Voters recognize the problems with a legally mandated basic income — the Humanity Party® offers the right solution
June 5, 2016 |
| 7 min read
Switzerland basic income: Landmark vote looms – BBC News
The Swiss have a basic voting right that most other people on Earth do not have: Direct democracy.
Basically, any person who can get at least 100,000 people behind a proposal can introduce a referendum. A referendum is a general vote by the people of legal voting age on a single political question that has been referred to them for a direct decision.
There’s a good reason why the Swiss maintain their neutrality in wars and other world conflicts: the majority of people (and the majority of humans are humane) have a say in their government. Representative governments, such as the U.S. Congress, do not allow normal citizens to offer referendums.
And one of the greatest parts of Swiss politics is that the people can veto any law that Swiss politicians pass with another referendum. The Swiss have been able to change their constitution and introduce laws as a direct result of Direct Democracy. There is little debate that the Swiss form of government has worked successfully and provides the maximum amount of political power to the people in their government. This system of Direct Democracy is responsible for one of the most stable political systems the world has ever known.
The Board of Directors of the Humanity Party® considered Swiss Direct Democracy when writing THumP®’s new U.S. and World constitutional proposals.
However,
The Swiss division into cantons (equivalent to states or territories) has also created political division and civil war in the past, and will continue to affect the outcome of some proposals that cater to the minority in spite of the vote of the majority. The Swiss constitution may be changed only if an overall majority of the people agrees in a referendum, and if the electorate of a majority of the cantons (states) agrees, too. The latter is sometimes just a little more difficult because it means that the rather conservative electorate of smaller rural cantons must be convinced as well.
As THumP® will detail below, why the current referendum to provide all Swiss citizens with a basic monthly salary of US $2,555.00 will and should fail.
The more rural cantons where hardworking farmers and rural workers reside are not as affected by technology to the degree that the more populous cities are. A farmer, for example, might argue, logically, that hard, physical work is the ‘way things are’; and why should a farmer have to work so hard to make ends meet while others who do not physically work do not.
The referendum upon which the Swiss people will soon vote,
“… would give every adult legally resident in Switzerland an unconditional income of 2,500 Swiss francs (£1,755; $2,555) a month, whether they work or not.”
THumP® supports most of the proponents’ reasons behind the referendum, mainly:
“… the fact that 21st-Century work is increasingly automated, with more and more traditional jobs, in factories, retail and even in finance and accounting, being done by machines. And they do not need salaries.”
“… the current situation forces people into work they often do not enjoy, and which does not allow them to choose other activities they might enjoy more, and which could be equally useful to society.”
“‘With a wave of technological change on its way, driverless cars, robotic surgery, the elimination of finance and accounting jobs, clearly there is going to be a huge disappearance of jobs. No one can really explain where the new jobs are coming from, so it would be foolish for a country not to prepare for what may be the greatest technological revolution in the history of the world.’”
THumP® does not agree that providing a basic living wage will,
“… encourag[e] a ‘lack of initiative and personal responsibility’, and of not providing young people with a real incentive to find work.”
THumP® supports the idea that if given the choice, as they were when they were children being provided for by their parents, the youth will become more constructive with their individual talents, creativity, and free will, and add to a more peaceful and productive society. Just because children are provided with all their basic necessities does not mean, and the facts show the opposite, that they will become lazy. On the contrary, physically secure children lead to more emotionally secure young adults whose goals and dreams of individuality and personal success is the driving force behind a more emotionally stable and successful human race.
Furthermore, the unemployed Swiss youth are the ones primarily responsible for the introduction of this basic wage referendum. The youth, being unemployed, had the time to consider and fight for it.
Of course,
“… Business leaders, already facing a skills shortage in many areas, are also alarmed.”
Business leaders, in order to make a profit, need people who are forced (slavery) to work for them. Corporate profits are never made from catering to a young person’s free will and individual hopes and dreams. Work stations (many manufacturing and office jobs) are created to make a few wealthy and confine the youth in chains of repetitious monotony that destroys their once-held childlike curiosity and dreams.
HOWEVER,
THumP® also agrees with the opposition:
Implementation of such a law would put the small Swiss country at the mercy of liberal European Union immigration laws.
“Switzerland could easily afford to introduce a basic income, … but not when Switzerland has a free movement of people agreement with all 28 EU member states, many of whom have a far lower standard of living. ‘Theoretically if Switzerland were an island [basic income] would be possible. You could cut down on existing social payments and instead pay a certain amount of money to every individual.
‘But with open borders it’s a total impossibility. If you would offer every individual a Swiss amount of money you would have billions of people who would try to move into Switzerland.’”
THumP® proposes giving all people upon earth the Basic Necessities of Life for free, financed by the abstract money system that humans have developed to support their economies. We invented the money system; and therefore, we can control it and make it serve all people equally.
THumP® does not propose providing any kind of financial support for anything other than the basic necessities of life. Doing so would inhibit and negatively affect childlike curiosity and the pursuit of individuality that current Capitalistic economies stimulate by human nature.
THumP® admits that the human race has advanced in technology and innovation that has increased the standard of living of many people, providing them with opportunities in more time and less stress to pursue individual happiness.
Greed (wanting to become financially independent) has led to many technological advancements that have positively affected the human race. The pursuit of physical security (maintaining a strong military presence) has also, probably more so, contributed to the technological advancements that have created more safety throughout the world. ONLY governments controlling monetary systems can pay for the strong militaries that protect people’s right to live. These governments introduce and control financial tools that pay for this security, which often creates, sadly, political wars and misery not supported by the people. But even so, military research and development has led to more technological advancements than any other human act.
Therefore, an irony exists:
The natural human tendency for greed and financial independence, along with the human desire to be protected from physical harm, have created the technology that has replaced human labor. But because the world’s economy is based on money and its availability in order to live,
… and money cannot be obtained without working for someone who is seeking financial independence, or from a government offering its citizens security through military jobs,
people are intellectually evolving themselves out of the ability to provide for their basic needs of life.
The Swiss referendum should not be passed.
A Worldwide Referendum legally mandated that all human beings be provided with the basic necessities of life from the moment of their birth to the moment of their death is the only way to prevent one group of people from being overwhelmed by immigration if a basic wage is introduced. Provide all people in all parts of the world with the basic necessities of life according to THumP®’s plan, allowing people to live wherever they want, and the world will change immediately.
And the ONLY way this will ever happen, the ONLY way this can possibly happen peacefully and properly, is if we eliminate the political boundaries that divide us (cantons, states, nations) and become ONE PEOPLE united under a ONE WORLD GOVERNMENT.
See how THumP® proposes this by studying our solutions.
THumP® has the solutions. No one else does.®
