The World Bank Considered UBI

4th February 2020 Universal basic income (UBI)—defined as a transfer that is provided universally, unconditionally, and in cash—holds an attractive promise of change across many lines. These include coverage potential, fairness in social contracts, power relations in labour markets, and gender equity, among others. It may speak, for some, to the appetite for social justice generated by glaring and growing inequalities in societies. From this standpoint, a UBI engenders interest as a societal ideal to which to aspire, and not merely a program. For others, a UBI is poised to mitigate the effects of purported massive job losses from automation, streamline the chaotic plethora of state-provided schemes, or empower people by redirecting natural resource–related revenues from public coffers to citizens.