‘Recovery Dividends’: An Emergency Basic Income for Palestine
This paper proposes that the next unified Palestinian government entrusted with administering the West Bank and Gaza, with support from the international community, should introduce an unconditional universalistic “emergency basic income” (EBI) scheme as an integral part of a coherent ‘recovery’ programme. It begins by noting some relevant contextual realities, then describes what defines a basic income, along with a brief outline of what would be an ethical justification regardless of the specific unfavourable context.
The paper briefly considers likely beneficial effects, drawing on pilots and experimental evidence from around the world, before considering possible objections or risks.
The paper outlines a proposal for a localised pilot that could be implemented at an earlier phase if modest funds could be raised and political goodwill could be exercised. Finally, an estimate is made of the cost of the full scheme, addressing the key question of ‘affordability’.
Very understandably, given their exposure to the ongoing horror, the conditions imply direct priority in such a programme for the Gaza Strip. But such is the destruction and devastation there, which might become even more dystopian in the coming months, that it would be more realistic to begin the policy to be proposed with a limited trial run in the West Bank. Of course, once the humanitarian relief needs of the two million people of Gaza have been addressed in the course of 2024 hopefully, EBI would be even more vital there.
