Andy Stern on Universal Basic Income

Andy Stern, former president of SEIU, released a book today in which he argues for a universal basic income in the United States.  Raising the Floor focuses on the impact of new technologies on the labor market, a subject we’ve been covering here at OnLabor.  Barbara Ehrenreich, in her review of the book, writes that “[w]hen a veteran labor leader like Andy Stern argues that we’re not going to survive an increasingly jobless economy without a universal basic income, then it’s time for the rest of us to listen up.” I agree.  Interested readers can learn more here.  For those looking to get some background and history of the universal income concept, Phillipe Van Parijs’ Basic Income: A Simple and Powerful Idea for the Twenty-first Century provides an excellent primer.