Everyone who would _like_ to be an artist, but can't afford to be one, is disqualified. Meanwhile, the acquaintance of mine who sold his house in London at a large profit and retired to a cottage in Westmeath to live off his gains and noodle around on the guitar a bit is a recipient of funds from this program.

Tellingly there's very little information about how to _become_ an artist with this program.

Edit/addendum: Worth noting they've produced some _very_ dubious numbers to claim this program is a net gain economically. https://www.rte.ie/culture/2025/0923/1534768-basic-income-fo...

""" A key component of the total benefits came from psychological wellbeing, which contributed almost €80 million. In addition, the report estimates that audience engagement with the arts generated €16.9 million in social value, based on public willingness-to-pay for cultural experiences. """

And, as much as I like psychological wellbeing (who doesn't!) - saying that it's worth €80 million when you didn't actually get €80 million doesn't help things when it comes time to pay for the program. I'm unsurprised that giving people money improved their psychological well being.

I'd be more excited to see basic income for Deliveroo riders and people working in chippers.

But as others have said, this has nothing to do with the UBI, as this is not universal. The main thing that makes this fellowship unusual, and not in a good way, is the fact that the selection criteria are shrouded in mystery.

Imagine how easy it would be to start businesses, startups non-profit projects if you had UBI. Bunch of guys come together and everyone knows $1,500 per month each "funding secured forever." Many people people dealing with burnout, mental or physical problems, could ease up and work part time.

I feel like this is not a good rate of return. For example, in the USA, 1 dollar spent on SNAP generates 1.52 dollars of economic benefit: https://www.cbpp.org/blog/snap-food-assistance-is-a-sound-in...

People generally won't prefer the fairest method of selection, but that doesn't mean it's not the best.

Doesn't get much more two-faced than this.

That's ok, you can have this idea for free.

I would love to see a list of the artists with links to their work, some of which, presumable, would be for sale.

Let's say its fine now, and in 5-10 years also. But in a sense, it is a lifetime commitment to a payment that can sustain people's basic living needs with no output from them.

Because if suddenly you cannot afford this, what do you do? You tell people, after assuring them they can live their life free from fear of hunger death, that suddenly they have to fend for themselves.

We kind of have "universal income" for old people in Europe - it's called pensions. And it's a massive ticking time bomb in exactly this way. They are increasingly unaffordable in the aging society, and chances are sooner or later governments will start curtailing these benefits.

That's bad, but what makes it tragic is you first assured people they are safe and can rely on this.

So, overall a neutral-to-good outcome, from a financial point of view. I think we can debate about whether it’s necessary for the government of Ireland to fulfill this funding role, but I’m not sure this is the most wasteful thing that a government can do.

This new initiative has had a lot of critics, but 2,000 spots annually is at least a bit of an improvement over the weird clique that admits 5 new people every 2 years.

(Aosdána is being retained alongside this new programme)

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aosd%C3%A1na

The arguments for UBI are that it effectively requires no bureaucracy and can not be gamed, while providing basic needs for all people. If you are doing needs based analysis, you are just back to a regular social system, which requires bureaucracy and will be gamed.

If some government decides to do UBI, than it actually has to do UBI and not just add another layer of social spending on top of an already sprawling social system.

https://www.gov.ie/en/department-of-culture-communications-a...

Some people hate it some abuse it and some do not qualify despite living in the street. But if you know how to navigate the system the income is guaranteed.

It is a bit sad though that some clerks like to abuse the receivers of such payments though, e.g. by inspecting your bank statements and questioning your expenses (true story). So making this whole thing closer to dejure is welcome as it avoids possible abuse.

NONE of them can make a living solely off their art.

Personally, if I wanted to subsidize someone who could bootstrap their talent and efforts into self-sufficiency, I'd never pick an artist.

Like in Sweden you pay 60-80% taxes as a sole trader - you're better off just trying to find some way to claim a disability benefit or subsidies like this.

Why artists? And how "universal" it is actually?

Just do UBI. Politicians just can’t help hanging conditions on it and making it complicated.

“But some people will sit around and do nothing!” Yes and they already do, including at bullshit jobs pretending to work. The punishment for a life sitting around doing nothing is a life wasted doing nothing.

It would have been so great.

Across the ocean, Peter Thiel recently did a private lecture on the anti-christ and how that is connected to how hard to hide your money and "escape from global taxation if you're a U.S. citizen." He has dual citizenship in New Zealand. And, the following article conjectures that "prophesies about a society where an individual's ability to engage in commerce is contingent upon brandishing the mark of the beast on one's body."

Is this a criticism of swag? I love free t-shirts at tech conferences, is he calling me out for taking them?

https://reason.com/2025/10/14/i-listened-to-over-7-hours-of-...

https://sfstandard.com/2025/09/16/peter-thiel-antichrist-san...

After squinting at it, this Irish action feels like paying off a few court jesters, nothing more.

They all are now involuntary patreons.

1) will never vote against it (and politicians will use it as a weapon against anyone that suggests it). 2) It's ever expanding and will become unaffordable and unsustainable 3) inflation will destroy its value over time

I also believe that if universal income becomes common, you forfeit your right to vote while accepting it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1EKCAE1vDzY

Now that I'm back to my normal office coding job, I feel like I'm actually saving less money because I have rent, and general city life to spend money on. It's all about the comforts one is used to.

The story of artists not having enough money is probably about people that are used to too many comforts. I've seen people complain they didn't have money to go by, whilst living in an apartment close to a densely populated city and having a car... get rid of those comforts if you want to make it!

What an utter, totally disconnected from reality measure.

Tax payers need to go to work everyday to support more and more unproductive members of society and have the state take by force more than half their income.

If I had a choice between some of my tax money supporting artists versus lighting my money on fire to pay an army of bureaucrats doing not much of anything, I'll always choose the artists. I've seen contracts for more money that do a lot less for society.