Unemployment is bad because it indicates the economy isn't using its resources optimally. What is this "economic independence" thingy? Sounds like communism to me.

SEWs and SIWS.

No need to reinvent the wheel.

The European Union has an established policy combating social exclusion.

Philosopher Axel Honneth thus speaks of a "struggle for recognition", which he attempts to theorize through Hegel's philosophy. In this sense, to be socially excluded is to be deprived from social recognition and social value. In the sphere of politics, social recognition is obtained by full citizenship; in the economic sphere (in capitalism) it means being paid enough to be able to participate fully in the life of the community.

Thus, we come to SEWs and SIWs.

Socially exclusive wages (SEWs) are those that deny the employed the ability to fully participate in the life of the community, thus in substance denying them the equality and human dignity requisite to the democratic society.  To allow the persistence of SEWs permits the diffusion of anti-democratic norms that promote unequal social relations mediated by things rather than interpersonal relation.  Labor is commodified, and the sacred nature of human life is denied through the imposition of anti-social market logic.

Socially inclusive wages (SIWs) are those that permit the employed to participate fully in the life of the community, granting them positive rights.  The promotion of SIWs through its insistence on egalitarian social norms based upon the belief that vertical economic relationships are contrary to the fundamental basis of the democratic society.  Equality.

It would be a huge project, but I think that at the NUTS II level you could parse out the cost of decent housing, the cuisine constituting the local social norm, and such cultural and educational activities as are deemed constitutive of the civic experience.


And I'll give my consent to any government that does not deny a man a living wage-Billy Bragg