The European Commission has published a new evidence review, Creating More Equal Societies: What works? by Abigail McKnight, Magali Duque and Mark Rucci: ‘A Citizen’s Income is an unconditional, non-withdrawable income for every individual as a right of citizenship in a country … According to some researchers, it would deliver reduced marginal deduction rates and would increase employment incentives, offer greater social cohesion (Article 2 of the Treaty on European Union), eliminate the stigma generated by means-tested benefits, and substantially reduce fraud and error rates while being simpler to administer. In his most recent work on a Citizen’s Income for the United Kingdom ‘Two feasible ways to implement a revenue neutral Citizen’s Income scheme’, Torry (2015) presents clear and direct policy proposals which live up to the title of the work. He does so by advocating for an all-at-once approach and a phased approach. … Torry (2015) concludes his argument by stating that any proposed Citizen’s Income scheme should be comprised of three non-negotiables: it should be strictly revenue neutral, it should not propose large increases in Income Tax rates, and it should impose very few losses on low-income households … (pp. 67-8); ‘The within country across time evidence presented does not support the case that greater targeting is more effective at reducing poverty or inequality’ (p.80).
Note: Parts of Torry (2015) have now been updated in Malcolm Torry (2016) An Evaluation of a Strictly Revenue Neutral Citizen’s Income Scheme.