Universal Basic Income - with Professor Guy Standing | Ep.10

This week we talk to Guy Standing, Professor of Development Studies at SOAS, founding member and honorary co-president of the Basic Income Earth Network and author of Battling Eight Giants: Basic Income Now.

The idea of a universal basic or guaranteed income has been advocated for centuries. Thinkers from Tom Paine in the 1790s to social reformers in the 1890s argued that it was the duty of the state to ensure a minimum income for all citizens. 

With inequality, climate change and automation the need for such a policy was evident before the coronavirus crisis, but one effect of the pandemic, which has left huge numbers of people economically insecure, has been that the idea now has political legs. We’ll be chatting to Guy, one of the worlds leading experts in basic income, about the transformative effects of a basic income on individuals and communities, how it can ensure a better future for all and why it must constitute part of a post-coronavirus settlement.

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