RON DERBY: Instead of swelling social grants, why not a basic income for all?
The US should be some sort of utopian society, judging by its most important economic statistic, unemployment. Under its 45th president, Donald Trump, and not because of him, the world's biggest economy has its lowest jobless rate in almost 20 years. Growth is on a record run, stock markets are in record territory and the dollar is strengthening. Yet we know by its politics and its scary shift to right-wing extremism that economic insecurity grips that nation. Holding down a job is no longer the security blanket it once was as the gig economy and the accompanying pack of T-shirt-wearing aficionados from Silicon Valley cause cold sweats - and the automation that comes with it, seizures. While machinery hasn't replaced the US worker entirely, there's no doubting it has helped suppressed wages. That's a snapshot of an American story, which is the best economic story offered on the global stage. It is in the sweetest spot, which was further evidenced by this week's quarterly GD...
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