[s_dev]

Irish here. It's a cultural thing. Ireland is the only country in the world whose national symbol is a musical instrument.

Art is seen as a worthwhile endeavour even if it can't necessarily support itself as a private endeavour. It's for the same reason galleries and museums are subsidised by the government.

Anyone can call themselves an artist but to receive this money you would have to have a portfolio of work that is approved by the application programme.

Ireland already has a competitive economy. There is more to a country than economics and that includes promoting things like art to foster a sense of identity and promote Ireland on a world stage.

Milton Friedman wouldn't approve and we're okay with that.

[Swizec]

We have a similar scheme in Slovenia. Don't know the details but there's the concept of a "free artist".

At a minimum you need a registered business, regular exhibitions or performances in your field, you have to register with the ministry of culture, and can't have a job. Contract work is allowed and encouraged. Also you are expected to apply when the government issues a Call For Creatives.

I think you get paid minimum wage as long as you continue fulfilling criteria.

[ErroneousBosh]

> Also you are expected to apply when the government issues a Call For Creatives.

I love the idea of having a list of "Registered Artists", where you get a basic income as long as you're prepared to Answer The Call of Your Country when needed.

"We need a nice cartoony figure for this public safety film! Find me some artists!"

"Here you go, boss"

"Naw, not those guys, have you got anything in a more Shel Silverstein-y kind of look? How about those ones?"

[matevzmihalic]

You don't actually get paid, but you don't need to pay taxes and social security fees (around 650€ per month) that you would otherwise have to pay as a self employed person.

[pastage]

Interesting concept, seems like it is a way to pay less taxes as an artist, not really a pay but it will make it easier to live. Not sure about the selection process though..

> Self-employed in culture can be given the right to pay social security contributions from the state budget.

https://e-uprava.gov.si/si/podrocja/izobrazevanje-kultura/za...

[some_random]

Having some kind of government employment scheme and having basic income are two different thing.

[CalRobert]

This seems like it mostly funnels money to rich kids, to be honest. Nobody else can afford to already be an artist.

[maleno]

I'm an Irish artist, living in Ireland. I'm very far from a rich kid. Like most Irish artists, I make some of my living from my "artistic" work, and some from what others here might call "real work". Sometimes there's not a clear division between the two, and anyway the ratio of one to the other changes every year.

Because of the cost of living here, particularly in Dublin, there is no way that the Basic Income would provide me with anything like what most people here would consider a decent standard of living. (It would currently leave me with about €200 left over every month, after I pay just my rent. That's before any bills or groceries or anything.)

Plenty of people find a way to continue to make art that other people value, even if the cost of living continues to spiral ever upwards. This payment is simply a buffer to make making art a little easier, for a fraction of the many people who contribute to the social, cultural, and intellectual life of this country. For some it pays their rent or mortgage, for some it pays for childcare so they have time to work, for some it facilitates research or purchase of materials, for some it allows them a workspace outside their home.

It's not perfect, as no public arts funding is perfect but, to me, the kind of cheap cynicism displayed in this comment comes from a place of deep ignorance and bitterness.

[Retric]

Working artists, spouses, and semi-retirees are relatively common.

‘2,000 creative workers’ would make this quite competitive, even if it’s only 20k USD/year that could easily enable people to be artists who wouldn’t make a career of it on their own.

[watwut]

Poor people and middle class people produce art. They both work as artists or do art on the side as a hobby. It is not that expensive either.

Expectation that you have portfolio does not strikes me as outrageous either.

[pash]

Milton Friedman wouldn’t have approved of a basic-income scheme restricted to artists. He would have argued that restricting the benefit to artists would distort incentives for choosing a profession in a way likely to reduce social welfare, and that eligibility by profession is a “welfare trap”: it’s hard to stop being an artist and start being something else when it means losing your guaranteed income.

But Friedman would have supported a broad basic-income scheme. We know this because he did support one. It was his proposal in 1962 of a “negative income tax” [0] (in Capitalism and Freedom) that gave rise to the movement to replace traditional social welfare programs with simple schemes that just give money to poor people. (This movement led to the Earned Income Tax Credit [1] in the United States.)

Friedman’s negative income tax is equivalent to the contemporary notion of a guaranteed basic income (but not to a universal basic income, as only people earning below some threshold would receive it). Like most economists, Friedman believed that people (even poor people) can typically make their own economic choices better than a government program can make those choices for them. (He was likewise not opposed to redistributive policies per se.) That was the root of his advocacy for market-based mechanisms of organizing the economy.

0. The idea dates to at least the 1940’s, but Friedman’s book is typically credited with popularizing it. See, e.g, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negative_income_tax.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earned_income_tax_credit

[vintermann]

It's not remotely a basic income scheme. It's a state stipend for acclaimed artists. Don't know about Ireland, but Norway has had this for over 100 years (kunstnerlønn). It's basically a court poet institution, ever so slightly broadened.

[p_v_doom]

Friedman is also not someone anyone should be taking seriously in the year of our lord '26

[mike_hearn]

> Ireland already has a competitive economy

Ireland's economic statistics are so badly distorted by US companies routing money there that there is an entire subfield of economics dedicated to trying to figure out what Ireland's real economic state is, called "Leprechaun economics". A common adjustment made by economics researchers when studying the EU is to just subtract Ireland entirely.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leprechaun_economics

https://www.cfr.org/articles/leprechaun-adjusted-euro-area-g...

https://democracychallenged.com/2025/05/14/irelands-phantom-...

> The key to understanding this disconnect is a number few outside Ireland pay attention to: Modified Gross National Income, or GNI*. Unlike GDP, which counts all activity happening within Ireland’s borders, GNI* adjusts for the distortions caused by the huge presence of foreign multinationals. And the gap is enormous. In 2023, GNI* was just €291 billion — meaning more than €219 billion of Ireland’s reported output never truly flowed into the Irish economy at all.

When looking at Ireland's own economy without the influence of US tax transactions, the economy shrinks by nearly half.

[s_dev]

I'm 38, I was fully aware of this when I was 15 years old in Economics class. This is simply a problem for people who go around measuring everything with GDP and demand the world adjust to that. You've run in to the limitations of GDP.

There is no single indicator of wealth, measuring wealth requires a number of measures to provide context and contrast. The Irish economy is largely comparable to the Danish economy. I'd say the Danes sneak in just ahead of us but well behind Norway and Switzerland.

Ireland for example is wealthier than either the UK or France on a per capita basis. The GDP of Alabama and Bavaria, Germany per capita is largely the same, yet you would be insane to think Alabama was in anyway wealthier than Bavaria.

I stand by my comment.

The Irish economy is competitive and your little 'gotcha' that is a common trope across various shallow sub reddits, increasingly at an alarmingly peevish rate simply doesn't persuade me or others who are interested in understanding these things at a deeper level. There is a time and place for that discussion and it really isn't this thread.

[direwolf20]

It's nice that they still get taxes on that money, and use it to support artists.

[haritha-j]

> Ireland already has a competitive economy

Well it has a competitive tax haven.

[probably_wrong]

Po-tay-to, po-tah-to.

[bagacrap]

To need to already have a portfolio of work kind of defeats the purpose, no? It kind of proves you didn't need this money to make art. I would have thought the point was to unlock potential artists who hadn't the time to develop their practice.

[inglor_cz]

Is there a tradition of rich Irish people supporting Irish artists privately?

In other places (like Italy) there is.

[tomcam]

Can you name a government-subsidized Irish artist who has been successfully promoted on the world stage?

I don't give a shit about Milton Friedman. I do give a shit about wage earners in Ireland who are being forced to pay for an artist welfare program. Ireland has a competitive economy.

[tjwebbnorfolk]

Soon: everyone is an artist.