Give People Money

How a Universal Basic Income Would End Poverty, Revolutionize Work, and Remake the World

By: Annie Lowrey

Narrated by: Annie Lowrey

A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice
Shortlisted for the 2018 FT & McKinsey Business Book of the Year Award

A brilliantly reported, global look at universal basic income—a stipend given to every citizen—and why it might be necessary in an age of rising inequality, persistent poverty, and dazzling technology.

Imagine if every month the government deposited $1,000 into your bank account, with nothing expected in return. It sounds crazy. But it has become one of the most influential and hotly debated policy ideas of our time. Futurists, radicals, libertarians, socialists, union representatives, feminists, conservatives, Bernie supporters, development economists, child-care workers, welfare recipients, and politicians from India to Finland to Canada to Mexico—all are talking about UBI.

In this sparkling and provocative book, economics writer Annie Lowrey examines the UBI movement from many angles. She travels to Kenya to see how a UBI is lifting the poorest people on earth out of destitution, India to see how inefficient government programs are failing the poor, South Korea to interrogate UBI’s intellectual pedigree, and Silicon Valley to meet the tech titans financing UBI pilots in expectation of a world with advanced artificial intelligence and little need for human labor.

Lowrey explores the potential of such a sweeping policy and the challenges the movement faces, among them contradictory aims, uncomfortable costs, and, most powerfully, the entrenched belief that no one should get something for nothing. In the end, she shows how this arcane policy has the potential to solve some of our most intractable economic problems, while offering a new vision of citizenship and a firmer foundation for our society in this age of turbulence and marvels.

Great ideas, good book, okay reading.

Author is obviously intelligent and the book is well-researched. She writes with passion on the subject but spends a great deal of time waxing poetic about the human stories. I get the relevance but she goes on. Her reading of the book reflects this. Her upward inflections and tired droning sometimes drag the material down. Contrast that with the actual philosophic parts of the book and she is excited and reading as much from her own personal philosophy as from the page.

Missed Opportunity

The author misses an opportunity for a substantive discussion of UBI, instead indulging in her own elaboration of Soacialism and a canned analysis of society at large.

I consider myself left of center and I do believe in social nets, but the author indulges in her own little view from the Ivory Tower without any substantive or technical discussion of UBI.

An intriguing idea

I first heard of the Universal Basic Income (UBI) about a year ago and wished there was a book that discussed it. And here it is. The studies the author cites are quite interesting, though they are generally not studies from Western countries. I did read about a study in Canada in another book. Oh, if only we could have such a thing. It seems unrealistic, but maybe one day. Talking about it, writing about it is the first step to getting the idea out there.

Well written and orated.

I agree with the author and feel that it should be implemented. Of course it's not enough for the wealthy to rise above. They are not satisfied unless the other 98% are held back. They will fight this tooth and nail to maintain the status quo.

Interesting

Overall, I enjoyed the book. However, I was hoping for more data on how UBI will change society.