Scott Santens is creating
support for a basic income guarantee
Writer, BIG advocate, and founder of the "BIG Patreon Creator Pledge" for basic income
133
$941.87
Milestone Goals
2 Milestone Goals
reached
The BIG Patreon Creator Pledge
Basic income achieved! I am now free to focus entirely on achieving the same for all of us, which I will do vigorously. Because I consider $1,000 per month an appropriate starting level for a basic income in the US (in 2014) - but will need 10% to cover Patreon's cut and transaction fees ($1,111 - 10% = $1,000) an amount of $1,111 is my final goal and all pledges above it I will not keep and will instead pledge to others who set the same goal of achieving their own basic incomes set at the same level here on Patreon. If you're familiar with Creative Commons, this goal essentially has a "Share Alike" stipulation.
About
Citizen of Earth. Writer. Proponent of science and human progress.
Location
New Orleans, LA, USA
Top PatronsSee all 133
Scott Santens here. You may also know me as "2noame", or as most recently "that basic income guy from the Atlantic article talking about fish", or "that guy on Huffington Post warning about the effects of self-driving trucks in an America without a basic income already in place." I'm a writer and now activist spending as much time and resources I have working to spread awareness for the idea of a basic income guarantee (BIG) - one whose time has come here in the 21st century where technology is now forcing our hand. Without an income floor set at the poverty level as a bare minimum, I believe poverty and inequality will continue to grow, the middle classes will continue to shrink, and the livelihoods of all but the top fifth of society will continue to slip away.
Until recently, my most popular article I've written about basic income was "Why Should We Support the Idea of an Unconditional Basic Income?" It made Medium's Top 100 in June 2014, but this has been surpassed by my article, "Self-Driving Trucks Are Going to Hit Us Like a Human-Driven Truck," which was republished across multiple media outlets and has likely altogether garnered over 1 million views so far. When not writing articles concerning basic income, I am further researching the idea, and reading and writing comments as a moderator of the basic income community on Reddit - (/r/BasicIncome), where I've helped grow the community from the less than 2,000 subscribers it had when I joined, to over 29,000 today. I do what I can there to help make it a central place for discussion and learning in hopes of gradually gaining momentum for the social movement it will require to eventually be realized. I also run multiple social media accounts in support of basic income: @BasicIncome, Basic Income on Facebook, @rBasicIncome, rBasicIncome on Facebook, and help with the social media outreach of the Basic Income Earth Network (BIEN) and the U.S. Basic Income Guarantee Network (USBIG). One of my larger projects in 2014 was helping to organize a week-long series of Q&As on Reddit (there known as AMAs) for International Basic Income Week with prominent proponents of basic income from all over the world.
Since joining Patreon, I have also started my own blog focused on answering frequently asked basic income questions, and my own Facebook page to better spread basic income awareness, and am now a contributor to The Huffington Post and the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies (IEET). I have also become part of a new group of activists who have decided to together begin organizing a movement for basic income in the US. (If you wish to be a part of this group, contact me, or head on over to basicincomeaction.org to volunteer to help.)
I am frequently writing down ideas for articles I want to write, and have an always growing number waiting anxiously to be written. If you choose to pledge your support, you will be helping free the required time necessary to craft and publish them. The more I'm able to earn through pledges for each piece, the more pieces I will be able to write, and the more active I will be able to become in the political organizing on the ground this new movement will require.
If you would like to read a selection of BIG pieces of I have written so far, here are a few:
Some additional BIG projects of mine I've done:
Some of my campaigns for basic income:
Some of my media appearances about basic income:
I would also like to work on more videos (like this one) and images (like this one) aside from articles, to help create media with the potential to go viral and reach a much larger audience, as well as begin to write a book about basic income.
Every patron dollar pledged will help towards my goal of $1,111 per month ($1,000 after Patreon's average 10% total fees). If I can reach that goal, I will have attained the level of basic income I personally believe we can and should start at here in the US as a poverty floor just above the poverty line (based on 2015 Federal Poverty Guidelines defining the poverty line for an individual without kids as $11,770), and at that point will be walking miles in the shoes of those whose feet I hope to similarly relieve. Through effectively attaining my own basic income through my writing and advocacy, I will be free to begin more fully engaging in the grassroots organizing required to better help achieve it for everyone.
"The BIG Patreon Creator Pledge"
Taking a page from the Creative Commons concept of Share Alike, any and every patron dollar pledged above $1,111 per month I will consider to be greater than a basic income and will pledge away to other Creators here on Patreon also creating content in support of their own basic incomes by making the same pledge to limit their own final goals to $1,111/mo (plus $333/mo per kid for Creator parents) and pledging to give the rest to others making the same pledge. My goal here is to create a community of content creators all working toward their own basic incomes with the same shared goal of achieving basic incomes for others.
Others who have taken The BIG Patreon Creator Pledge:
Contact me to take the BIG Pledge and have a link to your Patreon page added here.
Until recently, my most popular article I've written about basic income was "Why Should We Support the Idea of an Unconditional Basic Income?" It made Medium's Top 100 in June 2014, but this has been surpassed by my article, "Self-Driving Trucks Are Going to Hit Us Like a Human-Driven Truck," which was republished across multiple media outlets and has likely altogether garnered over 1 million views so far. When not writing articles concerning basic income, I am further researching the idea, and reading and writing comments as a moderator of the basic income community on Reddit - (/r/BasicIncome), where I've helped grow the community from the less than 2,000 subscribers it had when I joined, to over 29,000 today. I do what I can there to help make it a central place for discussion and learning in hopes of gradually gaining momentum for the social movement it will require to eventually be realized. I also run multiple social media accounts in support of basic income: @BasicIncome, Basic Income on Facebook, @rBasicIncome, rBasicIncome on Facebook, and help with the social media outreach of the Basic Income Earth Network (BIEN) and the U.S. Basic Income Guarantee Network (USBIG). One of my larger projects in 2014 was helping to organize a week-long series of Q&As on Reddit (there known as AMAs) for International Basic Income Week with prominent proponents of basic income from all over the world.
Since joining Patreon, I have also started my own blog focused on answering frequently asked basic income questions, and my own Facebook page to better spread basic income awareness, and am now a contributor to The Huffington Post and the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies (IEET). I have also become part of a new group of activists who have decided to together begin organizing a movement for basic income in the US. (If you wish to be a part of this group, contact me, or head on over to basicincomeaction.org to volunteer to help.)
I am frequently writing down ideas for articles I want to write, and have an always growing number waiting anxiously to be written. If you choose to pledge your support, you will be helping free the required time necessary to craft and publish them. The more I'm able to earn through pledges for each piece, the more pieces I will be able to write, and the more active I will be able to become in the political organizing on the ground this new movement will require.
If you would like to read a selection of BIG pieces of I have written so far, here are a few:
- Why Should We Support the Idea of an Unconditional Basic Income?
- Universal Basic Income as the Social Vaccine of the 21st Century
- Wouldn't Unconditional Basic Income Just Cause Massive Inflation?
- (Read even more in the Basic Income Collection on Medium and on my blog)
Some additional BIG projects of mine I've done:
- Traveled to NYC to take part in and report on the 2015 North American Basic Income Guarantee Congress
- Transcribed this entire Alan Watts video involving basic income into text (also available on Pastebin and Scribd)
- Created this visualization using Census data and my own calculations to show the per quintile effects of a basic income flat tax
- Compiled this list of 40 books about or involving a basic income guarantee
Some of my campaigns for basic income:
- The Big Ideas Project (83rd most voted idea of almost 2,000 progressive ideas to be presented to progressive lawmakers)
- The Basic Income for All Twibbon campaign (easily add the hashtag #BASICINCOME to your Twitter and FB profile photos)
- The 2014 and 2015 successful Thunderclaps for basic income awareness on Basic Income Day
Some of my media appearances about basic income:
- Redacted Tonight with Lee Camp on RT America
- KNPR's State of Nevada
- The Takeaway with John Hockenberry on WNYC
- (Full list of appearances now available here)
I would also like to work on more videos (like this one) and images (like this one) aside from articles, to help create media with the potential to go viral and reach a much larger audience, as well as begin to write a book about basic income.
Every patron dollar pledged will help towards my goal of $1,111 per month ($1,000 after Patreon's average 10% total fees). If I can reach that goal, I will have attained the level of basic income I personally believe we can and should start at here in the US as a poverty floor just above the poverty line (based on 2015 Federal Poverty Guidelines defining the poverty line for an individual without kids as $11,770), and at that point will be walking miles in the shoes of those whose feet I hope to similarly relieve. Through effectively attaining my own basic income through my writing and advocacy, I will be free to begin more fully engaging in the grassroots organizing required to better help achieve it for everyone.
"The BIG Patreon Creator Pledge"
Taking a page from the Creative Commons concept of Share Alike, any and every patron dollar pledged above $1,111 per month I will consider to be greater than a basic income and will pledge away to other Creators here on Patreon also creating content in support of their own basic incomes by making the same pledge to limit their own final goals to $1,111/mo (plus $333/mo per kid for Creator parents) and pledging to give the rest to others making the same pledge. My goal here is to create a community of content creators all working toward their own basic incomes with the same shared goal of achieving basic incomes for others.
Others who have taken The BIG Patreon Creator Pledge:
- Anya Ehrim - creator of stories and art
- Jamie Klinger - creator of a sustainable global economic platform
- John Light - creator of the P2P Connects Us podcast
- Matt Orfalea - creator of YouTube videos (including this one about basic income)
- Johan Nygren - creator of basicincome.co
- Mark Witham - creator of Basic Income Project
- Miss Bridget Walsh - creator of music and the platform for artists known as INDHE
- J Andrew World - creator of visual activism
- Lemmo Pew - creator of comics and games
Contact me to take the BIG Pledge and have a link to your Patreon page added here.
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