'*FREE -*MONEY*- FISH*'

WHAT WOULD YOU DO - if your income were taken of?

As a concept basic income has been kicked around in various guises for centuries, gaining adherents across a strikingly broad swath of the ideological spectrum, from English social Philosopher Thomas More to the American revolutionary Thomas Maine.

*WITH JOBS PRECARIOUS, scattered communities set up trial handouts. So, one need not be a  card-carrying revolutionary to deduce that global-capitalism has a problem*.

In much of the world, angry workers denounce a shortage of jobs paying enough to support middle-class life. Economists puzzle over the fix for persistently weak wage growth, just as robots appear poised to replace the millions of human workers.

At the annual gatherings of the global elite in the Swiss resort of Davos, billionaire chieftains debate how to make  capitalism kinder to masses to defuse populism.

Enter the universal basic income.

The idea is gaining traction in many countries as a proposal to soften the edges of capitalism. Though the details and the philosophies vary from place to place, the general notion is that the government hands out regular checks to everyone, regardless of income or whether people are working.

The money ensures food and shelter for all, while removing the stigma of public support.

Some posit basic income as a way to let market forces work ruthless magic, delivering innovation and economic growth while laying a down a cushion for those who fail.

Others present it as a means of liberating people from wretched, poverty-level jobs, allowing workers to organize for better conditions or devote time to organize for better conditions or devote time to artistic exploits.

Another school sees at as the required response to an era in which work no longer can be relied on upon to finance basic needs.

''We see the increasing precariousness of employment,'' said Karl Widerquist, a philosopher at  George Town University in Qatar, and a prominent advocate for a universal safety net.

''Basic income gives the worker the power to say, ''Well, if Walmart's not going to pay me enough, then I'm just going to work there.''

The universal basic income is clearly an idea with momentum.

Early this year, Finland kicked off a  two-year national experiment in basic income.

In the United States, a trial was recently completed in Oakland, Calif., and another is about to begin in nearby Stockton, a community hit hard by the  Great recession and the attendant epidemic in home foreclosures.

The province of Ontario is enrolling participants for a basic income trial. Several cities in the Netherlands are exploring what happens when they hand out cash grants unconditionally to people already receiving some form of public support.

A similar test is underway in Barcelona, Spain.

A nonprofit organization, GiveDirectly, is proceeding with plans to provide  universal cash grants in rural Kenya.

The Honor and Serving of  latest Global Operational Research on Poverty, Basic Income, Social Security continues to Part 2. !WOW! thanks author and researcher  Pieter S. Goodman.