Karl Widerquist

Keeping the Global Recession in Perspective

Karl Widerquist — Thu, 12 May 2011 11:16:12 PDT

The global recession has been spreading and deepening for nearly a year. It could become the worst downturn since the Great Depression of the 1930s, and it has captured nearly all of the attention we, our media, and our leaders pay to economic issues. Perhaps we’re paying too much attention to it. I want to convince you in this editorial that a recession—even a major depression—is not an economic problem of the first magnitude. Our most pressing economic problems are distribution, and they exist whether we are in recession or not. Recessions appear to be a major problem primarily because we allow existing distributional problems to get worse during recessions.

The Economic Lesson of 1938

Karl Widerquist — Thu, 12 May 2011 11:10:58 PDT

Economic events of 1938 are relevant to our handling of the global recession today.

I Have a Basic Income

Karl Widerquist — Wed, 11 May 2011 18:20:44 PDT

In a period of about eight months, I managed to save and invest enough money to get myself a small personal basic income. It was easy—if you get the kind of lucky breaks I got. I’m telling you this story only because it illustrates how much our economic fortunes are determined by luck, how favorably our laws treat people who own stuff (people who have obtained control of natural resources) and how much unearned income is available for redistribution.

Lessons of the Alaska Dividend

Karl Widerquist — Wed, 11 May 2011 18:11:38 PDT

At a time when progressive social policies are under attack across the industrialized world, the Alaska Dividend continues to be extremely popular. It distributes a yearly dividend to every man, woman, and child in Alaska without any conditions whatsoever. It has helped Alaska maintain one of the lowest poverty rates in the United States. It has helped Alaska become the most economically equal of all 50 states. And it has helped Alaska become the only U.S. state in which equality has risen rather than fallen over the last 20 years. Certainly Alaska is doing something right. As newsletter editor for USBIG, I’ve followed the Alaska Dividend for the past ten years. This article explains some the lessons I’ve learned from following the Alaska Dividend; I believe these lessons are valuable to people interested in progressive social policy and the basic income guarantee.

Two Memoirs Tell the History of the Alaska Dividend

Karl Widerquist — Wed, 11 May 2011 17:58:28 PDT

Alaska’s Permanent Fund Dividend is closer to a basic income than almost any other policy in the world today. The lessons of how it was created and how it became so popular and successful are extremely important to the basic income movement. Two autobiographies available now tell different parts of the story of the Alaska Dividend. One is by Jay Hammond, the governor who, more than anyone else, is responsible for creating the fund and dividend. The other is by Dave Rose, the first executive director of the Alaska Permanent Fund Corporation. This review essay draws lessons for the basic income movement from those two books.

A Day-Long Discussion of “the Alaska Model” at the University of Alaska-Anchorage

Karl Widerquist — Wed, 11 May 2011 17:42:22 PDT

On April 22, 2011, I had the privilege of attending a conference at the University of Alaska-Anchorage discussing the book, Exporting the Alaska Model: How the Permanent Fund Dividend Can Be Adapted as Model for Reform Around the World. The book is edited by Michael W. Howard and me. It is due out early next year on Palgrave-MacMillan. This is my personal account of a conference held on Friday, April 22, 2011 at the Institute of Social and Economic Research at the University of Alaska

John Maynard Keynes: Economic Possibilities of Our Grandchildren

Karl Widerquist — Fri, 11 Mar 2011 07:02:10 PST

How the Sufficiency Minimum Becomes a Social Maximum

Karl Widerquist — Mon, 06 Dec 2010 12:39:08 PST

This article argues that, under likely empirical conditions, sufficientarianism leads not to an easily achievable duty to maintain a social minimum but to the onerous duty of maintaining a social maximum at the sufficiency level. This happens because sufficientarians ask us to give no weight at all to small benefits for people above the sufficiency level if the alternative is to relieve the suffering of people below it. If we apply this judgment in a world where there are rare diseases and hard-to-prevent accidents that cause people to fall below the sufficiency threshold, all of our discretionary spending will have to be devoted to bringing harder and harder cases up to sufficiency. Nothing will be left for anyone to consume above the sufficiency level.

Lockean Theories of Property: Justifications for Unilateral Appropriation

Karl Widerquist — Sat, 07 Aug 2010 06:13:02 PDT

Although John Locke’s theory of appropriation is undoubtedly influential, no one seems to agree about exactly what he was trying to say. It is unlikely that someone will write the interpretation that effectively ends the controversy. Instead of trying to find the one definitive interpretation of Locke’s property theory, this article attempts to identify the range of reasonable interpretations and extensions of Lockean property theory that exist in the contemporary literature with an emphasis on his argument for unilateral appropriation. It goes through Locke’s argument point-by-point discussing the controversy over what he said and over what he perhaps should have said to make the most valuable and coherent argument. The result is an outline of Lockean theories of property: a menu of options by which one might use appropriation to justify property rights. Supporters only need to pick the version they find most plausible, but opponents should be aware of the entire menu. Anyone claiming to refute appropriation-based property rights must address not only one but all potentially valid versions of it.

What Does Prehistoric Anthropology have to do with Modern Political Philosophy? Evidence of Five False Claims

Karl Widerquist — Fri, 18 Jun 2010 11:54:00 PDT

A BIG Idea: A Minimum Income Guarantee

Karl Widerquist et al. — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 12:04:44 PST

The Basic Income Guarantee and the goals of equality, efficiency, and environmentalism

Karl Widerquist et al. — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 03:51:57 PDT

The most important issue in equality – if not in all economic policy – is the persistence of poverty. This chapter argues that anti-poverty policy needs to move away from the categorical approach towards universalism, specifically in the form of a Basic Income Guarantee. This chapter argues that the Basic Income Guarantee, in any of its various versions is the most efficient and comprehensive method to attack poverty. It can also be used as part of a strategy for environmental protection.

Problems with Wage Subsidies: Phelps's economic discipline and undisciplined economics

Karl Widerquist — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 03:44:21 PDT

This paper discusses problems with wage subsidy proposals, specifically focusing on the proposal in Rewarding Work by Edmund Phelps. It shows that the book uses one price theory to argue that the whole benefit of a wage subsidy will go to workers (rather than firms or consumers), but it uses an opposing price theory to argue against the Earned Income Tax Credit, unions and public jobs. These and other inconsistencies in the book make it a weak argument for its conclusions.

An Introduction to Citizens Capital Accounts

Karl Widerquist — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 03:35:30 PDT

A Retrospective on the Negative Income Tax Experiments: Looking Back at the Most Innovative Field Studies in Social Policy

Karl Widerquist — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 03:20:18 PDT

Does She Exploit or Doesn't She?

Karl Widerquist — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 02:28:07 PDT

Gijs Van Donselaar uses a Guathier-based definition of exploitation (A exploits B if A is better off and B worse off than either of them would have been had the other not existed) and a related concept the abuse of rights in a series of two-person examples to demonstrate that an unconditional basic income can be parasitic and to make the case that everyone has both a right and responsibility to work. This paper argues that the same conclusions cannot be made in a world of more than two people. Exploitation may be indefinable, and information problems may make both of these concepts unknowable and unworkable in a multi-person world.

The Physical Basis of Voluntary Trade

Karl Widerquist — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 15:38:35 PDT

The article discusses the conditions under which can we say that people enter the economic system voluntarily. “The Need for an Exit Option” briefly explains the philosophical argument that voluntary interaction requires an exit option—a reasonable alternative to participation in the projects of others. “The Treatment of Effective Forced Labor in Economic and Political Theory” considers the treatment of effectively forced interaction in economic and political theory. “Human Need” discusses theories of human need to determine the capabilities a person requires to have an acceptable exit option. “Capability in Cash, Kind, or Raw Resources” considers what form access to that level of capability should take—in cash, kind, or raw resources, concluding that a basic income guarantee is the most effective method to ensure an exit option in a modern, industrial economy.

Public Choice and Altruism

Karl Widerquist — Mon, 12 May 2008 04:31:52 PDT

Reciprocity and the Guaranteed Income

Karl Widerquist — Mon, 12 May 2008 04:28:34 PDT

The Ethics and Economics of the Basic Income Guarantee

Karl Widerquist et al. — Mon, 12 May 2008 04:21:48 PDT