While John Clarke makes some superficially good points, his response to Leah Gazan confirms Elaine Powers' point about the opponents of basic income reifying the commodification of labour and basically not concerning themselves that much with how those who don't work for a living get by other than calling for work for all, which is a debatable goal. I say "superficially good points" because his essential argument is that the basic income will be set at a low level that accommodates the conception of basic income of Elon Musk rather than Leah Gazan or Elaine Powers. But how is that different from current social policies like "employment insurance" which currently is largely set at a poverty level for most folks and only a fraction of the unemployed end up being eligible to obtain--far fewer than in the pre-neo-liberal period? Clarke argues correctly that workers need to fight to get EI rates higher and eligibility improved. But how is that different from fighting to have a decent level basic income except that they would be fighting for a larger group than those who can be reliably counted upon to be able to take jobs and keep them? Maybe the term "basic income" is the wrong one. Perhaps we should be talking about an "end poverty grant" in which everyone has their income topped up to above-poverty levels for their type of household with their special needs incorporated. That should then be paid for from corporate income tax, a hike of the capital gains tax to match income tax rates, and a special tax on the wealthy. Anyway, I fail to see anything in either of John Clarke's two pieces in Canadian Dimension that makes much of a case for there being something wrong with basic income being tacked onto the social programs that currently include EI along with medicare, CPP etc. A basic income could replace disability payments and social allowances (the latter are always much lower and seem to assume that recipients are not "disabled" in workforce terms when, in reality, the largest portion of them are single moms unable to work, Indigenous people who face employment discrimination, etc.) along with the non-insurance seniors' programs. And can anybody guarantee that they won't prove to be lower than the current program payouts, which is what the Elon Musks and Pierre Poilievre would demand? No, but I think that the coalitions that could be built to defend that "end poverty grant" or whatever would be larger than the coalition involved for current programs where smaller sections of the population have something at stake.