In September, Pope Francis attended the World Meeting of Popular Movements, an initiative he launched 10 years ago as a platform for grassroots organisations to come together and address the “economy of exclusion and inequality”. During his speech at the event, the head of the Catholic Church renewed his call for a global universal basic income (UBI), saying that implementing such a measure would not only be a reflection of compassion but also “strict justice”.
Pope Francis has joined a growing international movement advocating for income redistribution through a scheme of unconditional monthly cash payments to every individual to cover their basic needs and provide economic security as a fundamental human right.
A global UBI is not just a question of poverty relief. It’s also a question of social justice. Centuries of exploitation and overextraction of resources have concentrated wealth in the Global North, and as a result, most Global South countries lack the tax base and fiscal firepower to fund their own national UBIs. A global UBI would not only end world poverty, but also represent a necessary and equitable redistribution of wealth from north to south.
Critics of the movement have often pointed to the significant cost that implementing UBI could incur for governments. So is there a sustainable way to pay for it?
At Equal Right, a nonprofit that also advocates for UBI, we have developed detailed modelling laid out in our paper “Climate Justice Without Borders”. It shows that a charge of $135 per tonne on the global extraction of fossil fuels could raise as much as $5 trillion a year and fund a global UBI of at least $30 a month. A progressive wealth tax ranging between 1 and 8 percent on the world’s richest multi-millionaires and billionaires could yield another $22 for every person in the world, and a financial transactions tax of just 0.1 percent could raise another $16 each.
These payments could be supplemented by other taxes on the global commons, including land, mining and artificial intelligence tools, recognising the equal right we all have to a share of the world’s wealth and resources.
Now, a payment of around $70 a month may not be life-changing for many. But for the 712 million people living in extreme poverty worldwide, it would be transformational. Pilot programmes from Canada to India and Finland to Brazil have demonstrated the huge social and economic benefits of giving people cash.
So, we can fund a global UBI by taxing carbon and wealth, but we must acknowledge the limitations of this approach. As carbon emissions decrease and wealth becomes more evenly distributed, taxable resources will diminish. This creates a cliff edge for the longevity of UBI, one that can only be bridged through more sustainable financing.
At the same time, a green just transition is urgently necessary to end our reliance on fossil fuels, and huge potential exists in the Global South in particular. Currently, this transition is fettered by predatory, high-interest loans that keep many countries in never-ending debt cycles.
That is why, to ensure the sustainability of UBI and support a green just transition, Equal Right proposes establishing a Global Commons Fund (GCF) – a people-owned initiative that would collect revenues from the fossil fuel charge, invest them in the green economy, and distribute a UBI as a dividend to all citizens. Based on the performance of similar sovereign wealth funds, like Norway’s (which is worth $1.7 trillion), we expect the fund could become self-sustaining (and no longer be reliant on extractive revenues) within around 20 years. However, an initial capital endowment from Global North countries could expedite this.
The GCF would seek to end the debt cycle for poor countries and provide grants for climate mitigation and adaptation. It could even pay interest to governments who show leadership by keeping their fossil fuel reserves in the ground.
Crucially, we must ensure that this fund does not encourage further exploitation of our shared resources. Therefore, we propose a global cap on carbon extraction, based on scientific recommendations to keep global temperature rise within 1.5 degrees Celsius. Fossil fuel companies would then pay a charge to access every tonne of fossil fuel extracted under this cap.
The “cap and share” model we have put together not only funds a global UBI, but also mitigates the climate crisis, paving the way for a radical but necessary socio-ecological transformation needed to keep us within planetary boundaries and avoid continued climate chaos.
The UBI itself could be a powerful tool to tackle the climate crisis. For instance, in India, basic income pilot programmes have shown that households receiving UBI are more likely to transition to cleaner fuel options. In Peru, an NGO called Cool Earth provides a basic income for conservation work in the Amazon. Meanwhile, NGOs GiveDirectly and the International Rescue Committee are using data to predict natural disasters and provide cash payments to help communities prepare and rebuild, acting as a form of compensation for loss and damage.
Climate justice and economic justice are two sides of the same coin. Our “cap and share” system not only addresses the urgent need for climate finance, but also tackles poverty and inequality by funding a global UBI.
As the world looks towards COP29, and pressure mounts on member states to achieve the aims of the Paris Agreement and agree on a New Collective Quantified Goal (NCQG) for climate finance, Equal Right urges policymakers to consider the potential of the “cap and share” system.
This radical yet necessary approach can fund a global UBI, as championed by Pope Francis, while capping fossil fuels and funding a better future for us all. Embracing these bold yet essential approaches will not only advance climate justice but also foster economic equity, ensuring that no one is left behind in the pursuit of a sustainable and just future for all.
In a time of immense uncertainty, “cap and share” gives us options: a way out, a way through and a way forward.
The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.
