Insidemma Blog

The proportion of women in top jobs in large public companies has increased slightly. The organization “Women in the Supervisory Boards” (FidAR) determined this in a study.

A scientific experiment on unconditional basic income is starting in Germany. How does the project differ from previous ones – and what insights can it bring?

The concept of an unconditional basic income is hotly debated. Proponents praise it as a humane alternative to Hartz IV that makes us all freer and happier. Critics see it as an invaluable social utopia for idlers. An attempt is now being made in Germany to put the discussion between these two ideological poles on an objective basis.

The non-profit association “Mein Grundeinkommen” is starting a pilot project together with the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW) and scientists from the Max Planck Institute and the University of Cologne, which aims to investigate the specific effects of such a basic income. It is not the first basic income experiment – but a special one. Because it is the first long-term scientific study of this kind for Germany . How the field test works and what findings it can bring:

How is the experiment set up?

Starting in spring 2021, 120 participants should receive a monthly basic income of 1200 euros – regardless of what else they earn or own. The money is paid out for three years. At the same time, a control group of 1,380 people is formed who do not receive the money, but who are examined in the same way as those receiving basic income. In this way it can be determined which changes are really due to the basic income.

The test participants of both groups will be selected from all persons who apply to participate on the project website . In order to keep the sample as representative as possible, the researchers hope to have one million applicants by November. The project is financed by donations.

What exactly is being investigated?

Participants in the study are regularly interviewed to find out how the basic income is changing their lives. It’s about the professional situation, but also questions of general satisfaction and health aspects. For example: do people work more, less or differently? To what extent do existential fears, stress and the risk of burnout decrease? What do people do with the additional financial security and what does it do with them? Some participants even want to evaluate hair samples.

How does the project differ from other basic income experiments?

The idea of ​​an unconditional basic income has been and is being tried out in various countries. In a long-term experiment in Kenya, for example, thousands of people have been receiving a basic income equivalent to 20 euros a month for several years. However, the findings are often difficult to transfer. “Previous global experiments are largely useless for the current debate in Germany,” says DIW researcher Jürgen Schupp who was involved in the study .

The closest thing to us was another highly regarded experiment in Finland . The Finnish government paid an unconditional basic income of 560 euros per month for two years. The 2000 participants were all unemployed, however, as the Finns were primarily interested in the effects of the labor market. As these were not satisfactory, the project was discontinued. Participants from as many social classes as possible should now take part in the German experiment.

The topic is not entirely new in this country either. The Berlin association Mein Grundeinkommen, which has now initiated the pilot project, has been raffling off donation-financed basic incomes of 1,000 euros per month for a year for several years. ( Here winners report on their experiences. ) However, this experiment is not scientifically accompanied, so that no reliable statements can be made.

What findings can be expected?

In the Finnish experiment, the labor market effects were small, but the researchers found a number of other positive effects. The recipients of the basic income were “more satisfied with their lives and suffered less from psychological stress,  depression , sadness and loneliness,” as the final report states. They also had more confidence in their fellow human beings and social institutions.

Many winners of the Mein Grundeinkommen lottery in Germany also report increased life satisfaction due to the additional security. In a non-representative survey of these winners, a majority said they were more courageous and curious. Most of them felt less pressure to perform, but more drive.

In the upcoming experiment, DIW researcher Schupp expects that some “who work solely for the money” will actually give up their jobs, he told the “Spiegel” . But he also knows from social science surveys that many would not turn their lives upside down if they received an unexpected cash gift of 10,000 euros. “Around half answered that they would not change anything and would not touch the money at all, but would put it in their reserves. I would not be surprised if a similarly high proportion of our basic income recipients would keep it that way.”

You can find a McDonald’s shop almost anywhere in the world today. But the fast food revolution, about which the new season of the podcast “Battle of the Businesses” tells, began very modestly in 1948 in San Bernardino, California. There the brothers Richard and Maurice McDonald, known as Dick and Mac, had developed a new concept for their diner, which had been in existence for several years, and which was soon to revolutionize the restaurant world.

They had saved the car controls that were common at American diners at the time, reduced the menu to the bestselling burgers, fries and milkshakes and developed a sophisticated system of division of labor in the kitchen – the “Speedee System”. The result: a 15-cent burger like on an assembly line and a flourishing business.

The success of the McDonald brothers caused a sensation in the American gastronomy scene. Nevertheless, under her leadership, McDonald’s would never have become the top-selling fast food company on the planet. The brothers were innovators who had perfected their own store, but attempts to have other stores operated by franchisees using the same system were only moderately successful.

Franchising and aggressive expansion

Until they met Ray Kroc, a milkshake mixer salesman, in 1954 and gave him responsibility for the franchise business. The ambitious businessman (impressively portrayed by Michael Keaton in the Hollywood film “The Founder”) set the course for nationwide expansion – with sometimes aggressive methods, as the McDonald brothers themselves later had to experience painfully. In 1961, Kroc bought McDonald’s from the founders for $ 2.7 million and was henceforth sole ruler of the brand. The McDonald brothers had to rename their pioneer shop San Bernardino and eventually shut down. Kroc had opened a McDonald’s next door to dig them up.

The success of the revolutionary fast food franchise business drew more avid businessmen. As early as 1954, around the same time Krocs started working at McDonald’s, David Edgerton, who had originally wanted to open a Dairy Queen ice cream shop, opened his first burger shop in Miami, Florida. The concept of the store called “Insta Burger King ” at the time was based on a new type of quick grill that grilled the burgers over an open flame. With his business partner James McLamore, Edgerton soon built up the biggest competitor of the McDonald’s empire, also in franchise style: the Burger King Corporation.

The new season of the podcast “Battle of the Enterprises”, the first episode of which was released on August 25th on Audio Now  , Apple Podcasts  and Google , tells of the rise and struggle of these two fast food giants  . In the past few seasons, the German adaptation of the successful US podcast “Business Wars” has already been dedicated to the battle between Nike and Adidas, Coca-Cola and Pepsi, as well as Facebook and Snapchat.

Entertaining guests in closed rooms is a tricky task in times of Corona. The Burger King designers , who have been working on a new branch concept for the fast food chain over the past few months, must have had this in mind. In any case, the plans that the group presented this week fit well into a world with Covid-19.

The “restaurants of the future”, as the Burgerbrater calls the stores in a promo video, require 60 percent less space than a normal Burger King branch – and they are designed so that many customers no longer have to enter the store at all.

The customer can stay outside

This is ensured, among other things, by additional drive-through options; the designs provide for two or even three parallel car lanes. The space for additional lanes is made free by moving the kitchen and seating to the first floor, while cars can drive along below .

You also no longer have to enter the shop if you order in advance using the Burger King app and then pick up your food bag at a pick-up point on the outside wall. The compartment wall shown in the visualization is reminiscent of a DHL Packstation with visible windows. There is also the option of informing employees via the app that you have pulled up to the parking lot and would like to have your order brought to your car. In some parking spaces covered with solar panels, you can also stop to eat your fast food in your own four walls.

Those who absolutely want to get out of their car to eat are offered outdoor seats as an alternative to eating in a restaurant . So it is fitting that the first new Burger King restaurants are to open in 2021 in sun-drenched Miami, in Latin America and in the Caribbean.

The new designs take up trends that many restaurants and fast food chains are already practicing. Ordering and picking up food in the USA – just like here – is particularly popular in the wake of the pandemic. However, the managers of the big chains assume that the trend will persist even after the end of the pandemic, because it is largely related to the possibility of convenient mobile ordering. This is why other large US chains such as Taco Bell would also adapt their concepts accordingly, analyzes the business magazine Forbes.