logo
episode-header-image
Aug 2017
23m 20s

Does Universal Basic Income Work?

Bbc World Service
About this episode

Around the world, governments and researchers are experimenting with the introduction of universal basic income. From Finland and Spain to India, the idea of giving every citizen – whether working or not – a set amount of money per month is gaining momentum. It’s claimed to be a fairer and more efficient way of running a welfare system, but we’re only just starting to understand what actually happens when you introduce a basic income for everyone. We look at the evidence and try to establish whether it is an idea whose time has come.

Presenter: Mukul Devichand Producer: Jo Mathys

Image: An Indian man counts currency / Credit: Sajjad Hussain / AFP / Getty Images

Up next
Jul 8
Cutting food waste
Food waste is one of the biggest environmental and economic challenges we face — and much of it happens long before the food reaches our plates. In this episode, we meet the people working to tackle the problem in different ways. We hear about the smart sensors which could help c ... Show More
23m 24s
Jul 1
The traffic lights tackling poverty
Despite a lot of progress in the last few decades, more than a billion people still live in acute poverty, according to the UN. Many don’t have access to basic needs like food, water, shelter and clothing. We look at an innovative project in Paraguay where people identify their o ... Show More
23m 17s
Jun 24
What to do with stray animals
How the numbers of stray dogs - and feral pigeons - can be kept down kindly in urban areas. From street dogs to feral pigeons, many towns and cities are having to deal with exploding bird and animal populations which can pose risks to health and safety. This week we take a look a ... Show More
23m 23s
Recommended Episodes
Sep 2022
An Honest Discussion About A Universal Basic Income | Economics Explained
Subscribe to Economics Explained 👉 https://bit.ly/sub2eeIn this video we go over the pros and cons of a universal basic income. The US government spent over $5 trillion of economic stimulus and relief payments during the pandemic of 2020 and 2021. This is enough money to give ev ... Show More
16m 33s
Aug 2018
Annie Lowrey, “Give People Money: How a Universal Basic Income Would End Poverty, Revolutionize Work, and Remake the World” (Crown, 2018)
How can we end the scourge of poverty? How we can sustain ourselves once robots eliminate the need for many jobs? Annie Lowrey offers an answer in the title of her book, Give People Money: How a Universal Basic Income Would End Poverty, Revolutionize Work, and Remake the World (C ... Show More
36m 58s
Sep 2017
E23 Le revenu universel : une utopie ?
Intermediate French Podcast with Transcript. Learn French in Context with these Fascinating Topics. Depuis quelques années, l’idée de « revenu universel » est de plus en plus présente dans les médias.  Mais de quoi s’agit-il exactement ? Tout simplement de laisser l’Etat donner d ... Show More
30m 24s
Sep 2023
The value of free money
How would you react to being given money on a regular basis, with no strings attached? And how might this change you, your family or the wider community? This is the question faced by the Kenyan village of Kogutu after being chosen as a location for the largest ever experiment in ... Show More
22m 27s
Jun 2018
#130 — Universal Basic Income
Sam Harris speaks with presidential candidate Andrew Yang about "universal basic income" (UBI). They discuss the state of the economy, the rise of automation and AI, the arguments for and against UBI, and other topics. If the Making Sense podcast logo in your player is BLACK, you ... Show More
24m 52s
Mar 2019
141 SP 5 Ways Money May Be Costing Your Humanity
With the widest wealth gap on record between America’s wealthiest families and, well, everyone else, economic inequality is making headlines. History teaches us that concentrated wealth isn’t good for nations, but emerging science is teaching us it’s not good for individuals, eit ... Show More
9m 47s
Jul 2017
Nilofer Merchant: How to Turn Ideas Into Impact with Onlyness
Nilofer Merchant is a master at turning seemingly “wild” ideas into powerful new realities and showing the rest of us how we can do the same.Over the years, this has taken the form of books, her top-ranked TED talk, strategic advising for some of the largest, most-innovative comp ... Show More
1h 21m
Apr 2022
⚖️ The governments should give each citizen a basic income, so they have enough money to live on, even if they are unemployed. To what extent do you agree or disagree?
Introduction: It has been argued that, in order for citizens to be able to maintain an acceptable standard of living in a country, the government should institute a policy of payments to them regardless of their employment status. While such an idea may be appealing in principle, ... Show More
18m 44s
Jan 2024
The afterlife of MLK’s call for a guaranteed income
In 1967, Martin Luther King Jr. wrote that “the solution to poverty is to abolish it directly by a now widely discussed measure: the guaranteed income.” Decades later, while still a divisive idea, the conversation around guaranteed income is starting to simmer, and pilot programs ... Show More
21m 58s