Universal Basic Income

The goal of universal basic income is to address the problem where there is not enough jobs for everyone. People who are unable to find jobs will be provided with funds so they can subsist. There is two other ways that this problem could be addressed which I never hear discussed at the same time.

The first is to lower the retirement age. If the retirement age was lower that would remove people from the work force earlier and open up jobs. It would also create more demand for services from old people. That seems like a fairer way to address the problem. People who have worked for along time get to retire early rather than people who have hardly worked get to have UBI.

The second way to address the problem is with the work week. If there was a law that the work week had to be four days instead of five (not necessarily the same four days). In order for the same amount of work to be done more people would need to be hired. This again is a fairer way the address the problem of not enough jobs. The people who are currently working would have less of a burden and the people who are not working could help with more of the load. That is much better that UBI where the people who are currently working would keep on doing the same load so some other group of people could get UBI. Another variation of this would be to increase the number of statutory holidays per year. That has the advantage that it could be done gradually.

It would be interesting to see policy makers discuss the tradeoff between UBI, lowering the retirement age, and reducing the workweek.