
Finland Has Second Thoughts About Giving Free Money to Jobless People - DEFCON28
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/24/business/finland-universal-basic-income.html#
======
mistercow
According to at least one researcher involved with the project, this is
basically what was expected all along. It was planned to be a one year trial,
and now the year is up and they'll analyze the results before deciding what to
do next.

Source: [http://www.wired.co.uk/article/finland-universal-basic-
incom...](http://www.wired.co.uk/article/finland-universal-basic-income-
results-trial-cancelled)

~~~
ihodes
I believe it was supposed to run for two years. They ended it a year early.
(First source that pops up: [https://www.cnbc.com/2017/01/03/finland-
experiments-universa...](https://www.cnbc.com/2017/01/03/finland-experiments-
universal-basic-income.html))

~~~
mistercow
You're right that it was originally a two year plan, but they aren't
terminating it a year early. It will still run for the full two years. As your
link mentions, it launched at the beginning of 2017, and the Wired article
mentions, it will run until the end of 2018.

What's happened recently is that they declined to extend it _past_ two years.

~~~
ihodes
No, they explicitly made this a conditional handout this year, which is very
much a termination of the original plan. UBI researchers have generally
considered this a failure already (not to mention that many economists think
UBI cannot work, anyway).

"Finland has actually reversed course on that front this year, adopting rules
that threaten to cut benefits for jobless people unless they actively look for
work or engage in job training."

~~~
mistercow
The best I can tell, the part of the article you've quoted is a reference to
Finland's welfare policy in general, not this experiment. Note that it follows
"a reflection of public discomfort with the idea of dispensing government
largess free of requirements that its recipients seek work". Just bad writing,
I think. But I can't find any other sources that back up the idea that they're
changing this project mid flight, which would be a really bizarre thing to do,
since it would completely invalidate any possible results.

------
usr1106
Yet another poorly researched article about this experiment. This has been a
very limited experiment for only 2000 randomly selected participants
(unemployed with certain restrictions). It has beem time-limited from the
beginning. More critical observers have always said it is too small and too
limited to produce useful data. Some claim it was designed to fail by the
governmennt. But the international press has overhyped it with Finland giving
away free money.

Now nothing has really changed and no decisions were taken. No reports have
been published and this had not been intended before the end of the trial.

The so-called news is that the trial is not extended. But that's really a lack
of news, an extension had never been planned.

(I live in Finland)

------
grzm
Past discussions on the topic on HN within the past week or so:

\- 7 days ago, 169 comments:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16874921](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16874921)

\- 2 days ago, 36 comments:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16910856](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16910856)

\- 2 days ago, 45 comments:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16909881](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16909881)

\- 2 days ago, 27 comments:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16912072](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16912072)

------
guidedlight
I thought the point of universal income was that everyone gets it regardless
of their employment.

Finland just gave the money to unemployed people, so it just became an
unemployment benefit.

~~~
mistercow
Yes, that's partly true (although recipients don't appear to lose the benefit
if they become employed), but what they're studying is a specific question,
which is how giving unemployed people an unconditional stipend affects their
future employment. They're not trying to study broader aspects of UBI, and I'd
argue that if they wanted to do so, making the experiment much longer term
would be more important than applying it to more people.

~~~
mrfusion
They should also measure their health and happiness. Employment isn’t the full
Picture.

~~~
mistercow
Sure, a study should measure that. But not every study has to measure every
variable.

~~~
dingaling
This study should have, since those are key metrics for UBI in a projected
robotics-era of job scarcity.

Since it didn't measure them it is pointless classifying it as a test of UBI.

~~~
mistercow
No, it's not pointless. It just studies one aspect of the problem. Yes, this
is insufficient on its own, but more studies can be done, which can be
designed particularly to examine the other questions that need to be answered.

A test for lead is usefully classified as a water quality test, even though
you need to test for other compounds as well before you know if the water is
safe.

------
lioeters
Quoted from: [http://www.kela.fi/web/en/news-
archive/-/asset_publisher/lN0...](http://www.kela.fi/web/en/news-
archive/-/asset_publisher/lN08GY2nIrZo/content/contrary-to-reports-the-basic-
income-experiment-in-finland-will-continue-until-the-end-of-2018)

Many international media-outlets have published stories alleging that Finland
is going to discontinue its basic income experiment. This information is
incorrect.

“The experiment is proceeding according to plan and will continue until the
end of 2018”, says Professor Olli Kangas, the leader of the research team at
Kela (Social Insurance Institution of Finland).

------
test6554
If the goal was to head off job losses from automation, then the work
requirement should have been in place, but it should have somehow scaled up
and down proportionally with the number of unfilled jobs in the country.

------
qwerty456127
The idea that everybody must work and people that don't are a kind of evil,
that everybody must sacrifice something (even when nobody actually needs it)
to justify their fundamental needs being fulfilled (even if it doesn't
actually cost anything) is itself a fundamental evil. The real virtue of
economic development is setting everybody free.

~~~
aethertap
I probably have an unpopular view on this, but this isn't the point for me. I
don't think people are evil for not working. In fact, if I could manage it,
I'd skip it myself. Working is hard work, and I'd prefer to do less of it. The
problem I have is that, in order to have productive output to give away,
_somebody_ has to work to produce it. If that somebody is me, and I'm
producing enough for myself and another person+, then that means I have to
work that much more to fund it. It chafes me to realize that I'm missing time
with my family and friends in order to work for output that I don't even need.

I'm not an absolutist about it, and I'm happy to help people who need the
help. However, I think it's reasonable to expect people who are able to pull
their own weight.

\+ just for the sake of simplicity, hopefully in a real system the fraction
I'm supporting is less than one

Edit: Formatting

~~~
qwerty456127
I get your point but AFAIK there actually are many people annoyed by the mere
idea that some people wouldn't work and would just enjoy their free time while
they work, but as for me if I were producing (voluntarily and without working
too hard preferably) a lot more productive output than I need myself I would
absolutely not mind if the rest was distributed among other people and I would
not care whether they work or not. I would actually be more happy to know that
the people my work feeds just attend a university, do art or just have fun
rather tan that they spend their lives on a chair in a government-funded
office doing some useless paperwork to justify getting what they get.

As far as I understand modern production technologies may need rather humble
number of humans to produce amounts of goods enough for much much much more
people so the situation when one man work yields enough to feed a thousand is
not a fantasy. I actually doubt many people that actually do useful productive
work do just the amount to feed themselves even if they are paid just the
amount.

And there also is a huge number of obstacles that can prevent people from
doing what they are good at or anything useful at all. In many countries and
in many areas people still have to compete to get a job even if they are
willing to work. A coder can be denied a job for not smiling enough, being bad
at solving puzzles or having a degree less fancy than another applicant has.
Will to do a job and will (and capability) to compete are very different
things.

------
branchless
Is this about landlords getting state money for no work?

~~~
WillPostForFood
If they are making money and paying taxes, then, net, they aren’t getting
state money for no work.

~~~
branchless
they are getting wealth creator's money and they are doing nothing for it as
they are rentiers.

------
nategri
What a loaded headline. Get it together, NYT.

------
tnvaught
"In much of the world, the concept of basic income retains appeal as a
potential way to more justly spread the bounty of global capitalism while
cushioning workers against the threat of robots and artificial intelligence
taking their jobs." So, this is a funny way to acknowledge that global
capitalism is really that good. Not only can it provide "bounty," but other,
non-capitalist systems may be propped up by its success. It seems ironic that
"justly spread" and "global capitalism" are in the same sentence, and not
being contrasted.

