[P2P-F] important arguments on a Universal Basic Dividend, by Yanis Varoufakis

Fri Nov 4 16:07:51 CET 2016

https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/basic-income-funded-by-capital-income-by-yanis-varoufakis-2016-10

A common myth, promoted by the rich, is that wealth is produced
individually before it is collectivized by the state, through taxation. In
fact, wealth was always produced collectively and privatized by those with
the power to do it: the propertied class. Farmland and seeds, pre-modern
forms of capital, were collectively developed through generations of
peasant endeavor that landlords appropriated by stealth.'
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Sharon Ede <https://www.facebook.com/sharon.ede?fref=ufi> 'Taxation is the
wrong answer. Corporations pay taxes in exchange for services the state
provides them, not for capital injections that must yield dividends. There
is thus a strong case that the commons have a right to a share of the
capital stock, and associated dividends, reflecting society’s investment in
corporations’ capital. And, because it is impossible to calculate the size
of state and social capital crystalized in any firm, we can decide how much
of its capital stock the public should own only by means of a political
mechanism.

A simple policy would be to enact legislation requiring that a percentage
of capital stock (shares) from every initial public offering (IPO) be
channeled into a Commons Capital Depository, with the associated dividends
funding a universal basic dividend (UBD). This UBD should, and can be,
entirely independent of welfare payments, unemployment insurance, and so
forth, thus ameliorating the concern that it would replace the welfare
state, which embodies the concept of reciprocity between waged workers and
the unemployed.'

-- 
Check out the Commons Transition Plan here at: http://commonstransition.org

P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net  - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net

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