May 4, 2020 - 5:55pm

That, however, is what social security is for — supplemented, in this crisis, by emergency measures like the furlough scheme. Yes, there are problems with the speed and responsiveness of the benefits system, but are we going to get help to people any faster by setting up an entirely new payments architecture (which is what UBI entails)?

Harris is no fool and acknowledges some of the difficulties — not least the eye-watering cost of giving everyone enough free money to get by on. He also acknowledges that if we’re going to provide the whole population with unconditional support, then there are other, perhaps better, ways of doing it (universal basic services, for instance). Ultimately though, he resorts to a cop out — “if we are going to maximise our collective resilience, we should surely consider both.” Head. Desk. (If I still had a desk).

Harris reckons that because of “the government’s munificent response to the current crisis, radical spending plans are surely not the political taboo they once were.” But “munificent” (great word) does not mean limitless. It doesn’t matter how much money is borrowed — or gets magicked up by monetary means — it’s only as useful as the goods and services available to buy with it. With the pandemic still raging, whole swathes of the productive economy that provide that usefulness (whether in the public or private sectors) have shut down. Doing all the things necessary to get them restarted is the over-riding priority. Production is the primary basis of our “collective resilience” — everything else is secondary.

Of course, among those secondary things is ensuring there is sufficient means of consumption. If the latter falls short individually then people slip into poverty; if it falls short in aggregate then productive capacity is left idle.