I'd like to start with a simple question: Why do the poor make so many poor decisions? I know it's a harsh question, but take a look at the data. The poor borrow more, save less, smoke more, exercise less, drink more and eat less healthfully. Why?
Saya mulai dengan pertanyaan sederhana: Mengapa orang miskin membuat banyak keputusan buruk? Pertanyaan ini terdengar kasar, tapi lihat data yang ada. Hutang mereka banyak, tabungan sedikit, perokok berat, jarang berolahraga, mabuk-mabukan, dan makan makanan tak sehat. Kenapa?
Well, the standard explanation was once summed up by the British Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher. And she called poverty "a personality defect."
Penjelasan umumnya pernah disimpulkan oleh Perdana Menteri Inggris, Margaret Thatcher Beliau menjuluki kemiskinan sebagai "cacat kepribadian."
(Laughter)
(Tertawa)
A lack of character, basically.
Dengan kata lain, kurangnya karakter.
Now, I'm sure not many of you would be so blunt. But the idea that there's something wrong with the poor themselves is not restricted to Mrs. Thatcher. Some of you may believe that the poor should be held responsible for their own mistakes. And others may argue that we should help them to make better decisions. But the underlying assumption is the same: there's something wrong with them. If we could just change them, if we could just teach them how to live their lives, if they would only listen. And to be honest, this was what I thought for a long time. It was only a few years ago that I discovered that everything I thought I knew about poverty was wrong.
Saya yakin kalian tak berpikir sedangkal itu. Tapi pendapat bahwa ada yang salah dengan orang miskin bukan hanya pendapat Ibu Thatcher. Sebagian berpendapat orang miskin harus bertanggung jawab atas kesalahan mereka sendiri. Sebagian lagi merasa harus membantu orang miskin dalam pengambilan keputusan. Tapi asumsi dasarnya sama: ada yang salah dengan mereka. Seandainya kita bisa mengubah mereka, bisa mengajarkan bagaimana menjalani hidup, andai saja mereka mau mendengar. Sejujurnya, itu yang selama ini ada di pikiran saya. Beberapa tahun yang lalu saya sadar, semua yang saya kira saya tahu tentang kemiskinan ternyata salah.
It all started when I accidentally stumbled upon a paper by a few American psychologists. They had traveled 8,000 miles, all the way to India, for a fascinating study. And it was an experiment with sugarcane farmers. You should know that these farmers collect about 60 percent of their annual income all at once, right after the harvest. This means that they're relatively poor one part of the year and rich the other. The researchers asked them to do an IQ test before and after the harvest. What they subsequently discovered completely blew my mind. The farmers scored much worse on the test before the harvest. The effects of living in poverty, it turns out, correspond to losing 14 points of IQ. Now, to give you an idea, that's comparable to losing a night's sleep or the effects of alcoholism.
Semuanya berawal saat saya tak sengaja membaca tulisan dari beberapa psikolog Amerika. Mereka berkelana sejauh 13.000 km ke India, demi sebuah penelitian unik. Mereka bereksperimen dengan para petani tebu. Para petani ini mengumpulkan sekitar 60 persen sekaligus dari penghasilan tahunan mereka, tepat setelah hari panen. Akibatnya, mereka miskin selama kurun waktu tertentu, dan kaya di lain waktu. Para peneliti meminta mereka mengambil tes IQ sebelum dan setelah panen. Apa yang kemudian mereka temukan benar-benar mengejutkan saya. Nilai tes mereka jauh lebih buruk sebelum panen. Ternyata, hidup dalam kemiskinan mengakibatkan IQ mereka menurun 14 poin. Sebagai gambaran, itu sama dengan tidak tidur semalaman, atau efek alkoholisme.
A few months later, I heard that Eldar Shafir, a professor at Princeton University and one of the authors of this study, was coming over to Holland, where I live. So we met up in Amsterdam to talk about his revolutionary new theory of poverty. And I can sum it up in just two words: scarcity mentality. It turns out that people behave differently when they perceive a thing to be scarce. And what that thing is doesn't much matter -- whether it's not enough time, money or food.
Beberapa bulan kemudian, Eldar Shafir, profesor di Universitas Princeton dan salah satu penulis penelitian ini, mengunjungi Belanda, tempat tinggal saya. Kami bertemu di Amsterdam untuk membahas teori kemiskinannya yang baru dan revolusioner. Saya bisa rangkumkan hanya dengan dua kata: Mentalitas kelangkaan. Ternyata, sikap manusia berbeda jika mereka merasa sesuatu itu langka. Tak penting sesuatu itu apa -- baik itu waktu, uang, maupun makanan.
You all know this feeling, when you've got too much to do, or when you've put off breaking for lunch and your blood sugar takes a dive. This narrows your focus to your immediate lack -- to the sandwich you've got to have now, the meeting that's starting in five minutes or the bills that have to be paid tomorrow. So the long-term perspective goes out the window. You could compare it to a new computer that's running 10 heavy programs at once. It gets slower and slower, making errors. Eventually, it freezes -- not because it's a bad computer, but because it has too much to do at once. The poor have the same problem. They're not making dumb decisions because they are dumb, but because they're living in a context in which anyone would make dumb decisions.
Kalian tahu perasaan ini, saat pekerjaan Anda menumpuk, atau saat Anda menunda makan siang lalu gula darah Anda menurun. Fokus Anda teralihkan ke hal-hal berjangka pendek -- roti yang harus Anda makan sekarang, rapat yang akan segera dimulai, atau tagihan yang harus dibayar besok. Sehingga perspektif jangka panjang menjadi terbengkalai. Coba Anda bandingkan dengan komputer baru yang menjalankan 10 program berat sekaligus. Komputer itu akan melambat dan bermasalah, dan pada akhirnya berhenti bekerja -- bukan karena komputer itu jelek, tapi karena banyaknya tugas yang dikerjakan sekaligus. Orang miskin punya masalah yang sama. Mereka membuat keputusan bodoh bukan karena mereka bodoh, tapi dengan situasi hidup yang demikian, siapa pun akan membuat keputusan bodoh.
So suddenly I understood why so many of our anti-poverty programs don't work. Investments in education, for example, are often completely ineffective. Poverty is not a lack of knowledge. A recent analysis of 201 studies on the effectiveness of money-management training came to the conclusion that it has almost no effect at all. Now, don't get me wrong -- this is not to say the poor don't learn anything -- they can come out wiser for sure. But it's not enough. Or as Professor Shafir told me, "It's like teaching someone to swim and then throwing them in a stormy sea."
Tiba-tiba saya menjadi paham kenapa program anti-kemiskinan tak berjalan. Investasi di bidang pendidikan seringkali tak efektif. Kemiskinan bukan karena kurang pengetahuan. Analisis terkini dari 201 penelitian tentang keampuhan pelatihan mengatur uang menyimpulkan bahwa pelatihan itu kurang berhasil. Jangan salah tangkap -- bukan berarti orang miskin tak belajar apa pun -- mereka tentu menjadi lebih bijak. Tapi itu saja tak cukup. Profesor Shafir pernah berkata, "Itu sama seperti mengajari seseorang berenang kemudian melemparnya ke laut berbadai."
I still remember sitting there, perplexed. And it struck me that we could have figured this all out decades ago. I mean, these psychologists didn't need any complicated brain scans; they only had to measure the farmer's IQ, and IQ tests were invented more than 100 years ago. Actually, I realized I had read about the psychology of poverty before. George Orwell, one of the greatest writers who ever lived, experienced poverty firsthand in the 1920s. "The essence of poverty," he wrote back then, is that it "annihilates the future." And he marveled at, quote, "How people take it for granted they have the right to preach at you and pray over you as soon as your income falls below a certain level."
Saya pun duduk, merasa heran. Kemudian saya sadar bahwa masalah ini bisa saja diselesaikan sejak dulu. Para psikolog itu tak perlu melakukan penelitian otak yang rumit; mereka hanya perlu mengukur IQ para petani, dan tes IQ diciptakan lebih dari 100 tahun yang lalu. Sebenarnya, saya pernah membaca tentang psikologi kemiskinan. George Orwell, salah satu penulis terhebat sepanjang masa, mengalami sendiri kemiskinan pada tahun 1920-an. "Inti dari kemiskinan," tulisnya dulu, adalah bahwa ia "membinasakan masa depan." Dan dia takjub, tanda kutip, "Bagaimana orang-orang merasa mereka berhak berceramah dan mendoakanmu segera setelah pendapatanmu jatuh ke angka tertentu."
Now, those words are every bit as resonant today. The big question is, of course: What can be done? Modern economists have a few solutions up their sleeves. We could help the poor with their paperwork or send them a text message to remind them to pay their bills. This type of solution is hugely popular with modern politicians, mostly because, well, they cost next to nothing. These solutions are, I think, a symbol of this era in which we so often treat the symptoms, but ignore the underlying cause.
Ucapan itu sangat benar di zaman sekarang. Pertanyaan besarnya: Apa yang bisa dilakukan? Ahli ekonomi modern punya beberapa solusi. Kita bisa bantu orang miskin mengisi dokumen atau mengingatkan lewat SMS agar membayar iuran mereka. Solusi sejenis itu sangat populer di kalangan politikus modern, alasan utamanya karena, mereka tak butuh banyak biaya. Solusi tersebut menyimbolkan zaman sekarang yang seringkali kita mengobati gejala, namun mengabaikan masalah pokoknya.
So I wonder: Why don't we just change the context in which the poor live? Or, going back to our computer analogy: Why keep tinkering around with the software when we can easily solve the problem by installing some extra memory instead? At that point, Professor Shafir responded with a blank look. And after a few seconds, he said, "Oh, I get it. You mean you want to just hand out more money to the poor to eradicate poverty. Uh, sure, that'd be great. But I'm afraid that brand of left-wing politics you've got in Amsterdam -- it doesn't exist in the States."
Saya pun berpikir: Mengapa kita tak mengubah konteks kehidupan orang miskin? Kembali lagi ke analogi komputer: Mengapa mengutak-atik perangkat lunaknya sementara masalahnya bisa dipecahkan dengan memasang memori tambahan? Saat itu, Profesor Shafir merespons dengan tatapan kosong. Katanya beberapa detik kemudian, "Aku mengerti. Kau ingin membagikan lebih banyak uang kepada orang miskin untuk membasmi kemiskinan. Ide yang bagus, tentu saja. Sayangnya, politik sayap kiri semacam itu, yang ada di Amsterdam -- tidak ada di Amerika Serikat."
But is this really an old-fashioned, leftist idea? I remembered reading about an old plan -- something that has been proposed by some of history's leading thinkers. The philosopher Thomas More first hinted at it in his book, "Utopia," more than 500 years ago. And its proponents have spanned the spectrum from the left to the right, from the civil rights campaigner, Martin Luther King, to the economist Milton Friedman. And it's an incredibly simple idea: basic income guarantee.
Tapi apakah ini benar-benar ide sayap kiri yang kuno? Saya pernah membaca wacana kuno -- yang diusulkan oleh beberapa filsuf sejarah terkemuka. Filsuf Thomas Moore pertama kali menulis di bukunya, "Utopia," lebih dari 500 tahun yang lalu. Gagasan ini didukung pihak sayap kiri hingga kanan, mulai dari aktivis hak sipil, Martin Luther King, hingga ahli ekonomi MIlton Friedman. Gagasan ini sangat sederhana: jaminan pendapatan dasar.
What it is? Well, that's easy. It's a monthly grant, enough to pay for your basic needs: food, shelter, education. It's completely unconditional, so no one's going to tell you what you have to do for it, and no one's going to tell you what you have to do with it. The basic income is not a favor, but a right. There's absolutely no stigma attached. So as I learned about the true nature of poverty, I couldn't stop wondering: Is this the idea we've all been waiting for? Could it really be that simple? And in the three years that followed, I read everything I could find about basic income. I researched the dozens of experiments that have been conducted all over the globe, and it didn't take long before I stumbled upon a story of a town that had done it -- had actually eradicated poverty. But then ... nearly everyone forgot about it.
Apa itu? Mudah saja. Tunjangan bulanan, cukup untuk membayar kebutuhan pokok: makanan, rumah, pendidikan. Tunjangan ini tak bersyarat, tak peduli apa pun pekerjaan Anda, dan tak peduli Anda mau habiskan untuk apa. Pendapatan dasar bukan bantuan, tetapi hak. Tak ada stigma yang menempel. Saat saya mempelajari ciri-ciri kemiskinan yang sejati, Saya terus berpikir: Apakah ini gagasan yang kita semua nantikan? Mungkinkah ini sesederhana itu? Dalam tiga tahun berikutnya, saya membaca dengan giat mengenai pendapatan dasar. Saya meneliti puluhan eksperimen yang diadakan di seluruh penjuru dunia, dan tak lama, saya membaca kisah sebuah kota yang berhasil membasmi kemiskinan. Tetapi... hampir semua orang melupakannya.
This story starts in Dauphin, Canada. In 1974, everybody in this small town was guaranteed a basic income, ensuring that no one fell below the poverty line. At the start of the experiment, an army of researchers descended on the town. For four years, all went well. But then a new government was voted into power, and the new Canadian cabinet saw little point to the expensive experiment. So when it became clear there was no money left to analyze the results, the researchers decided to pack their files away in some 2,000 boxes. Twenty-five years went by, and then Evelyn Forget, a Canadian professor, found the records. For three years, she subjected the data to all manner of statistical analysis, and no matter what she tried, the results were the same every time: the experiment had been a resounding success.
Kisah ini dimulai di Dauphin, Kanada. Tahun 1974, semua orang di kota kecil ini diberi jaminan pendapatan dasar, sehingga tak ada yang jatuh ke dalam garis kemiskinan. Di awal eksperimen tersebut, sekelompok peneliti menetap di kota itu. Selama empat tahun, semua baik-baik saja. Tetapi, sesudah pemerintah baru berkuasa, kabinet Kanada yang baru merasa eksperimen mahal itu tak bermanfaat. Akibat tak cukup uang untuk menganalisis hasilnya, para peneliti tersebut mengemas berkas mereka ke dalam 2.000 kotak. 25 tahun kemudian, Evelyn Forget, seorang profesor Kanada, menemukan berkas itu. Selama 3 tahun, ia menganalisis data itu dengan berbagai statistik, dan tak peduli bagaimana caranya, hasilnya selalu sama setiap saat: eksperimen itu merupakan suatu kesuksesan yang besar.
Evelyn Forget discovered that the people in Dauphin had not only become richer but also smarter and healthier. The school performance of kids improved substantially. The hospitalization rate decreased by as much as 8.5 percent. Domestic violence incidents were down, as were mental health complaints. And people didn't quit their jobs. The only ones who worked a little less were new mothers and students -- who stayed in school longer. Similar results have since been found in countless other experiments around the globe, from the US to India.
Evelyn Forget menemukan bahwa penduduk Dauphin menjadi lebih kaya, lebih cerdas, dan lebih sehat. Prestasi anak-anak di sekolah meningkat tajam. Pasien rumah sakit menurun hingga 8,5 persen. Kekerasan rumah tangga berkurang, demikian juga masalah kesehatan jiwa. Orang-orang tak berhenti dari pekerjaan. Satu-satunya yang bekerja lebih jarang adalah ibu baru dan para murid -- mereka bersekolah lebih tinggi. Hasil yang sama juga ditemukan di berbagai eksperimen di seluruh penjuru dunia, dari AS hingga India.
So ... here's what I've learned. When it comes to poverty, we, the rich, should stop pretending we know best. We should stop sending shoes and teddy bears to the poor, to people we have never met. And we should get rid of the vast industry of paternalistic bureaucrats when we could simply hand over their salaries to the poor they're supposed to help.
Jadi ... inilah yang saya pelajari. Berbicara tentang kemiskinan, kita, orang kaya, harus berhenti berpura-pura bahwa kita tahu yang terbaik. Berhentilah mengirim sepatu dan boneka untuk orang miskin, yang bahkan tak kalian kenal. Kita harus memberantas para birokrat yang "peduli", yang mana seharusnya gaji mereka disalurkan bagi orang miskin yang butuh bantuan.
(Applause)
(Tepuk tangan)
Because, I mean, the great thing about money is that people can use it to buy things they need instead of things that self-appointed experts think they need. Just imagine how many brilliant scientists and entrepreneurs and writers, like George Orwell, are now withering away in scarcity. Imagine how much energy and talent we would unleash if we got rid of poverty once and for all. I believe that a basic income would work like venture capital for the people. And we can't afford not to do it, because poverty is hugely expensive. Just look at the cost of child poverty in the US, for example. It's estimated at 500 billion dollars each year, in terms of higher health care spending, higher dropout rates, and more crime. Now, this is an incredible waste of human potential.
Hal yang hebat dari uang adalah kita bisa menggunakannya untuk beli barang bukannya kebutuhan yang ditentukan para ahli gadungan. Begitu banyak ilmuwan, wirausahawan, dan penulis yang brilian, seperti George Orwell, kini semakin langka. Bayangkan energi dan bakat yang bisa kita lahirkan jika kita menghapus kemiskinan untuk selama-lamanya. Saya percaya pendapatan dasar berfungsi layaknya modal ventura. Dan kita harus menjalankannya, karena kemiskinan sangatlah mahal. Contohnya, lihat biaya kemiskinan untuk anak-anak di US. Sekitar 500 milyar dolar dihabiskan tiap tahunnya, untuk biaya kesehatan, angka putus sekolah yang lebih tinggi, dan kriminalitas yang tinggi. Potensi manusia menjadi sia-sia.
But let's talk about the elephant in the room. How could we ever afford a basic income guarantee? Well, it's actually a lot cheaper than you may think. What they did in Dauphin is finance it with a negative income tax. This means that your income is topped up as soon as you fall below the poverty line. And in that scenario, according to our economists' best estimates, for a net cost of 175 billion -- a quarter of US military spending, one percent of GDP -- you could lift all impoverished Americans above the poverty line. You could actually eradicate poverty. Now, that should be our goal.
Mari membahas masalah pokoknya saja. Bagaimana kita bisa membiayai jaminan pendapatan dasar? Sebenarnya ini jauh lebih murah dari yang Anda pikirkan. Di Dauphin, mereka membiayainya dengan pajak pendapatan negatif. Pendapatan Anda akan ditambah begitu Anda berada di bawah garis kemiskinan. Dalam skenario tersebut, menurut perkiraan para ahli ekonomi, dengan biaya bersih sebesar 175 milyar -- seperempat dari pengeluaran militer AS, satu persen dari PDB -- Anda bisa membebaskan semua rakyat -- Amerika dari garis kemiskinan. Anda bisa membasmi kemiskinan. Ini harus menjadi tujuan kita.
(Applause)
(Tepuk tangan)
The time for small thoughts and little nudges is past. I really believe that the time has come for radical new ideas, and basic income is so much more than just another policy. It is also a complete rethink of what work actually is. And in that sense, it will not only free the poor, but also the rest of us.
Bukan waktunya lagi memikirkan ide-ide kecil. Saya sangat yakin ide baru yang radikal telah tiba, dan pendapatan dasar jauh lebih dari sekadar kebijakan. Ini sekaligus memikirkan ulang fungsi pekerjaan. Dalam pengertian tersebut, tak hanya orang miskin saja, kita semua juga terbebas.
Nowadays, millions of people feel that their jobs have little meaning or significance. A recent poll among 230,000 employees in 142 countries found that only 13 percent of workers actually like their job. And another poll found that as much as 37 percent of British workers have a job that they think doesn't even need to exist. It's like Brad Pitt says in "Fight Club," "Too often we're working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don't need."
Dewasa ini, jutaan orang merasa pekerjaan mereka tak begitu berarti atau berguna. Berdasarkan survei terkini terhadap 230.000 karyawan di 142 negara, hanya 13 persen pekerja suka pekerjaan mereka. Survei lain menemukan bahwa sebanyak 37 persen pekerja di Inggris punya pekerjaan yang menurut mereka tak perlu ada. Seperti kata Brad Pitt di "Fight Club," "Kita melakukan pekerjaan yang kita benci demi membeli hal-hal tak berguna."
(Laughter)
(Tertawa)
Now, don't get me wrong -- I'm not talking about the teachers and the garbagemen and the care workers here. If they stopped working, we'd be in trouble. I'm talking about all those well-paid professionals with excellent résumés who earn their money doing ... strategic transactor peer-to-peer meetings while brainstorming the value add-on of disruptive co-creation in the network society.
Jangan salah tangkap -- Saya bukan membahas para guru, tukang sampah dan perawat di sini. Jika mereka berhenti bekerja, kita akan mendapat masalah. Saya membahas para ahli bergaji dan berprestasi tinggi yang mendapat uang dengan mengadakan rapat strategis antara berbagai pihak sementara berpikir apa gunanya mempertemukan mereka di komunitas jejaring.
(Laughter)
(Tertawa)
(Applause)
(Tepuk tangan)
Or something like that. Just imagine again how much talent we're wasting, simply because we tell our kids they'll have to "earn a living." Or think of what a math whiz working at Facebook lamented a few years ago: "The best minds of my generation are thinking about how to make people click ads."
Kira-kira seperti itu. Bayangkan seberapa besar bakat yang kita sia-siakan, hanya karena kita menasihati anak-anak kita agar "bekerja demi hidup." Kata seorang ahli matematika yang bekerja di Facebook: "Orang-orang terpintar di generasiku memikirkan cara-cara agar orang mengeklik iklan."
I'm a historian. And if history teaches us anything, it is that things could be different. There is nothing inevitable about the way we structured our society and economy right now. Ideas can and do change the world. And I think that especially in the past few years, it has become abundantly clear that we cannot stick to the status quo -- that we need new ideas.
Saya adalah ahli sejarah. Sejarah mengajarkan kita bahwa segalanya bisa saja berbeda. Tak ada yang tak mungkin bagaimana kita menyusun masyarakat dan ekonomi kita saat ini. Gagasan mampu mengubah dunia. Saya berbendapat bahwa beberapa tahun belakangan ini, sudah sangat jelas bahwa kita tak bisa mengandalkan status quo -- kita butuh gagasan baru.
I know that many of you may feel pessimistic about a future of rising inequality, xenophobia and climate change. But it's not enough to know what we're against. We also need to be for something. Martin Luther King didn't say, "I have a nightmare."
Saya tahu banyak dari Anda mungkin merasa pesimis akan ketidaksetaraan yang semakin bertumbuh, xenofobia, dan perubahan iklim. Tapi, menentang saja tak cukup. Kita harus mendukung sesuatu. Martin Luther tak berkata, "Saya punya mimpi buruk."
(Laughter)
(Tertawa)
He had a dream.
Beliau punya impian.
(Applause)
(Tepuk tangan)
So ... here's my dream: I believe in a future where the value of your work is not determined by the size of your paycheck, but by the amount of happiness you spread and the amount of meaning you give. I believe in a future where the point of education is not to prepare you for another useless job but for a life well-lived. I believe in a future where an existence without poverty is not a privilege but a right we all deserve. So here we are. Here we are. We've got the research, we've got the evidence and we've got the means.
Jadi ... inilah impian saya: Saya percaya masa depan; pada masa nilai pekerjaan Anda tak ditentukan oleh seberapa besar gaji Anda, namun oleh kebahagiaan yang Anda sebarkan dan nilai-nilai yang Anda berikan. Saya percaya masa depan dengan pendidikan bukan untuk menyiapkan diri untuk pekerjaan tak berguna tapi demi kehidupan yang baik. Saya percaya masa depan dengan hidup tanpa kemiskinan bukan merupakan hak istimewa, tetapi hak yang kita semua patut terima. Jadi inilah kita. Inilah kita. Kita punya penelitiannya, buktinya, beserta sarananya.
Now, more than 500 years after Thomas More first wrote about a basic income, and 100 years after George Orwell discovered the true nature of poverty, we all need to change our worldview, because poverty is not a lack of character. Poverty is a lack of cash.
Sudah 500 tahun lebih sejak Thomas Moore menulis tentang pendapatan dasar, dan 100 tahun sejak George Orwell menulis ciri-ciri kemiskinan yang sejati. kita semua harus mengubah pandangan dunia kita, karena kurangnya karakter tak menyebabkan kemiskinan. Kemiskinan adalah kekurangan uang.
Thank you.
Terima kasih.
(Applause)
(Tepuk tangan)