I want to be on record here. Today, December 17, 2016, I predict that this will fail. And by "fail", I mean that this will not become a universal entitlement in Finland.
Of course this "test" will fail, they're giving it to a group of people who already have a specific state of employment.
It won't be seen as a safety net to follow their ambition because of its temporary, non-universal nature. It might make sense for them to hoard the cash until the test is over or spend it lavishly as a temporary reprieve from poverty.
I hope this won't create material to make a case against basic income in future.
While I'm not particularly optimistic, I could imagine it succeeding by temporarily eliminating poverty traps and providing stability for the beneficiaries, allowing them to gain experience or pursue training and end up in a much better position in two years time.
That it won't become a universal entitlement as it is - that's pretty easy to predict. Question is whether Finland (and the rest of us) could learn from this experiment and make our current system better using the knowledge we gain from it, or not. "Failing" would be an appropriate term only if this would have zero effect on what we have today.
