1 Scope and economic impact. Faced with the drop in the real salary of the population and poverty that is becoming more and more structural, a new actor promoted by members of the executive power itself is put on the table: the Universal Basic Salary (SBU). A measure that would aim to reach almost 8 million people in the country through a non-contributory monetary benefit that is equivalent to a basic food basket per adult (which marks the indigence line) and that in May was $14,400. This would mean approximately 1.8% of GDP, although according to the project’s creators, by cutting other programs and leaving only this one, the fiscal cost would be reduced by practically 1 point. What do we know about the Universal Wage?

2 Definition. Salary? Universal? First of all, the project is misnamed. Salary is considered a remuneration in exchange for a job. Nor is it universal, because although the UBI (Universal Basic Income) has been debated and continues to do so in the world, this is not. If it is, it should not be limited to 8 million people, but rather all 47 million Argentines should receive it. Perhaps what this project plans to refer to, although less marketer is the Guaranteed Basic Income (IBG). Made the clarification, let’s see what happens. It should be noted that we are not pioneers in asking ourselves whether it would make sense to establish a Universal Basic Income for the entire population, which encompasses the following characteristics: it is periodic (granted monthly), it is individual (it is not measured in household income), it is via monetary transfers (not in goods or vouchers), be universal (for the entire adult population) and have no conditions (there is no requirement to receive it). Countries that have implemented the above in the world: 0. All the applications that are known today are variants of the original IBU, but they derived in specific schemes.

3- Discussion. The debate on the provision of a universal income has a double origin. First, in developed countries, the changing nature of work requires that social protection systems evolve with it. While automation, globalization, and employment diversification have driven efficiency and productivity gains, living standards have not always risen accordingly and, in some cases, have been stagnant. For their part, in low-income countries, where jobs have not changed so dramatically, they face different challenges. These include widespread poverty and informality, added to limited government capacities and revenues, which prevent a large part of the population from accessing higher productivity activities.

4. Financing. There are various complications surrounding the implementation of this guaranteed income. The first is that it goes against conditional transfers, that is, the social assistance modality that the world has chosen as the most appropriate and that refers to the fact that the person must perform some task (as, for example, happens with the AUH from vaccination or school attendance) because it allows to improve people’s health conditions and keep them active in daily life. In addition, there is the issue of financing. Trying to finance a basic income with the issuance of currency without support or demand, such as the peso, will generate inflationary pressure that can be even more counterproductive. In fact, in the countries where the attempt was made, such as Mongolia or the Republic of Iran, they were undone due to the high costs involved. Inflation is a tax, and it is the most regressive.

5 And now what happens?. Settled the discussion that what is being analyzed is not a salary and that it is not universal either, but rather a transfer to the most vulnerable sectors of society, it makes sense to go towards an unconditional scheme, in which when asking for some compensation, the person to be active and take care of themselves and their family. It is not necessary to generate a new division within society, but try to include as much as possible.