Contents

List of Figures vii

List of Tables viii

List of Contributors x

Preface xiii

Acknowledgments

1 An Introduction to the Basic Income Guarantee 1
Michael Lewis, Steven Pressman, and Karl Widerquist

Part One: History

2 In the Shadow of Speenhamland: Social Policy and the Old Poor Law 13
Fred Block and Margaret Somers

3 Inheritance and Equal Shares: Early American Views 55
John Cunliffe and Guido Erreygers

4 The Guaranteed Income Movement of the 1960s and 1970s 77
Robert Harris

5 A Retrospective on the Negative Income Tax Experiments: Looking 95
Back at the Most Innovate Field Studies in Social Policy
Robert A. Levine, Harold Watts, Robinson Hollister, Walter Williams,
Alice O’Connor, and Karl Widerquist

Part Two: Debate

6 Basic Income in the United States: Redefining Citizenship in the 109
Liberal State
Almaz Zelleke

7 Basic Income, Liberal Neutrality, Socialism, and Work 122
Michael W. Howard

8 A Framework for Justice and Fairness 138
Roy Morrison

9 Does She Exploit or Doesn’t She? 160
Karl Widerquist

10 Perhaps There Can Be Too Much Freedom 172
Michael Lewis

Part Three: Evidence

11 Income Guarantees and the Equity-Efficiency Tradeoff 185
Steven Pressman

12 Have the 1996 Welfare Reforms and Expansion of the Earned Income 205
Tax Credit Eliminated the Need for a Basic Income Guarantee in the
United States?
James B. Bryan

13 Back to Work Incentives in a Dynamic Perspective: An Application 220
to French Labor Market
Thierry Laurent and Yannick L'Horty

14 Social Minima in Europe: The Risks of Cumulating Income-Sources 234
Stephen Bouquin

Part Four: Proposals

15 The Political Economy of the Basic Income Grant in South Africa 257
Nicoli Nattrass and Jeremy Seekings

16 The Approval of the Basic Income Guarantee in Brazil 271
Eduardo Matarazzo Suplicy

17 The Basic Income Guarantee in Europe: The Belgian and Dutch 279
Back Door Strategies
Yannick Vanderborght

18 The Cost of Eliminating Poverty in Canada: Basic Income With 304
an Income Test Twist
Derek Hum and Wayne Simpson

19 Can a Negative Income Tax System for the United Kingdom Be 315
Both Equitable and Affordable?
Randall Bartlett, James Davies, and Mike Hoy

Index 339