scottsantens.com

Start with “A Guide to Basic Income: Frequently Asked Questions about UBI” on scottsantens.com. It is the site's dedicated FAQ guide, written for readers who are new to the idea of an unconditional universal basic income guarantee. The guide collects the questions Scott Santens has been asked most often over the years and links each one to a fuller article, so it works as both a quick orientation and an index into deeper reading.

What the guide covers and how it is organized

The FAQ is built around recurring reader questions rather than a single linear essay. According to the site, Santens has been researching and advocating for UBI since 2013, and the guide reflects that accumulated Q&A history: common questions are answered directly and then pointed to separate articles for detail.

That structure suits two kinds of beginners:

• Readers who want a definition first can read the FAQ entries on what UBI is and how it differs from existing welfare programs.
• Readers who already have a specific objection (cost, work incentives, inflation) can jump to the matching question and follow its link.

The guide is listed under Featured Posts and is dated 26 April 2016, so treat it as a stable starting point rather than a news feed. For newer material, the site's Recent Posts section carries more current essays.

A suggested reading path for new readers

1. Read the FAQ guide first. Use it to settle the core definition: an unconditional, universal cash payment with no work requirement or behavioral conditions.
2. Follow one or two linked articles on the questions you care about most. The FAQ is designed as a hub, so following links is the intended next step, not optional extra reading.
3. Check Recent Posts for current arguments. Recent entries apply the UBI case to present-day debates, such as a 4-day workweek, Medicare for All, and an automation tax, and a piece contrasting conservative critiques of UBI with later proposals that resemble them.
4. Use the evidence threads on Bluesky or X, which Santens recommends alongside the FAQ for readers new to UBI.

What else on the site helps a beginner

The site also identifies Santens as founder and CEO of the Income To Support All (ITSA) Foundation and a board member of the Gerald Huff Fund for Humanity, which helps you judge the perspective the guide is written from: advocacy for unconditional cash rather than a neutral survey of competing proposals.

Practical notes before you start

• Some posts are marked “Paid Members Public.” Both the FAQ guide and several recent posts carry this label, so full access may depend on membership. The site does not state pricing on the pages reviewed, so check the post or membership page directly rather than assuming the content is free.
• Expect an advocacy voice. The FAQ answers questions in support of UBI. If you want the strongest counterarguments too, read the posts on conservative critiques and pilot programs, which engage opposing designs directly.
• The email signup on the site delivers new posts; it is optional and not required to read the FAQ.

If your goal is simply to understand what UBI means before deciding whether to read further, the FAQ guide is the right single stop. If your goal is to evaluate whether UBI is a good idea, read the FAQ for definitions, then move to the Recent Posts and the book for the funding and design arguments.

Most article listings on scottsantens.com carry a "Paid Members Public" label, so you should expect some posts to sit behind a membership tier rather than being fully open. The site also offers a free email subscription: you enter your address, submit, and then click the confirmation link sent to your inbox to complete sign-up. The site does not publish membership prices or state that everything is free, so treat access level as something to check per post.

What the site is

scottsantens.com is the blog of Scott Santens, an author and unconditional universal basic income (UBI) specialist who says he has researched and advocated for UBI since 2013. The site describes him as founder and CEO of the Income To Support All (ITSA) Foundation, host of The Basic Income Show, a board member of the Gerald Huff Fund for Humanity, and author of Let There Be Money. He also notes a Substack, Foreword to Civilization.

Reading articles: what the labels tell you

The homepage's Featured Posts and Recent Posts sections show entries such as:

The practical reading: the label appears on the listing itself, so scan it before clicking. If a post is marked for paid members, expect a paywall or restricted view; if you only need the gist, the excerpt shown on the listing page often summarizes the argument. For a beginner, the UBI FAQ post is the natural starting point, and Santens points new readers to that FAQ plus his evidence threads on Bluesky and X.

Subscribing by email

The subscription form on the page works in three steps:

1. Enter your email address in the subscribe field.
2. Submit the form.
3. Open the confirmation email and click the link.

The page's own messages cover the outcomes: "Please check your inbox and click the link to confirm your subscription," "Please enter a valid email address," and "An error occurred, please try again later." If nothing arrives, check spam and re-submit; the confirmation step is required, so an unconfirmed address will not be subscribed.

Supporting the work

Santens states that he has lived with a basic income floor via Patreon since 2015, which let him focus on popularizing UBI full-time. Patreon is therefore the route he describes for ongoing financial support; the site does not list amounts or tiers, so check the Patreon page itself for current options. He also asks readers to share his work and notes the book is available on Amazon or as a free listen on podcast platforms.

A sensible order of operations

• New to UBI: start with the FAQ post, then the evidence threads he links.
• Want updates: complete the email confirmation, and follow him on Bluesky or X.
• Want deeper or member content: check whether a post's "Paid Members" label applies, and look at Patreon for support options.
• Want the full argument on funding: his book Let There Be Money covers UBI and how to pay for it.

Scott Santens treats funding as a design question rather than an objection, and he has set out his answer in two main places: his book Let There Be Money, described on the site as being about UBI and how to pay for it, and his blog posts, including a recent piece arguing that a "Pigovian automation tax" could finance a 4-day, 32-hour workweek and universal healthcare. These are the author's own proposals and arguments, not enacted policy or costed legislation, so they should be read as a framework for debate rather than a fiscal plan you can check line by line.

What the site actually offers on funding

The homepage identifies Santens as an author and unconditional UBI specialist who has researched and advocated the idea since 2013. It points new readers to two starting points: the UBI FAQ and his evidence threads on Bluesky and X. The funding discussion is spread across those materials rather than collected in one calculator-style page.

The automation-tax argument in outline

The recent post starts from an economics paper about companies caught in an "automation arms race"—firms automating because competitors are, rather than because it clearly pays. Santens uses that framing to argue the productivity gains from AI can be redirected: tax the automation, and use the revenue for a shorter working week and universal healthcare.

The logic to evaluate is the "Pigovian" label itself. A Pigovian tax is meant to price a cost that the market otherwise ignores. So the proposal rests on a claim that automation imposes a social cost not captured in firms' decisions—displacement, concentration of gains, or the arms-race dynamic above. If you accept that premise, the tax has a rationale beyond raising money. If you don't, the same tax looks like a levy on investment, and the funding case weakens. That is the hinge to test when reading the full post.

How to use the site to judge the proposals

1. Start with the UBI FAQ, which the site recommends for newcomers and which addresses the questions asked most often, funding included.
2. Read the automation-tax post in full for the mechanism, then check whether it supplies a rate, a base, and a revenue estimate. The excerpt does not, so the article itself is where to look.
3. For the book-length treatment, Let There Be Money is available on Amazon or as a free listen on podcast platforms, according to the site.
4. Cross-check claims against the evidence threads Santens maintains on Bluesky and X, which the site presents as a starting point for UBI evidence.

A practical test when you reach the numbers: a funding proposal is assessable only when it states what is taxed, at what rate, on what base, and what revenue that yields against a defined benefit level. Where those four elements are absent, treat the argument as a direction of travel rather than a budget.

What to keep in mind

Santens writes as an advocate, and the site says so: he has lived on a basic income floor via Patreon since 2015, founded the Income To Support All (ITSA) Foundation, hosts The Basic Income Show, and sits on the board of the Gerald Huff Fund for Humanity. That background shapes the framing. The value of the site for a funding question is the argument and the linked evidence, not an independent costing—and the automation-tax piece is explicitly a proposal about how AI gains could be converted into shorter hours and healthcare, not a description of what any government has adopted.

Scott Santens publishes his ongoing UBI research and commentary in four main places: the Recent Posts section of scottsantens.com, his evidence threads on Bluesky and X, his Substack Foreword to Civilization, and his show The Basic Income Show. The site is the hub, but the newest material often appears first on social platforms or Substack, so following more than one channel gives the most complete picture.

The site: scottsantens.com

Santens describes himself as having researched and advocated for unconditional universal basic income since 2013. The site is his main archive and the best starting point for context.

• Recent Posts is where new articles appear. Recent examples include a piece on the neuroscience of learned control and AI safety, and one arguing that a "Pigovian automation tax" could turn AI productivity gains into a 4-day, 32-hour workweek with universal healthcare.
• Featured Posts holds foundational material, including "A Guide to Basic Income: Frequently Asked Questions about UBI," first published in April 2016 and described as a continually growing collection of answers.
• A newsletter signup is on the page: you enter an email address and confirm via a link sent to your inbox. This is the simplest way to be notified of new posts without checking the site.

Note that several posts are marked "Paid Members Public," meaning full access to those pieces depends on a membership. The site does not state a price or whether any tier is free, so check the membership page before assuming access.

Social platforms: Bluesky and X

Santens points new readers to his "evidence threads on Bluesky or X" as a place to start. These threads collect research and data supporting UBI and are updated as new studies appear. If your goal is tracking evidence rather than reading essays, these are the most direct channel. You need an account on the relevant platform to follow along comfortably.

Substack: Foreword to Civilization

Santens runs a Substack under this name. Substack typically delivers posts by email and keeps an archive, which makes it a good fit if you want longer-form commentary in your inbox alongside the site newsletter. The source material does not specify a publishing cadence or paywall structure, so subscribe and observe before relying on it as a primary source.

The Basic Income Show

Santens hosts this show, which is suited to listeners who prefer discussion over text. The source does not list platforms or episode frequency; search for the show by name on your usual podcast app.

Choosing a channel

Other work worth knowing

Santens is founder and CEO of the Income To Support All (ITSA) Foundation and serves on the board of the Gerald Huff Fund for Humanity. His book on UBI and how to pay for it, Let There Be Money, is available on Amazon or free on podcast platforms. He has also said he has lived with a basic income floor via Patreon since 2015, which he credits with enabling full-time advocacy.

A practical way to keep up

1. Subscribe to the site newsletter with an email address and confirm the link.
2. Follow Santens on Bluesky or X for evidence threads.
3. Subscribe to Foreword to Civilization on Substack.
4. Check Recent Posts monthly, since some articles sit behind the paid-members label.

If a post you want is marked for paid members, treat the membership page as the place to confirm terms rather than assuming the content is open.

scottsantens.com is the personal blog of Scott Santens, an author and advocate who has researched and promoted unconditional universal basic income (UBI) since 2013. The site is a collection of his writing on UBI rather than a general news site or an organization's official homepage. It is the place to go if you want to read his explanations of how UBI works, answers to common objections, and links to his other projects.

Who is behind the site

Scott Santens describes himself as a full-time UBI advocate. According to the site, his work has been acknowledged by former U.S. presidential candidate Andrew Yang as having helped shape his thinking on the issue. Santens writes that he has lived with a basic income floor through Patreon since 2015, which allowed him to focus on popularizing UBI.

His other roles, as listed on the site, include:

• Founder and CEO of the Income To Support All (ITSA) Foundation
• Host of The Basic Income Show
• Board member of the Gerald Huff Fund for Humanity
• Author of a Substack called Foreword to Civilization
• Author of the book Let There Be Money, about UBI and how to pay for it

The book is available for purchase on Amazon, and the site says it can be listened to for free on podcast platforms.

What you can find on the site

The blog is organized around a growing collection of UBI material. The main entry points are:

Recent posts shown on the site cover a range of adjacent subjects, such as:

• A proposed "Pigovian automation tax" and how it could support a 4-day, 32-hour workweek and universal healthcare
• A critique of "RISE pilot programs" that would attach behavioral requirements and surveillance to payments instead of giving unconditional cash
• A piece on data centers, AI safety, and the neuroscience of learned control

How to use the site

If you are new to UBI, the site itself recommends starting with the UBI FAQ or the evidence threads on Bluesky or X. From there, the Recent Posts section shows what Santens is currently writing about, and the book Let There Be Money is the site's own pointer for a fuller treatment of UBI and its funding.

One practical note: several posts are marked "Paid Members Public," which indicates that access to some content depends on a membership. The site does not state pricing for that membership, so check the subscription options on the page itself if you want to read those posts.

The site also offers an email newsletter. Subscribing requires entering an email address and confirming via a link sent to your inbox.

What the site is not

scottsantens.com is an advocacy and explanation site, not a source of official policy, benefit enrollment, or program administration. If you are looking for information on how to apply for a basic income program or verify eligibility for one, this blog is not the right resource. It is best used to understand the arguments for and against UBI, the evidence supporters cite, and the funding proposals Santens discusses.