Nearly two-thirds of Australians say they would support the introduction of a universal basic income (UBI), according to a new poll.

Key points:

58 per cent of Australians support a universal basic income

The COVID lockdowns may have increased sympathy for UBI

A large number of Australians would spend more time with family and friends, and doing physical activities, if they received UBI

The finding comes after millions of Australians were forced to rely on some kind of regular welfare payment this year to survive the COVID recession.

According to Stanford University's Basic Income Lab, at its core, a UBI is a cash payment given to all members of a community on a regular basis (for example every month) regardless of income level and with no strings attached.

More than 3.6 million workers received JobKeeper payments between March and September (totalling nearly $70 billion), and 1.5 million were still receiving the payments after the program was revised in October.

The number of Australians receiving JobSeeker unemployment payments almost doubled this year, jumping from 724,000 in February to 1.46 million in May, and by October that figure had only retraced a little to 1.35 million.

Now, a first-of-its-kind survey has found a sizeable majority of Australians would support the introduction of a universal basic income.

The survey was conducted by the research company YouGov, on behalf of the Green Institute, between October 14 and 18.

The Green Institute is the official think-tank of the Australian Greens. It is the equivalent of the Liberal Party's Menzies Research Institute and Labor's Chifley Institute.

Tim Hollo, the Green Institute's executive director, commissioned YouGov to run the question in one of its recent national surveys.

He said Australians had never been asked the question and he was interested to see the data.

The survey question, put to 1,026 Australians, was:

"Unconditional income support is sometimes called a Guaranteed Living Wage or a Universal Basic Income. This means that just as we can rely on basic health care and education, everyone in a society has a guaranteed minimum amount of money that they can rely on. Would you support or oppose a guaranteed living wage being introduced in Australia?"

The survey revealed:

29 per cent "strongly support" the idea

29 per cent "somewhat support" the idea (net support of 58 per cent)

8 per cent "strongly oppose" the idea

10 per cent "somewhat oppose" the idea (net opposition of 18 per cent)

19 per cent "neither support nor oppose" the idea

6 per cent "don't know"

The YouGov survey also asked another question for the Green Institute.

It said for every job advertised in Australia, there were at least 15 jobseekers (when the survey was taken in October).

https://amp.abc.net.au/article/12970924

Baker. Where art thou. No new bread. Had to post here.

But if Australia main stream media is promoting UNIVERSAL BENEFITS INCOME the freat reset is on its way. And Joe Biden is your president of the USa