Specialists of the Kela fund are carefully studying the results of the experiment with the unemployed, trying to understand what other measures are needed to improve such a social program
As "Russkaya Germaniya" notes, this monthly amount is approximately equal to the level of social benefits in Finland for one person. But unlike "social welfare," the basic income payment did not impose any conditions for receiving it. The unemployed were not forced to look for any job, undergo retraining, or send their resumes to potential employers. Such were the conditions of the experiment. It should also be noted that the approved payments did not stop even if the basic income recipient started working.
What did the authors of this experiment want to achieve? The main goal of this initiative was: will people with basic income find a new job faster than those receiving traditional benefits? In addition, it was necessary to calculate bureaucratic costs, and possibly even state revenues, which in this case would no longer be responsible for integrating the unemployed into the labor market.
At least one question has already been answered. It turned out that unconditional basic income does not affect the employment rate at all, that is, simply put, it does not stimulate recipients of this social benefit to look for work, but recipients also do not spend more time "on the couch" than ordinary unemployed people.
It turned out that during the first year of the experiment, people who received a guaranteed 560 euros "net" worked only half a day more per month than other residents of the country employed in the low-paid sector of the economy. In essence, they led exactly the same lifestyle as those "social welfare recipients" who were in the control comparison group and received regular unemployment benefits.
But from a purely psychological point of view, recipients of guaranteed basic income felt much better. "Such a payment improves the well-being of the unemployed and their perception of their own future," the Finnish Social Insurance Institution now notes. Thus, 55 percent of the experiment participants said they rate their health as good. Among ordinary "social welfare recipients," this was 46%. Only 17% of basic income recipients noted that they experience a high level of stress; among "social welfare" recipients, this share was 25%.
"Recipients of the new type of benefit showed greater confidence in the future. This applies both to the possibility of finding a job and the ability to influence social processes," the authors of the study note. In addition, it turned out that receiving basic income makes it easier to agree to a new job or even start your own business.
The financial results of the Finnish experiment have not yet been summed up; the final figures will be announced here in a year. However, it is already obvious that no serious budget deficit has been recorded in this regard.
It must be said that such ideas have been circulating in left-liberal circles of Western Europe and the United States for several years now. These plans, which until recently were quite utopian, dating back to the famous book "Utopia" by the English philosopher Thomas More, published back in 1516, currently have a powerful lobby among many German intellectuals and politicians.
Recall that in June 2016, Swiss citizens in a referendum refused to introduce guaranteed payments of 2,500 francs for all residents of the country. But in Italy and in the individual state of Berlin, conducting the same experiments as in Finland, albeit in a slightly modified format, is a matter of the near future.