Guy Standing is professor of economic security at the University of Bath, before which he was director of the ILO's Social Security Programme. He is also the founder and co-president of the Basic Income Earth Network (BIEN), a coalition of economists, philosophers and thinkers that argues for a basic, universal, unconditional cash transfer for all citizens. He is in India to advise SEWA and spoke to Rukmini Shrinivasan You have become a strong advocate of cash transfers. Why so?
From my point of view, cash transfers are an essential pillar of a comprehensive social protection system. Social insurance was for an industrial society; it's not for the Indian open economy of the 21st century. You can't have unemployment insurance - it doesn't reach the poor. You can't have a means-tested system because we've seen the problems with it. So, you're going to need to have some basic income transfer.