Does Free Money Make People Lazy?

As a universal basic income, free money works. A response to those who state it makes people lazy

Free money works. But a lot of people still aren’t buying it. It’s too often associated with laziness, accommodation, and dependency. Cultural experience or conventional wisdom erroneously perpetuate these misguided beliefs, causing people to deny universal basic income the benefit of the doubt.

But it works. Countless pilot programs around the world have proven so.

It’s time to educate the public on this massively transformative program, one that could lift people out of poverty and alleviate the burden experienced by the shrinking middle class. People commonly conflate the concept of a universal basic income with social welfare programs that consist of conditional cash grants. Those two couldn’t be more different.

For one, a universal basic income, is, in its purest form, universal. It’s not ageist, sexist, or racist. It doesn’t discriminate against employment or education level. Everyone gets it so long as they have a heartbeat. Universality bypasses the exclusion so-often experienced by those enrolled in needs-based assistance programs. And it allows for the social inclusion of those on the brink of marginalization, oftentimes forcing them into obscure underground activities.

Unconditionality is key to making it work. It automatically removes the popular misconception that free money makes people lazy. Because recipients will continue to receive their grants regardless of whether or not their financial conditions improve, the disincentive to seek better opportunities is slashed. The problem only surfaces when they are forced to weigh the loss of their guaranteed income against the prospects of uncertain higher monetary gains.

Lastly, it’s basic, meaning it covers an individual’s most basic needs for survival. Article 25 of the Human Rights Declaration says it all, stipulating that every human being deserves the right to an adequate standard of living. What does that entail? Adequate food, water, sanitation, clothing, housing, and medical care. An unconditional cash transfer program must be enough to provide people with a humane standard of living. When they no longer fear starvation and homelessness, they are finally free to live their lives unchained.

Needs-based cash transfer programs negatively taint the universal basic income, but they fail to function like it’s intended. By preventing them from seeking better opportunities, such programs effectively function as poverty traps. Brazil’s flagship welfare program best illustrates this issue, ingraining in its population the belief that free money makes people lazy.

While international experts admire the Bolsa Família, they fail to grasp its more intimate effects, a vicious cycle of dependency and fear. For years, those enrolled in the program were used as pawns in a corrupt political system, made to fear the loss of their benefits if they failed to elect their benefactors. Such conditional cash transfers have trapped the poor just above the poverty line: if their incomes increase or their kids stop attending school, they lose their cash grants.

In short, a basic income program bolstered by these three pillars (universality, unconditionality, and basic coverage) is effective, simple, and flexible, functioning as the ultimate security blanket.

Free money works. So, before you contest this well-founded fact by citing a failed experiment, ask yourself: was it actually free?