Money for everything? Universal basic income in a crisis

Abstract

This paper explores universal basic income (UBI) in relation to crisis, from COVID-19 to techno-economic disruptions to work and prospective post-capitalist transition. Critical debates around automation, wage labour and post-work are brought into conversation with emerging trends in urban political economy around foundational infrastructure, smart cities and platform capitalism. To deliver the socio-economic transformations promised by UBI’s advocates, it is argued that more radical structural interventions in capitalist asset ownership and property relations, alongside democratized state investment in technological development, universal basic services and infrastructure, are necessary counterparts to any sufficient UBI–that is, if we hope to construct new systems of collective coordination capable of contending with complex epidemiological, economic and ecological crises.