days.

Mr. Barreto said the first of many flights into the region will also bring critical health supplies into Ecuador from the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO).

At a time when we are seeing the virus devastate our region, this support is absolutely crucial for people on the frontlines of the pandemic, and we look forward to the arrival of more supplies in the coming days and weeks, he said.

More here:

COVID-19: UN agencies warn against rising hunger in Latin America and the Caribbean - UN News

The pandemic and the lockdown have had serious effects on childrens wellbeing. The EU recovery plan must ensure their specific needs are addressed.

As we are phasing out of a lockdown into a crisis, recovery is on everyones mind. Recovery, however, can mean different things. An employee with an office job can expect something different than someone out of a job from the hugely affected service sector. A large companys expectations will also differ from a small business ownersas will those of a single parent, compared with a household of two earners. It is the responsibility of Europes leaders to ensure that recovery reaches children too and offers them a helping hand.

The European recovery plan advanced by the European Commission on May 27th proposes to mobilise 1,100 billion under the 2021-27 Multiannual Financial Framework, and an additional 750 billion through a new instrument, Next Generation EU. The commission has urged national governments to approve it quickly, in view of the challenges ahead.

Indeed, to save one of the most prosperous regions of the world from collapse, billions of euro will be required to alleviate the burden on those who will suffer most under the looming economic downturn. In these efforts at stabilisation, there is not only a particular urgency but a rationality in investing in children. The announced Child Guarantee and earmarking of resources from the cohesion envelope to tackle child poverty are therefore symbolic and urgent.

"Social Europe publishes thought-provoking articles on the big political and economic issues of our time analysed from a European viewpoint. Indispensable reading!"

Columnist for The Guardian

Thank you very much for your interest!Now please check your email to confirm your subscription.

In the realities we are all experiencing there is a child somewhere. Covid-19 is not just affecting adults and our mental healthwe know it is affecting children just as much. If we are not under 18 ourselves then we might have a child whom we want to comfort, or have friends or families in lockdown with children. Social distancing places stresses on all humans as social beings, regardless of age.

There is growing evidence of the challenges children have been facing as a result of the coronavirus crisis. Because of how the pandemic exposes our collective vulnerability and humanity, it might be thought decision-makers would relate more readily to the difficulties endured by children, and be more likely to prioritise their needsbut that might be a nave assumption.

Looking beyond our own households, we can notice all the services that have abruptly come to a halt under the lockdown and on which families normally rely. Daycare and schools having been shut, as well as targeted social services, such as psychological support, family counselling and home visitsyet with no support with childcare available from the accustomed network of family or friends.

Only people living within the same walls know what happens in homes where there is substance abuse, alcoholism, a mental-health issue, violence or neglect. Children and families in vulnerable situations are missing out on much-needed support. Years of progress made in these homes with the help of professionals can be undone and children may be severely affected by confinementthere is no way of knowing exactly. The United Nations has raised the alarm about the mental health of children, including adolescents, as they are at particular risk of abuse during the pandemic.

As lockdowns ease and children trickle back to daycare and school, inequality will have grown between children of more and less well-off families. Governments will need to focus on the services designed to reduce these inequalities, be these universal or specialised. The EUs efforts to support investment and reform by member states should recognise that.

We cannot be assured merely by billions flying around at the macro-level. Resources are still scarce and decision-making is in a crisis mode of crude prioritisation. The criteria for such decisions are not new; neither are the basic assumptions. Work creates livelihoods, income creates purchasing power, creating demand, which meets and creates further supply. The economy picks up, businesses can borrow more, banks can lend more and we reach the bliss of balance in the bubble. But in the post-pandemic crisis such assumptions should be questioned.

As you may know, Social Europe is an independent publisher. We aren't backed by a large publishing house, big advertising partners or a multi-million euro enterprise. For the longevity of Social Europe we depend on our loyal readers - we depend on you.

We can see that the looming crisis will create more poverty and inequalityit is just impossible to tell its magnitude yet. The World Bank predicts that progress made in the last five years to reduce poverty globally will be erased and it estimates that 40-60 million more people will fall into extreme poverty (an income below $1.90 a day) in 2020.

Not just enterprises but entire sectors have crashed. Travel and tourism, catering and indeed most services have suffered their biggest setbacks this century. The International Labour Organization estimates that about half of the global workforce are at risk of losing their livelihoods. What if some parts of our economies cannot pick up again, or not to the level before? What if the people who worked in these areas need to receive welfare support to sustain themselves while they figure out how to fight the fire life has blown their way? What if their retraining is not yet in sight? What if they have to change lifestyle to such an extent that they have to rely on basic income and social housing? And what, in that context, will be the collateral damage to the children in their lives?

If anything, the comprehensive impact of the crisis in Europe has brought to the surface the harsh differences in the buffer potential of our different welfare systems. We cannot go past this. We need to praise what they are doing for the victims of the breakdown now but also say what more could be done.

It is the responsibility of every government to take an honest look at how existing social safety nets are catching people, children included. Then, to reach those that fall through, there should be no shame to seek exemptions from deficit rules to enhance social investment. National reforms of child-protection systems and policies aimed at preventing poverty and additional inequality should meanwhile not come to a halt but should be accelerated with EU backing, to support those most in need.

The EU budget powering the recovery plan promises at least 5 per cent of total expenditure under the European Social Fund Plus to help lift children out of poverty. Its agreement by heads of state or government will be a milestone for investment in children. This is the EUs chance to spearhead the fight against growing inequality. It can remind decision-makers to make childrens wellbeing central in structural reformconnecting welfare policies, leave, education and healthcare policies, social protection and support services through a strategy aimed at preventing and reducing child poverty.

Efforts should focus on preparing our systems now, to strengthen their ability to reach all children through universal provisions, coupled with support measures targeting the most disadvantaged. The EU can pass this message through the Child Guaranteewhich it has committed to initiate as a matter of priorityand spend that 5 per cent in a strategic way.

More:

Why recovery needs to have children at its centre - Social Europe

Michael Howard, Co-ordinator of USBIG, has written an article about increasing Basic Income activism in the United States.

Two years ago, if one were to speak of a basic income movement, one might be accused of hyperbole. USBIG was able to muster support for annual congresses, in cooperation with the Basic Income Canada Network, and disseminate information and analysis through the website and newsflash. Then came the Yang campaign, putting UBI on the national agenda.

To read the article, click here.

Michael Howard has written 5 articles.

Michael W. Howard is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Maine, USA. He is the coordinator of the US Basic Income Guarantee Network, co-editor of Basic Income Studies, and co-editor, with Karl Widerquist, of two books on Alaska's Permanent Fund Dividend.

The views expressed in this Op-Ed piece are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent the view of Basic Income News or BIEN. BIEN and Basic Income News do not endorse any particular policy, but Basic Income News welcomes discussion from all points of view in its Op-Ed section.

See the rest here:

Basic Income activism in the United States | BIEN - Basic Income News

(Pixabay)Such an expansion of the welfare state would have once kept conservatives awake at night.

Amid all the momentous events that have defined the coronavirus pandemic, the decision by both the Trump administration and, in near-unanimous votes, both houses of Congress to institute a stimulus program an element of which amounts to a de facto universal basic income (UBI) is perhaps the least appreciated.

Paying individuals a flat check of $1,200, is, effectively, a one-time UBI. Legislators are already considering a second round.

The long-term import of this is significant. At a time when the two parties can agree on almost nothing, they came together to support a policy that up until recently was restricted largely (but certainly not exclusively) to the Silicon Valley Left.

Watching this go through brought to mind Rudyard Kiplings 1919 poem The Gods of the Copybook Headings. Kipling contrasts the Gods of the Marketplace, meaning the socially acceptable wishful thinking, with the Gods of the Copybook Headings, who remind us of the eternal truths we routinely abandon for a more fashionable pantheon. He concludes with these lines:

And that after this is accomplished, and the brave new world beginsWhen all men are paid for existing and no man must pay for his sins,As surely as Water will wet us, as surely as Fire will burn,The Gods of the Copybook Headings with terror and slaughter return!

Sound familiar? In a few short months, we went from UBI (the idea of giving almost every adult citizen a check) being an idea favored only at the margins to its being the official policy of a Republican administration backed by a Republican-controlled Senate.

The counterargument is clear. These are extreme times. This is not UBI but merely a temporary support measure for working families in exceptional circumstances. It is an argument that might have more force had not conservative political parties in the Western world found it so difficult to rein in an expanding welfare state that can no longer be afforded, something that became all too obvious in the battles over austerity after the European debt crisis.

Since Americas current UBI was promoted as an essential element in a stimulus program, it seems reasonable to assume that, whatever is being said to the contrary, it will be more difficult to end it until the economy gets strong enough to no longer need stimulus. The list of temporary spending programs instituted during a crisis but later discontinued is distressingly short.

Fearing the electoral consequences of challenging this regime, many conservative parties of the Western world seem to have given up on the task of decreasing the size of government. In the United Kingdom, Prime Minister Boris Johnsons Conservative Party has made protecting the U.K.s public health-care system one of the cornerstones of his government.

The Trump administration has signed relief plans totaling over $2 trillion, in an environment where were already spending $4.45 trillion a year. The small-government that once defined conservative politics appears to have fallen out of fashion.

UBI programs such as the individual $1,200 checks are simply the next step in the evolution of the welfare state. The preexisting welfare systems (whatever their faults) are designed to act as safety nets, but the checks in this case are universal they go to people who havent fallen into the safety net as well as to those who have. It isnt an unemployment benefit, federal jobs guarantee, work-for-welfare regime, or any other welfare system. Those at least maintain the pretense of encouraging the recipient to be self-reliant.

An expansion of the welfare state of the type represented by these checks would have once kept conservatives awake at night. But wed put our emphasis on the used to, as conservative parties have been on their current path for years; it just took an excuse, provided now by the pandemic and accompanying shutdowns, to push them off the cliff. We might look back on the societal consequences of the pandemic not as revolutionary but as acceleratory.

Unfortunately, we have been doing the bidding of Kiplings Gods of the Marketplace for quite some time now, by acting as though we can infinitely expand the federal government and suffer no consequences. Had the Western world not abused monetary and fiscal policy during our past crises and recoveries, we would have had more margin, more room for error in dealing with this one. But we treated peacetime like wartime, and now that a true war is here, we find our swords are dull.

The United States is straining against the limits of sound policy and relying on the credulity of bond investors after decades of growth of the federal government in a way and to a size that now threatens our fiscal stability. Even if this first draft of UBI does not last past the pandemic, the Trump administration has normalized the practice of giving every American a check solely for existing. Dont be surprised if 2022 and 2024 feature politicians far more prominent than former Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang running campaigns on Universal Basic Income.

If a Republican president can do it, why not a Democratic one?

A pandemic should prompt some introspection, if nothing else. While it is far from clear how things will turn out and how severe the consequences of our policies will be, the coronavirus and its repercussions have demonstrated once again that we are not invincible. The laws of economics are not suspended just because theres a crisis.

Jerry Bowyer is the president of Bowyer Research and editor of Townhall Finance. Charles Bowyer is a risk analyst for Bowyer Research and a writer for Townhall Finance.

Here is the original post:

When All Men Are Paid for Existing: Universal Basic Income Has Arrived - National Review

ImpactAlpha, June 3 If the COVID crisis has laid bare longstanding inequities, the widespread protests over the police killing of George Floyd are pushing racial equity to the center of the COVID recovery.

Just as long-standing inequities have left black people disproportionately at risk to the virus, the lockdown has been particularly devastating to Black-owned businesses that are heavily concentrated in the service economy in hospitality, retail, wellness and other high-touch businesses. The number of working African American business owners in the U.S. has fallen by more than 40% in the pandemic, far more than for other groups. And these are the same kind of businesses that have struggled to access federal relief.

Impact investors and corporate leaders are calling for bold action for racial justice. All businesses are being closely watched for how they treat workers, customers, communities and other stakeholders. A growing chorus is demanding a bailout of people, not just corporations.

Racial lens investing, with both private and public funds, both equity and debt, has never been more timely.

Get up, stand up: Impact investors speak out for racial justice

The blueprints for a racially inclusive recovery already are taking shape in communities across the country. In Oakland, Calif., Boston, and New Mexico, local funds such as Runway Project, Ujima Fund and the Boston Impact Initiative are doing the kind of deep, innovative, relationship-based work that is needed to begin to heal racial inequities and trauma.

Such new revivalists, are modeling solutions that can be rolled out widely, to speed the recovery of people and families, as well as businesses. That includes universal basic income for black founders, people guarantee pools and sharing power in investment decision-making and ownership the financial infrastructure that is going to love black and brown people as Runways Jessica Norwood puts it.

The pandemic is an accelerator and amplifier of everything, says Deborah Frieze of Boston Impact Initiative. If we cant figure out how to respond now, when will we?

Runway was established to address the racial wealth gap. Its portfolio is an example of the potential for Black entrepreneurs when they have access to capital, mentoring and a support network that has too often been out of reach.

For Small Business Week in early May, the Runway Project had planned to celebrate the strides made by the Black-owned businesses in its portfolio, from Essence of Flowers, a locally-sourced floral business to Hox Uniforms, which makes custom team uniforms. Instead, the loan fund found itself scrambling to keep them afloat as the COVID crisis shut down large swaths of the economy.

We were trying to grow businesses, now were trying to stop the loss, says Jessica Norwood, who founded Runway in 2016 to tackle the gap in friends & family funding for Black entrepreneurs. COVID has changed everything.

Starting in Oakland, Calif. and expanding to Boston, Norwood and her team have spent the past few years modeling a different kind of financial system that is attuned to the needs of underserved communities and the historic legacy of social and economic discrimination they are trying to overcome.

Jessica Norwood: Believe in you money for black entrepreneurs

When COVID hit, the first order of business was to speed relief to small businesses whose revenues evaporated almost overnight. Small, local funds were among the parallel system of first financial responders. Norwood and her team conducted wellness checks and immediately deferred all loans and interest payments from its 30 or so borrowers for six months. (Its standard loan terms include a 2-year interest-only period).

They helped portfolio companies apply for federal aid via banking partners such as Self-Help Credit Union and Berkshire Bank. And they offered strategic and marketing support through partner Uptima Business Bootcamp, an Oakland-based accelerator cooperative, so that businesses could retool for the new socially distant world.

Even more was needed to stem the loss of income for Runways business owners, many of whom are sole proprietors. The answer: six months of no strings attached payment or, universal basic income for Black business owners.

We wanted to create spaciousness to pivot, reimagine, create a new business plan for the post-COVID world, says Norwood. UBI reflects our belief in choosing trust and relationships over bureaucracy and evaluation, and doubling down on what it means to be friends and family.

That support made all the difference for Ariana Marbley, the founder of Esscents of Flowers, a local flower delivery service in East Oakland. Marbley had entered 2020 with a full schedule of events and weddings, but as COVID took hold, one by once they cancelled or postponed. She reluctantly applied for loans, but was turned down by bank after bank.

The monthly payments from Runway have relieved the stress and allowed her to focus on marketing. I felt for the first time in a long time that I was taken care of, that the business was taken care, says Marbley. Its not until times like this that you realize how deep that support and love runs.

Shes returning the favor, in a sense, by handing out yellow roses with a message of affirmation to Black East Oakland residents grieving over the killing of George Floyd.

Oaklands community capitalists are modeling an inclusive economy

Runway was inspired in part by Aisha Nyandoros Magnolia Mothers Trust, which distributes $1,000 a month for a year to twenty families in Jackson, Mississippi. The city of Stockton, Calif., has also experimented with $500 universal basic income payments to low-income residents. In the face of the COVID crisis, Stockton has extended the program, which was set to wind down this summer, through January.

Runway was able to raise the money to fund these programs in less than a month from longtime funders including RSF Social Finance and Candides Olamina Fund.

In Boston, Deborah Frieze conducted resiliency tests with the 30 portfolio companies of the Boston Impact Initiative, the charitable loan fund she founded to help close the racial wealth divide. Only four have had to completely close (seven were deemed essential and a dozen or so were able to operate remotely). But some teetered on the brink after gearing up for big contracts with hard-hit industries like airlines that were put on hold. All told, 200 employees suffered a full or partial loss of income.

Her first imperative was to throw out a lifeline for workers, many of them women of color, undocumented immigrants, formerly incarcerated or part-time employees who lacked savings and might not be eligible for federal aid. Frieze worked with her lawyers to structure what she calls a People Guarantee Pool to provide a one-time $1,200 non-taxable gift to portfolio company employees (those who lost partial income received $600).

At the same time, she instituted a blanket three-month principal and interest forgiveness for business owners starting April 1, which could be extended, restructured or deferred further as circumstances required.

BII also worked with portfolio companies to help them preserve cash and renegotiate rents and other expenses.

As a small fund, we can actually wrap our arms around the entire set of companies in our portfolio, says Frieze, who raised $162,000 in grants to fund the peoples guarantee pool and another $230,000 in recoverable grants for the loan forgiveness programs. Some donations came from MBA 1200, where Harvard and other MBA students or alumni donated part of their government relief checks.

That kind of unconventional thinking is a hallmark of BII. The fund deploys a creative mix of debt and equity financing to achieve its goals. Rather than lavishing perks on its biggest investors, it prioritizes the small, retail investors with higher interest rates and more loss protection.

Those that can least afford to lose the money should be de-risked the most, says Frieze. And those who have the most can take on more risk, either a lower rate or higher risk.

How community investment funds are building resiliency to disasters, pandemics and economic shocks

BII helped incubate and launch the Boston Ujima Fund, which is democratically controlled by community members in Bostons working class neighborhoods, who vote on impact objectives and investment decisions. Ujima has created its own relief fund, the Ujima Boston Worker and Resident Care Fund, that will issue one-time payments to voting members, businesses and employees impacted by COVID.

Now, Frieze is turning her attention to the recovery phase, which will be equally hard on business owners of color that have traditionally struggled to access capital but will need to invest in order to re-open. BII is looking to raise a $2.5 million Business Resilience Fund fund to originate zero-percent working capital loans to fund an inclusive recovery.

The recovery has just begun. But the models these small funds are designing and testing point the way to a recovery and system rooted in a different set of values and beliefs. If we understood ourselves as interdependent, wed be looking at, how can I ensure that my suppliers stay healthy? My customers and employees? says Frieze.

The COVID crisis may speed up the development of infrastructure to nurture and support entrepreneurs of color. We really leaned into our values at this time and it made all the difference, says Norwood. There is another way and world possible, and its happening right now. We all feel so much stronger.

The kind of deep, relationship-based work does not necessarily scale. Thats why Runway is evolving its model to support more communities of practice and moving the needle on what it means to build a repair economy and infrastructure that loves black and brown businesses.

Frieze has launched a fund-building cohort to share BIIs experience with others looking to create their own place-based and racial justice funds. A dozen teams spanning Baltimore to the Twin Cities to New Mexico have been meeting virtually since April. Many are speeding up their timelines and prototyping funds in realtime to deal with the COVID fallout.

As Norwood says, I dont believe we will make it on the other side of this COVID crisis if we dont all make it.

Read the rest here:

Local funds model the racial reckoning and renewal central to the COVID recovery - ImpactAlpha

(Editors Note: This is the latest in Just Securitys weekly series keeping readers up to date on developments at the United Nations at the intersection of national security, human rights, and the rule of law.)

WHO Doctor Warns Coronavirus may Never Go Away, as Agency Outlines Reopening Criteria and Highlights Pandemics Mental Health Effects

The novel coronavirus may become just another endemic virus in our communities and may never go away, World Health Organization (WHO) Executive Director of Health Emergencies Dr. Mike Ryan said in a May 13 media briefing. He cited HIV as an example of a relatively recent virus that has become treatable but has not been eradicated or limited by an effective vaccine. The comments drew major news coverage (see here, here and here). Ryan went on to state:

Im not comparing the two diseases, but I think it is important that we be realistic and I dont think anyone can predict when or if this disease will disappear. We do have one great hope: if we do find a highly effective vaccine that we can distribute to everyone who needs it in the world, we may have a shot at eliminating this virus, but that vaccine will have to be highly effective, it will have to be made available to everyone, and we will have to use it.

WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, in an earlier media briefing on May 11, discussed the need to balance the potential health harms of lifting stay-at-home orders and business closures against the social, economic, and health harms associated with extending the orders indefinitely. Stating that to protect lives and livelihoods, a slow, steady lifting of lockdowns is key to both stimulating economies, while also keeping a vigilant eye on the virus so that control measures can be quickly implemented if an upswing in cases is identified, Tedros outlined three key questions for policymakers to consider when deciding when and how to ease lockdown measures:

First, is the epidemic under control? Second, is the healthcare system able to cope with a resurgence of cases that may arise after relaxing certain measures? Third, is the public health-surveillance system able to detect and manage the cases and their contacts, and identify a resurgence of cases?

Tedros emphasized that these are merely criteria to be considered, and no perfect formula exists to balance harms, cautioning that recent resurgences of the coronavirus in locations such as South Korea, Germany, and Wuhan, China, following the easing of restrictions are signs of the challenges that may lie ahead.

WHO on May 10 issued a policy brief on surveillance strategies for containing the spread of the virus and procedures for reopening schools. The agency also warned May 13 that the pandemic could undo recent progress in improving global health, and, in a May 14 news release, highlighted the increased prevalence of mental-health issues globally due to the pandemic.

Migrant Lives at Risk in Mediterranean, with Pushback Practices, says OHCHR

The United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) stated it is deeply concerned about recent reports of failure to assist and coordinated pushbacks of migrant boats in the central Mediterranean, which continues to be one of the deadliest migration routes in the world. The May 8 statement came after reports that Maltese authorities were engaging in pushbacks, whereby boats containing migrants are towed back out to sea. OHCHR Spokesperson Rupert Colville expressed concern that nations appear to be using the coronavirus pandemic as an excuse for closing their borders to vulnerable migrants, especially those fleeing war-torn Libya. He called for the use of administrative regulations and measures being used to impede the work of humanitarian NGOs to be lifted immediately, noting that [s]uch measures are clearly putting lives at risk.

Meanwhile, the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) also expressed concern that the combined effects of conflict and the coronavirus pandemic are driving more and more civilians to depart Libya on a dangerous sea route.

Renewed Efforts at Security Council for Ceasefire Resolution Amid US Recalcitrance

The United States blocked an attempt by members of the U.N. Security Council to pass a resolution imposing a global ceasefire in order to address the pandemic, according to a May 8 report in The Guardian. The U.S. made the move after some representatives thought they had reached a compromise whereby reference to WHO would be replaced by a reference to specialist health agencies in the resolution, due to U.S. demands.

Germany and Estonia submitted another proposed global ceasefire resolution on May 12. No date has been set for a vote on the new resolution. Some have speculated that if all reference is dropped to the WHO, even indirectly, in the text of the new proposed resolution, China may exercise its veto instead of the United States.

UNAIDS and World Leaders Call for Free Peoples Vaccine

More than 140 world leaders and high-ranking experts, including the heads of state of Ghana, Pakistan, South Africa, and Senegal, signed onto an open letter drafted by U.N. AIDS (UNAIDS) calling for any effective coronavirus vaccine that is developed to be made available for free to everyone globally. The letter states that [g]overnments and international partners must unite around a global guarantee which ensures that, when a safe and effective vaccine is developed, it is produced rapidly at scale and made available for all people, in all countries, free of charge. The same applies for all treatments, diagnostics, and other technologies for COVID-19.

Coronavirus Fallout May Cause 6,000 Daily Deaths of Children Under Five, UNICEF Warns

In a May 12 appeal for additional funding of $1.6 billion to help it fulfill the needs of vulnerable children amid the ongoing pandemic, the U.N. Childrens Fund (UNICEF) warned that the devastating socioeconomic consequences of the disease and families rising needs. The following day, citing a recent publication by Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health researchers in the Lancet Global Health journal,UNICEF said, An additional 6,000 children could die every day from preventable causes over the next six months as the COVID-19 pandemic continues to weaken health systems and disrupt routine services. UNICEF Executive Director Henrietta Fore stated, The pandemic is a health crisis which is quickly becoming a child rights crisis.

UN Leaders Urge Additional Coronavirus Protections for Prisoners

The heads of the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), WHO, OHCHR and UNAIDS issued a joint statement on May 13 seeking to to urgently draw the attention of political leaders to the heightened vulnerability of prisoners and other people deprived of liberty to the COVID-19 pandemic, and urge them to take all appropriate public health measures in respect of this vulnerable population that is part of our communities. The statement called attention to the special vulnerabilities of people deprived of their liberty, such as their inability to practice physical distancing, the prevalence of preexisting conditions that render them more vulnerable to COVID-19, and lack of access to proper medical care and hygiene facilities, among other factors.

First COVID-19 Cases Confirmed in Bangladesh Refugee Camp Housing Rohingya

A refugee in Bangladeshs crowded Coxs Bazar refugee camp tested tested positive for the coronavirus, UNHCR spokesperson Andrej Mahecic confirmed on May 15. The news raises concerns of a potentially massive outbreak of the virus, as 860,000 Rohingya refugees are living in the areas refugee camps in very close quarters.

UN Officials Issue Joint Statement on Libya

Seven prominent U.N. officials released a joint statement on the situation in Libya and the special risks civilians in the country face due to the combination of conflict and COVID-19. In the statement, U.N. Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs Mark Lowcock, U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi, Executive Director of UNICEF Henrietta Fore, Executive Director of the U.N. Population Fund Dr. Natalia Kanem, Executive Director of the World Food Programme David Beasley, Director-General of WHO Tedros and Director General of the U.N.s International Organization for Migration Antnio Vitorino reiterate the urgency of a ceasefire to allow the pandemic to be addressed. They single out attacks on water supplies as especially troubling, calling for all parties to the conflict to protect such resources and infrastructure.

Envoy Reports Significant Promise in Yemeni Ceasefire Negotiations

U.N. Special Envoy for Yemen Martin Griffiths informed the Security Council of significant progress in ceasefire negotiations in Yemen, although he qualified his assessment: I am coming to this Council yet again to express hope, instead of to report success. More from the U.N. News Service here.

Additional Items

U.N. peacekeeping forces in Sudan reported the first confirmed positive coronavirus test in a Protection of Civilian (PoC) site, as confirmed by a May 13 briefing by the Office of the Secretary-Generals Spokesperson. The same day, the U.N. News Service reported that the South Sudanese government confirmed that two confirmed cases of the virus were identified within a PoC in Juba. There is major concern that an outbreak within PoC sites could be devastating. In South Sudan, more than 190,000 civilians are sheltering at such sites, including 30,000 in the Juba location. Given that such sites tend to be crowded, an outbreak would be exceedingly difficult to contain.

U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet referred on May 8 to the potential for a dual threat of a surge in violence and in coronavirus infections in Syria as a ticking time bomb. Various parties to the conflict in Syria, including ISIL, appear to view the global focus on the COVID-19 pandemic as an opportunity to regroup and inflict violence on the population, she said.

UNAIDS issued a warning on May 11 that disruptions to the delivery of antiviral medicines critical to treating HIV/AIDS attributable to the COVID-19 pandemic could cause hundreds of thousands of additional deaths and increase transmission rates significantly. UNAIDS chief Winnie Byanyima said, The right to health means that no one disease should be fought at the expense of the other.

The U.N. Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) released its third special report (Spanish only) on May 12 on the effects of the coronavirus pandemic, entitled The Social Challenge in Times of COVID-19. The commission proposes that governments ensure immediate temporary cash transfers to meet basic needs and sustain household consumption, which will be crucial for achieving a solid and relatively quick reactivation, according to an English-language ECLAC press release. In addition, in the long term, the organization reiterates that these transfers should be made permanent. This support for a universal basic income echoes a recent statement in support of a universal basic income by U.N. Development Programme Asia-Pacific Bureau Chief Kanni Wignaraja.

Three senior U.N. officials called for the immediate release of all Palestinian children detained by Israeli authorities. In a May 11 joint statement, they noted that Israeli government data shows 194 Palestinian children were detained by the Israeli authorities in prisons and detention centres as of the end of March. The statement was issued by U.N. Humanitarian Coordinator in the Occupied Palestinian Territory Jamie McGoldrick, UNICEF Special Representative in the State of Palestine Genevieve Boutin, and Head of the U.N. Human Rights Office in the Occupied Palestinian Territory James Heenan. The best way to uphold the rights of detained children amidst a dangerous pandemic, in any country, is to release them from detention and to put a moratorium on new admissions into detention facilities, they said.

Various U.N. agencies and officials condemned two attacks in Afghanistan on May 12 that killed at least 14 people. Among those who issued condemnations were U.N. Secretary-General Antnio Guterres, U.N. Humanitarian Coordinator Toby Lanzer, and the U.N. Assistance Mission to Afghanistan (UNAMA).

The U.N. Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), held an informal video briefing on May 11 on Joining Forces: Effective Policy Solutions for Covid-19 Response. ECOSOC President Mona Juul released a statement on May 12 summarizing key takeaways from the briefing. Echoing the rallying call of the U.N. to build back better from the pandemic, Deputy Secretary-General Amina J. Mohammed referred to the sustainable development goals as a clear compass that can guide the world in rebuilding.

Expressing its concern that least developed countries such as Haiti will be disproportionately affected given the weak health infrastructure and underlying social and economic inequalities characterizing these countries, ECOSOCs Ad Hoc Advisory Group on Haiti issued a statement on May 8 cautioning that the COVID-19 health emergency, and its socio-economic impact, could become a humanitarian catastrophe in Haiti if immediate action is not taken to address the countrys health and humanitarian needs. More from the U.N. News Service here.

U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) Director-General Qu Dongyu reported May 11 that while significant gains had been made in the fight against the desert locust upsurge in East Africa and Yemen more needs to be done to prevent a food security crisis, as the ongoing rainy season not only provides livelihoods for farmers and pastoralists but also favourable conditions for locusts to breed. The locust outbreak is the worst in decades in East Africa.

Three U.N. peacekeepers from Chad were killed in northern Mali on May 10 when their convoy hit a roadside bomb. Four others were injured in the attack, which Secretary-General Guterres noted in a statement may constitute war crimes under international law. He called on the Malian authorities to spare no effort in identifying the perpetrators of these attacks so that they can be brought to justice swiftly.

Three U.N. experts issued a joint statement on May 13 urging Hong Kong not to charge peaceful protestors with crimes. Special Rapporteur on the right to peaceful assembly and association Clement Nyaletsossi Voule, Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression David Kaye and Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders Mary Lawlor expressed concern that the recent arrest of 15 prominent pro-democracy activists will have a chilling effect on peaceful protests, calling for the charges against the arrested activists to be dropped.

In remarks to a video-conference on the role of religious leaders in addressing the COVID-19 pandemic, Secretary-General Guterres said that leaders from all religions have a shared responsibility to promote solidarity as the foundation of our response a solidarity based on the human rights and human dignity of all. Additional reporting on the remarks from the U.N. News Service available here.

The U.N. Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) on May 13 released a report on ocean conditions in the region. According to ESCAP, the report, entitled Changing Sails: Accelerating Regional Actions for Sustainable Oceans in Asia and the Pacific, explores the key areas around which regional platforms can rally interdisciplinary and cross-sectoral solutions for the ocean. Notably, the study finds that the ongoing global pandemic has created breathing space for the ocean habitat to begin to rehabilitate itself as the pressure of ocean traffic, overfishing and pollution are eased due to reduced activity. See the U.N. News report on the release of the report here.

In a statement on last weeks deadly gas leak that killed 12 people and sickened 1,000 more at a chemical plant in India, Special Rapporteur Baskut Tuncak reiterated calls for the industry to implement human rights due diligence. Tuncak, whose brief covers the implications of the handling of hazardous substances and wastes on human rights, welcomed the opening of an investigation into the incident, including the possibility of charging perpetrators with homicide offences. The statement was endorsed by the Working Group on Business and Human Rights, the Special Rapporteur on human rights and environment David Boyd, and the Special Rapporteur on the right to physical and mental health, Danius Pras.

The world economy will shrink by 3.2 percent due to the coronavirus pandemic, the U.N. Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA) forecasts in its mid-2020 report, producing $8.5 trillion in reduced economic output over the next two years. DESA also estimates that the pandemic will push over 34 million people into extreme poverty this year due to its economic impacts.

Secretary-General Guterres called it unlikely that leaders will gather in New York in September, as had been planned to mark the 75th anniversary of the formation of the General Assembly, the Brussels Times reported on May 14. The reported quote is from a French-language interview in the magazine Paris Match.

The United States accused Iran of violating a U.N. resolution by launching a satellite last month according to a May 14 news report from the Associated Press. On May 12, Russias ambassador to the U.N. reportedly referred to the U.S. assertion that it continues to have rights as a participant in the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, including the right to reinstate sanctions on Iran for alleged violations of the deal, as ridiculous, given that President Donald Trump announced in 2018 that the United States would be leaving the agreement. China also reportedly rejects the United States position that it can unilaterally reinstate sanctions against Iran, also citing Trumps withdrawal from the deal.

WHO representatives are seeking answers after Burundi unexpectedly expelled its staff. Burundian officials requested that WHO officials leave the country May 13. The WHOs ouster comes as the U.N. Commission of Inquiry on Burundi has expressed concern that the ongoing election campaign in the country has been marked by an increase in political intolerance and numerous acts of violence and human rights violations. In its May 14 statement, the commission expressed its concern regarding the decision by the Burundian authorities not to apply [WHO] recommendations on social distancing to prevent the spread of the coronavirus during the electoral campaign, while thousands of people interact on a daily basis during political rallies. The commission also expressed regret at the ouster of a WHO official from the country.

The International Labour Organization (ILO) warned that the current gaps in social protection could compromise recovery plans, expose millions to poverty, and affect global readiness to cope with similar crises in future. The cautionary note came in two policy briefs, the first entitled Social protection responses to the COVID-19 pandemic in developing countries and the second entitled Sickness benefits during sick leave and quarantine: Country responses and policy considerations in the context of COVID-19.

Originally posted here:

National Security at the United Nations This Week (May 8-15) - Just Security