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Comment by cunidev | Hacker News Reader

Italy has had this for a few years now (people born from 1998 onwards, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-08-23/italy-s-1...): €500 to be spent on books, music and cultural events, so even looking at the app idea and graphics I would guess this is where it was inspired from.

Overall, I would say it was well-used considering the problem our country has with "free money" initiatives, although I definitely met some people who tried to "cheat the system" to some (smaller) extent, e.g. by using the voucher to get free high-end Kindles in bookstores.

Also, about 40% of purchases (if I recall the stats correctly) were made on Amazon, Spotify or other "big tech" corporations, meaning that while it gave a boost to the smaller economy, local businesses did not get from it as much as one could expect.

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2018 statistics (for completeness' sake): ~80 % on books; a bit more than a half on e-books; often used for university textbooks ~9 % on concerts ~7 % on cinemas 1.6 % on music 1 % theatre and dance 0.3 % museums 0.3 % cultural events

-- https://www.ilpost.it/2018/06/20/bonus-cultura-editoria-ital...

Thanks! This is what I needed

And smartphones, playstations, cash (e.g. https://www.lastampa.it/cronaca/2020/05/16/news/bonus-cultur...)

That amount is related to illicit activities in 2017-2018. Compared to 2018 budged, it is ~0.2 % (800k€ out of 126M€). In 2019 the violations found were a fifth.

The french government openly recognize they got the idea from Italy.

Is it such a waste to spend it on an eink kindle? Obviously it doesn’t sound as good but ebooks are cheaper and a kindle will last a long time. Obviously it doesn’t do much to support the local economy unless you count money going towards authors.

I had this thought too. A Kindle is a fine investment, especially because you're just going to use it to read books anyways (not many first person shooters to play on an e-ink screen).

My guess is you can flip a Kindle easily to get cash which you can spend on whatever you want.

I would imagine the "high end Kindle" GP is referencing might be one of their Fire tablets which is their iPad competitor.

I love my e-ink displays though :)

Not at all, but it is easy to convert such Kindle to money. I am a hardcore Kobo user myself

Problem is you don't use it, you resell it and keep the cash.

23 years is a solid dataset. Thanks

they started in 2016

I totally misread the 1998 above.

The cheating included much more (https://duckduckgo.com/?q=bonus+cultura+truffa) than expensive e-book readers. Many, with fraudolent sellers, converted the monetary bonus to cash, and spent it as they please.

In my opinion letting people spend this bonus on crap (blockbuster action movies, pop music, etc.) puts the concept of "culture" in a spot I don't really like, when we're talking about public money: while anything you artistic can be considered cultural, because I'm a boring boomer I'd like my hard earned money to be used for something better than a summer music festival.

Well used? There were plenty of tricks and companies doing shady things with the money. When it was used within the rules, youngsters were using it to go to the movies or buy music online.

I know of some tricks from friends of friends and you can find a few newspapers articles about the bonus being used to buy playstations and other electronics or converted in cash (500€ bonus -> 300€ cash).

If there is a rule, it will be circumvented. Italy and France should think about stopping taxing young people so much, instead of wasting public money in this way.

2018 data: less than 10 % of the money has been used for music (excluding concerts) and cinemas. Please check your sources. 2.503 young people misused that during 2017-2018. Every law can be violated; that does not mean it is bad or good just because someone could behave badly.

Appreciate the stats.

I disagree even with the use within the rules.

I don't think society should pay for students' university books.

One thing I've never understood about this position--why is university such a stark cutoff? Most everyone agrees students shouldn't have to pay for their books in K-12. We agree it's better for our society if primary and second education is not gated by a family's wealth. Not just ethnically, I think it's better for a nation's economic productivity. The whole world is getting more educated, and it does feel like a bachelors or equivalent training is what a high school diploma was 60 years ago.

> I don't think society should pay for students' university books.

Why not? You will have to pay for their jail cells if they don't get the education experience they need to compete in a global economy.

jail cells? I hope you are merely waxing hyberbolic!!

If I was French or Italian, I'd be extremely offended at that implication that kids are being taught that crime is an acceptable societal and moral choice, especially just because one might not receive a government bribe because they don't meet an arbitrary age requirement.

Obviously paying for textbooks is not the breaking point, but it's a similar mentality (that society should not be responsible for its kids) that leads kids to crime when they have no marketable skills that can be used to get a job.

>I don't think society should pay for students' university books.

Then society should stop accumulating savings beyond what is reasonable. There are two sides to every discussion.

Then society gets the fruits of this small investments in terms of social services, public school, public hospitals, etc.

Do they tax young people a lot?

Young people are not likely to earn money a lot, or at all in France, and so their income tax is 0%...

https://www.blevinsfranks.com/news/article/French-taxation-i...

Up to €10,084: 0% (a student job would not make more than that)

€10,084 – €25,710: 11% (a young person without a university degree would not probably earn less than 25,710)

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