Ireland Launches World's First Permanent Basic Income Scheme For Artists, Paying $385 a Week (irishcentral.com)
- Reference: 0180803746
- News link: https://slashdot.org/story/26/02/16/1640202/ireland-launches-worlds-first-permanent-basic-income-scheme-for-artists-paying-385-a-week
- Source link: https://www.irishcentral.com/culture/ireland-basic-income-for-the-arts
An external cost-benefit analysis of the pilot calculated a return of $1.65 to society for every $1.2 invested. The new scheme will operate in three-year cycles, and artists who receive the payment in one cycle cannot reapply until the cycle after next. A three-month tapering-off period will follow each cycle. The government plans to publish eligibility guidelines in April and open applications in May, and payments to selected artists are expected to begin before the end of 2026.
[1] https://www.irishcentral.com/culture/ireland-basic-income-for-the-arts
That's not basic income (Score:2, Interesting)
That's a subsidy for artists.
Basic income doesn't work because the people getting the money resent the handouts and the people paying the taxes for the money resent giving the handouts.
If you have ever had a coworker that doesn't pull their own weight it's like that. You resented them right? That feeling of resentment where you're working and somebody else isn't is easily exploitable.
Now we have solid evidence that 70% of middle class jobs in the last 45 years got taken by machines and we all kn
Re: That's not basic income (Score:2, Insightful)
Explain how the "artists" getting the handouts are resenting it? Hahaha... are you delusional? It lends legitimacy to living in their mom's basement because they are "starving artists." They now have even LESS incentive to be productive and get a real job.
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What is a real job exactly? Is a software developer who works on video games not doing a real job because video games are frivolous art? What's the difference between a painting and a website layout? Are the "serious business folks" who manipulate numbers on spreadsheets so much more valuable than those who create tangible things others find beautiful?
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> What is a real job exactly? Is a software developer who works on video games not doing a real job because video games are frivolous art? What's the difference between a painting and a website layout? Are the "serious business folks" who manipulate numbers on spreadsheets so much more valuable than those who create tangible things others find beautiful?
well, broadly a "real job" is one that produces output that people are willing to pay for. and I guess we can expand it to an activity that is reasonably likely to produce such output.
Although... some say custom kitchen delivereyeyey is the only real job. (or animating same)
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Plenty of "real jobs" don't produce output someone necessarily pays for. Government jobs (including police) don't produce any tangible output someone will pay for. And plenty of artists do produce output people will pay for.
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> Plenty of "real jobs" don't produce output someone necessarily pays for. Government jobs (including police) don't produce any tangible output someone will pay for. And plenty of artists do produce output people will pay for.
On the contrary, they absolutely do. Policing is a job with output. Criminals are caught, rules are enforced. This is output that can be measured. Output isn't directly died to producing manufactured goods. Output can be a service that people are willing to pay to have done.
In much the same vein, cleaning staff and maids aren't manufacturing anything, but they still produce output that people will pay for.
government jobs (Score:2)
Government jobs are more value than most because they are a part of a Democratic process. That is we vote on what the government should do and then hope that the Executive branch manages to do that without being inefficient. The problem with e.g. what is happening in the US right now is that you can not get elected on efficiency and add authorian bloat yourself.
Re: That's not basic income (Score:1)
The difference is people are willing to pay for one and not the other.
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But people do pay (sometimes quite a bit) for paintings, sculptures, and other artistic output.
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Indeed. However that is what determines if you are successful or not. If you are an artist producing output that people WILL pay for - then that's a "real job". If you're an artist producing output that nobody is willing to pay for - then you're just wasting time.
Focusing activity where it is needed is part of the job market. If you go into your back yard with a shovel and just start digging a deep hole people will rightly think you're wasting time. If you instead take the same shovel and effort and di
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A job is something that generates a positive income. If this activity were to continue to generate a negative income long term, say 5 years or more, it's then considered a hobby. Most artists are hobbyist and not professionals. They may aspire to be professional but have yet to get there.
There are still a lot of jobs that we don't need but there is more to life then just the essentials of survival. So the game dev and the movie star and the tiktok influencer all provide value to society in the form of enter
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I just finished explaining that this is not basic income it's just a subsidy for artists.
I then switched to talking about basic income which is the process of giving everyone enough money that they can have an okay life.
Those are two different things. Please do try to keep up.
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What "solid evidence" exists that 70% of middle-class jobs have been taken by machines over the last 45 years? Unemployment hit 8.8% in 1981 (45 years ago). Today it's around half that. And don't give me the "the unemployment rate is a lie" nonsense. The BLS collects different measures of unemployment and also publishes a U6 unemployment that counts discouraged or marginally attached workers as well. That rate is also low.
It is true that many jobs have been replaced by machines. The U.S. makes a similar amo
Google it (Score:2)
I can't be bothered to post the link you can find it on Google pretty easily by searching for the phrase. There are actually studies of the effect of automation on employment over the last several decades and they are not good.
We are currently at 25% functional unemployment. That number includes everyone unemployed, everyone who gave up looking for work and crucially everyone who makes less money than it takes to afford a studio apartment and enough food to survive.
Those people are mooching off rela
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I can't be bothered to post the link you can find it on Google pretty easily by searching for the phrase.
Sorry, but no; that's not how it works. You made the claim, so you're the one who has to provide the evidence, not me. If you can't be bothered to do so, I'm perfectly entitled to presume that it doesn't exist and that your claims are nonsense, as usual.
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Besides, how do they select which artists to subsidize?
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Doesn't really matter. It's just a regular run of the mill government subsidy for artists. Nothing we haven't been doing for a well over 150 years. My point is that we shouldn't be calling it basic income because it's not.
The problem isn't whether giving out money helps people and helps society as a whole we have plenty of research on the topic and yeah it does. The problem is like I mentioned people who give out the money resent giving it out and people who get it resent the handouts and I don't have a
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Ironically - they'd likely end up picking the worst artists in the country, as artists with skills who are more valuable are less in need of the program in the first place.
I get that the lack of a social safety net can be an issue. It leads people to either take or stay in jobs that they hate where conditions may be bad or unfair, because if you become unemployed most people aren't too many paychecks away from homelessness.
Still, I'd rather see something akin to an unemployement option where everyone gets
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> That's a subsidy for artists.
And as such, is nothing new whatsoever. The [1]National Endowment for the Arts [wikipedia.org] was established win 1965 for that specific purpose.
The only difference is that's generally a one time grant, where this is pretending it's permanent (but will only last until money is short and their parliament needs to cut expenditures).
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Endowment_for_the_Arts
Haha (Score:3, Insightful)
This is going to piss off the MAGA simps here so badly
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And that amuses you why? Is it a healthy reason that indicates wellbeing, or bitter resentment that indicates illness?
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because of the magical reasoning they engage in!
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Why? Ireland isn't our country. Maybe it will encourage some of the "starving artists" here to go emigrate to Ireland and free load over there.
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Well then why don't you explain to us all how that benefit was computed?
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> An external cost-benefit analysis of the pilot calculated a return of $1.65 to society for every $1.2 invested
I'd be interested in seeing more details. What exactly was that benefit? Hopefully it wasn't "the artist was able to buy more groceries."
I'd also be interested in seeing if the study looked into the ROI of not paying artists anything and letting average citizens keep their tax money.
Define "artist" (Score:4, Insightful)
It'll be interesting to see how they define what an artist is.
Writer? Poet? Painter? Musician?
Do you need an established body of work? Many times it's the beginner who's starting out that needs a subsidy more than the chap who's been doing whatever for 50 years.
Re:Define "artist" (Score:4, Funny)
It gets assigned at birth.
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We're not quite to 'Gattaca' yet... give it a generation, and we'll be there.
UBI (in the US) could work if they calculate it to be enough to survive on, but not enough to live 'high on the horse' (pay rent and bills, afford food, basic stuff like that), maybe (in the US, at least) put the UBI on the EBT card used for SNAP and have some kind of requirement (like actively looking for work, working a low-hours per week job, not making over 'X' amount, not drawing SS anything, et cetera).
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I thought it was "eating high on the hog" ...
my take is that the only way to do UBI is to give the same amount to every adult citizen (some letter amount for kids up to 2. much less for 3rd+). No other requirements. no regional adjustment for metro areas. maybe for rural areas ... maybe not.
some single digit percent of people will still need "services" instead of in addition because they can't "adult" (due to mental illness, congenital issues, hooked on drugs etc)
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Okay joke, but the only successful attempt at humor on a story with so much potential for funny? But that's what the moderators voted.
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I wondered the same thing but it says right away that these artists were pre-selected.
It's not like this is currently an open system where people can claim to be an artist in order to receive extra money.
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Well, established artists don't need the help, so I'd guess it's newcomers. Which also means this will be abused like crazy in short order.
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Maybe linked to a graduate program? e.g. you study music, sculpture, theatre, dance etc and graduate third in your class after 3 years of study. You have a portfolio of work but just need a break.
The stereotype being broke twenty-somethings on the dole applying for bs jobs while they wait for their next paid gig. Breaking that cycle; maybe Ireland has sufficient casual workers that they don't need ballerinas working as baristas.
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waiting for graham norton to publicly demand his.
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Maybe the government feels the world is a better place with more art?
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Ireland especially has little to export and tourism is a big part of their economy. They export culture which pays back and drives tourism and the positive kind of immigration. Other countries do similar.
The Arts is broad. It's what reflects and defines culture. People DIE for their way of life and tribalism so it's actually important stuff. Without it, everybody / everyplace is the same but different language.
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> I too would love to get paid to do my hobby.
Feel free to petition your government to create similar programs.
I don't know where you live. But in the US, it is a constitutional right!
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This is extremely revealing of the conservative mindset; they just don't consider "art" actual work or producing value (in spite of them engaging in the same consumption of the output of artists).
This is 90% of it being the idea that art is all "liberal", any art that codes itself as conservative is immediately consumed without criticism of question (they all have to pretend to like Kid Rock now for example) so conservatives have spent the past 40 years disengaging from the culture and discouraging their ch
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[1]https://www.theautomaticearth.... [theautomaticearth.com]
If the artist is that good it might be worthwhile.
See also John William Waterhouse.
[1] https://www.theautomaticearth.com/2026/02/debt-rattle-february-16-2026/
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I know, we should do it the US way and give handouts to billionaires instead. Because those people work hard on their hobbies.
How's that calculated? (Score:2)
How are they calculating a $1.65 return on that $1.2? Especially since they say it is a return "to society", and not, "the artist sold his work for $514"?
The value of art, which is valuable, is entirely subjective. How are quantifying that?
Besides, don't artists usually need to struggle and suffer, at least at first, to be any good? Coddle them, and you'll just get paintings of kittens and anodyne love songs.
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> paintings of kittens and anodyne love songs
The is AI territory in 2026. You won't even notice that the cats have 6 toes.
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Yup. Have you worked out the next bit? I'll give you a clue - it's about scamming the system.
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Life is full of struggle and suffering without also heaping starvation on top of that. There have even been artists that continue to be great artists AFTER they're rich and no longer need the money to survive and are free to create whatever they want.
Lots of people keep working at things that they enjoy even without remuneration.
What I'd like to know is why they didn't just say for every $1 invested, $1.38 comes back. Do Irish folks pay in $1.20 increments?
Not UBI (Score:5, Informative)
This is a sexed-up grant program. Various "artists in residency" and similar grant programs have existed for quite some time with the idea of paying artists so they can have time to create. This is just relabeling the grant payments as "UBI".
But UBI isn't supposed to be paying you because of some merit or value you add to society. In fact, the idea is making payments to people precisely because a lot of individuals have no particular or unique skill and such individuals may be replaced by machines.
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it's not even sexed up, imo. for one thing it's explicitly not permanent
and you're tossed off of it after 3 years.
> the new BIA will operate in 3-year cycles with artists being eligible for every 3 out of 6 years. This means that, if selected in 2026 – 2029 for the payment, an artist won’t be eligible for the payment in the next cycle, but may reapply in the cycle following that.
and it's not exactly a princely income either... so it'll buy food and a piece of the rent, but not much else
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It shouldn't even be 3 years. 3 months is more like it. If you can't create a salable piece of art or several in 3 months you're not an artist and should probably apply to flip burgers or be a walmart greeter.
Normal for real countries. (Score:5, Insightful)
Several countries do provide personal stipends, working grants, or quasi-salary systems for artists.
France
Through the “intermittents du spectacle” system, performing artists can receive unemployment-style income support between contracts, if they meet work-hour thresholds. It’s not a universal artist salary, but it functions as income stabilization.
Germany
Artists can receive working grants (Arbeitsstipendien) that support living costs for a period of time without requiring a specific deliverable. There’s also the Künstlersozialkasse, which subsidizes health and pension insurance for self-employed artists.
Nordic countries
This is where it gets serious.
Norway, Sweden, Denmark, and Finland offer multi-year working grants and, in some cases, long-term stipends that function almost like partial salaries. Norway has had lifetime grants for selected artists. These are competitive but substantial.
Netherlands
Individual artist grants exist via national arts funds, often covering living expenses during creative periods.
Ireland
The Basic Income for the Arts pilot (launched 2022) provides direct monthly payments to selected artists. It’s explicitly personal income support.
Canada
The Canada Council offers individual artist grants covering living and creation time. Some provinces provide additional stipends.
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It's worth noting that the Canadian grant system is incredibly overloaded, and so it can be really hit or miss for artists who are at the beginning of their careers. I have friends in several theatre groups and they have to jump through a lot of hoops and ultimately get very little grant money.
The basic income plan is so much better just for its reliability.
Basically grants... (Score:2)
I'm not knocking the arts at all but I question how you measure the value returned and the quality of the art? Art is highly subjective. I've seen pieces of art that to me look like a toddler did them, but other people are just entranced by them. I can be absolutely entranced by some musical or theater performances and others I find just off putting. So how do you judge the value? How do you actually measure the return?
In terms of the money being paid out it sounds very similar to grant money to me.
"A happy little road..." (Score:2)
Did they have a trial to see whether the taxpaying non-artists had greater professional autonomy, less anxiety and higher life satisfaction?
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sure we'll get right on that you fuckin' limey
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Why would that be, AC? It's IRELAND. A lot of the citizens speak IRISH.
But you can barely speak English.
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Like Oscar Wilde and Bram Stoker.
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Or time literacy. Permanent!=3 years