A universal basic income could rebuild social cohesion

Declining social cohesion and increasing financial stress point to the need for a universal basic income, writes Dr Bronwyn Kelly.

AUSTRALIAN Bureau of Statistics (ABSs) recently released its latest version General Social Research and the results are quite disturbing.

They report that Australians are less satisfied with their lives compared to the COVID-19 lockdowns of 2020, and significantly less satisfied than in the decade before the pandemic. The Bureau also noted a dramatic decline in the value placed on multiculturalism; Only 75% of survey respondents agree ‘It is good for society to consist of different cultures’That’s down from 85% in 2020 and 81% in 2019.

This decline in social cohesion appears to coincide with an increase in the percentage of households experiencing financial stress.

The ABS does not engage in a discussion of whether financial stress is a causal factor in the apparent decline in cultural tolerance. To be sure, the decline is a function of a network of interrelated factors, not all of which are economic. But the extent of the decline in social cohesion should be of great concern to our governments.

Social breakdowns are incredibly difficult to overcome; They are much better prevented than treated. Therefore, any potential economic factors that could aggravate problems in social cohesion must be neutralized before the collapse worsens and frequently turns into civil unrest or – to use less polite and sterile descriptors – mass protests, mass shootings, police brutality and riots reminiscent of pre-World War II fascism.

The incidence of such civil unrest is increasing in Australia. Witness the end times Shooting at Bondi Beach And police brutality At the protest in Sydney against the visit of the President of Israel in early 2026. These are unusual events in Australia and any government would be well advised to remove as many individuals as possible who are contributing to this unrest.

The ABS is not the only agency whose research points to a breakdown in social cohesion in Australia. It is not the only institution to note that growth in financial stress coincides with declining compliance.

Scanlon FoundationHe said in his latest research, implying a direct relationship between the two: ‘Fiscal conditions remain the most important factor associated with social cohesion’. And if the Scanlon Foundation is right about this link, the Government should be very concerned, given the magnitude and speed of the increase in poverty over the last decade and the financial difficulties for families and individuals.

Since 2015, accordingly Australian Council of Social Service (ACOSS) And University of NSWThe number of Australians living in poverty has increased from 3.05 million to more than 3.7 million. And every year since COVID, according to Scanlon Foundation And Australian National UniversityBetween 35% and 40% of adult Australians (equating to approximately 8.5 million adults) experience financial difficulty.

This is a measure of financial stress that it would be very unwise for the Government to ignore. If the present Government desires social harmony – as we may hope it does – it would be best to deal with the various causes of unrest before millions more are added to the ranks of the financially insecure.

It must be good news, then, for the Labor Government that there is a way to stop the potential fragmentation of Australian society resulting from increased financial insecurity.

The Government can work with Australians to create a new agreement that will protect everyone from the possibility of falling into poverty and also protect the Government from failing to provide full access to adequate services for our health and wellbeing. An option for a process by which Australians and the Government could reach this agreement has been outlined by Commonwealth Future Planning (ACFP) aspect Australian Public Interest Collaboration.

The proposed Collaboration would, in essence, create a process through which the community could design a truly universal basic income (UBI). In turn, the Government can work in a parallel process to design an orderly program to support the security of services essential to our well-being, starting with the reintroduction of free higher education.

The two strands of design activity can then be integrated to ensure that everyone in the country can participate in the economy to their full potential. This would restore the possibility of life satisfaction, and the result would be a thriving economy of the kind we might expect to arise from sustained optimism among its members. This will translate into political, social and democratic stability.

In effect, Collaboration will lead Australians to redesign their welfare and tax systems to be fully fair; In this process where everyone is provided with income security, they can also establish universal service assurance for the first time in our history.

How can this happen? This could easily happen if Australians and the Federal Government decided to have a fair trade in distributing wealth and collecting taxes.

In this trade, Australians may offer to make new arrangements for the fair payment of duties in exchange for:

Guarantee a universal basic income for everyone at or above the poverty line (tax-free and for life, no questions asked other than proof of eligibility to apply for citizenship, permanent residence or residency); And

A second guarantee that the government will spend whatever we need on the services we deem essential to our well-being. (In this agreement, we can be quite specific about how much the Government should spend on each essential service. In fact, it is an agreement to eliminate austerity in federal budgets.)

The ACFP tentatively called this trade the “social new deal”; This may sound a bit like the “green new deals” that political parties sometimes offer people at election time. But a new social agreement that can be developed through cooperation according to society’s preferred design of welfare and tax distribution is actually the opposite of the kinds of agreements (green or otherwise) that politicians tend to put on hold at election time.

These agreements have no guarantees and are often canceled after elections. But an agreement in which the community reveals what it can offer and what it is prepared to accept in return is a very different thing, if only because it gives the community control of the terms of exchange.

Of course, the agreement must be economically viable. Ultimately, this is a complete reorganization of public spending, taxation and welfare. This means it must be designed to eliminate economic and financial risks for both the Government and society.

However, if the design of the agreement is organized within the framework of cooperation in the public interest, the community and the Government can integrate the terms of the agreement as follows:

UBI will seek to eliminate any risk of poverty for people;

The taxation agreement will eliminate the injustice in taxation as well as, most importantly, the risk of inflation; And

Agreement on essential public spending would eliminate the risk of loss of services that are vital for well-being and therefore maximum economic participation.

Together, we can achieve unprecedented improvements in economic and financial security that will ensure justice for all.

Such an agreement can only come about if the Government is ready to support the idea of UBI. Without a UBI designed to ensure everyone has fair access to opportunity and the benefits of the economy, we cannot even begin to develop a deal that will ensure fairness in taxation, let alone the security of services.

To that end, Labor might consider the benefit of such social new deals to its re-election prospects. The government can learn how the process can be handled Here.

Dr Bronwyn Kelly is the Founder of Australian Community Future Planning (ACFP). He specializes in long-term integrated planning for Australia’s society, environment, economy and democracy, and governance systems for nation states.

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