Rutger Bregman: Utopia for Realists (2017, Little Brown & Company)
336 pages
English language
Published April 4, 2017 by Little Brown & Company.
Utopia for Realists: The Case for a Universal Basic Income, Open Borders, and a 15-hour Workweek (alternatively subtitled And How We Can Get There and How We Can Build the Ideal World) is a book by Dutch popular historian Rutger Bregman.[1] It was originally written as articles in Dutch for a virtual journal, De Correspondent and was since compiled and published,[2] and translated into several languages. It offers a critical proposal that it claims is a practical approach to reconstructing modern society to promote a more productive and equitable life based on three core ideas:
a universal and unconditional basic income paid to everybody a short working week of fifteen hours open borders worldwide with the free movement of citizens between all states
Thesis
Rationale As a result of the advance of international trade and economic science in recent decades, globalization has radically transformed the traditional social and economic order …
Utopia for Realists: The Case for a Universal Basic Income, Open Borders, and a 15-hour Workweek (alternatively subtitled And How We Can Get There and How We Can Build the Ideal World) is a book by Dutch popular historian Rutger Bregman.[1] It was originally written as articles in Dutch for a virtual journal, De Correspondent and was since compiled and published,[2] and translated into several languages. It offers a critical proposal that it claims is a practical approach to reconstructing modern society to promote a more productive and equitable life based on three core ideas:
a universal and unconditional basic income paid to everybody a short working week of fifteen hours open borders worldwide with the free movement of citizens between all states
Thesis
Rationale As a result of the advance of international trade and economic science in recent decades, globalization has radically transformed the traditional social and economic order from smaller, connected nations to a new world economy which, while already demonstrably capable of rescuing millions of people from poverty, could be extended to the entire human race.[3]
However, the new global system unfairly compensates a few rich countries,[4] and, with the progressive substitution of human capital with automation and robotics,[5] has also generated an increase in inequality, both between the investment community and its workforce[6] within the G20 states as well as between developed countries and their developing neighbours.
Justification Each idea is supported by multiple academic studies and anecdotal evidence including numerous success stories. For example, it quotes
Richard Nixon's 1968 plan for a basic income for Americans[7] The Mincome project in the Canadian city of Dauphin, Manitoba which "eliminated poverty" and reduced hospitalisation rates[8] The perceived success of the Schengen Agreement[9]
A call to arms bolstered by data, Rutger lays down the case for UBI, less work, and open borders. Some of his arguments are convincing, some of them have me wanting for generalized data, but in any case I agree with his methods and motives.
Makes a lot of good points supported by a lot of good evidence but also takes a number of things for granted
