A German experiment has found that people are likely to continue working full-time even if they receive no-strings-attached universal basic income payments.
Archived version: https://archive.is/20250412140637/https://edition.cnn.com/2025/04/11/health/germany-universal-basic-income-study-intl-scli-wellness/index.html
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Not surprising to me - a Canadian study 10 or 15 years ago produced the same results - the only people who stopped working were moms who quit to take care of children, and students who returned to school (having quit school to work because their families needed money). The conventional “wisdom” that says getting free money will turn people into bums is a traditional conservative misconception that goes with thinking people are inherently bad.
I don’t even get this notion.
“Everyone will become a lazy bum!”. Humans are biologically coded with the want to do SOMETHING. If you took current day scenarios of people wanting to not work at all, that’s only because WE HAVE TO WORK to live.
People want to remove stress, not be “lazy”.
And lazy is such a defective term.
A lot of “conventional wisdom” turns out to be just catchy little sayings that vindicate people’s personal attitudes.