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35C3 - The Precariat: A Disruptive Class for Disruptive Times.

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    35c3 preroll music
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    Herald Angel: Our next speaker speaks
    British English. He writes books and he's
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    going to talk about those books. He's an
    economist and member of the Basic Income
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    Earth Network which has its 18th
    conference... had its 18th conference this
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    year. It's from 1986, 32 years going
    strong. Allow me to introduce Guy
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    Standing, talking about "The Precariat: A
    Disruptive Class for Disruptive Times".
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    applause
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    Guy Standing: In a book that I wrote in
    2011 on page 1, I said that unless the
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    insecurities and the fears and the
    aspirations of the precariat were
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    addressed as a matter of urgency, we would
    see the emergence of a political monster.
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    You will not be surprised that in November
    2016 I received a lot of emails from
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    around the world from people who said:
    "the monster has arrived". Today,
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    ironically, he is in Germany, inspecting
    his troops. Maybe a lot of Americans would
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    like him to stay in Germany, but I would
    not. What I'm going to talk about today is
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    something that has involved me in
    something I never expected in my life, an
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    adventure, because since that book was
    published it's been translated into 24
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    languages and taken me around the world to
    speak in over 500 places and about 40
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    countries. And the reason for that is not
    the book, but the fact is that the global
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    precariat is growing in every part of the
    world. And I want to talk about some of
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    the background of this disruptive class
    that is taking shape, because I think it
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    has a resonance with this conference and
    similar events taking place. Because as
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    someone like myself—I'm an economist—as I
    was walking around here this morning, I
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    thought: this is the future. You are the
    future—if, IF we are to have a future.
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    It's up to YOU to define that future. And
    I mean it very seriously. We are in the
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    midst of a global transformation. Those of
    you who are political scientists or know
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    political science will understand. Karl
    Polanyi wrote a great book in 1944 called
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    "The Great Transformation" and his book
    was fundamentally about what took place in
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    the 19th century and the early part of the
    20th century. He described the mid-19th-
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    century until the Second World War as "the
    disembedded phase of the Great
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    Transformation". It was dominated
    initially by financial capital, by
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    laissez-faire economics and by a
    technological revolution that was taking
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    place at the time. It took place in which
    the dominant groups were around finance
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    and monopolies and imperialism. But what
    happened in that disembodied phase was
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    that insecurities multiplied, inequalities
    worsened, wealth inequality grew more than
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    income inequality. And in the process we
    had the emergence of a new class
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    structure, in which the bourgeoisie was
    confronted by a solidified proletariat.
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    The proletariat were the losers in the
    process of two world wars and the Great
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    Depression and we had what Polanyi said
    was the threat of the annihilation of
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    civilization. We all know what happened.
    But after the Second World War a new
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    embedded phase of his Great Transformation
    took place, in which finance was tamed, in
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    which social democracy became the dominant
    force. Labor based insecurities were
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    reduced, inequalities were reduced, and we
    had a period in which global trade grew in
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    competitive goods, but with similar
    standards in the industrialized capitalist
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    countries. But there were inherent
    contradictions in that embedded phase of
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    the Great Transformation. It became
    inflationary, it became sluggish. It was
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    no golden age. It was no golden age that
    prompted 1968, the riots, the revolt
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    against the system. It was a period of
    drabness in many ways, when full time
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    stable jobs were meant to be the Nirvana
    but it stultified the human creativities,
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    it stultified subversive thinking. It was
    a period in which there were many
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    improvements, but it had its limitations.
    As we all know that Great Transformation
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    collapsed in the 1970s and 1980s and
    ushered in the disembedded phase of the
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    global transformation. The disembedded
    phase was dominated by neoliberalism in
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    economics, by the emergence of politicians
    like Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan
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    to put those neoliberal ideas into
    practice. It was dominated by the
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    emergence of US dominated financial
    institutions like Goldman Sachs that
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    became great umbrellas around the world,
    and it ushered in to a new technological
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    revolution that you're all dealing with
    today. For my story, the most important
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    aspect of the early phase of that
    technological revolution was that it made
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    the relocation of production and
    employment much easier, so that the
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    relocation depended on relative costs. And
    it strengthened the power of capital over
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    labor. So we see around the world in EVERY
    country a shift in which more and more of
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    the income goes to capital and less and
    less goes to labor. It's a phenomenon that
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    spread around the world. And the
    technological revolution also meant that
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    capital mobility increased dramatically
    and we have some other interesting
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    developments which I come to in a moment.
    But inequalities have increased,
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    insecurities have become vastly greater in
    every part of the world. We have a new
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    gilded age at the top and at the bottom,
    and that gilded age has gone with a new
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    Kondratiev long wave of technological
    revolution, which has helped in the
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    relocation again of the geopolitical POWER
    that is so important today. We have, now,
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    moved away from the neoliberal era of the
    1980s and 1990s and a pivotal event came
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    in 1994, when the passage of TRIPS by the
    World Trade Organization—TRIPS: Trade-
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    Related Aspects of Intellectual Property.
    What this did is globalize the American
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    system of intellectual property rights,
    with patents, with copyright, with brands,
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    with all of the adages that go with that
    system. So now we have a system in which
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    about a quarter of the world's
    GDP—national income—is attributable to
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    intellectual property rights. Some of you
    benefit from patents and other copyrights
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    rights and so on, but it's a system that
    has entrenched powerful big corporations.
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    So we have big pharma, we have big finance
    and above all, we have big tech. The big
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    tech are rentiers taking more and more
    from the world's income pile. And in
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    effect we have rentier capitalism today,
    not a free market. This is the most UNfree
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    market system ever created in history.
    Where more and more of the income is going
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    to the owners of property. Physical
    property, financial property, and
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    intellectual property. We've had a
    breakdown of the income distribution
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    system of the 20th century, it's broken.
    Wages have been stagnating in all
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    industrialized countries for three
    decades. Three decades! They are lower in
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    the United States in real wage terms than
    they were in the 1980s. The implications
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    are dramatic and above all we've got a new
    global class structure that has taken
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    shape. The class structure has a
    plutocracy at the top. It's not the top
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    1%, it's the top ZERO point one percent of
    multibillionaires striding the globe as
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    global citizens, taking more and more
    rental income. Take someone like Jeff
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    Bezos. His income has grown by four
    hundred million dollars per WEEK this
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    year. This is obscenity, multiplied. This
    plutocracy of course now have a
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    representative in the White House, as
    their spokesperson. We have other
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    plutocrats manipulating our politics,
    manipulating our technology, manipulating
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    our commons. These are the realities.
    Beneath the plutocracy is an elite who are
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    the servants of the plutocrats, who are
    making many millions of dollars, euros,
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    pounds or whatever and are servants. We
    don't have to feel sorry for them either.
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    Below them is the salariat. When I was a
    student, we were told and we were taught
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    and we believed that by the end of the
    20th century the vast majority of us would
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    be part of the salariat with stable
    salaried employment, with pensions to look
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    forward to, paid holidays, paid medical
    leave, paid this, paid that, paid the
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    rest. The only problem is that the
    salariat has been shrinking everywhere in
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    the world. It won't disappear, but today
    many in the salariat worry about their
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    daughters and their sons because they're
    not going into the salariat. Below the
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    salariat, just, is what a group I call in
    the books the proficians, a combination of
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    professionals and technicians. Many in
    this hall this morning are part of the
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    proficians. But be careful: these people
    don't want full time stable jobs. They
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    don't want to be saying "yes", "no" to a
    boss. They're making good money, they're
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    rushing around with their laptops or what
    ever over their shoulders. They're making
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    a lot of money. They're making a lot of
    money and they are tending to be
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    complacent. But they should worry about
    burn out. They should worry about mental
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    illness at age 28 and a half, or
    thereabouts. The proficians are helping in
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    identifying the technological and
    political options for the future, they
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    have a responsibility. But they must not
    lose that responsibility in an egotistic
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    narcissistic pursuit, a private gain. It's
    a difficult balancing act. But they have a
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    responsibility because they have the
    skills, they have the knowledge, and they
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    know what's going on. Beneath these
    groups: the old proletariat, disappearing
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    everywhere. They were the ones that
    established social democracy, the trade
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    unions, collective bargaining, tripartism,
    all the institutions of the International
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    Labor Organization. But today they are
    shrinking everywhere, and along with them
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    their political representatives are
    effectively dead men walking. They are not
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    the future. They did many good things in
    the 20th century. I do not wish to
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    disparage them in any way, but they are
    not the future. Beneath the precariat in
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    terms of income is the precariat, beneath
    the proletariat is the precariat. The
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    precariat can be defined in three
    dimensions. The first dimension is that if
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    you're in a precariat you are being told
    and you are being habituated to accept a
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    life of unstable labour and insecure work.
    You don't have an occupational narrative
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    to give to your life, an occupational
    identity. "I am something." You worry that
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    tomorrow morning you'll have to be
    something else. You also have to do a lot
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    of work for labour, work that is not
    recognised, not remunerated, not in our
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    statistics, but you know you have to do
    it, otherwise you will pay a price. And in
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    being in the precariat you don't know the
    optimum use of your time. Should I spend a
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    little more time networking, doing this,
    retraining, going to a conference, doing
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    this, doing that. Looking after my baby,
    paying the rent. And therefore you suffer
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    from what I've called the precariatised
    mind. The precariatised mind, when you're
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    stressed, you're anxious all the time. You
    put a good face on it, but every now and
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    then you see your friends collapsing in
    one way or the other. That's how it feels
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    for many people. Every day I receive
    emails from various people from various
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    places who don't know me who want to
    explain their experience. Sometimes I get
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    very angry, sometimes I feel like crying.
    But the pain out there is part of the
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    process of liberation as well. It's not
    just a victimhood, it's about people
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    trying to make sense. Of a life of
    insecurity. And another feature is that
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    people in the precariat tend to have a
    level of agitation that is above the level
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    of labor they can expect to obtain. The
    second dimension of the precariat is that
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    people in it have distinctive relations of
    distribution. What that means is they have
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    to rely very largely on money wages, money
    payments. They don't get access to the
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    prospect of pensions or paid holidays or
    paid medical leave or subsidised this or
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    subsidised that, they have to live on
    wages. The only problem is that the value
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    of those wages is tending to go down and
    the volatility of their income is growing.
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    So basically the second aspect of this
    distributional question is that most
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    people in the precariat are living on the
    level of unsustainable debt. One mistake,
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    one illness, one bad decision and you
    could be tipped out into the lumpen-
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    precariat, outside society, without a
    voice. And of course at the same time the
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    state has been changing its social
    security and social protection system
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    towards more targeting on the poor. So
    it's reduced the social solidarity of the
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    social protection system, and this hits
    the precariat in a very big way. Because
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    state benefits, welfare benefits, have
    been shrinking and they've been means-
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    tested and behaviour-tested, drifting to
    Hartz 4 or the equivalent in other
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    countries, where you're expected to
    behave as the state tells you to behave.
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    Not enough people realise what is
    happening down at that end of the labour
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    market, the indignities that go with it.
    The shame, the stigma, the poverty traps.
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    Whereby if you do get a benefit and you
    then have the offer of a low wage job,
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    you're losing as much in benefits as you
    get from the low wage job. You're facing a
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    marginal tax rate of 80% in Germany, 86%
    in Denmark, 80% in Britain. If the middle
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    classes had to accept such marginal tax
    rates there would be riots in the street.
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    But that is what society expects of the
    precariat. It's NOT funny. And in
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    addition, and what I think is most
    importantly about the precariat: it has
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    distinctive relations to the state, the
    institutions of society and governance.
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    The precariat is losing the rights of
    citizenship often without realising it,
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    they're losing cultural rights because
    they cannot belong to organizations that
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    represent their cultural identity or
    aspirations. They're losing civil rights
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    because they cannot get access to due
    process and legal justice. They're losing
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    social rights because they don't have
    access to rights-based benefits and
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    services. They're losing economic rights
    because they cannot practice what they are
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    perfectly qualified to do. And above all
    they're losing political rights because
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    they don't see out there politicians or
    political parties that represent what they
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    are and what they want to be. Now in that
    context I've described the precariat today
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    in an old Marxian term: it's a class in
    the making. Not yet a class for itself.
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    And what I mean by that is that while
    millions of people share the objective
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    characteristics of being in the precariat,
    they have different consciousness of what
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    it is. And you can divide the precariat
    into three groups. The first I call the
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    atavists. These are those who do not have
    a lot of education, but their parents and
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    their families and communities used to be
    in the proletariat, used to have working
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    class backgrounds of being dockers or
    steelworkers or car workers or whatever.
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    This group is relating their deprivation
    of today to a lost Yesterday, real or
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    imagined. That lost Yesterday they want
    back. It's this group that supports the
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    Donald Trumps. It's this group that
    supported Brexit in Britain. It's this
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    group that supports the Marine Le Pen's,
    the Orbans and the equivalent in Germany
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    and elsewhere. This group supported the
    Liga in Italy. You can name right wing
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    populist groups. There's good news and bad
    news. The bad news here is that they are
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    proving to be profoundly strong. We risk
    today that that group could lead us into a
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    new dark political future, characterized
    by demonizing migrants and minorities,
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    authoritarian tendencies, destructive,
    vile outcomes. But there's good news. In
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    my view, they have reached their peak in
    terms of size. Many are getting older of
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    that type, and they will not lead the
    other two groups in the same direction.
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    The second group in the precariat are what
    I call the Nostalgics. These are made up
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    with the migrants, the minorities, the
    disabled, people who feel they have no
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    sense of home. They don't have a home
    there, they don't have a home here, but
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    they dream of a home. This group knows
    it's losing rights, it's being demonized,
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    it's being victimized. But they will not
    support a neofascist populism. They keep
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    their heads down because they have to
    survive. Every now and then, there are
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    days of rage when everything gets too
    much, but this group is LOOKING for a
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    home. It's LOOKING for a future. Its
    relative deprivation is: it's got a lost
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    now. The first group a lost past, the
    second group a lost now. The third group
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    in the precariat are what I call the
    progressives. These are the millions of
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    people who went to college, went to
    university and were told by their parents
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    and by their teachers: go to university
    and you will get a future! A future! A
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    career, status, influence, dignity. And
    they come out of university and college
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    knowing they don't have that future. All
    they have are debts, disillusions, and
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    difficulties. This group is entering the
    precariat. It will not support neofascist
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    populism, it is looking for a future. It
    is looking for a new politics of paradise.
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    There are many people at this conference I
    believe are in this third part. The bad
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    news is they've been dismissing politics
    because they know very wisely that it's
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    being cynically manipulated by the
    plutocrats and by others, and therefore
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    they have detached themselves from
    politics. The trouble with that is that it
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    surrenders the ground to the others with a
    regressive, antidemocratic, anti-
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    enlightenment perspective. But the good
    news is this: since the crisis of 2008 and
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    particularly since the Occupy movement and
    the Arab Spring in 2011 and the Indignado
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    movement, more of this third part of the
    precariat are reengaging with politics.
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    They're reengaging in different ways,
    beginning to forge an agenda for that
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    future. And I believe that if you take a
    historical perspective, then I only wish I
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    were 21. I would love to be 21 because if
    you are 21, you have a vacuum, you have an
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    opportunity to forge a fundamentally
    enlightenment-led future. Let me give you
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    by way of conclusion a few thoughts on
    what that might be. The thoughts are
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    these: today are income distribution
    system is broken. We can't put yesterday
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    back. Therefore we have to build a new
    income distribution system. We will not
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    get anywhere by trying to raise wages. But
    we WILL get somewhere if we decide that
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    what society has to do is recycle the rent
    from the technocrats, the financiers and
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    the property owners to the commons, to the
    commoners. We must build that distribution
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    system by returning to the values of the
    enlightenment, of egalité, liberté,
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    fraternité or solidarité. And to do that,
    I strongly believe that one part of this
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    new income distribution system should be a
    basic income that everybody has as a
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    right.
    applause
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    I have had the privilege of working for
    this for thirty years since before BIEN.
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    Anybody can join BIEN, we have many
    Germans who are part of it. We have
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    thousands and thousands of people who are
    members. For many years we were regarded
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    as crazy, mad, bad and dangerous, but
    suddenly in the last few years we've
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    suddenly become respectable, at least
    tolerated. I've had the privilege of
  • 32:21 - 32:30
    designing and conducting basic income
    pilots in four continents, the biggest
  • 32:30 - 32:37
    being in India. Anybody who's interested:
    I've written a book, "Basic income: and
  • 32:37 - 32:43
    how we can make it happen". But let me
    just tell you what happened in India, a
  • 32:43 - 32:51
    country that's poor, a country that
    poverty is terrifying. And when we decided
  • 32:51 - 32:56
    we would do it, and we mobilized money, we
    provided 6000 people, men, women and
  • 32:56 - 33:03
    children, with basic income. Sonia Gandhi
    told us, herself, she said you're wasting
  • 33:03 - 33:14
    the money, they're wasted on drink and
    drugs. Two years later, after we had done
  • 33:14 - 33:20
    the pilot and seen what had happened, she
    called us back to our house and she said
  • 33:20 - 33:26
    she wished she had known. What happened
    was that when they started receiving the
  • 33:26 - 33:32
    basic income they did what all of us in
    this room would do. They started giving
  • 33:32 - 33:38
    their children better food, so nutrition
    improved, health of the children improved,
  • 33:38 - 33:45
    schooling improved, health and nutrition
    of others, adults, improved. People with
  • 33:45 - 33:53
    disabilities suddenly had a basic income
    with which they could be citizens. Womens'
  • 33:53 - 34:04
    status improved, sanitation in the
    villages improved. Work increased,
  • 34:04 - 34:12
    production increased. If you go to those
    villages today, you would have seen a
  • 34:12 - 34:21
    transformation. Now that happened in a
    poor place. We also did it in Africa,
  • 34:21 - 34:27
    where very similar results were showing.
    We've now got pilots in Canada and some
  • 34:27 - 34:33
    hopefully launched soon in Scotland, and
    the opposition leadership in Britain has
  • 34:33 - 34:40
    asked me to prepare a plan for doing it in
    Britain. If you had told me 10 years ago
  • 34:40 - 34:46
    that any of those things would have
    happened, I would have said I must have
  • 34:46 - 34:55
    had something to smoke or drink, because I
    must be hallucinating. But change can come
  • 34:55 - 35:05
    quicker than we think. It is up to US. I
    want to tell you one story. I still have a
  • 35:05 - 35:11
    few minutes, I hope, I thought... is
    that... what's that figure? I don't know,
  • 35:11 - 35:20
    but I'm going to tell the story. When we
    were launching the pilot in India, we went
  • 35:20 - 35:30
    to one village and all the young women had
    veils. And we had to have their photo
  • 35:30 - 35:36
    taken for the cards, so that they could
    get their monthly basic income, and we had
  • 35:36 - 35:42
    to persuade them to go into a hut with
    other women to have their photos taken. 9
  • 35:42 - 35:48
    or 10 months later I went back to that
    particular village and I said to one of my
  • 35:48 - 35:56
    Indian colleagues, I said, "Have you
    noticed a difference here?" He said, "No,
  • 35:56 - 36:05
    no." I said, "What difference?" He said,
    "Nothing, perhaps better sanitation."
  • 36:05 - 36:13
    "No," I said, "None of the women are
    wearing veils." He said: "Yeah!". So we
  • 36:13 - 36:19
    called some of the women across and we
    said, "Look, excuse us, but you wore
  • 36:19 - 36:26
    veils, you're not wearing veils now. Why?"
    They were shy. They didn't want to speak
  • 36:26 - 36:31
    to a foreigner and so on. But after a
    while one of the young women spoke up and
  • 36:31 - 36:41
    she said, "You know, before we had to do
    what the elders told us to do. Now we have
  • 36:41 - 36:48
    a basic income, we can do
    what we want to do.
  • 36:48 - 36:57
    applause
    Standing: And there is an e– there is an
  • 36:57 - 37:05
    even more poignant story in our Namibian
    pilot. At the end of that one I went to
  • 37:05 - 37:11
    one of the villages and I asked some young
    women. I said, "What was the best thing
  • 37:11 - 37:19
    about having a basic income, what was the
    best thing?" They talked to each other,
  • 37:19 - 37:25
    giggled, you know, again, talking to a
    foreigner and so on. And then one of the
  • 37:25 - 37:33
    young women said, "You know, before, when
    the men came down from the fields at the
  • 37:33 - 37:45
    end of the month, with their wages in
    their pockets, we had to say: 'Yes'. Now
  • 37:45 - 37:55
    we have our basic income. We say 'No'."
    That's emancipation. And if you can put an
  • 37:55 - 38:01
    analogy in Germany or Britain or anywhere
    else, you will find that this ability to
  • 38:01 - 38:08
    say 'No' to exploitation and oppression is
    a fundamental part about a progressive
  • 38:08 - 38:17
    agenda for the 21st century. We have to
    find a way of liberating people to say
  • 38:17 - 38:25
    'No' and also to say 'Yes', to say 'Yes'
    to the ability to help people to do
  • 38:25 - 38:35
    things, to care, to participate in the
    ecological aspects of life. And I think it
  • 38:35 - 38:47
    will help in both respects. In that
    context, let me conclude by saying: a
  • 38:47 - 38:55
    basic income is not a panacea. It must be
    part of a new system. We need new forms of
  • 38:55 - 39:03
    voice. We need new forms of work. We need
    to realize today the new technologies are
  • 39:03 - 39:14
    potentially liberating us to escape from
    labour, so that we can do more work. Most
  • 39:14 - 39:23
    languages distinguishes the difference but
    only in the 20th century were we stupid
  • 39:23 - 39:34
    enough to think only labour counts as
    work. I have never worked harder than
  • 39:34 - 39:41
    since I stopped doing labour, since I
    stopped having a job.
  • 39:41 - 39:47
    applause
    Standing: And what we have to do, what we
  • 39:47 - 39:54
    have to do, is convince the politicians
    and the social scientists that they should
  • 39:54 - 40:02
    change their thinking about what is work
    and what is not work. Every feminist—and
  • 40:02 - 40:08
    we should all be feminists—every feminist
    should be demanding that they change their
  • 40:08 - 40:16
    concepts, because it means that most of
    the work women do doesn't count as work.
  • 40:16 - 40:20
    It's ridiculous, it's sexist,
    it's arbitrary.
  • 40:20 - 40:31
    applause
    For me, this has given a new dimension
  • 40:31 - 40:34
    because of the growth of the precariat,
    because if you're in the precariat you
  • 40:34 - 40:42
    know you have to do a lot of work. A lot
    of work. And you're treated as if you're
  • 40:42 - 40:51
    being lazy. But there's another wonderful
    opportunity here. We all know or should
  • 40:51 - 41:00
    know that we are threatened by extinction.
    Extinction that comes from the greenhouse
  • 41:00 - 41:06
    gas emissions, the pollution, the erosion
    of the commons, the privatization of our
  • 41:06 - 41:18
    spaces, our loss of nature, our loss of an
    ecological landscape. We know that. It's
  • 41:18 - 41:23
    the number one crisis charging towards us.
    We didn't need the panel of climate change
  • 41:23 - 41:30
    to tell us that, but we know it. And what
    are we doing? We've just seen in Poland,
  • 41:30 - 41:39
    hardly anything. We need big carbon taxes.
    Big carbon taxes.
  • 41:39 - 41:45
    applause
    But there are two problems. There are two
  • 41:45 - 41:56
    problems. First, taxes are unpopular. And
    second, if you just put a carbon tax, it
  • 41:56 - 42:02
    would worsen inequality. Because the poor
    person pays proportionately more than the
  • 42:02 - 42:14
    rich person. Therefore we need to combine
    carbon taxes with carbon dividends. So
  • 42:14 - 42:21
    that the proceeds of carbon taxes are
    recycled. I think most of you can work it
  • 42:21 - 42:29
    out where I'm ending this discussion.
    Recycled as basic incomes. The carbon tax
  • 42:29 - 42:37
    can pay for a large part of a basic income
    future, and therefore this perspective
  • 42:37 - 42:44
    leads to you thinking: we can advance the
    cause of ecological survival, advance the
  • 42:44 - 42:51
    cause of security, advance the cause of
    emancipation and do what every
  • 42:51 - 43:01
    transformative class should do. The
    precariat is a transformative class
  • 43:01 - 43:10
    because it wants, intuitively, to abolish
    the conditions that define its existence.
  • 43:10 - 43:18
    And therefore—abolish itself. We can do
    it. Thank you very much.
  • 43:18 - 43:41
    applause
    Herald: Thanks very much. They say on
  • 43:41 - 43:45
    Congress every time, every year we have a
    system that we don't want to use anymore,
  • 43:45 - 43:50
    I think it's capitalism.
    laughter
  • 43:50 - 43:55
    applause
    Herald: We're going to hold a Q&A
  • 43:55 - 44:00
    including your questions from the
    Internet. There are six microphones
  • 44:00 - 44:08
    scattered around the room, so if anybody
    wants to ask a question in public, we'll
  • 44:08 - 44:15
    start this now. And we'll start with mic
    six over there.
  • 44:15 - 44:20
    Question: Brilliant. So...
    Standing: Where is mike six?
  • 44:20 - 44:21
    Q: Here.
    Herald: Mike six is over there.
  • 44:21 - 44:27
    Standing: OK. Hello. So
    Q: Hi, I was wondering... you mentioned
  • 44:27 - 44:34
    basic income and you connected it with
    carbon taxes. I was wondering what other
  • 44:34 - 44:43
    strategies you're thinking towards
    tackling other systemic issues we have,
  • 44:43 - 44:51
    especially in regards to land, which to
    me– you mentioned different types of
  • 44:51 - 44:58
    property. But the thing that land today is
    the proxy to access to all the other
  • 44:58 - 45:04
    values. So...
    Standing: Shall I answer that one?
  • 45:04 - 45:07
    Herald: Yes.
    Standing: Okay, thank you very much. I've
  • 45:07 - 45:12
    got a new book coming out to make me more
    boring. It's called "Plunder of the
  • 45:12 - 45:20
    Commons". And basically, what you've
    touched on is the theme of this book. If
  • 45:20 - 45:27
    you think of the commons, the natural
    commons, the social commons, the civil
  • 45:27 - 45:36
    commons, all our commons including land,
    water, the air, our amenities and so on.
  • 45:36 - 45:43
    We've allowed the privatization and
    colonization of the commons to take profit
  • 45:43 - 45:50
    from our commons, and therefore we need a
    system of levies to say: Hey, we want the
  • 45:50 - 45:56
    rental income back for the commoners, and
    that includes land. That's why I strongly
  • 45:56 - 46:04
    favor a Land Value Tax. A Land Value Tax
    is a very efficient tax and it has to be
  • 46:04 - 46:11
    part of building this commons fund along
    the Alaska Permanent Fund. Principles of
  • 46:11 - 46:16
    those... you're all familiar with that. We
    also need it for water, for air, for
  • 46:16 - 46:24
    digital information. I don't believe
    taxing robots, as Bill Gates proposes, is
  • 46:24 - 46:29
    the answer. What I do believe is we should
    put a levy on all the information that
  • 46:29 - 46:36
    Amazon and Facebook and the others are
    taking from us free and making billions.
  • 46:36 - 46:39
    We should have a levy on that,
    applause
  • 46:39 - 46:44
    Standing: ... and the levy the levy should
    go to everybody equally. Because you
  • 46:44 - 46:49
    cannot attribute the profits they're
    making to any individual. We have to give
  • 46:49 - 46:55
    it to everybody. And if we do that we are
    all the time building the fund that can
  • 46:55 - 47:01
    help pay out towards a decent basic
    income. So that's my answer to your
  • 47:01 - 47:07
    question.
    Herald: Thanks very much. Mic four.
  • 47:07 - 47:14
    Q: Hi, thank you for being here. Great
    pleasure. Just recently, Sahra Wagenknecht
  • 47:14 - 47:21
    was invited in a talkshow about basic
    income and future of work. She's the
  • 47:21 - 47:26
    leader of the German party The Left, "Die
    Linke". She said that she don't like the
  • 47:26 - 47:33
    idea of basic income. Her two arguments
    are she don't like it. Regarding merchant
  • 47:33 - 47:39
    neoliberal powers, they also like the idea
    of basic income. For example the CEO of
  • 47:39 - 47:46
    Volkswagen and other big players and
    second, she said if you move to a basic
  • 47:46 - 47:52
    income, we will lose a lot of—we, as
    society—will lose a lot of protection and
  • 47:52 - 48:00
    social benefits. What would be your
    reaction on her opinion?
  • 48:00 - 48:07
    Standing: I address this question in my
    basic income book in the following way:
  • 48:07 - 48:18
    every new idea in history, in social
    policy in particular, has been greeted, at
  • 48:18 - 48:25
    the time, by people saying it will
    threaten something else and that it will
  • 48:25 - 48:32
    lead to unintended negative consequences.
    They said this about unemployment
  • 48:32 - 48:38
    benefits. They said it about family
    benefits. And then, when it's introduced,
  • 48:38 - 48:51
    suddenly the objections go away. To me, I
    asked myself the following question: Do I
  • 48:51 - 49:00
    want that person, or that person, or the
    person I meet in the street... do I want
  • 49:00 - 49:09
    that person to have the basic security of
    being able to pay for food, to pay for
  • 49:09 - 49:18
    their rent, and to buy decent clothes? Do
    I want that? And I say very easily to
  • 49:18 - 49:25
    myself: yes! I want that! Don't tell me
    that it's going to be a threat to
  • 49:25 - 49:34
    something else if that person has basic
    security! Why is it, that so many social
  • 49:34 - 49:42
    democrats make this argument? I've
    confronted many, including one major trade
  • 49:42 - 49:47
    union leader. I said, "why are you so
    hostile to having people base– have basic
  • 49:47 - 49:57
    income? Why?" And the man who was chairing
    the session when I was talking, he said,
  • 49:57 - 50:03
    "I think we'll have a coffee break now"
    before anybody could answer and when we
  • 50:03 - 50:09
    came back he said "Well now we'll move on
    to the next session" and the trade union
  • 50:09 - 50:15
    leader at the back stood up and he said
    "No, I think we should answer the
  • 50:15 - 50:24
    question". And he said "you know I think
    the answer is, that if people had basic
  • 50:24 - 50:34
    security, they wouldn't be dependent on
    us. They wouldn't join trade unions" and I
  • 50:34 - 50:36
    looked at him.
    applause
  • 50:36 - 50:44
    I looked at him and I said "just imagine
    the morality of what you've just said. The
  • 50:44 - 50:51
    morality is, you want people to be fearful
    and insecure, because you want to gain." I
  • 50:51 - 50:58
    said "But you're also wrong. Because
    you're wrong in the following respect:
  • 50:58 - 51:04
    people who are insecure and frightened
    don't engage in politics they don't engage
  • 51:04 - 51:12
    in society. They've got too many things to
    worry about. If they have basic security,
  • 51:12 - 51:17
    they're more likely to stand up and fight
    for rights, more likely to stand up and
  • 51:17 - 51:25
    fight for the ecology, more likely to be
    good citizens. Why don't you trust people
  • 51:25 - 51:34
    more? Why are you so bureaucratic and
    distrustful? Believe it. We need a new
  • 51:34 - 51:41
    distribution system. And don't tell me
    neo-liberalism is going to destroy it.
  • 51:41 - 51:47
    They're destroying what we've got anyhow.
    We can do better than that and if you
  • 51:47 - 51:54
    deny, you—people who say this not you, but
    people who say that—you are denying the
  • 51:54 - 51:59
    enlightenment freedoms that we should be
    fighting for! So I say, stop being so
  • 51:59 - 52:06
    negative, to those people. Sorry. I was a
    bit angry but apologized.
  • 52:06 - 52:11
    applause
    Herald: laughs you've got all reason to.
  • 52:11 - 52:16
    A question from the Internet.
    Internet: There was a popular vote in
  • 52:16 - 52:20
    Switzerland on basic income and it was
    massively rejected. How do you analyse
  • 52:20 - 52:24
    that, what should be the way forward, and
    how can we inaudible against the
  • 52:24 - 52:30
    globalists who oppose basic income?
    Standing: I ... again address that
  • 52:30 - 52:38
    particular referendum. I participated in
    the referendum. We had no money. We
  • 52:38 - 52:42
    mobilized a hundred twenty five thousand
    signatures, literally going in the
  • 52:42 - 52:48
    streets. All the banks were putting up
    money. The main political parties were
  • 52:48 - 52:54
    opposed, etc. But we were doing
    fantastically well. We got up to about 40
  • 52:54 - 53:01
    percent opinion poll support applause
    and then one of our leaders, one of our
  • 53:01 - 53:08
    leaders without permission from any of us,
    went on television and an interviewer
  • 53:08 - 53:14
    asked him, he said "Well how much do you
    think the basic income should be?" and the
  • 53:14 - 53:19
    man, instead of saying it's up to
    parliament and everything, which is what
  • 53:19 - 53:26
    the referendum said, he said it should be
    two thousand five hundred Swiss francs per
  • 53:26 - 53:34
    month. Which, for your information, is
    considerably higher than all the rural
  • 53:34 - 53:42
    areas, the rural cantons, in Switzerland.
    At that moment we lost the referendum. We
  • 53:42 - 53:49
    lost. I'm proud of the fact that in Geneva
    we got 38 percent. And that was where I
  • 53:49 - 53:53
    was campaigning—it had nothing to do with
    me, but the fact was that they had more
  • 53:53 - 53:59
    meetings and more people could understand
    what the politics were. But the greatest
  • 53:59 - 54:05
    thing about that referendum is that today
    people in Switzerland in the auberges, the
  • 54:05 - 54:14
    cafes, they're talking about basic income,
    they know what it means. I gave a talk
  • 54:14 - 54:22
    recently in a big theater in Geneva. There
    were hundreds and hundreds of people. Many
  • 54:22 - 54:27
    of those had not participated. If there is
    another referendum I think it will
  • 54:27 - 54:36
    succeed. Switzerland has a history of even
    very mild ideas losing in the first
  • 54:36 - 54:41
    referendum and then a few years later a
    second referendum, they pass. So I'm
  • 54:41 - 54:50
    actually optimistic that it will come in
    Switzerland—but not 2500.
  • 54:50 - 54:57
    Herald: Thank you. Mic six again.
    Mic 6: I think a lot of the ideas you
  • 54:57 - 55:03
    presented here are, like, respected in the
    community and the Congress. But how can we
  • 55:03 - 55:09
    change the society? How can we change the
    mind of all the other people to also
  • 55:09 - 55:16
    considers these ideas to transform to a
    new society?
  • 55:16 - 55:25
    Standing: I think this is the biggest
    question you could ask. I strongly believe
  • 55:25 - 55:37
    that it's up to us. It really is up to us.
    Politicians have spaghetti in backbones.
  • 55:37 - 55:45
    Our job is to strengthen the spaghetti.
    Our job is to desplain why dreaming of the
  • 55:45 - 55:55
    impossible leads to it becoming possible,
    and then happening. I believe that we have
  • 55:55 - 56:04
    to be taking part in any small way we can.
    I will tell you a secret. Yesterday a very
  • 56:04 - 56:11
    good friend of mine, an economist, very
    well-known economist. He contacted me and
  • 56:11 - 56:16
    we were talking and he said : "Guy, why
    are you wasting your time going to
  • 56:16 - 56:24
    Leipzig? On December the 27th, when you
    should be having relaxation with
  • 56:24 - 56:37
    Christmas?" and I said "John, that's not
    it. I hope that just one person, just one,
  • 56:37 - 56:46
    will leave this room, with more energy and
    with more thought than when I started.
  • 56:46 - 56:53
    Just one." That would be worth coming to
    Leipzig. I feel energized. I hope somebody
  • 56:53 - 56:59
    here feels energized. We have to realise
    that it is up to us. We have no excuse for
  • 56:59 - 57:09
    cynicism. We have to challenge the Trumps.
    We can't let them win. For our children
  • 57:09 - 57:21
    and grandchildren, we can't let them win.
    applause
  • 57:21 - 57:26
    Herald: Thank you very much. I think
    you'll be around for more questions. We're
  • 57:26 - 57:32
    out of time, sorry, but you can ask those
    questions directly and I think they will
  • 57:32 - 57:36
    be answered in great length.
    Standing: Thank you.
  • 57:36 - 57:41
    35c3 postroll music
  • 57:41 - 57:59
    subtitles created by c3subtitles.de
    in the year 2019. Join, and help us!
Title:
35C3 - The Precariat: A Disruptive Class for Disruptive Times.
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Duration:
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