Who will dare to implement UBI?

Universal Basic Income (UBI) is the solution to India's poverty, according ti BJ Panda. Apparently, it can be funded by reducing fraud in present schemes and it will eliminate the need to tailor help to select groups of needy people. The recent agitation by farmers and the protests, often violent, for various groups for reservation in government jobs is the result of the failure to create enough meaningful jobs, wrote Prof P Bardhan. "One idea is that of a Universal Basic Income Supplement (UBIS)" which "should be looked upon not as an anti-poverty programme, but mainly as part of the citizen's right to minimum economic security". The Economic Survey of 2016-17 also supported a UBI scheme. "A just society needs to guarantee to each individual a minimum income which they can count on, and which provides the necessary material foundation for life with access to basic goods and a life of dignity. The trouble is that experts cannot even agree on what constitutes poverty, how many people should be covered and whether UBI should be in addition to, or instead of, all the present social schemes. A guaranteed UBI would encourage people to increase consumption which was predicted by Milton Friedman in 1957 in his permanent income hypothesis (PIH). A two-year study in Finland, in which unemployed workers were given 560 euros per month in addition to unemployment benefit, found that it did not encourage them to find jobs, even though they would have continued to get the extra money in addition to their salaries. Unemployment benefit would have stopped if they started working. However, some see the experiment as a great success because "it made recipients feel happier and less stressed". Since it is easy to be charitable with taxpayer money politicians compete in announcing handouts to tempt people to vote for them. Congress President Rahul Gandhi announced a Minimum Income Guarantee, if elected, in which the government will pay a top up to those earning below a certain level. Does it mean that if someone is earning zero the government will pay the entire sum to bring him to the guaranteed level? Being in power, Prime Minister Modi was able to announce a lot of handouts in this year's Budget. To show that the fiscal deficit will be controlled the Budget has assumed unjustified levels of revenue, wrote V Kaul. Modi has turned out to be like former President of Argentina Cristina Fernandez in controlling institutions which publish bogus statistics so as to hide massive spending on populist programs, wrote Prof V Dahejia. The electoral advantage of announcing welfare schemes outweighs the value of providing better services through institutions, wrote Y Aiyer. The rapid growth in 1980s-90s was due to fall in fertility rate in India, a UN report said. Perhaps, all this debate is moot. Those benefiting from present handouts will resist a transfer to UBI. Politicians will not dare.