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Is universal basic income working? We went to Finland to find out | CNBC Reports - YouTube
Channel: CNBC International
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I’m in Finland. It’s one
year after the launch
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of a first-of-its kind experiment
here in the country.
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We’re talking about
universal basic income.
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Here’s how it works.
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Researchers randomly selected
2,000 unemployed people
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between the ages of 25 and
58 from around Finland.
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Each month those 2,000
people receive €560,
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which is about
670 bucks, tax-free.
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What they do with the money
is entirely up to them.
[26]
The purpose of the experiment is to address
unemployment here in Finland.
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The government hopes that it will
encourage unemployed people to
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take jobs instead of being afraid of
losing their unemployment benefits.
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So one year into the
experiment, is it working?
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We went to Finland
to find out.
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It wasn't easy finding someone who is
actually receiving the free money.
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Researchers are keeping
the names of the recipients
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private to try to keep
the results consistent.
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But we did manage to find
Mika Ruusunen on Facebook,
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and he agreed to meet us
at his office in Tampere,
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about two hours
north of Helsinki.
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So, we are going meet
Mika now at his office.
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He’s here, he's agreed to meet
us during his lunch break.
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The fact that we’re meeting him at his
office is actually a promising sign.
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It means that he has a job, so
we’ll see what he has to say.
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Hi, Mika?
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Hi!
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Nice to meet you.
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Nice to meet you, too.
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Thanks so much for
having us here today.
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Okay, great, excellent!
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Let's get started!
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Mika was doing an internship at an IT
company, where he now works full-time,
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when he found out he was selected
for Finland’s basic income trial.
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When you first found out that you
were going to be part of the trial,
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did you tell people or did
you want to keep it a secret?
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When I first received the letter I opened
it and I didn’t understand it at all.
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And so I gave it to my wife and
asked her, "What the heck is this?"
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Mika had been unemployed
for 16 months before
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he decided to go back to school
to switch career paths into IT.
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Do you find there’s less
bureaucracy than there was
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when you were receiving benefits
for being unemployed?
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Yeah definitely, that’s the best
part of the basic income.
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That it would mean
much less bureaucracy.
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People who are using the system
are already using the system.
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The basic income encourages
people to do work.
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Mika said the €560 a month
wouldn’t be enough to live on.
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But it's given him flexibility for
things like a family vacation
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or the possibility of
starting his own business.
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He’s proud to be part of
the experiment in Finland,
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but he’s not sold on the
idea that you should
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continue receiving free cash
even when you’re well-off.
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There’s no getting out.
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If I won a million bucks at the lottery
they would still give it to me.
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It’s a pretty
weird idea.
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It’s strange.
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Our next step was to find out
what the researchers think
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about the universal basic
income experiment so far.
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Kela is the arm of the Finnish government
that’s implementing the trial.
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So we’re at the office
here at Kela in Helsinki.
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We’re about to meet with one
of the main researchers now.
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Researcher Miska Simanainen
said he won’t actually hear
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from any of the participants until
the trial concludes at the end of 2018.
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But the experiment
has already revealed
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one of the biggest issues
with universal basic income,
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funding.
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We had to make many
practical compromises
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during the design
process of the experiment.
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Researchers only had enough funding
to hand out cash to 2,000 people.
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And they chose to limit their sample to
participants who were unemployed.
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Do you envision a world where
eventually there could be
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everyone in Finland has
universal basic income?
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There is a strong consensus
between political parties that
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the current social security
system should be reformed.
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But we found there is disagreement
about how to reform the system.
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Is the idea that universal basic
income is actually going to
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take the place of some of the
other benefits here in Finland?
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That’s the way that
the discussion is that
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if we’re going to give you
universal basic income,
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then we’re going to
cut from other sectors.
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This is Antti Jauhiainen, he’s the author
of a book about welfare in Finland.
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He sees universal basic
income not as a way to
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replace the current welfare
system, but as an added benefit.
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Our path shouldn’t be
to create low-wage jobs
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but to really improve education
and to improve people’s skills.
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And I think giving the kind
of freedom that through
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universal basic income would
provide, might help with that.
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It looks like the trial is
off to a good start here.
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But it still seems like
it's a long way away from
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universal basic income being
universal here in Finland.
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Hey guys it’s Elizabeth,
thanks so much for watching.
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If you want to check out more of our stories, we
have an Explains about universal basic income
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and other CNBC Explains up
on our YouTube page.
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While you’re at it give us some suggestions,
we’re looking for other ideas.
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And subscribe to our channel.
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See you later!
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