This is a comment on a paper available in the wsn archive, section
"working papers", namely:
Myron J. Frankman, "Planet-Wide Citizen's Income: Antidote to Global
Apartheid" (1997)
Prof. Frankman advocates such measures as a "global citizen's income" (a
guaranteed global minimum income), "global safety net", a "global system
of public finance" and a "global system of taxation". The justification
for these proposals is given in justice terms ("from national to global
justice"). I would like to point out that proposals of this kind can also
be justified in economic theory terms along left-Keynesian lines.
Measures which raise the purchasing power of the unemployed and
underemployed billion of the world would raise global aggregate demand.
Increased global aggregate demand leads to increased global employment,
output and consumption.
This position can be criticized from various perspectives:
(a) ecological critique ("the earth cannot afford more growth"); here one
can counter that an increase in economic output could be through an
increase in health, education and other services, which may not stress
Mother Earth too much, and through "green" (sustainable) technology regimes.
(b) old-left critique ("Keynesianism is nothing but evil Fordism"); here
one can counter that the term "Keynesian" covers a wide range of
positions from left to center and that the changes envisaged by
left-Keynesians (similar to Prof. Frankman's proposals) cannot be brought
about without the combined strength of a variety of leftisms.
(c) right-wing critique ("Keynesianism is an evil leftism"). Some
observers have pointed out that Keynes's _General Theory_ and Marx's _Das
Kapital_, vol. 2, have important ideas in common.
Regards,
Gernot Kohler
Oakville, Canada