“We need worthy and decent unemployments”… and a Universal Basic Income could be useful for that.

Sir, Tobias Buck quotes Marcel Jansen, a professor of economy at Madrid’s Autónoma university with “More than a quarter of unemployed workers in Spain have been out of a job for more than four years. Their chances of getting back into the labour market are very dire” “Spain’s first quarter job losses less severe than usual” April 29.

It relates directly to an Op-Ed I wrote in Venezuela (before I was censored there) titled “We need worthy and decent unemployments”. I quote the following from it:

“What politician does not speak up for the need to create decent and well paid jobs for young people? But, if that's not possible, and the economy is not able to deliver that on its own ... What on earth do we do?

Society must of course do its utmost seeking to solve the problem of youth unemployment ... including taking leisure to levels never thought of… six months vacations! But it also needs to prepare itself to handle a growing number of unemployed, not cyclical but structural, that is, those who never ever in their life will have a chance to get an economically productive job.

The power of a nation, and the productivity of its economy, which so far has depended primarily on the quality of its employees may, in the future, also depend on the quality of its unemployed, at least in the sense of these not interrupting those working.”

And recently I have reflected on that a Universal Basic Income, as that is not-having-a-job-or-not related social contribution, could be a significant part of the efforts needed.

@PerKurowski ©

The quality of its unemployed is also vital for the strength of a nation

Sir, Janan Ganesh refers to the relative political tranquility that has prevailed in Britain over the last years, even in the face of 21 percent unemployment among young people, and other hardships resulting from the current crisis/recession, “The British have met crisis with understatement”, November 19.

That is of course extremely valuable and commendable, as long as it is of course much more the result of stiff upper lips, than of a feeling of resignation or sheer apathy, especially in coming generations.

In June 2012 in an Op-Ed I wrote “The power of a nation, and the productivity of its economy, which so far has depended primarily on the quality of its employees may, in the future, also depend on the quality of its unemployed, at least in the sense of these not interrupting those working.”

But what about a bachelor degree in being happily unemployed?

Sir, as you say June 14 happiness lessons might not be a subject to add to the national curriculum, but perhaps some core course in how to be an unemployed with socially acceptable behaviour could be useful in times of so much outsourcing and migration.

A certified independent's view on World Bank reforms

Sir, Inder Sud in his letter “The prime World Bank issue is reforming board’s procedures” May 19, ends by saying that “What is important is to ensure that the board is truly independent and is specifically empowered to provide oversight.” Sounds nice, but that’s about it. Being arguably among the most independent Executive Director the World Bank has ever seen, having been nominated through a procedure initiate on the web by a government going through chaotic times and that when later regretting such appointment found out it was then too late to do something about it, I should perhaps know a bit or two about that issue. What on earth is independent and free of conflict of interests? In my country and yours too, perhaps some shoe-shiners could meet these criteria. And as to being empowered, the board is so more than enough, and what is missing is to make that empowerment more effective.

And in this I am in total agreement with Mr Sud, the procedures of the board need to be revised. The Executive Directors are so drowned in paper and asked to opine on so many issues, that in fact they almost mean nothing. Who is to blame and whether this could just be a Machiavellian device of management to render the board ineffective in its controls is something we could discuss another day but for me, the most important reform the World Bank board of Executives could do, is to demand from management a list of the ten best and ten worst programs or the Bank in order to dedicate themselves to scaling up the good and weeding out the irremediable bad, instead of losing so much time on the middle grey which in fact should be almost exclusively management territory.

As for a good mix at the Board I am all for it, and having a couple of independent lose cannon minds there to really question and plenty of dependant minds to anchor them back into realities, sound like the best alternative. Civil society? Why not, whatever that now means, but in an increasing global world I have also been suggesting that the global migrant working community and the multinational corporations needs to be represented.

As for the Presidency? Why not have donors bid for it and raise some money! Jest aside, though he clearly should be an independent, he should not be so much that he distances the World Bank from the real world. That no one can afford!

Per Kurowski
Former Executive Director of the World Bank
Chairman of the Voice and Noise Foundation for International Development and Global Strategic Studies.

Inefficiencies are often very precious.

Sir, Martin Flash in response to your editorial “Corporate France comes into focus” raises the question of “Is inefficiency a cost worth bearing?” May 17. I would dare to go much further, even stating that inefficiencies are in fact extremely valuable societal factors, that should be nourished and protected, of course in an efficient way. Think of it, if the world was really as efficient as it could be, what would there be left to do for the likes of me and you. And this by the way reminds me of another issue close to my heart and that I have not written to you previously about, I think.

We often see tables where they discriminate between occupations, like agriculture, manufacturing, services and so on, but when it comes to the unemployed they are usually bunched up into one and the same group. This is tragic, we urgently need to create new categories of unemployed so that we for instance can start recording those millions that more and more belong in special categories such as the “employed unemployed” (see Scandinavia) and also the gainfully unemployed. In a global world order disrupted by more efficient job allocation it is important for Universities and others to start giving courses on how to be and make a living being structurally unemployed, (Unemployed BA)and perhaps this is something that the French, with an intuitive efficiency, have been able to pick up.

On the other hand the French, with their savoir faire, might have just decided that the markets should not be trusted in its efficiency, and personally I think they have a point, especially when some few credit rating agencies have been ordered to substitute for so much of the market.

It should not be about compensating losers but about distributing better the dividends of globalization.

Sir, Danny Leipziger and Michael Spence the vice chairman and chairman of the Commission of Growth and Development in their “Globalization’s losers need support” May 15, by talking about the need for protecting losers are, whether they know it or not, sending a quite wrong and negative message about globalization. A more constructive way to phrase the issue would be along the lines of “We have to make sure that the immense dividends from globalization are adequately distributed” Let us be honest, it must be clear by now that some beneficiaries are just getting more than their fair share.

If for instance a Mr Carlos Slim of Mexico is able according to Forbes to turn himself into the worlds second richest persons with a wealth of $53bn by controlling the Mexican telecommunication industry, it should be perfectly clear that this has nothing to do with globalization and all to do with bad regulators.

In this respect we only wish that Mr Leipziger and Mr Spence would give more attention to the obvious needs of scaling up global antitrust legislations and of finding ways of how to assure that the many monopolies that are created through assigning and defending the intellectual property right are reasonably exploited, instead of thinking about compensating handouts. That Bill Gates gives back is commendable, but that cannot be the basis for a government policy, when every citizen should have the right to earn his own keep, even if only employed as an unemployed.