A Japanese Political Party is supporting the Basic Income. The sponsor free weekly articles got me excited about the idea. It’s getting media coverage in Japanese. I have to pick up the April issue of the Japanese SotoKoto outdoor/simple life magazine… They have some cool-looking sites about it. They have a picture of what it would look like to have a 30% income tax and pay everyone 50,000 yen (500 dollars or so) a month. I’m not sure if it’s just an excuse to bring in Forbes’s flat tax and attack welfare and safety nets or if it really woud be emancipatory. Michael Moore often comments on how efficient social security checks are. Maybe Bi would be a way of avoiding some ‘coordinatorism’.. It would be nice to have a 3 word program to get excited about. ‘Yes We Can’, ‘Single Payer Healthcare’, "Basic Income Guarantee." It just seems like a timely issue with the need for ‘bailouts for the little people’ in the air. This political party looks pretty much like a One-man show, he did some important stuff on dams, and was impressive for abolishing the local press club. The reporters shouldn’t be hangning out at the prefecture office waiting for announcements – they should be out getting stories….
If I have time I’ll have to try and work through the 45% income tax proposal put forth by Shyuuji Ozawa, A Public Policy Professor at Kyoto City University in the sponsor free weekly. He think it’s possilbe to pay out 80,000 yen (800 dollars) a month to every citizen It’s the amount paid out to the most disabled people now. I always wondered if this was a tradeoff, cash payments instead of laws guaranteeing access, and the public funds to support more ramps, elevators, sign language interpreting services etc.
ZNetwork is funded solely through the generosity of its readers.
Donate