On Sunday 5 May, 77% of Swiss voters said NO to basic income and did so not for economic considerations but, at least according to the statements made after the vote, for a moral reason. The idea that the State should guarantee all citizens, regardless of their income and whether they work or not, 2.500 euros a month in fact contrasts with the Calvinist work ethic for which work is not a "right" but a "duty" (also moral), as well as a harsh necessity. Receiving a salary without having done anything to deserve it is unacceptable for the Swiss Calvinists, just as it was for the Communists on whose banners it was written "he who does not work does not eat".
However, beyond the dubious morality of the proposal, the fact remains that the idea of guaranteeing a salary to everyone, including those who don't even look for a job, is, in itself, profoundly wrong. It is not only economically unsustainable and morally unacceptable. It is also deeply conservative and, in some ways, even reactionary. In fact, this idea stems from the belief that development has now reached its limit, that the information revolution underway is destined to destroy much more work than it will be able to create and that productivity can only stagnate. As a result, if work is not destined to disappear as Rifklin prophesied, it will certainly be drastically reduced, while the basis of the real economy, the only one capable of creating wealth and work, is also destined to shrink to the advantage of the economy of paper (finance), which instead will continue to grow on itself uncontrollably.
If this is really the future that awaits us then, the theorists of basic income argue, there are only two possible answers, both however negative. The first is a conservative response and consists in redistributing wealth through subsidies and equalization measures also in order to keep consumption high. The second, much more radical and frankly reactionary, consists in trying to curb progress by opposing technological innovations by all means (in particular: GMOs, biotechnologies, vaccines, fertilizers, etc. as well as, obviously, nuclear power, computerization of production processes, globalization, etc.). Conservatives are mostly economists, like Piketty or Sergio Rossi (one of the promoters of the Swiss referendum) or protest movements like 5 Stars, Podemos, Sel and the like. The reactionaries, on the other hand, are the theorists of happy degrowth (Deleuze), the fanatics of organic and biodynamic agriculture, of consumption at Km. Zero up to No Tav, No Triv and No to everything.
What unites these two positions is the belief that mass unemployment cannot be eliminated and that growth is impossible (for the former) or undesirable (for the latter). If the State, any State and whoever was at the helm, were to really bend to this logic and demagogically introduce the Citizenship Income for all, at that same moment it would fail in its fundamental function, which is not that of distributing subsidies but that to promote development to create jobs. In all likelihood that state would sooner or later cease to be democratic.
Nor is it true that the information revolution underway threatens work. It is true, however, that it changes him profoundly. The most arduous and tiring manual jobs tend to disappear (thankfully), while those that require more professionalism and knowledge increase. It is inevitable that this happens and it is also a good thing. Our problem is having the right tools to protect jobs in this difficult transition phase. However it is not so. We are moving from a labor market based on "fixed" jobs to one in which work will in the vast majority of cases be "mobile" and from a "one-off" training system (apprenticeship) to "continuous training". A real Copernican revolution. The various redundancy funds, mobility schemes, early retirement schemes, provincial employment offices, training courses, etc., with which we have managed industrial restructuring in recent years, well or badly, are no longer needed today. The Job Act marked a first turnaround but the road ahead is still long and full of obstacles.
It is in this context, and precisely to manage the technological transition, that it might make sense to introduce a "guaranteed salary" instead of other forms of support, not for everyone but for young people looking for their first job and for those , having lost it, looks for a new one. Young people and the unemployed looking for a job cannot be left without an income. Provided, of course, that they actively seek it (possibly with the help of the employment centers that will come), that they are available to attend training and retraining courses and that they do not refuse any reasonable job offers that may be made to them.
In short, the field on which we should really commit ourselves is that of building a truly efficient, open and inclusive labor market and it is also that of equipping ourselves with all the tools necessary to protect, promote and enhance work at all stages of the working life of individuals. Why shouldn't we be able to do this? It is not the first time that a technological revolution seems to threaten the very survival of work. Even the Industrial Revolution, which kicked off the "great escape" of humanity towards a well-being never experienced before, was perceived by most as a danger and was welcomed by a formidable movement that tried to counter it. And, in fact, while that revolution was laying the foundations for our future growth, it created enormous problems for the workers involved: of work, safety, subsistence, health and also professional dignity. All side effects that the market did not see and therefore did not consider, just as today it seems not to see and not to consider the side effects of the information revolution underway. It was up to the British liberal forces, enlightened entrepreneurs, the first trade union organizations, the nascent socialist movement and the State (starting with Bismark's Germany) to face and solve the problems that the market did not see. It was thanks to the State, Politics, Culture and Science that the foundations of the Welfare State and of the modern market economy in which we still live were laid.
Why should today be any different? Why shouldn't the Democratic State, Politics and Culture be able to manage the effects of the ongoing technological revolution by extending its benefits to everyone? However, we must want it, renouncing to take illusory paths such as those of welfarism. Woe if welfarism were to take hold again in Italy. We have already experienced it and never, in any case, has it created work and well-being. It has only corrupted a part of the world of work.
The path to take, if anything, is another and it is the one Marx indicated in one of his very few anticipations of the future. For Marx, the society of the future should have been based on the principle "from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs". That is to say: a salary for everyone, but with work performance corresponding to each person's abilities. In short, the exact opposite of the citizen's income which ensures everyone a salary even in exchange for nothing.
