Basic Income

Basic Income is a progressive, innovative and powerful solution to redress widening global inequities and poverty driven by transformations of modern welfare states.

We seek to apply the collective knowledge and skills of researchers across universities to tackle big picture global challenges of our time: poverty, climate change and inequality. As we see it, Basic Income is one of the keys to dearly needed transformation and social change.

Our group is a collaboration of leading academic experts on social policy, inequality and basic income, brought together to research and respond to developing a just society for all. The group is involved in progressing research projects that shape and influence policy and disseminating research findings and results and project outcomes.

A Universal Basic Income (Basic Income Guarantee) is an unconditional cash payment to individuals sufficient to meet basic needs (Universal Basic Income New Zealand, 2003).

In its simplest form, Van Der Veen (1998) described Basic Income as a proposal 'to disburse a tax-free subsistence income to every adult citizen, whether he or she is employed or unemployed, wealthy or poor, healthy or sick, active or idle, and…young or old, with basic incomes [including] children replacing existing child benefits' (p. 141).