Ireland has already provided substantial benefits to artists — income from art is exempt from income tax up to a certain level. Society has not disintegrated. Speculation and anecdotes are not terribly useful but my Irish author friend is not from a rich family, nor is she well-off, but she’s able to support her husband and child in a smaller Irish city by dint of writing several books a year and stressing a lot. I don’t think it would be possible without the tax exemption.
> I don’t think it would be possible without the tax exemption.
Maybe it shouldn't be possible. Society is telling your friend that her work is not particularly valuable and that she should probably consider doing something else.
Indeed! e:g - looking after elderly and/or disabled people, to give their family carers respite. Which is a minimum wage job seen by many as "drain on the taxpayer", ignoring that apart from being worth providing for its own sake, it can enable the family carers to be also economic contributors and pay tax themselves.
I think we as a society strive to make gp correct that money is representative of value, and rightfully so.
Anyone partaking in any activity that has value to others should be given money. That is literally what this basic income/tax break for artists is for. Someone thought producing art had value and pure capitalism wasn't correctly matching that value with monetary rewards.
There are lots of rich churches and church leaders out there. That's because they serve a human need, and those humans are willing to direct some of their finite resources towards that provider. (I'm talking about the collections plate if you didn't catch that.)
Now obviously money on its own is not value. It should represent value that you delivered to someone else in the past, and is helpful for getting whatever value your life needs. You mentioned philosophy --- that yoga retreat in the Andes isn't free, is it?
Now sometimes we muddy the waters, for example we permit lotteries where the winner takes home a good deal of money without providing any value to anyone. That debases money, and I think it has no part in society, but I'm unfortunately swimming against the tide on that one.
Of course they do. I'm not saying it's the only way to measure value as individuals. But as a society, lots of things do boil down to money, as that's the medium of exchange. Society was the context of this thread, not individual.
Not quite. Money is how we describe instrumental value, and occasionally allocation priority. Personal attachment and moral worth are also terms often used interchangeably with "value," though in my opinion that should stop and we should all simply never use the word "value" again because so many meanings have collapsed into it.
What I would suggest you do is, find a loving partner to start a family with, then do everything you can for 20 years to focus primarily on earning, or otherwise acquiring, money.
Then get divorced and discover your children don’t know who you are, and neither do you. And your wife took the dog too.
It’s an almost guaranteed way to eradicate this wildly stupid idea you have.
A lot of those relevant writings became relevant because of the horrible experiences the author went through forged them into an interesting writer. If we're assuming that we only know retrospectively whether the writing is important then the best course of action would be for people to write as a hobby and make choices that are likely (rather than unlikely) to lead to a comfortable life. Particularly in this current era where we might suspect that writing and publishing a book is getting much easier thanks to technology.
Are you arguing that most good writers from history were poor? This is after all the only "horrible experience" a subsidy would alleviate. I don't think that's actually supported by evidence, most great writers I can think of were relatively extremely sheltered (although they often were sensitive to the horrible experiences of others)
I think the argument is a) most writers have to do a lot of writing to achieve writing consumable/appreciated but sufficient to be considered successful, b) most great writers had to go through some shit in life to incorporate that in their writing to make it interesting in order to be successful.
> A lot of those relevant writings became relevant because of the horrible experiences the author went through forged them into an interesting writer.
Sometimes artists suffer, but it's mostly a legend at this point. Plenty of great artists have perfectly fine lives. Look at like, any modern fantasy or sci fi author.
You’re missing, somewhat gleefully, most of the history of western art, which you could imagine as split between patronage-based art (have you heard of the Sistine Chapel, for instance?) and vernacular art - where things like genre storytelling and family portraits come from.
Broadly speaking, vernacular artists work for a fucking living; it’s rare there (like in most pursuits) to get super rich. We can’t all be David Baldacci or Danielle Steele.
NB: Thanks to Neal Stephenson for the best essay on this. He calls genre artists “Beowulf” artists.
Am noob. The phrase "folk art" never satisfied me. Is it really all that different? But I didn't have the gumption to learn more. Happily, the critics and philosophers did:
I don't think that being able to support a family of three in Ireland is particularly a sign that society doesn't value your work. If she had to pay income tax, perhaps she'd only be able to support herself -- but if you think everyone in Ireland who only makes enough money to support themselves is doing not particularly valuable work, I think it's worth considering the implications of that.
I have thoughts on how we're defining value as well, but others have covered those.
Ireland has not disintegrated, but it's society is under incredible pressure and is fewer missed meals away from a cultural revolution sized event than most places.
Obviously not because of this income scheme and not complete disintegration, but Irish society is under extreme strain from housing pressures, rising living costs, and growing polarisation that is tearing at social cohesion.
It's frustrating to see funds allocated to this scheme when health, housing, transport, etc are all failing apart.
All true, but let's not lose track of relative costs.
The income program provides €33,800,000 a year (2000 participants, €325 a week, 52 weeks in a year). Double that to account for cost of managing the program -- that seems too high to me, but I want to err on the side of caution for this analysis.
Some percentage of that money flows right back into the economy, of course.
Meanwhile, ignoring windfall corporate taxes, Ireland ran a €7.4 billion deficit in 2025. So the cost of the program, ignoring the money flowing back into the economy, is under half a percentage point of the budget? Those small amounts do add up, but I can't see this as relevant competition to the cost of shoring up health, housing, and transport. I don't have good estimates of how much those costs are, which is why I'm using the deficit as a relevant proxy, but still -- we ought to avoid the trap of seeing numbers which are large to you and me and forgetting that other numbers are larger by orders of magnitude. (There's a term for this which slips my mind.)
Meanwhile, what's going to be the social effect of working stiffs living paycheck to paycheck seeing the government giving preference yet again to someone other than them?
The allocation this year is €18m and it goes live in Q4. On a steady-state basis we are likely in the €60–70m range annually. That's not a rounding error.
This is an eight-figure recurring commitment. It represents the total lifetime income tax contribution of well over 100 ordinary Irish workers per year. That's not an abstract, it's decades of PAYE from real people.
Public finance is about marginal allocation. Many high-impact projects sit in or below this band:
* St Christopher’s Hospice rebuild in Cavan – €13.5 MM
* Cork Educate Together Secondary School in Douglas – €45 MM
* NAS Ambulance Centre in New Ross – €0.5 MM
* CAMHS national annual opex budget – €180 MM
So these aren't symbolic sums. They're the difference between capacity and waiting lists.
“Money flows back into the economy” applies equally to nurses, SNAs, paramedics, construction workers, carers, etc. Recirculation is a property of all domestic public spending. It is not a defence of any specific programme.
Comparing this to the national deficit is also wrong. Almost every discrete programme looks small beside a multi-billion euro figure (whether it's the structural deficit or the €29 BN DSP budget). That does not mean it should escape scrutiny. Budget decisions are made at the margin. €60 MM for artist basic income competes with all these other €5-100m line items, not with the entire deficit.
Exponent blindness is real, but it is not relevant here. The question is:
Is this the highest-value use of €60-70 MM per year in a system with delayed scoliosis surgeries, SNA shortages, and overstretched mental health services?
Thanks for the more detailed analysis — you clearly have better visibility into specifics than I do as an outsider. I sincerely appreciate the follow up and I agree that the economics should be examined.
I still think there’s value to encouraging the arts that isn’t purely financial, but I don’t think there’s an easy way to answer yes to your last question.
That 33 million could have built, let’s say, 66 houses and housed, let’s say, 264 people (66 families of four) for a generation before needing much in the way of maintenance.
But no, fuck the working poor, let’s fund artists.
Sorry, but what exactly makes you say that artists aren't working poor?
I don't want to put words in your mouth, but it sounds a bit like you've got a pre-existing opinion of the value of artists vs. however you're defining working poor.
> But no, fuck the working poor, let’s fund artists.
What if they built those 66 houses? Is the complaint then, "what about the other working poor, why didn't they get houses"? Is there ever a point where it's like, ok to help some people given that some is more than none? Or is this all zero sum bullshit where if we can't help everyone we should help no one and just give Google back it's tax dollars?
> It also recouped more than the trial's net cost of 72 million euros ($86 million) through increases in arts-related expenditure, productivity gains and reduced reliance on other social welfare payments, according to a government-commissioned cost-benefit analysis.
I'd love to see the breakdown on this, because in my experience with Government comms, if it was a straightforward economic win like an FDI or industrial announcement, they'd headline the figure. Unquantified phrases like "reduced reliance on other social welfare payments" are usually spin at best.
I understand your point, but in response to GP (they should spend this money on houses for other poor people instead), the reduced reliance on other social welfare is totally legitimate to count.
I agree, but another commenter linked the cost-benefit analysis and it really is creative accounting to get to a positive net social return.
The net fiscal cost after accounting for increase tax revenue and social protection savings was €72 MM.
This was then offset to get to a positive net social gain by €80 MM in "wellbeing gains", as measured by a single survey question called the WELLBY test:
> “Overall, how satisfied are you with your life nowadays, where 0 is "not at all satisfied" and 10 is "completely satisfied"?
The €80 MM in "wellbeing gains", which is the sole decider of whether this pilot was a net positive or a huge net negative to society, is because on average, the 2,000 pilot scheme participants had a very approximate 0.7–1.1 increase in score when asked the above question during the pilot as compared to before the pilot. Each 1 point was deemed to be worth €15,340.
Classic false dilemma. You're trying to frame my comment as “we can only ever fix one problem” when it is, in fact, “we have constrained resources and urgent systemic failures and so prioritisation is important”.
For example, Budget 2026 did not address the €307 million structural shortfall in university funding. Is basic income for artists a better allocation than third-level education? Or capital expenditure on cancer care? Or NAS opex?
I specifically disagree with this allocation of funds as we live in country filled with specific solvable structural and life-limiting problems that should be solved before artist wellbeing.
Ultimately that comes out of their pockets. Every tax benefit my neighbor gets simply shifts the tax burden more to me. Unless I am someone who doesn't pay taxes I guess. Do you pay taxes?
I pay alot of taxes. Probably more annually in the last decade than I made in total my first decade working.
Many of my peers spend alot of time agonizing about this stuff and spending both mental energy and significant capital in avoidance. I get a higher ROI focusing on more valuable activities. Besides, art is an economic engine. If you studied it, I’d guess those tax credits in Ireland generate multiples in domestic economic activity.
Agreed it is a waste to spend too much time worrying.
It seems dubious to claim that the tax break is a net positive for the country's economy. If art were so economically viable I suspect it would pay for itself and not need government incentives. I have no problem with the government paying a muralist to beautify some public space, but this is not that. This is subsidizing art that already has some economic value to someone, just not very much.
I feel like what is actually happening is subsidizing the buying of art, as the artist themselves can afford to charge a lower price due to the tax break. So you are encouraging the population to buy more art. And I guess that has some hypothetical returns in terms of life satisfaction and civility...? I think if they framed it this way, as a tax benefit available to anyone instead of exclusively to a select few, it might be more well received. I think of the mortgage interest tax break in the USA (which is actually almost completely negated at this point by the growing standard deduction) in the same way. It encourages people to settle down, maintain a job, and buy into society, so it helps build social stability and reduces violence.
This was an indigenous people treaty case, and when mothballed says "certain public elections" they mean "a single election for a position in Hawaii which was established in negotiations with indigenous Hawaiians in the 1970s. Not, however, a treaty obligation.
I don't know that I agree with RGB here, but I don't find that to be a racist opinion.
I love it. A video depicting both white and black people as non-human primates is more racist than literally using the might of the state to try and block excluded races from voting for a public office.
This is part of the reason why the nominally anti-racist zealots are losing the battle. We want to live in a world where it's actually considered racist to exclude races in a public election, rather than one where it's not racist to exclude races from a public election but somehow more racist to post a multi-racial video depicting whites and others as non-human animals.
Would you say a 25 year old opinion by a single dead Supreme Court justice is more damaging to your supposed platform than voter ID laws, gerrymandering, and the attack on vote by mail?
No, it just is the most direct obvious example I can find of high level assistance in violating the 15th amendment since the year 2000. I have no doubt all of your examples have also been used to effectuate the same thing, they just have a little more plausible deniability to the point it's harder to point out in black and white.
I was not asked to contemplate every example of racism.
The ID bit is particularly amusing to look at. In my state you need an ID to vote but not to conceal carry a gun. In Illinois it's the exact opposite, with a lot of handwaving why you need an ID to prove you are a 'person' but not a 'citizen'. Obviously the states and government are totally inconsistent on the issue of ID to exercise rights.
Mail voting might be more prejudicial to the poor with irregular addresses, since their only option is to vote in person whereas those better off with regular mail access can vote via mail or in person.
Overall I would take a stab that both mail voting and ID requirements yield a net slight prejudice against some minorities. Gerrymandering is just dog-shit all around.
RBG didn't want to take the time and stop and think about her career and have discourse with us here. She wanted to work to the end so that Trump could replace her with someone less racist. It was her final, but most valuable act.
Safe to assume your characterization of RBG as racist is based purely on one instance of balancing colorblind values and the rights of indigenous people?
Clearly if Barrett is "less racist" that isn't a value Trump actually sought.
"indigenous people" do not have the right to block other races from voting for a public office. The fact that they're polyneysians that slaughtered other polynesians isn't a magic trump card to shit on the ethnic filipinos, chinese, and others that were enslaved and subjected under the "Kingdom of Hawaii" which by the estimation of BryantD were part of the subjected people at that time the "treaty" was meant to protect (no matter that the case itself, ruled that these "treaty" protections carveouts were applicable to Indians and that Hawaiians are not that, thus the racist tried to angle on the legally vague 'indigenous' instead.)
RBG was not balancing the rights of 'indigenous' but rather "balancing" and supporting the racism of ethnic Hawaiians against all the other exploited minorities on the island that were subject in the Kingdom that the US overthrew. Only in the simplified view that it was just Hawaiians and the colonizers does the 'balancing' nonsense even look remotely to be the case, and that is in the most charitable possible interpretation.
The fact you may have contradicted yourself later by arguing it is a "case" but not a "matter" doesn't disprove that. It's just a cheap way to cover both bases by using vague enough overlapping terminology that you can claim it's a "case" when you want or a "matter" when you want so you can retroactively create a catch-22 where you win if it's heads and I lose if it's tails.
How do you manage to have conversations with people in your day to day life with so much assuming negative intent? Some people treat these little linguistic excursions as ways to achieve common understanding, rather than as a sporting event with winners and losers, you know.
What you can do if you're uncertain -- and my language was sloppy, good point! -- is say "hey, I'm not sure what you meant here; can you clarify?" And I say "yeah, I was unclear. I meant that the question was related to treaty status but after digging in, it's not required by treaty for that elected position to only be occupied by someone of a specific heritage. Thank you for pointing that out."
(I might not have said thank you, to be honest, and of course you're welcome to assume I'm just covering up because you called me on the phrasing.)
>>>what a great example of the tired old trick of attempting to use social justice language as a rhetorical lever.
>... assuming negative intent?
You're not fooling anyone. You kicked off saying I was lying obviously and used tired tricks and rhetorical levers, then surprise pikachud when I received negative intent and following that called out your contradiction.
Don't pretend to be the victim here and that bit about me being a liar was just helpful clarification with positive intent. You know what you're doing, then blaming me for what you're doing.
Well it's good you acknowledge she wasn't coming from a place of hatred but rather choosing between two terrible options. The president's video, on the other hand, is unambiguously hateful and ethnocentric.
It's a proof of an address, akin to soviet-style "propiska", which was very important and hard to get without (it also affected ownership/inheritance).
What's more fun is that even though they accept different types of residence, they mostly trust utility bills -- but to set up utilities on your name even for your personal home utility company will ask a lot of documents, including credit score checks.
I personally felt that it's utility companies who do the heavy proof checking, not DMVs.
I think the comparison to the propiska system is incorrect. This Soviet system heavily controlled internal migration and was what ultimately dictated where someone was permitted to live. You couldn't relocate without one, and having this permission was tied to all sorts of local services. This system anchored people to where they were, and usually barred them from moving unless they had a good reason to.
The US currently has freedom of movement. You don't need the government's permission to live somewhere or to move somewhere else. An ID with your address listed isn't propiska. At best, you could compare it to the 'internal passport' that the USSR and most post-Soviet countries had, which acted as a comprehensive identity document and was the ancestor to modern national ID cards that are used in many countries.
Except that it appears one of the primary reasons this has become a thing is that the Feds are angry at states like Washington that don't verify citizenship when issuing driver's licenses. The whole point was that Washington (as an example) wanted to make sure people were able to get an identification and driving with a license (IE: some degree of documentation, had achieved some degree of driver's education and testing somewhere along the line...) regardless of their immigration status - and that pissed off the Feds. So it shouldn't be related to citizenship but that's part of how we got here.
It's hardly proof of address. At best, I'd say it's proof of state residency.
I've moved several times since getting my Colorado driver's license (a REAL ID). Technically, you are supposed to submit a change-of-address form to the DMV online within 30 days of moving. They don't send you a new card when you do that; the official procedure is to stick a piece of paper with your new address written on it to your existing ID yourself, and then just wait until your next renewal to actually get a card with the new address on it. The change of address form does not require utility bills or any other proof of the new address-- that's only required when you initially get the driver's license.
I certainly got a new plastic ID card within 2 weeks after filing the change-of-address form on DMV website, with a new address on it. They sent it to the new address. But mine was not RealID compliant (nor before nor after).
Real ID/Drivers License being a proof of address is laughable. In my state (NY) they accept the following as proof of address for getting a new Real ID:
- Bank statement
- Pay stub
- Utility bill
- Any other state ID with the same last name, which I can claim is my parent or spouse.
I can change my mailing address on any of them with a few clicks online, no actual verification needed.
It should be noted, and I don't understand why people aren't angry about this: Account numbers unredacted on the statements. The numbers are redacted the documentation gets rejected.
You don't have to read this comment, I'm just throwing down a marker for myself.
I think this is a good policy direction. I don't like the rhetoric and I understand that this as much a political decision as anything else, but I'm glad to see it regardless. A year from now if someone says "you reflexively oppose anything Trump's administration does," I'll have this to look back on.
They are not. Many people are doing this; I don't think there's enough data to say "most," but there's at least anecdotal discussions of people buying Mac minis for the purpose. I know someone who's running it on a spare Mac mini (but it has Internet access and some credentials, so...).
The blogger who wrote the linked post is a white supremacist who explicitly supports eugenics. His stock in trade is pseudoscience. This particular post is an attempt to get people thinking he’s clever before they get to the racist bits — look at the cool dental things we learned! It is not surprising that he was shoddy here; he’s always shoddy.
This is somewhat blunt but like a lot of these schmucks, he relies on people being polite. I see no reason to play along.
As far as I know there is no link between, say, talk.bizarre and weird Twitter, but it's a sign that the same basic impulses are universal. I'm sure that in 1776, a few dedicated oddballs were creating snarky weird in-jokes on broadsides that nobody read except them.
If you're a cinema person, I strongly recommend Agnes Varda's documentary on LA street art at the end of the 1970s, Mur Murs. (That's a pun: murals as an expression of the murmurs of the community.) It takes graffiti as an expression of ownership as the central thesis and I found it really lovely. Thanks for this comment.
https://www.citizensinformation.ie/en/money-and-tax/tax/inco...
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