This essay will outline a proposal on how the case of children should be handled under a society which has fully established a ‘Universal Basic Income’. This is a topic which poses a unique problem for UBI, due to the fact that up until adulthood, children are often ill-equipped to make use of such fiscal endowments. Nevertheless, children are future adult citizens, and so to deny them UBI may be a failure to realize the ‘universality’ of the policy. The proposal presented here attempts to strike a balance between the duty of society to extend its welfare commitments to its infant population, and the necessity of withholding such endowments until they can be effectively exercised by rational adults. I therefore advocate combining UBI with another proposal: that of the ‘Stakeholder Society’, whereby all citizens reaching the age of adolescence receive a lump-sum cash endowment. It will be argued that a welfare system which combines these two proposals is superior to either one alone, combining their benefits whilst also mitigating some of their issues.
Continue reading “Universal Basic Income and Children’s Rights: A Compromise?”Universal Basic Income and Children’s Rights: A Compromise?
