When studying the feasibility and justice of basic income, researchers usually assume that policymakers would be introducing the unconditional benefit to a closed economic entity. When contemplating the introduction of a universal policy, few researchers take into consideration the fact that citizens and foreigners migrate, and that this movement alters the size and skill structure of the population. This article addresses this oversight by analyzing how basic income schemes based on residence or citizenship may affect tax base, wages, and employment (...) while incorporating migration incentives. The discussion is based upon neoclassical labor supply and migration theory and informed by the conjectured economic effects from a normative perspective. This research suggests that a basic income would create migration incentives that reduce the tax base, leading us to question this policy’s feasibility. Moreover, the flow-on effects of migration call into question the justice of both residence-based and citizenship-based basic income schemes. Therefore, this article sheds light on how basic income’s feasibility and justice relate to each other and identifies the benefits and further opportunities for interdisciplinary social policy research. (shrink)

Within a Norwegian labor activation program for social assistance, we explore how the presence of a work-oriented ethos shapes and changes the balance of rights, discretion, and negotiation available to and marking the interactions between service providers and program participants. We trace connections between changed delivery interactions and heightened shame or enhanced dignity for participants. Two themes emerge, the first related to an imagined institutional trajectory of progress attached to labor activation in which participants were offered “more” and the second (...) to whether participants and caseworkers had a meaningful voice in co-negotiating the terms of activation. Unrealistic optimism and an institutional focus placed on individual participants’ new responsibilities fueled a longer-term negative impact. Descriptions of enhanced rights, new possibilities for negotiation, and reported feelings of shame and frustration depended both on the participant’s distance to the labor market and on the point at which respondents were interviewed. (shrink)

Solving poverty is a laudable public policy goal. While there are many approaches, one that has gained popularity is the conditional cash transfer that requires recipients to satisfy conditions imposed on them such as requiring regular medical checkups. Another approach, which is gaining interest is unconditional cash transfers that do not impose conditions. The question we ask in this paper is: what do these past and current attempts tell us about the implications for gender? To answer this question, we explore (...) two programs using a gendered framework: Brazil's Bolsa Familia,which is a conditional cash transfer, and Manitoba's Mincome experiment, which was an unconditional cash transfer in Canada. We then consider how this information might be used by states, particularly as it relates to ending social marginalization. Broadly, this research contributes to academic discussions of public policy, income, gender and social vulnerability. (shrink)