What has become of the universal basic income project?

BarcelonaUntil just over a year ago, the universal basic income (UBI) was one of the proposals at the center of the debate regarding innovative social policies. Its universality generated division: those in favor considered it a transformative and interesting policy precisely for that reason, while opponents argued that social benefits should discriminate positively based on income. Pere Aragonès's government embraced the idea of universality and promoted a pilot project on the basic income, aimed at a small group of people to study the extent to which it can improve the lives of those who receive it. Although one of the conditions of ERC's support for Salvador Illa's investiture was precisely to maintain this pilot project, the project is currently on hold, according to several sources told ARA.

In the pact with the Republicans, the PSC committed to "updating the pilot plan" to "adapt it to the social, economic, and legal context" and to carry out the test during the legislature. All this, despite the fact that the Socialists are opposed to studying a possible UBI: their electoral platform included the "elimination" of the pilot plan and the "closure" of the office in charge of designing it.

In January of this year, the Government set a condition for starting the trial during the second half of 2025: approving the Generalitat's budget, as the executive asserted that a specific financial allocation is necessary to carry out the test. The accounts have not been approved, and neither has ERC set this issue as a condition when approving any of the three credit supplements. Thus, the UBI pilot plan office, which currently employs three technicians (waiting to incorporate another) and an administrator, has been at a standstill for some time.

The Department of Social Rights assures that the office is currently carrying out tasks to "reinforce" the methodological approach and to ensure that the pilot designed during the last term offers "clear and relevant results." He also says he wants to "ensure" the compatibility of the UBI with other non-universal benefits, such as the state's minimum living income, which the Generalitat is assuming management of, or the guaranteed citizen income, which is being reformed.

However, sources involved in the pilot project proposed during the ERC government emphasize that this issue was studied "extensively" with the legal teams of Social Rights and the Presidency. Regarding doubts about the methodology, they recall that the plan was carried out with Ivalua, the institute that evaluates public policies in Catalonia. In fact, in its review report, this body assures that the pilot plan has "potential to provide information" and that a "rigorous" evaluation of the plan can be carried out because it details what it expects to find, "minimizing," the text says, "the risk of misinterpretation of the results."

Asked by this newspaper about the future of the pilot, the Catalan government says it plans to incorporate the funding for the pilot project "into the budgets for the new legislative cycle"—for which the government has no guaranteed support—and that it "maintains its commitment to the project." However, sources consulted assure that the Advisory Council has not been convened on any occasion in the last year. This was also expressed by Judit Font, a sociologist and member of the Consell, who reproached PSC MP Mónica Ríos in Parliament for saying that the pilot project is still "ongoing" despite not having convened the Advisory Council and not having been informed "of anything" since the change of government, while Ríos argued that work is being done to "improve it."

For this reason, the same sources consider there to be a "lack of political will" to move the pilot project forward. They point out that for the moment this is an "experiment" involving a very small number of people, not a public policy that should be implemented nationwide—with the magnitude that this entails—and they regret that there is no "interest" in exploring the potential of a UBI.

Rejection of Parliament and changes from the Illa government

In any case, the lack of budget, and therefore the wait, extends beyond this legislative term. In March 2023 The Socialists, along with Junts, PP, Ciutadans and Vox, rejected the budget allocation in the Catalan chamber. This was supposed to allow the pilot project the office had been developing for months to begin. The trial proposal, which involved an international committee of experts and was approved by Ivalua, was ready to be implemented. It contemplated that 5,000 people would receive 800 euros per month for two years, and how their lives would improve would be studied. Since the budget was not approved, the theory could not be tested in practice.

Upon taking office in the Generalitat (Catalan Government), the Socialists decided that the office would be dependent on the Department of Social Rights, instead of being attached to the Presidency as it had been until then. Another notable move was the dismissal in September 2024 of the director of the office appointed by ERC, the sociologist and UBI activist Sergi Raventós. In his place, the PSC appointed economist Guillem Vidal. Despite the changes, the issue remains at the same point it was when the Socialists blocked the trial from starting with their votes in Parliament: a specific budget is lacking to allow it.