IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bpj/bistud/v15y2020i1p38n1.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Full Employment, Unconditional Basic Income and the Keynesian Critique of Rentier Capitalism

Author

Listed:
  • Thomas Alan

    (Philosophy, University of York, York, YO10 5DD, UK)

Abstract

This paper compares and contrasts the basic income proposal with the alternative policy proposal of the state acting as employer of last resort. Two versions of the UBI proposal are distinguished: one is hard to differentiate from expanded welfare state provision. Van Parijs’s proposal is radical enough to qualify as major egalitarian revision to capitalism. However, while it removes from a capitalist class the power to determine the terms on which others labour, it leaves this class in place and able to exert other powers that distort the macro-economy. These include pecuniary emulation, demand pull inflation, and political resistance to full employment so that the rentier class does not have to contend with entrepreneurs *and* the working class over the distribution of the productive surplus. The state as employer of last resort proposal addresses these deeper issues while also claiming that inflationary pressure will undermine the UBI alternative.

Suggested Citation

  • Thomas Alan, 2020. "Full Employment, Unconditional Basic Income and the Keynesian Critique of Rentier Capitalism," Basic Income Studies, De Gruyter, vol. 15(1), pages 1-38, June.
  • Handle: RePEc:bpj:bistud:v:15:y:2020:i:1:p:38:n:1
    DOI: 10.1515/bis-2019-0015
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1515/bis-2019-0015
    Download Restriction: For access to full text, subscription to the journal or payment for the individual article is required.

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1515/bis-2019-0015?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. L. Randall Wray, 2024. "Modern Money Theory," Springer Books, Springer, edition 3, number 978-3-031-47884-0, March.
    2. Thomas, Alan, 2017. "Republic of Equals: Predistribution and Property-Owning Democracy," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780190602116, Decembrie.
    3. Palley,Thomas I., 2013. "From Financial Crisis to Stagnation," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781107612464, January.
    4. J. E. Meade, 1993. "Liberty, Equality and Efficiency," Palgrave Macmillan Books, Palgrave Macmillan, number 978-1-349-13084-9, December.
    5. Temin, Peter, 2017. "The Vanishing Middle Class: Prejudice and Power in a Dual Economy," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262036169, December.
    6. Karl Widerquist, 1999. "Reciprocity and the Guaranteed Income," Politics & Society, , vol. 27(3), pages 387-402, September.
    7. William Vickrey, 1961. "Counterspeculation, Auctions, And Competitive Sealed Tenders," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 16(1), pages 8-37, March.
    8. Kenworthy, Lane, 2016. "Social Democratic America," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780190230951, Decembrie.
    9. Tcherneva Pavlina R., 2012. "The Job Guarantee: Delivering the Benefits That Basic Income Only Promises – A Response to Guy Standing," Basic Income Studies, De Gruyter, vol. 7(2), pages 66-87, January.
    10. Prasad, Monica, 2006. "The Politics of Free Markets," University of Chicago Press Economics Books, University of Chicago Press, edition 1, number 9780226679013, October.
    11. Joan Robinson, 1976. "The Age of Growth," Challenge, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 19(2), pages 4-9, May.
    12. Pavlina R. Tcherneva, 2011. "Fiscal Policy Effectiveness: Lessons from the Great Recession," Economics Working Paper Archive wp_649, Levy Economics Institute.
    13. Mitchell, William & Fazi, Thomas, 2017. "Reclaiming the State," University of Chicago Press Economics Books, University of Chicago Press, number 9780745337333, October.
    14. Stuart White, 1997. "Liberal Equality, Exploitation, and the Case for an Unconditional Basic Income," Political Studies, Political Studies Association, vol. 45(2), pages 312-326, June.
    15. Hockett, Robert C. & Library, Cornell, 2019. "Open Labor Market Operations," LawRxiv xrk3w, Center for Open Science.
    16. Przeworski, Adam & Wallerstein, Michael, 1988. "Structural Dependence of the State on Capital," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 82(1), pages 11-29, March.
    17. Hockett, Robert C., 2019. "Open Labor Market Operations," LawArchive xrk3w_v1, Center for Open Science.
    18. Veblen, Thorstein, 2009. "The Theory of the Leisure Class," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199552580 edited by Banta, Martha, Decembrie.
    19. Mill, John Stuart, 2008. "Principles of Political Economy and Chapters on Socialism," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199553914 edited by Riley, Jonathan, Decembrie.
    20. Robert Hockett, 2019. "Open Labor Market Operations," Challenge, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 62(2), pages 113-127, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Andrew Lister, 2017. "Markets, desert, and reciprocity," Politics, Philosophy & Economics, , vol. 16(1), pages 47-69, February.
    2. Andrew Lister, 2020. "Reconsidering the reciprocity objection to unconditional basic income," Politics, Philosophy & Economics, , vol. 19(3), pages 209-228, August.
    3. Ehnts, Dirk H. & Höfgen, Maurice, 2020. "Modern Monetary Theory and the public purpose," IPE Working Papers 133/2020, Berlin School of Economics and Law, Institute for International Political Economy (IPE).
    4. Ginger Zhe Jin & Andrew Kato & John A. List, 2010. "That’S News To Me! Information Revelation In Professional Certification Markets," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 48(1), pages 104-122, January.
    5. Hongpeng Guo & Zhihao Lv & Junyi Hua & Hongxu Yuan & Qingyu Yu, 2021. "Design of Combined Auction Model for Emission Rights of International Forestry Carbon Sequestration and Other Pollutants Based on SMRA," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(20), pages 1-18, October.
    6. Güth, W., 1997. "Boundedly Rational Decision Emergence -A General Perspective and Some Selective Illustrations-," SFB 373 Discussion Papers 1997,29, Humboldt University of Berlin, Interdisciplinary Research Project 373: Quantification and Simulation of Economic Processes.
    7. Ellis Scharfenaker, Markus P.A. Schneider, 2019. "Labor Market Segmentation and the Distribution of Income: New Evidence from Internal Census Bureau Data," Working Paper Series, Department of Economics, University of Utah 2019_08, University of Utah, Department of Economics.
    8. Steven Rosefielde, 2020. "Stakeholder Capitalism: Progressive Dream or Nightmare?," Book chapters-LUMEN Proceedings, in: Adriana Grigorescu & Valentin Radu (ed.), 1st International Conference Global Ethics - Key of Sustainability (GEKoS), edition 1, volume 11, chapter 3, pages 14-23, Editura Lumen.
    9. Lau, Stephanie, 2011. "Investment incentives in bilateral trading," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 73(2), pages 538-552.
    10. Paul Pezanis-Christou & Abdolkarim Sadrieh, 2003. "Elicited bid functions in (a)symmetric first-price auctions," UFAE and IAE Working Papers 578.03, Unitat de Fonaments de l'Anàlisi Econòmica (UAB) and Institut d'Anàlisi Econòmica (CSIC).
    11. Ewerhart, Christian & Cassola, Nuno & Valla, Natacha, 2012. "Overbidding in fixed rate tenders: The role of exposure risk," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 36(2), pages 539-549.
    12. Scott Fay & Robert Zeithammer, 2017. "Bidding for Bidders? How the Format for Soliciting Supplier Participation in NYOP Auctions Impacts Channel Profit," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 63(12), pages 4324-4344, December.
    13. Franziska Voelckner, 2006. "An empirical comparison of methods for measuring consumers’ willingness to pay," Marketing Letters, Springer, vol. 17(2), pages 137-149, April.
    14. Karl Widerquist, 2006. "Who Exploits Who?," Political Studies, Political Studies Association, vol. 54(3), pages 444-464, October.
    15. Tafreshian, Amirmahdi & Masoud, Neda, 2022. "A truthful subsidy scheme for a peer-to-peer ridesharing market with incomplete information," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 162(C), pages 130-161.
    16. Bogetoft, Peter & Nielsen, Kurt, 2003. "Yardstick Based Procurement Design In Natural Resource Management," 2003 Annual Meeting, August 16-22, 2003, Durban, South Africa 25910, International Association of Agricultural Economists.
    17. Shunda, Nicholas, 2009. "Auctions with a buy price: The case of reference-dependent preferences," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 67(2), pages 645-664, November.
    18. Shrestha, Ratna K., 2017. "Menus of price-quantity contracts for inducing the truth in environmental regulation," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 83(C), pages 1-7.
    19. Piketty, Thomas & Bozio, Antoine & Garbinti, Bertrand & Goupille-Lebret, Jonathan & Guillot, Malka, 2020. "Predistribution vs. Redistribution: Evidence from France and the U.S," CEPR Discussion Papers 15415, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    20. Palma, Marco A. & Ness, Meghan L. & Anderson, David P., 2015. "Buying More than Taste? A Latent Class Analysis of Health and Prestige Determinants of Healthy Food," 2015 Conference (59th), February 10-13, 2015, Rotorua, New Zealand 202566, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bpj:bistud:v:15:y:2020:i:1:p:38:n:1. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Peter Golla (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.degruyter.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.