Univis 2.1 (Univ 16) – Universalism’s Contribution to The UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) [Plus: An ‘Image Modification Competition’]

Competition Winner (Robin Ketelaars – Congratulations and Thank You):

Australia’s Recent Eradication Achievements

1. Covid-19 eradication: Congratulations Australia – especially the Disempowered who are contributing despite suffering societal systemic assault.

[Yes, a new outbreak has occurred; unfortunately, there’re still vision and systemic weaknesses – i.e. the Federal and NSW government’s ‘suppression’ mindset, a non-national zero-risk policy for overseas arrivals (including air-crews) and such misunderstandings as the NSW premier’s insistence: it’s not the system’s fault, it’s people’s fault; which overlooks the need for our systems to be people-proof so as to prevent them doing the wrong thing); nevertheless, overall, our intent and capability are reasonably clear.]

For the Citizen’s Dividend Organisation’s (CDO) contribution please see, The Universalist 11: Universal Covid-19 Eradication.

2. The beginning-of-the-beginning to eradicating Xi: Congratulations to Australia’s political-class – especially Prime Minister Morrison – for standing strong against Xi-na (Xi Jin Ping’s China) particularly via the new foreign veto laws over States and Territories; however, in 2021, we need to optimise our systems so we are able to both resist Xi-na’s interference and also project a hitherto never seen integrated system of:

1. Universal Empowerment;
2. Universal-societally-contributing-self-actualisation; and,
3. Universal-Coopetition (Cooperative-Competition);

that is focused on achieving the vision of ‘universal sustainable stability-prosperity maximisation’, which, among other things, will inexorably undermine Xi because, when Chinese mainlanders see it, they will demand it for their country.

For the CDO’s contribution please see, The Universalist 15: Universally Eradicating Xi.

‘The Year of Universalism 2021’: Australia’s Remaining Optimising Goals

• ‘Universal Empowerment’ via implementing the last of the 4 Universal Empowerment Infrastructure (UEI) cornerstones:

1. Universal Liberal Democracy [Australia – Yes];
2. Universal Education [Yes];
3. Universal Healthcare [Yes]; and,
4. Universal Survival Income (USI) [not yet];

which, given Australia already has robust versions of the first 3, will eradicate all forms of systemic Disempowerment including eradicating stigma, harassment and obstacles to societal-contributive self-actualisation, which, in turn, will unleash our nation’s potential;

• Overcoming, once and for all, the perpetual Left/Right/Centre Industrial-Relations/Welfare ideological tectonics via universalising this issue – i.e. $20,000 per year to every in-country non-imprisoned adult citizen together with the abolition of the societal-wide minimum-wage, which will, amongst other things, eradicate both poverty and unemployment; and,
• With unemployment as ‘Dead as a Dodo’, adopt an appropriate national vision – i.e. replace our current materialism-encouraging environment-destroying socio-distorting economy-perverting ‘jobs, jobs, jobs’ (or, ‘Triple-J’) national vision with, for instance, ‘universal sustainable stability-prosperity maximisation’.

Universalism’s Progression: From The Universalist to The Univisionist

Since the CDO’s launch of The Universalist on December 8, 2019 [The Universalist 1: Bob Hawke], Universalism has made massive strides into Australians’ consciousness as, among other things, Opposition Leader Albanese invoked it in his October 8 Budget Reply and the ABC published an article on December 11.

Accordingly, in order to assist in propelling Universalism to the next level, The CDO is today launching a new phase in the form of The Univisionist, which focuses more emphatically on Universalism’s vision.

2021’s New Year’s Challenges

1. To the Leftist, Rightist & Centrist (LRC) Class-Warfarists fair notice …

The class-warfare paradigm – for which the LRCs each represent 1 of its 3 segments – has led to multi-dimensional unnecessary disaster, which includes:

1. Literally, gifting us perpetual conflict – both internally (for example, ‘dole-bludger’) and externally …;
2. The World Wars, everything from Communism to Fascism and present-day problems such as the likes of Xi-na and North Korea;
3. Spawning the latest own-goal factionalised scourge of identity-warfare;
4. 70% of the world still living in conditions akin to 1760 Industrial Revolution Britain;
5. Even in a 2020 First World country such as Australia, when our potential productivity per person – due to human capital improvements and Organisation, Science & Technology innovation – is around 10,000-fold compared to that prevailing at the Industrial Revolution’s beginning, Disempowerment afflicts perhaps 20% (5 million) of the population; and,
6. The existence of our present perfect storm of culminating exponentiating Socio-Econo-Enviro- (SEE) catastrophes.

Nevertheless, meanwhile, with humanity oblivious, another unifying nature-consistent (because it’s nature-driven) paradigm has simultaneously been evolving – i.e. ‘Universalism’ – which, so far, has manifested as Universal Liberal Democracy, Universal Education and Universal Healthcare yet, since, most of all, ‘everyone needs survival-income’, it must also include The USI.

Furthermore, recently, Universalism has been gathering as a concept within our collective awareness to the point where humanity is now able to receive the Universalism baton from nature and deliberately, methodically and efficiently implement it in its full unnecessary-suffering-eradicating glory.

So, finally, with a navigable path in mind, given the unnecessary suffering of Australia’s Disempowered, Australia per se and humanity, in general, surely it’s time to act.

Thus, to class-warfarists, fair notice: it is futile to continue ignoring, sidelining, denying and/or distorting Universalism, which means you should either:

1. Re-prepare your arguments, this time, with respect to Universalism; or,
2. Vacate the field.

[Regarding distorting Universalism, there is the case of so-called ‘universal childcare’, which, rather than being a Universalism cornerstone is, on the contrary, just yet another inefficient add-on.  That is, with The USI, parents have the income and the freedom to choose, amongst other things, whether to pay for childcare or to spend more time with their children.]

To those LRC class-warfarists of good faith, when ‘the penny drops’, by definition, Universalism will welcome you.

However, to those who are wilfully lagging because they either don’t want to think about it or are acting in bad faith – i.e. there are more class-warfare bad-faithists than you may think, for a start, ‘the divide and conquerists’ and, more generally, those whose career, income and, sometimes, self-identity are built on it – this issue is greater than all of us put together.

2. To the Media:

Most current affairs’ programs are like merry-go-rounds – rather than being serious, they are entertainment that goes round-and-round in circles.

However, you have Fourth Estate status, which means, institutionally, you transcend the murmurings of the day.

Hence, while we realise that, until now, most of the talk has been about add-on matters such as ‘Raise the Rate’ and ‘Jobkeeper’, in 2021, we beg you to please genuinely attempt to understand the substance of Universalism per se and The Universal Survival Income (USI), in particular.

Though the world may currently seem irreconcilable, we are as close as The USI to making all our Socio-Econo-Enviro- (SEE) catastrophes manageable.

Thus, we implore you to join the dots – i.e. with The USI, we don’t need more-and-more resources shoved into such management-intensive dignity-ravaging supply-side areas as social-housing, mental-health, family law courts, domestic violence, charity, the environment, Raise the Rate, ‘Triple-J’ etc.

In short, in 2021, we hope you will sprint and catch-up to your rightful place at the head of the pack.

December 21, 2020

Hi

Whether you’re a fan of the UN or not, we hope you agree the Strategic Development Goals (SDGs) are valuable aims.

On that note, we wonder if you are aware The Universal Survival Income (USI) is the one and only policy that assists with all the SDGs?

The reason for this starts with the fact, in a modern – i.e. non-hunter-and-gatherer and non-subsistence-farming – nation:

‘Everyone needs survival-income.’

We need survival-income because we can no longer independently directly gather or produce what we need, which means, if a survival-income is not universally unconditionally guaranteed then:

1. Some become Disempowered – i.e. via bushfires, drought, sickness, mental-illness, unemployment, family-caring responsibilities, relationship-breakdown, Covid-lockdowns etc. – which means they unnecessarily suffer (as mentioned, currently, perhaps 5 million Australians);
2. Individually, we must disproportionately (and inefficiently) each focus on getting it, which, among other things, encourages citizens to ‘rip-off’ other citizens, which is now normalised, puts undue pressure on relationships and leads to an increasing percentage of children being neglected by paid-working parents;
3. Families are forced to help Band-Aid over the resultant income deficiencies of other family members, which causes a tsunami of other problems;
4. Organisations are distorted such that businesses are as much social-service entities as profit-maximisers, which, for example, is why we don’t have much tradeable manufacturing, and the non-taxpaying charity sector, despite being volunteer-rich, is bloated to 10% of the economy yet still can’t keep up and, moreover, is falling further-and-further behind;
5. Our economy is fundamentally perverted such that instead of it being a purely demand-driven mechanism for creating and distributing the goods and services we desire, it has become a partial cart-before-the-horse entity that is, additionally, tasked with generating superfluous paid-work; and,
6. Governments are debauched into adopting ‘jobs, jobs, jobs’ (‘Triple-J’) as the national-vision.

Therefore, just one error – one absence – is pushing us down rabbit-hole after rabbit-hole within rabbit-hole.

That is, our USI-absent societies are unnatural such that, currently, despite all the ad-hoc add-ons we already have, our Socio-Econo-Enviro- (SEE) challenges aren’t slowing-down, let alone halting, let alone reversing such that, on the contrary, as also mentioned, we are facing a perfect storm of culminating exponentiating SEE catastrophes.

The point is, whereas our plethora of stand-alone add-ons all seek to address one or more of the USI-absent ‘manufactured’ problems, The USI foundationally bottom-up ‘pull the rug out’ pre-empts them – i.e. whereas the add-ons are symptom-addressing snake-oil, The USI is pre-emptive science.

Frankly, we should sense that it can only be this difficult if our systems are fundamentally violating nature.

Thus, regarding the SDGs, instead of top-down attempting to tailor-make add-ons to address each, we should instead:

‘Work smarter not harder.’

——

Regarding ‘The SDG’s Image Competition’, as well as celebrating the launch of the new Univisionist phase, we confess The CDO’s expertise doesn’t extend to such wizardry as editing a .png.

Regarding Robin Ketelaars design, which is the starting point, in general, we love it so, in a minimalist sense, we are just looking for 2 additional versions of it.

Specifically, observing the image’s right-hand side:

1. Both additional versions should have generic rather than Euro-centric wording and, instead of ‘Basic Income/s’, it should have ‘Survival Income/s’ – for example, where it says: ‘Start Unconditional Basic Incomes throughout the EU’ it should be changed to, ‘Start Unconditional Survival Incomes’; and,
2. One version should have the website link deleted (i.e. it is for general global use – via this newsletter, we will distribute it to all the world’s major USI activists and organisations) and a second version (i.e. for our use) with the website link replaced with https://citizens-dividend.org/.

There’s no need to adjust the design or the colours or the rest of the wording; however, if you have an idea you believe is better then please feel free to have a go – for example, a circle of the SDGs with The USI at its centre would be superb.

The cut-off is February 15, 2021 and the winner, as well as being recognized in The Univisionist, will receive the following prize – universal love and gratitude from their grandkids and all future Australians, indeed, all future humanity.

Mmmm – unfortunately, we are a zero-revenue not-for-profit.

Thank you.

Merry Christmas, Great Holidays &, especially, Happy New Year

Paul Ross

Founder

The Universal Empowerment Organisation (UEO) Australia

The Citizen’s Dividend Organisation (CDO) Australia

https://citizens-dividend.org/
https://www.facebook.com/paul.ross.798
https://twitter.com/paulross2

Humanity is being confronted by a perfect storm of Socio-Econo-Enviro- (SEE) Catastrophes including:

1. Social:

a. Internal: mental illness, domestic violence, drug & alcohol abuse etc.

b. External: our weaknesses boost Democracy’s enemies, which is currently enhancing international rivalry such as with China, Russia, North Korea and Iran;

2. Economic: absolute poverty, relative income inequality, unemployment, homelessness etc.; and,

3. Environmental: ecosystem destruction, species extinction, human population explosion, plastic islands, climate change etc.

Hypothesis: This is due to a single foundational ‘Society-Individual Interface’ contradiction whose deleterious effects are cascading through every facet of society.

The relevant contradiction is the partial absence of the natural-morality-derived ‘Universal Empowerment Infrastructure’ (UEI), which consists of the four cornerstones:  

1. Universal Liberal Democracy – [In Australia] Yes;
2. Universal Healthcare – Yes;
3. Universal Education – Yes;
4. Universal Basic/Survival Income (UBI/USI) – No, not yet.

The Socio-Econo-Environment-Harmonising Universal Survival Income (USI):

It’s not that it is the solution; 
It’s that its absence is the problem.

The Taxpayer-to-Citizen-Transfer [Note: Unlike the Current System, this is not a ‘cost’ but a ‘transfer’.]Around $20,000 per year x 18 million (non-incarcerated in-country adult Australian citizens) + $5,000 x 4.5 million (children) = $386 billion (2018 figures).

This may be achieved by:

1. Reallocating $150 billion of the $175 billion Social Services budget (yes, we are already spending half of what we need), which still leaves $25 billion to top up pensions and disability payments;

2. Abolishment of the Tax-Free Threshold ($35 billion); and,

3. Insertion of a 20% full-breadth GST (no – it’s not regressive if the disempowered are net beneficiaries; also, the wealthy and multinationals’ capacity to avoid a GST is particularly limited), which results in $200 billion minus $60 billion (from the current 10% gap-ridden GST) equaling an additional $140 billion.

In addition to this $325 billion total, there will be massive human-capital, efficiency, societal-involvement and trust gains, which means, not only is the USI easily afforded, we will be, at least, twice as prosperous such that it will amount to a win-win-win in which all community segments – the wealthy; the middle-class; and, the currently disempowered – all win.

In the process, the economy will also be transformed from an ‘environment-destroying jobs-for-jobs’-sake’ ‘own-goal’ one to ‘an efficient production of goods and services we desire’ one.

Then, there is the massive permeating benefit of achieving full-employment.

That is, with everyone both taken care of and invested with the freedom to say ‘no’ to an employer plus the rectification of the present social-status premium on paid-work over unpaid-work, which will dissipate the stigma of not having paid-work, this means there will be a massive flow of power to the disempowered and working classes, which will result in a workers’ paradise.

Yet, this workers’ paradise will enable significant labour-market deregulation (i.e. everyone is already being looked after so, while we may continue to feel an emotional attachment to, for instance, economy-wide minimum-wages, in practice, there will no longer be a need for them).

And, this means our (pre-Covid-19) 5.7 million volunteers can get paid something and our young, elderly, relatively unskilled, disabled, unpaid-carers, 600,000+ unemployed and 1.1 million+ underemployed can, if they desire, get paid-work (or, more work) and, generally, there is full-employment such that ‘anyone who, at the going rate, wants a job, can get one’.  

In addition, the USI will eradicate the current welfare-to-paid-work distortion where there is a disincentive to acquire paid-work because, in doing so, one loses one’s welfare.

Furthermore, full-employment will result in wages and conditions being bid-up.

And yet, business, as well as benefiting from deregulation, rather than having to tolerate the current crop of unhappy conscripts, will benefit from an army of volunteer workers, which given, with regard to morale and productivity, ‘one bad apple spoils the barrel’, will deliver massive productivity efficiencies.

This means our tradables’ sector – especially manufacturing – will roar back to life. 

The Citizen’s Dividend Organisation’s Commitment (August 1, 2019):

1. Short-term (interim) – At the 2022 Australian Federal Election (unlike in 2019), at least one registered political party will have the USI as its signature policy such that the USI is an election issue; and,
2. Medium-term (end) – At the 2025 Australian Federal Election, the winner has a mandate for the implementation of a USI, which it then prosecutes.

Without The Universal Survival Income (USI),

It’s Impossible to Save the Environment.