Rutger Bregman Quotes

The minimum wage in Denmark is about twice that of the United States, and people who are totally out of the labor market or unable to care for themselves have a basic income guarantee of about $100 per day.

Let's means-test benefits - let's means-test Social Security and Medicare and make the rich pay more for these benefits.

The conventional viewpoint says we need a jobs program and we need to cut welfare. Just the opposite! We need more welfare and fewer jobs.

What we're putting forward is the most radical reform of the welfare state... for 60 years. I think it will have a transformative effect in making sure that everyone is better off in work and better off working rather than on benefits.

We believe that the federal government is responsible to give every man employment or a guaranteed income.

I am in favour of a fully transferable allowance.

The most important thing is guaranteed livable income, which will take a while to bring in because it means all the provinces have to participate.

Expanding the EITC can get us close to a universal basic minimum income.

Every American has a right to food, housing, and health care - and we can afford to provide it if billionaires and big corporations pay their fair share.

A universal basic income funded by a value-added tax, which is a tax placed on a product whenever value is added at each stage of the supply chain, from production to the point of sale, would spread the benefits of automation to a much wider group of people.

I think it's fair to set limits, so that people cannot receive more than the equivalent of the national average wage while living on benefits.

My dream is universal income, with a completely different fiscal system to finance it.

The Welfare State is merely a method for transforming the market economy step by step into socialism.

The welfare state may be well-intentioned, but it is a Ponzi scheme

The welfare state is the oldest con game in the world. First you take people's money away quietly, and then you give some of it back to them flamboyantly.

The most important social welfare program in America is a job.

I want a society that provides decent jobs for those who can work and decent security for those can't.

I have continuously said that, at the very minimum, the Bush tax cuts for income under $250,000 should be extended.

Well you know I've attracted a lot of criticism by, for example, suggesting that child benefit should be taken away from higher rate taxpaying families.

I say I don't need a tax cut. It will not do me any more good. I can't buy more, I can't eat more, I can't do more, and I want it distributed among the ordinary people who work every day.

A properly designed tax system can strike a balance between helping the poor and, at the same time, giving people the incentive to work.

There are people who believe in expanding the welfare state across the spectrum of races and ethnicities and creeds.

Raising the minimum wage means we have workers paying more in to support the Social Security system.

We’ve taken care not to penalize the wealthy but we have to redistribute some income …It is through reform that we can obtain fairness in the modern world…A reformed welfare state is the only way to obtain social justice.

One way to reduce income inequality is to get rid of the rich. If Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, Rupert Murdoch and their billionaire friends could be persuaded to emigrate from the United States, income inequality would decrease overnight.