Mark Donovan

This is ✨Senator Kim Pate✨

Canada's champion for Basic Income in Parliament

She just gave one of the most iconic speeches ever
- it's cheaper than poverty
- encourages work and entrepreneurs
- cuts crime and helps victims of abuse

We break it down🧵

Abstract Workers who are worried about their personal finances may find it hard to focus at work. If so, reducing financial concerns could increase productivity. We test this hypothesis in a sample of low-income Indian piece-rate manufacturing workers. We stagger when wages are paid out: some workers are paid earlier and receive a cash infusion while others remain liquidity constrained. The cash infusion leads workers to reduce their financial concerns by immediately paying off debts and buying household essentials. Subsequently, they become more productive at work: their output increases by 7% (0.11 std. dev.), and they make fewer costly, unintentional mistakes. Workers with more cash on hand thus not only work faster but also more attentively, suggesting improved cognition. These effects are concentrated among more financially constrained workers. We argue that mechanisms such as gift exchange or nutrition cannot account for our results. Instead, our findings suggest that financial strain, at least partly through psychological channels, has the potential to reduce earnings exactly when money is most needed.

Study out of India finds that reducing financial concerns could increase productivity. A cash infusion led to paying off debts followed by becoming more productive at work. Output increased by 7%, and they made fewer costly, unintentional mistakes.

Now imagine UBI.

academic.oup.com/qje/article-...

"AI isn't coming for everybody's job — it's coming for the jobs of people who don't learn to use AI."

I don't think he means for that to come off as a threat, but it is.

Here's the deal. Everyone should benefit from AI, whether you choose to use it or not, your work helped train the AI.

#UBINOW

Help grow the conversation around universal basic income by boosting posts about it and doing your part to be and stay informed. I try to make it easier to do these things. Use my timeline. Use my pinned thread. Use my YT channel. Help get UBI mentioned more often and widely as a key policy demand!

"We will have to consider UBI in some form. AI will cause great abundance, great GDP growth, great productivity growth, all the things economists measure, and increasing income disparity." - Vinod Khosla

BREAKING: Lee Jae-myung who previously ran on UBI elected South Korea's new president

New research shows 1 in 4 Americans are 'functionally unemployed' Research released this month has show that about one in four Americans are unable to find living wage jobs.

One in four workers in the US is now “functionally unemployed,” meaning they either want but can’t find full-time work or are stuck in poverty-paycheck jobs. A higher minimum wage alone can't solve this because it would increase automation and decrease hours. We need a universal basic income floor.

Universal Basic Income.

Don’t let anyone tell you it’s not possible.

Letter from a supporter to Canadian PM candidates

Basic income leaves most of us more well-off, and all of us better off.

Humanity’s Next Leap: Quantum AI, UBI And A Fair Chance For All Universal basic income has been debated for decades. The rise of quantum AI can make it possible at scale, in sustainable ways that free people from financial instability

Discussions around #BasicIncome, automation and AI tends to end up polarising between utopian optimism or inequality-fuelled pessimism
Really enjoyed this piece, outlining "Humanity's Next Leap" powered by Quantum AI & UBI for all zurl.co/QFJPT

MASSIVE new study of Iran's UBI-like monthly cash program:
- Adult work didn't go down
- CHILD LABOUR went down to focus on school
- Drug use didn't go up

We had a fantastic participant picnic last week at Wash Park in Denver. This gathering was created to connect our participants with one another and celebrate the milestones of our program.

Thank you to everyone for coming!

P.S., the food was top notch 👌🏼

The solution? Direct cash. That’s it.

“There are those timid souls who say this battle cannot be won; that we are condemned to a soulless wealth. I do not agree. We have the power to shape the civilization that we want. But we need your will, your labor, your hearts, if we are to build that kind of society.” Lyndon B. Johnson

“When a flower doesn’t bloom, you fix the environment in which it grows, not the flower.” Alexander den Heijer

Calgary‑bound tomorrow for our first in‑person @xprize.org Global Visioneering Brain Trust session (Learning + Society). Honored to help craft prize challenges that reimagine how the world learns and thrives. Big ideas ahead! 🚀

We are presently exploring pathways to a wealth fund in Colorado. It is a proven concept. Data/AI/Robots are the resources that will drive massive wealth appreciation in the coming years.

Karl's arguments make sense to me even if they are not in the current context of our social safety net being dismantled and the increasing threat of AI and robotics to jobs. In the current context the idea of a basic income rises to the level of an urgent imperative.

We’re thrilled to announce that Hunter Ambrose has joined DBIP as our new Community Power-Building Lead! 🎉

Many know Hunter from her incredible journey—from DBIP Group C participant to fierce advocate for guaranteed income, and now stepping into a full-time role to advance our shared mission. 🧵

If inequality had remained the same as it was in 1975, every American adult could be getting a universal basic income of $16k a year right now instead of the top 1% sucking it all up for themselves. GET MAD.

Text ontop of dark blue bowl shape, saying, "We need an economy that works for all of us." Header reads, "The game is not the same.

Our economy is a system, a "game" that we all have to play. But we aren't all playing by the same set of rules. It’s time for our economy to work for all of us, not just the wealthy. It's time to change the rules.

🫂 Join us in this collective effort to expose this false narrative for what it is, and inspire society to dream and fight for an economy that works for all of us. Check out @income-movement.bsky.social’s page to learn more!

💬 Their message:
Our economy is a system, a “game” that we all have to play. But we aren’t all playing by the same set of rules. It’s time for our economy to work for all of us, not just the wealthy. It’s time to change the rules.

One of the most harmful false narratives in the US is that we live in a Meritocracy. It’s a lie that success comes from intelligence, skills, and work ethic, letting us blame the poor, not the system.

What’s your experience with this lie?

We aren't all playing by the same set of rules. It’s time for our economy to work for all of us.

Alaska's been paying yearly oil dividends to every resident since 1980.

Canada should too. Instead, we're squandering 80% of our mineral wealth to private extractors. That's $1,000,000,000,000 or $24,000 per Canadian.

We can tax wealth and do universal basic income. We can reduce inequality to sane levels and keep everyone above the poverty line permanently. The rich will just be less rich, while the rest of us will finally be able to own assets too (like our own homes) and be less stressed-the-fuck-out.

Bernie and AOC are coming to Denver for a Fighting Oligarchy rally, Civic Center Park, Friday March 21 — starts at 5pm.

Another long-time Basic Income researcher joined Bluesky: John Baker (@jmbaker19.bsky.social) from Ireland. Y'all might want to follow him @michaelalewis10.bsky.social @theubiguy.bsky.social @scottsantens.com @basicincomeearth.bsky.social

🫂 As Community Power-Building Lead, Hunter will work with DBIP participants, policymakers, and the public to amplify guaranteed income’s impact. She’ll elevate participant voices and strengthen advocacy, ensuring those most affected by economic insecurity lead the movement.