Freakonomics Radio
Is the World Ready for a Guaranteed Basic Income? (Update)
Sep 17, 2025 · 36 min · Episode 242 · 34.6 MB
0:00-36:02
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A lot of jobs in the modern economy don’t pay a living wage, and some of those jobs may be wiped out by new technologies. So what’s to be done? We revisit an episode from 2016 for a potential solution.
- SOURCES:
- Erik Brynjolfsson, professor of economics at Stanford University.
- Evelyn Forget, professor of economics and community health sciences at the University of Manitoba.
- Sam Altman, C.E.O. of OpenAI.
- Robert Gordon, professor emeritus of economics at Northwestern University.
- Greger Larson, professor of archeology at the University of Oxford.
- RESOURCES:
- "Here's what a Sam Altman-backed basic income experiment found," by Megan Cerullo (CBS News, 2024).
- Utopia for Realists, by Rutger Bregman. The Correspondent (2016).
- The Second Machine Age, by Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee (2014).
- "The Town With No Poverty: Using Health Administration Data To Revisit Outcomes of a Canadian Guaranteed Annual Income Field Experiment," by Evelyn Forget (Canadian Public Policy, 2011).
- "The Negative Income Tax and the Evolution of U.S. Welfare Policy," by Robert Moffitt (Journal of Economic Perspectives, 2003).
- Capitalism and Freedom, by Milton Freidman (2002).
- "Lesson from the Income Maintenance Experiments," (Federal Reserve Bank of Boston and The Brookings Institution, 1986).
- Law, Legislation and Liberty, Volume 3: The Political Order of A Free People, by Frederick Hayek (1981).
- "Daniel Moynihan and President-elect Nixon: How charity didn't begin at home," by Peter Passell and Leonard Ross (New York Times, 1973).
- "Income Maintenance Programs," (Hearings Before The Subcommittee On Fiscal Policy Of The Joint Economic Committee Congress Of The United States, 1968).
- EXTRAS:
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Erik Brynjolfsson
brynjolfsson.comEvelyn Forget
umanitoba.caSam Altman
blog.samaltman.comRobert Gordon
economics.northwestern.eduGreger Larson
arch.ox.ac.ukUtopia for Realists,
thecorrespondent.comThe Second Machine Age
amazon.comThe Negative Income Tax and the Evolution of U.S. Welfare Policy
inequality.stanford.eduCapitalism and Freedom
amazon.comLesson from the Income Maintenance Experiments
bostonfed.orgIncome Maintenance Programs
jec.senate.govpcm.adswizz.com
pcm.adswizz.com