The irony is that Herbert seems to have forgotten King’s emphasis on guaranteed income in addition to jobs. Here are the last few paragraphs.

Speaking about one of his many antipoverty initiatives, Dr. King told Look magazine in 1968: “We called our demonstration a campaign for jobs and income because we felt that the economic question was the most crucial that black people, and poor people generally, were confronting.”

That was then. The loudest voices against poverty and economic injustice of all kinds have long since faded. The government, reclining comfortably on a vast cushion of campaign contributions, has allied itself with big business and the big banks against the interests of ordinary Americans. Millions upon millions of families are suffering, but mostly in silence.

We honor Dr. King with a national holiday, but his long campaign for economic justice has been all but forgotten.

Here’s Herbert’s complete piece.

Guaranteed income is necessary. That’s the only way to ensure dignity for all. There will never be enough jobs for everyone because in most situations employers profit by cutting jobs, not creating them. I present that logic in more detail in Peaceful, Positive Revolution: Economic Security for Every American.

Steven Shafarman

Official unemployment is now 9.5 percent, according to the U.S. Department of Labor. As reported in the New York Times:

The American economy lost 467,000 jobs in June and the unemployment rate edged up to 9.5 percent in a sobering indication that the most painful downturn since the Great Depression has yet to release its hold.

(Note the passive phrasing: “the economy lost 467,000 jobs … the unemployment rate edged up.” That’s so common. Much more honest and meaningful, in my opinion, is to focus on real people, not abstractions. “Another 467,000 people lost their jobs last month.”)

The complete Times story is here.

It’s important to remember that 9.5 percent is just the official number. It excludes people who have given up looking for jobs, those who are only working part-time but would like full-time jobs, and those who have only contingent work. Including all of those, using what some analysts call “Effective Unemployment” the rate is 18.70 percent and the Effective Number of Unemployed is now 30,172,000.

Effective Unemployment is the subject of blog posting from Steve Clemons in the Washington Note:

Each month, I receive from Leo Hindery an update on “America’s effective unemployment rate” which includes not only the official unemployment figures but other data points showing off-the-books unemployed or underemployed people.

…

Hindery writes:

Here is a June 2009 version of the summary that calculates the Effective Unemployment Rate, which is now 18.70%, and the Effective Number of Unemployed, which is now 30,172,000.

There are currently 14,729,000 officially unemployed workers, as just announced. However, this figure does not include the combined 15,443,000 workers either (1) in the “labor force reserve” because they have abandoned their job searches (i.e., 4,278,000) or (2) underemployed because they are “part-time of necessity” (i.e., 8,989,000) or “otherwise marginally attached” (i.e., 2,176,000).

…

It’s important to see the entire picture of America’s jobs profile — no matter how unpleasant.

What are those 30 million people, the effectively unemployed, going to do? How are they going to manage? There aren’t enough jobs, and there won’t be. That would be obvious if we were not so numbed, distracted, and confused by the passive language.

Let’s give every one of the 30 million a guaranteed basic income of, say, $1,000 a month. Every adult citizen ought to get the same amount. Guaranteed. Unconditional. We can and must ensure that every citizen has an income independent of any job. Income security for all.

Millions of Americans demanded guaranteed income in the 1930s, and that’s how we won Social Security. In the 1960s, Martin Luther King Jr. and many moderate politicians and many leading economists also endorsed guaranteed income. It’s time to update the idea and enact it.

The complete plan, the idea, the benefits, and how we can make it happen, is in Peaceful, Positive Revolution,.

Additional information is on the home page and elsewhere on this web site.

I hope you’ll also comment on this blog. And please help spread the word.

Steven Shafarman

Welfare rolls are increasing, according to the Wall Street Journal, and food stamp use is increasing even faster. The facts are only part of the story.

A few key sentences from the Journal article:

Twenty-three of the 30 largest states, which account for more than 88% of the nation’s total population, see welfare caseloads above year-ago levels.

The number of food-stamp recipients has risen in every state and was 19% higher in March than a year ago, a much bigger increase than the number of welfare cases.

In general, a family of four must have a monthly income of less than $2,297 to qualify for food stamps. Welfare, on the other hand, is designed as a last resort.

The average monthly welfare benefit in 2006, which reflects the most current data collected by the government, was $372.

The complete article is here.

Can anyone live on $372?

Suppose every adult citizen is getting $1,000 a month, Citizen Dividends. That’s unconditional. It would go to the homeless and unemployed, members of the middle class, Bill Gates and Oprah Winfrey. And its independent of earnings, unlike welfare and food stamps. The unemployed will have strong incentives to work and earn.

For a poor couple, even one adult working part time would put them above the limit for food stamps. Thus, we could eliminate welfare and nearly eliminate food stamps, using that money to help pay for Citizen Dividends.

Giving it to everyone will end the stigma, coercion, and degradation, including the moral and spiritual degradation, that comes with welfare and extreme poverty. That will also make it simple to administer, with no means-testing or welfare bureaucracy. We won’t have to endure continuing political conflicts about who’s included, how much they get, where and how to draw the lines. Plus, there will be a baseline of economic justice and economic equality, constant reminders that each of us is a member of We the People, that we’re all in this together with mutual interests in making your government more just, efficient, accountable, and responsive.

Here’s the final paragraph from the Wall Street Journal article:

A further explanation is that income limits for welfare eligibility are set so low, and haven’t been adjusted for so long, that having a low-wage part-time job can disqualify an applicant. In New Jersey, a family of three earning more than $636 a month is ineligible. “These are the people who really will fall through the cracks because they’re not eligible for any help,” says Donna Gapas, who oversees the welfare program in Hunterdon County, N.J.

Can anyone live on $636?

It’ll be hard for people to live on $1,000 a month, of course, though for a couple that’s $24,000 a year, which is more than the current federally-defined poverty level for a family of four. People will have strong incentives to work and earn more, because unlike with welfare and food stamps they won’t be penalized for working and earning.

Cutting welfare is just one way to pay for Citizen Dividends. We can also cut, and perhaps eliminate, corporate welfare. No more bailouts or subsidies. No more need for government spending with the specified purpose of “creating jobs.” Everyone who’s unemployed or underemployed will have a basic income for food and shelter while they find or create their own jobs.

Cutting individual welfare and corporate welfare won’t be at the federal government level only. We’ll also be able to cut a lot of state and local programs. That’s how we pay for Citizen Dividends, by cutting or eliminating the programs that become superfluous.

Guaranteed income was a mainstream, moderate idea in the 1960s. Martin Luther King called for it in his last book, and a plan to provide it passed the House of Representatives by two-to-one, but was blocked in the Senate. Proponents including leading economists from the left and the right.

In the 1930s, mass movements for guaranteed income security generated the political will for Social Security, and that history is document on the official web site of the Social Security administration.

Early ideas about income security helped power the progressive and populist movements of the 1890s and go back to the Founders, Thomas Jefferson and Thomas Paine. A summary history is elsewhere on this web site, here.

The complete plan, the idea, the benefits, and how we can make it happen, is in Peaceful, Positive Revolution,.

Additional information is on the home page and elsewhere on this web site.

Please comment on this blog and help spread the word.

Steven Shafarman

Politicians are talking about paygo, and President Obama endorsed the concept a few days ago. Why not? It purportedly worked in the 90s, when President Clinton and the Republican Congress cut government spending and produced a budget surplus.

It’s a simple rule: New spending legislation must include the cuts to pay for it. Pay as you go.

Obama and the Democrats are endorsing it now in response to Republican warnings about the budget deficit. Republicans want to blame Obama and the Democrats for the deficits, ignoring the fact that most of the red ink spilled on their watch, while they controlled Congress with the Bush administration, cutting taxes and launching the war in Iraq.

For some help in cutting through the spin and fear tactics, here’s a very good article from a truly nonpartisan source, Public Agenda.

Paygo: Useful, but Not Nearly Enough

A direct link to an article it recommends,

America’s Sea of Red Ink Was Years in the Making, is here.

For some “truly terrifying data about the real state of the U.S. economy” (that’s the subtitle), here’s a piece from Slate that has some very good short tables.

All three articles conclude that radical reforms are necessary.

The best way to start, in my view, is with income security for all.

In the 1960s, guaranteed income was a mainstream, moderate idea. Martin Luther King called for it in his last book, and a plan to provide it passed the House of Representatives by two-to-one, but was blocked in the Senate. Proponents including leading economists from the left and the right.

The updated idea is to set some amount, say $1,000 a month, and provide that to every adult citizen. It should be enough for food and shelter, but just enough, so people still have strong incentives to work and earn.

Once that is in place, it will be a lot easier to cut government programs. Everyone will have a basic income, so we’ll be able to cut individual welfare programs. Everyone who’s unemployed or underemployed will be able to manage while they find or create jobs for themselves, so we’ll be able to cut corporate welfare programs that subsidize employers. Cut individual welfare, perhaps eliminating whole programs and agencies. Cut corporate welfare bailouts, subsidies, tax credits, and such. That’s how we pay for the basic income, Citizen Dividends.

Give the same amount to everyone – the hungry and homeless, the middle class, Bill Gates and Oprah Winfrey – and we create a baseline of economic justice and economic equality. It will be a lot easier for us to work together as We the People to demand that our elected officials enact the necessary reforms. That includes the necessary reforms of our tax code.

The complete plan, the idea, the benefits, and how we can make it happen, is in Peaceful, Positive Revolution,.

Additional information is on the home page and elsewhere on this web site, www.IncomeSecurityForAll.org.

Please comment on this blog and help spread the word.

Steven Shafarman

President Obama is in Green Bay today as part of his push for health care reform.

A story on the front page of the Washington Post has the following paragraph near the end:

Richard Cooper, professor of medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, says he thinks the variations identified by the Dartmouth researchers — due primarily to enormous hospital expenses — are often related to patients’ socioeconomic status. States such as Wisconsin have lower medical costs because they are predominantly white and middle class, he said. The notable exception is Milwaukee, with its “poverty corridor,” he said. “Nobody wants to talk about the fact that if you want to deal with health care you have to deal with poverty.”

The complete story is here.

The last sentence deserves extra emphasis:

“[I]f you want to deal with health care you have to deal with poverty.”

That’s a point we ought to raise in every debate about health care reform. Getting people to talk about it, and do something about it, ought to be a national priority – and a personal priority for everyone who cares about health care, everyone who’s dissatisfied with the status quo.

Citizen Dividends will reduce health care costs significantly. Every adult citizen will have added income, say $1,000 a month to ensure that they can afford food and shelter at least. Some of that money could also pay for health care.

I posted yesterday about hunger and a new book by Sasha Abramsky, and here’s a quote from a review of the book:

“The failures of our policies that led to this epidemic of hunger and poverty are evident across the country. Unemployment, lack of benefits, and wage cutbacks by major employers are forcing families to the food pantries.”

Also from yesterday’s blog, some data about poverty:

• In 2008, the official poverty line was $ 10,590 for a single person and $21,203 for a family of four. Census data shows 37 million Americans at or below these numbers.

Citizen Dividends of $1,000 a month would put everyone above that poverty line. To pay for it, and to prevent inflation, we’ll cut other government programs at the same time, and adjust the amount as necessary. We can eliminate hunger and debilitating poverty.

Here’s an earlier post about health care reform.

Income security for all, as I’ve written elsewhere on this blog and web site, updates ideas that were mainstream and moderate in the 1960s. Martin Luther King called for guaranteed income in his last book, and a plan to provide it passed the House of Representatives by two-to-one, but was blocked in the Senate. Proponents including leading economists from the left and the right.

In the 1930s, mass movements for guaranteed income security generated the political will for Social Security, and that history is document on the official web site of the Social Security administration. Mass demands for economic justice also helped power the Populist and Progressive movements of the 1890s, which resulted in many political reforms.

Give it to everyone – the hungry and homeless, you and other readers of this blog and our families, Bill Gates and Oprah Winfrey – because that will minimize the administrative costs and bureaucracy, while preventing political fights about where and how to draw the lines over who’s included. That will also create a baseline of economic justice and economic equality, thus making it easier for us to work together to solve our social, cultural, political economic, and environmental problems.

We will achieve this if we individuals and We the People demand it.

The complete plan, the idea, the benefits, and how we can make it happen, is in Peaceful, Positive Revolution,.

Additional information is on the home page and elsewhere on this web site.

Please comment on this blog and help spread the word.

Steven Shafarman

A new book reports that 35 million Americans go hungry every day. It’s Breadline USA: The Hidden Scandal of American Hunger and How to Fix It.

Here’s a quote from the author, Sasha Abramsky:

“The failures of our policies that led to this epidemic of hunger and poverty are evident across the country. Unemployment, lack of benefits, and wage cutbacks by major employers are forcing families to the food pantries.”

Though I haven’t read it yet, that quote and subtitle are certainly promising. Does he talk about guaranteed income, basic income, Citizen Dividends, or anything of the sort? I hope so, though there’s no sign of that in any of the reviews or articles I’ve seen.

Here’s a bit more from one article:

SOME OF THE NUMBERS FROM BREADLINEUSA:

• In 2008, the official poverty line was $ 10,590 for a single person and $21,203 for a family of four. Census data shows 37 million Americans at or below these numbers.

• From 2000 through 2007, as corporate profits grew 2.5% per year, median income for working-age households fell by 0.6 %–with African Americans and Latinos experiencing greater losses.

• In 2008, 28.4 million Americans were receiving food stamps. In New York City, 1.1 million residents were on food stamps; 700,000 more were eligible but not enrolled.

• A single person on food stamps in mid-2008 received an average of $26 per week and a maximum of $40 in vouchers.

• From 2002 to 2007, the USDA cut its food contribution to the state of California from 97 million pounds to 39 millions pounds.

• In the 1950’s, one in three Americans worked a manufacturing job with fair wages, benefits and secure pensions. By 2007, that number declined to one in 10.

• By 2008, America’s 499 billionaires owned over $1.5 trillion in assets, equivalent to the average annual salaries of approximately 30 million of the country’s workers.

The complete article is here.

We can end hunger by providing income security for all. I believe, moreover, that there is no other way to achieve that goal, and I will be happy to debate that assertion with anyone.

Income security for all, as I’ve written elsewhere on this blog and web site, updates ideas that were mainstream and moderate in the 1960s. Martin Luther King called for guaranteed income in his last book, and a plan to provide it passed the House of Representatives by two-to-one, but was blocked in the Senate. Proponents including leading economists from the left and the right.

In the 1930s, mass movements for guaranteed income security generated the political will for Social Security, and that history is document on the official web site of the Social Security administration. Mass demands for economic justice also helped power the Populist and Progressive movements of the 1890s, which resulted in many political reforms.

The updated idea is to set some amount, say $1,000 a month, and provide that to every adult citizen. It should be enough for food and shelter, but just enough, so people still have strong incentives to work and earn.

Give it to everyone – the hungry and homeless, you and other readers of this blog and our families, Bill Gates and Oprah Winfrey – because that will minimize the administrative costs and bureaucracy, while preventing political fights about where and how to draw the lines over who’s included. That will also create a baseline of economic justice and economic equality, thus making it easier for us to work together to solve our social, cultural, political economic, and environmental problems.

We will achieve this if we individuals and We the People demand it.

The complete plan, the idea, the benefits, and how we can make it happen, is in Peaceful, Positive Revolution,.

Additional information is on the home page and elsewhere on this web site. IncomeSecurityForAll.org.

Please comment on this blog, especially if you’ve read Abramsky’s book. And please help spread the word.

Steven Shafarman

Sonia Sotomayor has become a household name since President Obama announced her as his pick for the Supreme Court.

Her life story is truly remarkable: Puerto Rican parents, growing up in the South Bronx, the death of her father when she was young, her mother working two jobs to support Sonia and her brother, Princeton University, Yale Law School, a distinguished legal career, and now this nomination.

Along with her story, we are of course hearing a lot about politics and the expected fight over her confirmation. Democrats appear to be uniformly elated, though a few have expressed remorse that Obama didn’t pick someone who’s more of liberal ideologue. Republicans are divided, and portrayed as being in a bind over how to oppose her.

Instead of writing about the politics of this nomination, I’m inspired to focus on a relevant subject that’s too often distorted by ideology – justice for all. That, of course, is the closing phrase in the Pledge of Allegiance, which many of us learned when we were kids in school. “… with liberty and justice for all.”

Justice for all is impossible when only a few have real access to elected officials, while many others are mostly excluded. The very rich meet politicians at fundraisers; the rest of us may try to arrange meetings, but in most cases our phone calls are returned only by interns.

Income security for all will help level the legal, social, cultural, political, and economic playing fields.

This shouldn’t be a matter of liberals vs. conservatives or Democrats vs. Republicans. After all, the Pledge of Allegiance is nonpartisan.

Here’s how income security for all can work: There will be some baseline amount, say $1,000 a month, and our government will provide that for every adult citizen. It should be enough for food and shelter, but just enough, a basic income, so there will still be strong incentives to work, earn, and produce.

Major reasons for social exclusion are economic insecurity and economic inequality. People who are struggling to pay their bills, typically, cannot afford to be active citizens, participating in politics. Conversely, the very rich can readily hire lawyers, lobbyists, and PR professionals to advance their causes and plead their cases.

Even a basic income, $1,000 a month for every adult citizen, will do a great deal to reverse those injustices.

Sonia Sotomayor is truly exceptional, obviously. Her mother clearly did an extraordinary job in extremely difficult circumstances. Yet in a more just society, such exceptions would do more than prove the rule, they will also seek to help others to also become exceptional. Justice for all may require income security for all.

Perhaps Justice Sotomayor will one day write a Supreme Court majority opinion declaring that extreme economic inequality is, in itself, a violation of our fundamental rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

The complete proposal for income security for all is in my book, Peaceful, Positive Revolution,.

Guaranteed income was a mainstream, even moderate idea in the 1960s. Martin Luther King was a leading supporter, and a plan to provide a guaranteed income actually passed the House of Representatives in 1970 by a margin of two to one. More of that history is on the home page of this web site, IncomeSecurityForAll.org.

Steven Shafarman

Sooner or later, our elected officials and other “leaders” will have to acknowledge that conventional political and economic approaches are not working. Conventional policies cannot work.

A panel of prominent economists and scholars recently discussed the economic crises and some of the problems with the policies our government is employing. No one talked about basic income, not surprisingly, though neither did they propose any other specific policy.  Their comments clearly indicated, at least to me, the need to provide income security for all.

The participants were former senator Bill Bradley, Niall Ferguson, Paul Krugman, Nouriel Roubini, George Soros, and Robin Wells, with Jeff Madrick as moderator.

The link is here.

Do you know any of them? If not directly, than perhaps through a few degrees of separation? It would be great to hear them respond to the idea of Citizen Dividends, income security for all. Please do what you can to facilitate those connections. Please send out links to this post.

(Some personal contact, or multiple contacts, seem to be necessary before any of us consider new products, services, or ideas. You can make a real contribution. Please help.)

Here’s an important quote from Krugman, from late in the discussion:

The other thing not to miss is the importance of a strong social safety net. By most accounts, most projections say that the European Union is going to have a somewhat deeper recession this year than the United States. … But the human suffering is going to be much greater on this side of the Atlantic because Europeans don’t lose their health care when they lose their jobs. They don’t find themselves with essentially no support once their trivial unemployment check has fallen off. … When Americans lose their jobs, they fall into the abyss. That does not happen in other advanced countries, it does not happen, I want to say, in civilized countries.

And there are people who say we should not be worrying about things like universal health care in the crisis, we need to solve the crisis. But this is exactly the time when the importance of having a decent social safety net is driven home to everybody, which makes it a very good time to actually move ahead on these other things.

Citizen Dividends, a guaranteed basic income for all, is the solution for many reasons. That includes the fact that this is an idea that can appeal to Republicans and Democrats, and especially to ordinary Americans who are simply angry at or about our government. I’ve discussed that appeal in several recent blog posts and on the home page of this web site, IncomeSecurityForAll.org.

The complete proposal, the benefits, and the plan to make it happen is in my book, Peaceful, Positive Revolution,.

Following is something from a blog post of a week or ten days ago:

Think about it: We can give every adult citizen a basic income of, say, $1,000 a month.

The amount should be enough so the poor and unemployed can afford food and shelter, at least. But we give it everyone, even Bill Gates and Oprah Winfrey, to create a baseline of economic justice and economic equality.

We pay for it by ending the bailouts and subsidies, and cutting government programs that become superfluous. With this basic income, which I call Citizen Dividends, there will no longer be any rationale for individual welfare or corporate welfare. We’ll be able to cut or eliminate hundreds of federal, state, and local government programs. Every citizen will have an income independent of those programs and independent of any job.

This is a platform that can appeal to Democrats and Republicans who sincerely want to take their parties back from the special interests. It can also appeal to Greens, Libertarians, and independent candidates who seek to overthrow the Democrats and Republicans.

This is actually not such a radical idea. Earlier versions of guaranteed income were mainstream ideas in the 1960s, supported by moderate Democrats and moderate Republicans, Martin Luther King Jr., and more than 1,200 economists from across the political spectrum. Earlier proposals for income security go back to Thomas Jefferson and Thomas Paine.

Please explore the web site, read the book, and help spread the word.

This will happen when enough of us demand it, when We the People demand it.

Steven Shafarman

That phrase, “saved capitalism,” is one many historians use to describe Franklin Roosevelt’s actions in response to the Great Depression. We got Social Security; the FDIC, to insure bank deposits; the SEC, to protect investors and restore confidence in financial markets; and other government agencies and programs.

Roosevelt also reconceived government as “the employer of last resort.”

We’re now in the midst of the Great Recession, and Barack Obama is responding by trying to update or resurrect Roosevelt’s legacy. That appears logical, because current conditions are generally attributed to decades of deregulation. One form of deregulation has been the failure – most notably by the SEC, the Federal Reserve, and the Treasury Department – to apply and enforce regulations.

Though Obama’s approach is keeping things from getting too much worse, it’s not enough. It’s only providing aid to people who are losing their jobs, bandaging the failed government programs, and comforting the victims of Wall Street’s excesses and crimes. Aiding, bandaging, and comforting are good, often necessary, but in this case mostly just rearranging the deck chairs on a sinking ship. The deck-chairing can’t go on much longer. The ship really is sinking.

We need more fundamental reform, a peaceful, positive revolution.

It’s time to update an idea millions of Americans supported in the 1930s, an idea that was nearly enacted in the 1960s, an idea that actually has its roots in the founding of our nation. That idea is guaranteed income. We can and must ensure that every citizen has an income independent of any job. Income security for all.

In the 1960s, guaranteed income was a mainstream, moderate idea. Martin Luther King called for it in his last book, and a plan to provide it passed the House of Representatives by two-to-one, but was blocked in the Senate. Proponents including leading economists from the left and the right.

In the 1930s, mass movements for guaranteed income security generated the political will for Social Security, and that history is document on the official web site of the Social Security administration.

As for the Founders: Thomas Jefferson and Thomas Paine clearly endorsed ideas about income security. Think for a moment about the real meaning and logic of “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” Life requires food and shelter, and therefore an income to pay for food and shelter. Liberty is denied, at least partly, to people who cannot afford basic necessities. And happiness, though it is clearly more than money, almost always requires some income. If we sincerely believe in the ideals of the Declaration, it makes sense to enact income security for all.

The updated idea is to set some amount, say $1,000 a month, and provide that to every adult citizen. It should be enough for food and shelter, but just enough, so people still have strong incentives to work and earn.

Why don’t we have that? Because we individuals and We the People are not demanding it.

The complete plan, the idea, the benefits, and how we can make it happen, is in Peaceful, Positive Revolution,.

Additional information is on the home page and elsewhere on this web site.

I hope you’ll also comment on this blog. And please help spread the word.

Steven Shafarman

But first:

Are you tired of news about “the economy”? When you listen to the people on TV and radio – the reporters, commentators, and authors; the bankers, CEOs, and economists; and the politicians, too – do you sometimes wonder if they even know what they’re talking about?

If you were to ask them a simple direct question, “What is ‘the economy’?”, do you think they could answer it? Most couldn’t, because it’s an abstraction.

Economists and some of the smarter politicians, President Obama, say, would likely define the phrase in terms of the GDP. That’s the total production of goods and services, all the stuff, but GDP is still rather abstract. And it includes lots of stuff that’s never used or shouldn’t be produced, such as weapons, crime, waste, and pollution.

A proposal: Turn off the talkers or tell them to shut up. Don’t be distracted or hypnotized or brainwashed by “the economy.” Let’s focus, instead, more concretely and specifically on our own economies. That’s important because there’s “the economy” of finance and Wall Street and economic analysts, and it’s very different than “the economy” of Main Street and ordinary people.

How is your economy? Do you have enough money? Could you get by if you or your spouse lost your job? What if you, your spouse, your child or a parent became seriously ill?

The way to fix “the economy” is to start with real people and our immediate needs and concerns. The most simple and direct strategy is to enact an idea that more than 1,200 economists endorsed in the 1960s – including economists from the left and the right who later won Nobel Prizes – and that is guaranteed income.

Instead of bailing out banks and subsidizing big corporations, we can and should give the money to ordinary people. Every adult citizen ought to get a basic income of, say, $1,000 a month tax free. Give the same amount to everyone, rich or poor, employed or unemployed, so we can distribute it with minimal bureaucracy and a real increase in equality.

“Citizen Dividends” would promote the general welfare, and we can pay for it by cutting the current programs that serve and subsidize only the special welfare of select individuals, groups, businesses, or industries. The general welfare, not the special interests. Bailout the people, not the banks.

This is a serious policy proposal. A guaranteed income plan passed the House of Representatives in 1970 by two-to-one, but was blocked in the Senate. Martin Luther King called for guaranteed income in his last book, describing it as necessary for real progress on homelessness, racism, and education. “There is nothing except shortsightedness to prevent us from guaranteeing an annual minimum – and livable – income for every American family. The time has come for us to civilize ourselves by the total, direct and immediate abolition of poverty.”

Before that, millions of Americans joined mass movements for income security in the 1930s, and their demands were key to enacting Social Security and other innovations. Similar ideas inspired the political reforms of the 1890s. Earlier proponents included Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine, and Abraham Lincoln.

Why don’t we have it? Because we’re not demanding it. We will have it if each of us tells our friends and neighbors about these ideas, and if we then start working together as citizens, as members of the We the People.

To learn more about these ideas, visit the home page and other material on this web site, www.IncomeSecurityForAll.org.

You can read the complete plan, the idea and how we can implement it, in Peaceful, Positive Revolution,which is available from Tendril Press.

I hope you’ll also comment on this blog. And please help spread the word.

Steven Shafarman