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Category: UBI Pilot

  • University of Chicago study praises rollout of city’s guaranteed basic income pilot

    By Elvia Malagón

    See original post here.

    The federal funds set aside to do community outreach ahead of the Chicago Resilient Communities pilot, which ended in 2023, could provide a road map for how the city serves residents, according to a recently released study.

    The funding that was allocated for outreach efforts during Chicago’s guaranteed income pilot could be a model for how the city reaches communities in other social service programs, according to a newly published report.

    The University of Chicago’s Inclusive Economy Lab recently published the report as part of its research into the yearlong program, the Chicago Resilient Communities pilot, which provided 5,000 city residents with $500 for 12 months with no strings attached. The city’s pilot, which ended in 2023, was funded through federal pandemic relief funds.

    The study looked at the administration of the pilot, ranging from the application window to the period once the last checks were distributed to participants.

    Misuzu Schexnider, program director for financial security at the university’s Inclusive Economy Lab, said that while organizations are usually contracted to run social services, few of them receive funding explicitly to do outreach efforts.

    “You’re just being paid to serve them,” she said. “You’re not actually being paid to locate them, to recruit, to build trust with them. It’s difficult sometimes to be able to serve that population because you’re not explicitly funded for outreach activities.”

    During the application window, some people sought in-person assistance programs because they wanted to reach an actual person to ensure the program wasn’t a scam, according to the report.

    “Especially folks who are less comfortable with virtual or digital forms of communication or relationship, they needed that in-person touch point to be able to feel that this was a real program,” Schexnider said.

    The YWCA Metropolitan Chicago was the lead contractor for the pilot program, according to the report. In total, there were more than 700 in-person events while the application window was open. About 176,000 people applied for 5,000 slots. Participants were chosen through a lottery system, according to the report.

    But the short window of time for the program launch — about three weeks — resulted in organizations contracted by the city facing unexpected overtime because they weren’t able to add staff as quickly, according to the report.

    The report also outlines how the program ensured the additional cash didn’t result in participants losing other social service benefits. The payments were considered gifts by the IRS because GiveDirectly, a nonprofit, was contracted by the city to administer the payments, according to the report.

    Chicago’s pilot may have also been the first one to receive an exemption from the the Social Security Administration for Supplemental Security Income and Social Security Disability Insurance, which meant people who receive SSI payments were able to potentially participate in the pilot, said Mary Bogle, a principal research associate at the Urban Institute.

    “That’s actually huge,” Bogle said. “I haven’t heard of any pilot doing that.”

    Other pilots across the country discouraged people receiving those types of benefits from applying for guaranteed income pilots because of the risk it posed to keeping their long-term benefits, she said.

    A second city pilot, rebranded as the Chicago Empowerment Fund, is expected to launch sometime in 2025, according to the city’s proposed budget. The program will again serve 5,000 “low-income families and returning Chicago residents,” and provide $500 for 12 months, but more details about the qualifications weren’t available.

    The city’s Department of Family and Support Services did not comment on the second pilot’s timeline.

    While President-elect Donald Trump has vowed to cut government spending, Bogle said many of the pilots weren’t meant to be permanent because they were funded with temporary funds. Future pilots or more permanent guaranteed income programs would likely have to be funded privately or from municipalities’ general funds.

    Bogle said she thinks that idea could return again once officials realize that today’s employment market isn’t providing the same opportunities as it did during the country’s manufacturing era.

    “I think this idea is going to keep coming back,” Bogle said. “And I think it’s quite possible that one day in the future — and it could be sooner, it could be later — the conclusion will be that a healthy America needs to offer a consumption floor to its citizens in order for everybody to participate and consume goods.”

    This post was originally published on Basic Income Today.

  • How Denver’s Basic Income Pilot Will Work

    By: Esteban L. Hernandez

    For one year, Denver will provide 140 people experiencing homelessness $12,000 with no strings attached as part of a program testing universal basic income.

    Why it matters: The experiment with guaranteed income is one of the more novel programs in the nation, but joins other major cities, including Chicago and Los Angeles, in an attempt to provide stability to people in vulnerable circumstances.

    Driving the news: The Denver City Council this week approved using $2 million in American Rescue Plan Act money to provide monthly cash assistance.

    • The money is paying for a contract with the Denver Basic Income Project, the agency responsible for giving out the funds.
    • Most of the money in the contract ($1.8 million) will pay for cash installments, according to city staff, with the rest allotted for administrative costs.
    • The $2 million provided by the city is a portion of the overall funding, as the project seeks to help 820 people in total. The entire initiative will cost about $9 million, Denver Basic Income Project founder Mark Donovan told Axios Denver.
    • He said most of the money is being raised through charitable foundations, including the Colorado Health Foundation and the Denver Foundation.

    State of play: Angie Nelson, deputy director of Housing Stability and Homelessness Resolution, said participants include those who are already using local resources, such as shelters. They cannot have a severe and unaddressed mental health or substance use need.

    • Denver Basic Income Project will be responsible for choosing the participants.
    • “As excited as we are about it, this isn’t something you can call in and apply for,” Nelson told Axios Denver.

    By the numbers: Overall, 520 people in Denver will get $12,000 for one year as part of the project.

    • 260 people will get $6,500 up front, and $500 a month for 11 months.
    • 260 people will receive $1,000 monthly over the course of a year.
    • 300 people will be part of a control group and get a $50-a-month stipend to determine whether there’s a difference in outcomes.

    Of note: Donovan said all participants will be able to get a free phone with a year of service included.

    Between the lines: Nelson explained the city wants to use its money for direct cash payments to women, transgender and gender non-conforming people.

    • The number of unhoused women using the shelter system in the city has tripled since the start of the COVID pandemic.
    • Nelson added that the city wants to use the federal money to alleviate the compounding effect the pandemic had on homelessness in Denver, and families, who Nelson pointed out often have a harder time finding safe and inclusive shelter options in the metro area.

    Yes, but: The city won’t know whether this experiment has been effective for more than a year. HOST spokesperson Derek Woodbury told Axios Denver results likely won’t be available until 2024.

    This post was originally published on Basic Income Today.

  • Anti-poverty advocate welcomes court decision on Basic Income Pilot Project

    See original post here.

    An anti-poverty advocate in Thunder Bay says the Ontario Court of Appeal made a just decision when it allowed a class action lawsuit related to the cancelled Basic Income Pilot Program to proceed.

    Frank Wilson, a volunteer with Poverty Free Thunder Bay and Diversity Thunder Bay, said it wasn’t right for the provincial government to abruptly cancel the three-year program in 2019, after just 18 months.

    Eligible participants were receiving up to $17,000 per year, less 50 per cent of any earned income, while couples received up to $24,000 per year.  

    Wilson said the 4,000 recipients in the Thunder Bay, Hamilton and Lindsay areas had made commitments to go to school or find proper housing with their new source of income.

    “So when the government came along and cancelled it with no compensation…that’s unfair.”

    The Lakehead Social Planning Council at the time asserted that the abrupt end to the program had left 1,000 area residents in crisis mode.

    A study released last year by a Lakehead University researcher concluded that the basic income pilot had brought major improvements to the lives of the recipients, but those improvements were reversed after the program was axed.

    The recent Court of Appeal decision, Wilson said, means “the small people of the world, the people that are usually marginalized, have a voice and are getting their case heard. And the merits of the case will hopefully speak for themselves.”

    He said he’s done a lot of reading on the subject and is convinced of the necessity of a guaranteed income program across Canada.

    “I do believe the pilot would have proven, more and more, that the benefits are there to launch a basic income program.”

    Wilson said there are people throughout Thunder Bay who are suffering, not because of something they did wrong, but because of systemic problems.

    “They lost a job, had an income, their income declined, they couldn’t pay the rent, they gradually got worse off. And the support systems we have in Canada are not adequate. It got me thinking and I got to learning about how the basic income program here, and many years ago in Manitoba, really changed people’s lives.”

    He said not only did people get physically and mentally healthier, but “they had dignity, there was less crime….they were better off and so was the whole community. And they started to be more productive as citizens.”

    At the same time, Wilson said, there were no indications people were squandering the money they received.

    “They felt stable…Everything was clicking in the right direction. There has been no indication [in] all the studies I have read from around the world that people shirk off and don’t seek employment, as some critics think..”

    He acknowledged that some clients dropped out of the job market to go to school, but that was so they could eventually land better jobs. 

    “There’s not really a lot of downside here,” Wilson insisted.

    The class action lawsuit seeks $200 million in damages on behalf of the people enrolled in Ontario’s pilot project, alleging the province breached a contract.

    The claim has yet to be proven in court.

    The post Anti-poverty advocate welcomes court decision on Basic Income Pilot Project appeared first on Basic Income Today.

    This post was originally published on Basic Income Today.

  • Cambridge to be first city in the US to provide guaranteed income to every family living in poverty

    See original post here.

    During the State of the City Address on Wednesday, April 27, Mayor Siddiqui announced that the City of Cambridge will be allocating close to $22 million in American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funding to build on the work of the Cambridge RISE pilot and combat the adverse effects of the pandemic faced by low-income families in Cambridge. This allocation will provide direct cash assistance, in the form of $500 dollars per month for approximately a year and a half, to every single eligible family under 200% of the federal poverty level in the City of Cambridge. This step makes Cambridge the first city in the country to expand its cash assistance program to every family living in poverty.

    “Our commitment has always been to find a way to expand the impact of RISE and ensure that all families living in poverty in our city would similarly receive cash assistance,” said Mayor Siddiqui at the State of the City Address. “Particularly in light of the ongoing effects of the pandemic, which we know disproportionately affect low-income residents and residents of color, this historic allocation will help put families on a path to economic stability.”

    “Cambridge has always been a leader on progressive issues and has clear values of compassion and integrity,” said Geeta Pradhan, president of the Cambridge Community Foundation, a Cambridge RISE partner. “Our hope is that this infusion of cash will help reduce the debilitating trauma of scarcity and put families on a path to economic stability.”

    The Mayor was joined at the State of the City Address by one of the RISE recipients, Porchia and her daughter Rose. RISE has been a stabilizing force for Porchia, and since last fall, she has been taking classes to become a medical assistant. RISE has helped her cover expenses for class, transportation, childcare, and more. “I was struggling to pay my utilities, struggling to pay my friends back,” Porchia said. “By the time I was finally about to get my first check, my lights had went off.” Just recently, she passed the final exam to receive her medical assistant certification, and will be finishing the program in June. 

    Providing direct cash assistance has proven to be an effective anti-poverty strategy, as families who are struggling can use funds as they best see fit without limitations.

    The post Cambridge to be first city in the US to provide guaranteed income to every family living in poverty appeared first on Basic Income Today.

    This post was originally published on Basic Income Today.

  • The Welsh government is to trial a form of Basic Income as part of its COVID-19 recovery strategy. So how should it be designed?

    A striking element of pandemic recovery planning in Wales has been the announcement of a Basic Income scheme. But what should this pilot look like – and does the suggested focus on care leavers alone need expanding?

    By: Jonathan Rhys Williams.

    Just days after the Senedd election in May, Wales’ First Minister Mark Drakeford announced that his government would trial a form of Basic Income. The news captured the world’s attention; from the BBC to Humanity Forward, everyone was talking about it.

    The Basic Income concept is that everyone receives a basic level of income regardless of their wealth, income or employment status. It differs from Universal Credit in that there is no means testing involved; rather, it is unconditional and universal.

    The idea isn’t new, of course, having first found fame in Thomas More’s Utopia (originally published in 1516). More recently, it has been seen as a response to the rapid growth in automation (with the associated threat to jobs), and as an alternative to current welfare systems – which have come under huge pressure during the pandemic, with the poorest 20% in the UK experiencing the biggest relative drops in income.

    The value of a wide-ranging pilot

    Since the First Minister’s announcement, we have learned from the media and government ministers that the trial is likely to focus on care leavers. No details on when and where the trial will take place have been provided, and it is also unclear exactly who will be included: will the trial involve those who left care over the past five years, say, or only those who have left in the past 12 months?

    There is no question that care leavers need more support. During my time as a trainee solicitor, I worked on claims brought on behalf of people leaving care, and I know firsthand from reading their records the incredible difficulties that led some of them into the care system. These people don’t just need extra support; they deserve it – so I fully support the decision to include care leavers in any trial, as does UBI Lab Wales (a campaigning group I co-founded to press the Welsh Government to introduce a Basic Income trial in Wales).

    However, there is a danger that by only including care leavers, the results won’t provide the evidence that policymakers need to fully understand the transformative impacts the policy could have on society.

    This concern is shared by the rest of the Basic Income movement across the UK – although it’s important to note that there’s no such thing as a perfect trial.

    If you ask five Basic Income advocates what the pilot should look like, you’re likely to get at least four different answers. That’s why we must approach this question with objectivity, and not let the perfect be the enemy of the good.

    The Welsh Government is focusing its attention on care leavers because such a trial is within its gift to deliver. Were it to undertake a more wide-ranging pilot, this would need the cooperation of the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) and HMRC, because Wales doesn’t have the devolved powers to do more by itself.

    Jane Hutt, the minister responsible for delivering the trial, must be ready for a battle with the UK Government if she wants to run a substantive pilot. But if she decides to make the case to Westminster, she will have the support of a significant majority of the Welsh electorate and the 25 Members of the Senedd who backed our ‘Pledge for UBI’.

    Who should be included, and for how long?

    For the purposes of this blog, let’s say the incumbent UK Government is willing to provide the relevant powers over tax and welfare – not permanently; just for the trial. With these newly granted powers, this is what I think it should look like.

    Firstly, the trial must include children, employed people, unemployed people and pensioners – as this is what society looks like. If we want to understand what would happen if we rolled out the policy tomorrow, we must include all demographics.

    For example, how can we understand what a Basic Income would do for school performance and educational attainment if we do not include children and their parents? Wales has the worst rates of child poverty in the UK, and we know the impacts that poverty has on school performance, productivity and wellbeing. We should not miss the opportunity to learn whether Basic Income makes a difference to all these issues.

    In terms of where the trial would happen, the Welsh Government should invite all 22 local authorities to submit a proposal making the case for their area to be a pilot location. In particular, I would hope councils that have consistently been in the upper half of the Welsh Index for Multiple Deprivation (WIMD) would submit a proposal.

    Of all these proposals, two locations should then be selected to receive a Basic Income, and two with similar characteristics should form the control group. Doing this would enable us to understand the community effects of the Basic Income trial, such as an improvement in social cohesion and/or the emergence of new local businesses.

    In terms of the number of participants, 2,000 people per location is my preference – a total of 8,000 across the four locations (so the total number in receipt of a Basic Income would be 4,000, with the other half in the control group). In addition to this, the trial should also include the approximately 600 people across Wales who have left care in the 12 months before it begins. As previously stated, giving care leavers more support is the right thing to do.

    The duration of the trial should be between 18 and 24 months. While it would ideally be longer, it’s likely that the Welsh Government will want it concluded by the end of this Senedd term. This timeframe would ensure that the newly elected government does not abruptly cancel the pilot, as happened in Ontario.

    A financial plan for the pilot

    I’d suggest the weekly rates of Basic Income should be as follows:

    1. 0 to 17 years: £50
    2. 18 to 21 years: £80
    3. 22 to pension age: £140
    4. Pension age: current pension rate

    A trial paying these amounts would cost in the region of £20 million per year. (Those who baulk at paying such a figure for a trial might look at the money wasted over the past 18 months on test, track and trace, and the cronyism displayed by the UK Government in handing out contracts during the pandemic.) All subsistence benefits would be removed and replaced with a Basic Income. Disability, carers’ and housing-related benefits would all be left intact to ensure that nobody is left worse-off.

    Specifically, the benefits removed would be:

    • Income Support (personal allowance)
    • Income-based Jobseeker’s Allowance (personal allowance)
    • Income-based Employment & Support Allowance (personal allowance)
    • Child Tax Credit (family plus child element)
    • State Pension
    • Child Benefit
    • Universal Credit (standard allowance for a single person)
    • Universal Credit (first child and subsequent payments)

    By scrapping these benefits, pilot participants would be freed from the conditions and sanctions imposed by the DWP – such as losing benefits for missing an appointment at the Job Centre because they have fallen ill, or because their train was late.

    This kind of model would thus measure the emancipatory effects of a Basic Income.

    By no longer requiring people to attend these appointments, we might see that people have more time to set up their own business or find meaningful employment and build a career, rather than taking a job simply to keep the DWP off their back.

    Another advantage of this model is that for those already receiving Universal Credit (standard allowance), the added cost would only be a further £61 per week to reach the proposed £140 payment. And the net cost would be further reduced because Child Benefit and State Pension is paid as a Basic Income at a slightly higher rate and at the same rate, respectively.

    The benefits of this ‘ideal model’

    Were this model to be rolled out tomorrow, welfare administration costs would be vastly reduced as the eligibility checks needed to receive benefits would be removed. The UK currently spends around £7 billion per year on administering welfare payments before anyone receives a penny.

    Further savings would be made via the reduction in people using health services. The most consistent finding across all past Basic Income pilots is the significant improvement in physical and mental wellbeing. This could save our economy billions in the years after the policy’s introduction, while adding value by offering a fitter, healthier and more productive workforce.

    People would have more money in their pockets to spend – clearly a good thing for the economy. The flow of money would be cyclical because most people on lower incomes would use their Basic Income to ensure they are properly fed and clothed, while those on higher incomes who do not need the money would be taxed, so it’s clawed back.

    The people who need the money use it to meet their basic needs – the clue is in the name.

    This is my ideal model. I’m aware that concessions have to be made with any pilot design – but the Welsh Government should at least try to make the case to DWP and HMRC for a wide-ranging trial.

    _____________________________________________________

    Jonathan Rhys Williams is the co-founder of UBI Lab Wales and a solicitor at Watkins & Gunn

    The post The Welsh government is to trial a form of Basic Income as part of its COVID-19 recovery strategy. So how should it be designed? appeared first on Basic Income Today.

    This post was originally published on Basic Income Today.

  • King County Councilmember unveils proposal to explore universal basic income

    By: NICK BOWMAN

    King County Councilmember Dave Upthegrove announced this week that he intends to push for a preliminary study into universal basic income. Upthegrove noted in a written release that the economic impact from the pandemic over the last year has made it clear to him that providing people with a stable income is crucial in times of need.

    “The economic disruptions brought on by COVID-19 have cast a spotlight on the devastation caused by losing one’s income,” he said.

    Typically, universal basic income programs have been run by city-level governments, including a pilot starting this summer in Tacoma. That said, Upthegrove believes that looking into it at the county level could provide valuable data.

    “I am interested to learn what a county program might look like and how it could be structured to best assist those who need it the most,” he described.

    “What kind of qualifications would be best? What goals would be meaningful and measurable? A study that provided such answers could drive future policy discussions and now is the perfect time to look at creative economic ideas.”

    Tacoma’s own pilot program will run for one year, distributing a monthly $500 stipend to roughly 100 families facing poverty. It will be funded from by a $500,000 donation from Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, and an additional $100,000 from the Mayors for Guaranteed Income group.

    Without similar donations in King County, Upthegrove will look to fund his proposed study with a request in the spring supplemental budget, which is set for a council vote in late-June.

    In a separate pilot program that ran in Stockton, California, roughly 43% of participants worked full- or part-time; 11% took care of parents or children; 20% had some sort of disability; and just 2% said they weren’t looking for work. Of the $500 they received monthly, 40% went toward food, 25% to sales and other merchandise, and 12% was spent on utility payments.

    The post King County Councilmember unveils proposal to explore universal basic income appeared first on Basic Income Today.

    This post was originally published on Basic Income Today.

  • As some San Francisco artists get basic income, how do we head off bad-faith arguments against it?

    Guaranteed income programs, no matter whom they support, must frequently battle the same zombie ideas.

    By Lily Janiak

    When the city announced last month that it planned to launch a pilot program to give more than 100 artists $1,000 monthly payments for six months, my hope for all the performers I write about and love was tinged with worry. I frequently see a couple of bad-faith arguments in response to the idea of state support of the arts, and I didn’t want them to hijack the conversation about a promising idea:

    • Bad-faith argument No. 1: Artists’ work isn’t real work, and if they can’t support themselves in the market, their art must be mere hobby.
    • Bad-faith argument No. 2: If the city is sending unrestricted cash to artists, could any Joe Schmoe throw some finger painting together and become eligible?

    The latter is further complicated by the idea that I want Joe Schmoes to have all the access to finger painting that their little fingertips desire; that I believe in all the Joe Schmoes’ potential to, one day, get so good at finger painting as to change the world with it, or at least change their own lives. My challenge, then, is to hold and articulate simultaneously two ideas that can seem contradictory:

    Everyone should have access to the arts as leisure, and some professional artists merit public funds for their art as work.

    Dorian T. Warren, an expert on guaranteed income, says the concept faces bad zombie arguments that won’t die.
    Photo: Community Change,

    When I shared my concerns with guaranteed income expert Dorian T. Warren, he reminded me of a felicitous phrase from New York Times columnist Paul Krugman: zombie ideas. These are bad arguments that just won’t die, no matter how much data disproves them.

    “They’re not grounded in evidence,” says Warren, the president of Community Change and co-chair of the Economic Security Project, both nonprofits, and co-host of the podcast “System Check.”

    “They’re grounded in mythology.”

    Guaranteed income programs, no matter whom they support, must frequently battle the same zombie ideas. Warren trots them out with a sigh: “It’s going to make people lazy. They’re not going to want to work. They’ll spend it on drugs and alcohol.” All stem from centuries-old prejudices that the poor are poor by choice or moral failing, and that they won’t work jobs unless you punish or force them. Those prejudices mix with racial and gender bias, hence the persistent myth of “the welfare queen,” he adds.

    “It really goes to core distinctions of who is deserving and who is undeserving of support, particularly support of the government, and that is related to fundamental notions of who belongs and who doesn’t,” he says.

    “Do we think you belong in this political community we call the United States of America? If you don’t, you don’t deserve what the rest of us, who do belong, get.”

    That notion of belonging also applies to artists, whom our country frequently demonizes as some kind of “other.” It’s a lot easier to say someone doesn’t deserve to have their basic needs met if you make them out to be fundamentally different from you. It’s a lot easier to say artists don’t deserve a living wage for the TV shows you watch, and the music you listen to, if you write them off as weird or deviant.

    Lorrine Paradela, a single mother of two, is one of 125 Stockton residents receiving monthly cash disbursements, with no strings attached, as part of an attention-grabbing experiment on guaranteed income.
    Photo: Yalonda M. James, The Chronicle 2019

    Data from a slew of guaranteed income pilot projects across the country might help weaken, if not defeat, some of these zombie ideas. In addition to San Francisco’s program for artists, Oakland and Marin County both recently announced their own programs for people of color, and in 2019, the city of Stockton launched the Stockton Economic Empowerment Demonstration, a guaranteed income program for 125 city residents.

    In Stockton, preliminary results released in March show that not only are these zombie ideas wrong; at times, they’re backward. For instance, guaranteed income recipients were twice as likely to gain full-time employment as a control group, says Sukhi Samra, the director of SEED as well as the director of a new group, Mayors for a Guaranteed Income.

    She attributes that finding to two factors: “When you give people $400 or $500 a month, and it’s reliable, not only are they able to do the tangible, physical things, like put gas in their car to get to the job interview, but they also have increased mental capacity for goal-setting,” she says. “When you’re experiencing poverty, and each paycheck’s dollar is accounted for in terms of which bills it’s going to pay, you just don’t have the mental capacity to plan for your future.”

    Take all the time our artists spend on hold with the unemployment office, all the brain space they exhaust checking their bank account to make sure they don’t overdraft between freelance payments, all the bureaucratic hoops they jump through to make sure they have health insurance between gigs. Why, in the richest country in the world, do we demand artists waste so many of their resources? What if they could instead spend that time and energy composing a new symphony? Or dreaming up a new artistic form altogether?

    Chris Steele in Cutting Ball Theater’s “Utopia.” Steele is among those applying for San Francisco’s guaranteed income program.
    Photo: Nic Candito, Cutting Ball Theater

    In Bay Area theater, even artists at the pinnacles of their careers make minimum wage or less. For many, $1,000 per month would help to remove food and housing insecurity. Preliminary data from SEED shows that program recipients experienced not just less psychological difficulty, but less physical pain than a control group.

    San Francisco theater maker, drag queen, makeup artist and Poltergeist Theatre Project co-founder Chris Steele is applying to the city’s guaranteed income program partly for those reasons.

    “All of the times that I haven’t been able to rise to the occasion of my art have come from the fact that I have to do so many exhausting things in order to just have a roof and food and be able to live,” Steele says.

    “That kind of stress, that kind of constant anxiety not only changes your DNA, but it is just antithetical to the spiritual and mental place that you need to be in to create art.”

    Poltergeist Theatre Project’s “The Julie Cycle” creators and actors Britt Lauer (left) and Chris Steele in San Francisco.
    Photo: Paul Kuroda, Special to The Chronicle 2019

    Guaranteed income is different from other social safety net programs in that there are no strings attached. Once you’re enrolled, you don’t have to prove anything to keep it and you can spend the money however you want. In Stockton, Samra says, recipients spent their funds on groceries, rent and utilities.

    The concept is built on trust, Warren says. We don’t demand corporations spend their subsidies or tax breaks in a particular way, so why do we treat the poor differently?

    “That means you don’t trust me,” he says, putting himself in the place of a welfare recipient, “and that means you don’t respect me, and that means I have no dignity.”

    Distrust comes from a scarcity mind-set, a sense that resources are scarce and we’re all competing with one another. And who is it that helps us shift to an abundance mind-set? To see the world as full of wonder and possibility and joy?

    It’s artists. What a coincidence.

    _____

    To see original article please visit: https://www.sfexaminer.com/news/sf-launches-guaranteed-income-pilot-program-for-130-artists/

    The post As some San Francisco artists get basic income, how do we head off bad-faith arguments against it? appeared first on Basic Income Today.

    This post was originally published on Basic Income Today.

  • From Stockton to Oakland, Santa Clara to San Francisco, basic income is gaining traction and proving effective

    The Bay Area is ground zero for UBI. More than anything, these pilots could help normalize the concept of guaranteed income, for the public and national political leaders. 

    by Benjamin Schneider

    “I’m hella proud of Oakland today,” Michael Tubbs said during a recent press event announcing one of the nation’s largest ever guaranteed income programs. Tubbs, the former mayor of Stockton who has become a national champion of guaranteed income, is starting to see his advocacy bear fruit downriver. Oakland is just one of several Bay Area cities or counties to announce a guaranteed income program in recent weeks, joining Marin, Santa Clara, and San Francisco. 

    For years, the Bay Area has served as the intellectual and financial epicenter of the movement for a universal basic income (UBI), which seeks to provide everyone, or almost everyone, with an unconditional payment every month — like a stimulus check that keeps on coming.

    Now, the Bay Area is rapidly becoming a hotspot for more targeted guaranteed income experiments. These programs provide a no-strings-attached monthly income to specific vulnerable populations, including pregnant women, artists and youth aging out of the foster care system.  

    But the boosters of these guaranteed income pilots are explicit in their desire to see them scale into something closer to UBI in the hopes that, someday, such policies could eliminate poverty altogether. These efforts could also intersect with other progressive policy goals, like reparations for Black people. A lot of work — and debate — remains before these revolutionary aspirations become a reality. But advocates in the Bay Area are planting the seeds. 

    “Our vision is an Oakland that has closed the racial wealth gap, and where all families thrive,” Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf said when announcing the city’s guaranteed income program, which she views as a test case in a growing national movement.

    “Oakland joins with cities across this great nation to create a body of evidence that says guaranteed income is a policy that must be adopted at the federal level.”

    From Artists to Foster Kids

    If you take a look at the Stanford Basic Income Lab’s map of guaranteed income programs around the world, the Bay Area stands out as a crowd of colorful dots, each one representing a different experiment. 

    Oakland’s pilot is the largest in the region, providing $500 per month to 600 low-income families for at least 18 months. All applicants must make no more than 50 percent of Oakland’s median income, or about $59,000 for a family of three, although half of the spots will be reserved for people making a lot less — about $30,000 for a family of three. Applications will be released starting this spring for residents of a specific corner of East Oakland, and for residents citywide in the late summer. Eligible recipients will be selected at random.

    Marin County’s program will function similarly, giving 125 low-income women of color with children $1,000 per month for two years. Applications will be released sometime this year. 

    Meanwhile, down in Santa Clara County, a guaranteed income program that began in September 2020 has been providing 72 youth who have aged out of the foster care system $1,000 per month. State Senator Dave Cortese, who spearheaded Santa Clara’s guaranteed income pilot as a County Supervisor, has introduced legislation, SB 739, that would provide a guaranteed income to the approximately 3,000 youth who age out of the foster care system for three years.

    San Francisco is developing a smorgasbord of guaranteed income programs for different groups of people. Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (YBCA) will give $1,000 a month to 130 artists living in San Francisco for six months. Applicants must live in one of about a dozen zip codes that have been particularly hard-hit by the pandemic, and be considered “very low income,” which in San Francisco means earning less than $60,900 for a single person and under $87,000 for a family of four.

    The program encourages applicants whose artistic practice “is rooted in a marginalized community,” and welcomes teachers and craftspeople as well as fine arts professionals. Applications are out now on the YBCA website, and are due by April 15. 

    San Francisco’s Department of Public Health is currently working on a guaranteed income pilot called the Abundant Birth Project, specifically for pregnant Black and Pacific Islander women. The mothers will receive $1,000 per month while they are pregnant, and for another six months after their child is born. Yet another guaranteed income program is being planned as part of the Dream Keeper Initiative, programs designed to help the Black community with funds redirected from law enforcement. 

    Why Now?

    Guaranteed income is hardly a new idea. It was championed by Martin Luther King, Jr. at the end of his life, when he began to offer a more radical critique of capitalism. “The solution to poverty is to abolish it directly by a now widely discussed measure: the guaranteed income,” King wrote in his 1967 book Where Do We Go From Here: Chaos or Community? In the late ’60s and ’70s, the concept actually had bipartisan appeal. Before becoming architects of the Bush war machine, Nixon Administration officials Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney supported guaranteed income-esque programs, but were unable to get more far-reaching policies through Congress.

    Fast forward to the 21st Century, and two people stand out for reviving this idea.

    The first is Michael Tubbs, who, soon after being elected mayor of Stockton at the ripe age of 26, began developing a guaranteed income pilot for his hometown. In March, researchers released data on the first year of the two-year program. The results?

    Employment among the recipients increased by 12 percent, anxiety and fatigue decreased, and recipients spent most of their additional income on essentials.

    The 25-page analysis by social scientists from the University of Pennsylvania and the University of Tennessee found the program to be largely a success. 

    The second high-profile guaranteed income champion is the tech entrepreneur Andrew Yang, whose 2020 presidential campaign hinged upon his proposed “Freedom Dividend” — a monthly $1,000 stipend for every American adult. After gaining a cult following during his presidential bid, Yang is now the frontrunner in the race for mayor of New York City, with guaranteed income serving as a major plank of his platform. (Tubbs had no such luck: His success in drawing national media attention to UBI appears to have harmed him in his 2020 mayoral reelection campaign, which he lost to a Republican.)

    But for all of their agitation, Yang and Tubbs’ impact on people’s perception of guaranteed income might pale in comparison to recent actions by the federal government. Over the past year, the stimulus payments most Americans received likely did more to normalize guaranteed income than any prior advocate or program.

    “Once you give them that experience of what a guaranteed income or other kinds of cash assistance could look like, people start to be more open to it,” says Max Ghenis, CEO of the UBI Center.

    There used to be a lot of false stereotypes that poor people would misuse direct cash assistance, but when “COVID-19 hit that really went away for the most part,” says Grace Peter, director of national partnerships at Family Independence Initiative, one of the groups leading Oakland and Marin’s guaranteed income pilots. Government stimulus and other forms of mutual aid — like people contributing to GoFundMe drives for strangers — helped normalize “the belief that people are going to do the right thing” with their money.

    The pandemic and the racial justice protests this year also highlighted just how extreme inequality has become in America, and in the Bay Area in particular. “There’s a correlation between low income and communities of color and COVID impact,” says Deborah Cullinan, president of YBCA. The pandemic created a sense of urgency to explore new financial models that “reach the people that have been hardest hit and have not necessarily been funded in the past.” Clearly, there is a strong demand for this kind of assistance: Cullinan says YBCA’s guaranteed income program for artists has already received 1,600 applications for just 130 spots.

    Why Here? 

    While guaranteed income is gaining steam among local elected officials all over the Bay Area, the concept has long held sway in Silicon Valley. The animating concern of Andrew Yang’s UBI push was the threat automation and AI presented to the likes of store clerks, factory workers, and long-haul truckers. This continues to be a major fear in Silicon Valley, serving as an inspiration for Y Combinator’s 2016 UBI pilot in Oakland. 

    Guaranteed income easily fits with an “engineering mindset that emphasizes simplicity when you’re trying to solve a problem,” Ghenis says.

    “We have this problem of poverty, so the simplest thing that you can do to reduce that is give people money so that they’re not in poverty.” It’s also an innovative social policy — something that tech people, and Bay Area politicians, are attracted to. Hence the local pools of money that are available to fund these programs. 

    The Economic Security Project, which funded the Stockton pilot, was co-founded by Facebook co-founder Chris Hughes. San Francisco’s Abundant Birth Project is being funded in part by a $1.1 million gift from Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey. The Marin Foundation is funding the majority of Marin County’s guaranteed income program, while Oakland’s program will be fully funded by a philanthropy called Blue Meridian Partners. It’s a similar story to that of California’s recent cash assistance programs for undocumented people, which were funded by big philanthropies and tax windfalls from the IPO boom. 

    Perhaps the region’s extreme — and extremely visible — inequality is also pushing leaders to act.

    “The Bay Area and San Francisco have struggled with economic disparity in a major public and glaring way, with housing insecurity and affordability issues,” Cullinan says.

    “The pandemic brought that into such stark relief and I think that also has catalyzed the fact we had to solve this problem.”

    Piloting Reparations

    With their explicit focus on racial justice, several of the Bay Area’s guaranteed income programs point the way toward another policy idea that was once thought radical and now appears to be gaining traction. In an article about Oakland’s pilot, Los Angeles Times columnist Erika D. Smith wrote that its focus on people of color is “not that far off from providing Black Americans with financial reparations for slavery — an idea that, until fairly recently, had gone absolutely nowhere politically.” 

    This has already emerged as a complicating factor in the planning and promotion of the Bay Area’s guaranteed income pilots. During the initial announcement of Oakland’s program, Mayor Schaaf said it would only be open to people of color. The program has since changed its criteria, editing the language on its website to remove references to race in the eligibility requirements. Explicitly race-based criteria could pose legal challenges to government-supported guaranteed income programs in California, where affirmative action remains illegal. However, those laws wouldn’t affect Oakland’s pilot, which is being fully funded by non-profits. 

    “This pilot is targeting families with the greatest disparities, and a lot of those are based on our systems, which are rooted in structures that hold Black and brown families back,” Peter says.

    While racial justice is the guiding principle of Oakland’s guaranteed income pilot, Peter emphasizes that anyone who fits the income and geographic criteria can still apply. That’s also true for San Francisco’s guaranteed income pilot for artists.

    In all likelihood, beneficiaries of these programs will be people of color. The median income for white households in Oakland is three times that of Black households. Across the country, Black and Latino people have about one-tenth the wealth of white people. These economic disparities, combined with continued racial discrimination, contribute to disparities in areas like health, education, housing, and the workforce. The Bay Area’s guaranteed income pilots come as California begins to assemble a task force to study reparations for Black people.

    While Ghenis sees the value of explicitly targeting racial groups for guaranteed income, he’s concerned about how that could affect the momentum for UBI at the federal level.

    “The polling for something like reparations, which is really what this gets at, is a lot less favorable than it is for more universal or at least race-neutral policies like cash assistance as part of the American Rescue Plan.”

    Another variable for these programs is the way they interact with government benefits. Guaranteed income can usually be classified as a gift, and therefore not be taxed. However, these payments may affect participants’ ability to access other benefits. Oakland and San Francisco’s programs will have benefits counselors who will help participants navigate these issues. 

    Community Benefits 

    But getting through these logistical headaches will be well worth it, researchers believe. Ghenis is particularly excited that many of the Bay Area’s guaranteed income programs are focused on families with children. “There’s a ton of evidence that reducing poverty has really important effects for child development,” he says. “As they grow older, they have higher earnings, they have better health and better mental health, they have even longer life expectancy.” 

    Researchers are also considering how these programs affect the communities that guaranteed income recipients are a part of.

    “What happens when you shift from a destabilized community to an economically more stable community?” Cullinan asks.

    “We’re trying to understand not only what are the impacts in the artist’s life, but also what’s the increase in creative output, what’s the positive impact in the community?”

    The Oakland pilot is designed to specifically measure neighborhood-level effects. With one half of participants concentrated in East Oakland, and the rest scattered throughout the city, researchers will be looking to see if there’s a noticeable difference in the economic, public safety, educational, and health outcomes in the community where many people are receiving guaranteed income. 

    San Francisco District Attorney Chesa Boudin has voiced his support SB 739, the state law that would extend Santa Clara’s guaranteed income for foster youth across the state, highlighting its impact on criminal justice.

    “Transitional age youth without familial support far too often end up victimized or arrested and incarcerated for committing crimes to support themselves,” he said in a statement.

    “Providing all people — especially our most vulnerable — with economic stability promotes public safety.”

    While researchers are eager to see the results of these experiments, the fact is there’s already been a lot of research on cash assistance and guaranteed income programs. It turns out that when you give poor people money, their lives get a lot better. More than anything, these pilots could help normalize the concept of guaranteed income, for the public and national political leaders. 

    “Research is important and data helps us to learn, what works and what doesn’t work,” Peter says. “But it’s really narratives that are going to shift hearts and minds and ultimately policies.”

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    To see original article please visit: https://www.sfweekly.com/news/the-bay-area-is-ground-zero-for-ubi/

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  • Hartford, Connecticut considering a UBI pilot

    By Marc E. Fitch

    The City of Hartford’s Court of Common Council voted in March to create a task force to assess the possibility of a universal basic income pilot program for some of its residents. The task force will study the issue and report their findings to the city council.

    The initial resolution put forward in February cited the COVID-19 pandemic; other UBI pilot programs in cities like Stockton, California; national lawmakers from both sides of the political aisle who have supported a UBI, and a Roosevelt Institute study that found a national UBI would create $4.6 million jobs.

    During a March 15 meeting of the Hartford Operations, Management, Budget & Government Accountability Committee, David Grant, executive assistant to City Council President Maly D. Rosado, shared a presentation on UBI and stressed that the resolution was merely to form a task force to study the viability of a UBI in Hartford.

    “The task force is going to be put together to understand what the needs of our city are and whether a program like this would be beneficial,” Grant said.

    The task force would identify a funding strategy for the program and “Develop a structure to include benchmarks, application process, administrative support, program management, oversight, etc.,” according to the presentation. 

    The presentation highlighted Alaska’s annual stipend to residents from its mineral royalties, a program instituted by the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians in North Carolina, and a recent pilot program out of Stockton that gave $500 per month to 125 residents who earn less than the state’s median income.

    Grant’s presentation showed the UBI in Stockton went primarily to general living expenses, such as groceries, clothing and transportation costs like gas.

    “Right now, we’ve got Indiana, North Carolina and Louisiana being the most recent states who have committed to a UBI pilot program in select cities,” Grant said.

    Although the task force has yet to be formed and start its work, Grant said they were looking at a possible pilot program of 50 single mothers or fathers receiving $500 per month for a total cost of $150,000. Grant said they are not looking to use taxpayer money to fund the program but would rather look to existing revenue streams and possibly applying for funding grants.

    The task force would develop criteria to select pilot program participants.

    Councilwoman Wildaliz Bermudez raised the possibility of using cannabis tax revenue if Connecticut moves forward with legalizing recreational marijuana. 

    Gov. Ned Lamont’s budget proposal includes using cannabis tax revenue to help support payments to cities for tax-exempt properties and allowing municipalities to levy a local excise tax on cannabis sales. 

    A cannabis equity bill passed by the Labor and Public Employees Committee would allow a maximum three percent local excise tax on cannabis sales in a given municipality. 

    Grant said these questions are probably best left to the expert panel and noted the final details of the cannabis bill – and whether or not is passes – is still up in the air. Other possible funding sources include philanthropic grants.

    “I do think there is a desire from organizations in Hartford to support something like this, but we need to be able to provide a full proposal on what we expect, what the results from other programs have been and what type of sustainability plan we can create from the initial data that’s collected through the pilot,” Grant said.

    A Universal Basic Income has become a more public discussion in recent years, being put forward by 2020 presidential candidates like Hawaii Representative Tulsi Gabbard and Andrew Yang, who is currently running for mayor of New York City.

    The preliminary analysis by the Stockton Economic Empowerment Demonstration was released this past March.

    Overall, the report found Stockton’s UBI provided more financial stability to participants, enabled them to have more “self-determination, choice, goal-setting and risk taking” and found that the percentage of participants with full-time work increased from 28 percent to 40 percent over the course of a year.

    But researchers cautioned that “guaranteed income is not a cure all for the consistent, market-driven obstacles that prevent many American households from achieving stability and health.”

    However, UBI programs are not without their critics who say the UBI could disincentivize work and be altogether too costly for governments to maintain, and some UBI experiments in the past have not panned out as well as Stockton’s. 

    One of the largest UBI experiments in the world in Finland did not go as planned, possibly due to how the experiment was designed – namely, reducing other welfare payments for those receiving the guaranteed income – but there were cost concerns as well.

    A similar massive UBI experiment in Ontario suffered from similar problems and results, ultimately leading to its cancellation.

    Hartford appears poised to move forward with the task force, according to the Hartford City Council’s April 12 agenda.

    The Council will vote on appointing three experts to the UBI Task Force: Professor of Economics and Policy Eric Brunner and Professor of Economics Stephen L. Ross, both of the University of Connecticut, along with Assistant Professor of Social Work Gina R. Rosich of the University of Saint Joseph.

    The task force will submit their report and recommendations at the end of 2021.

    _____

    Meghan Portfolio contributed to this article.

    Marc E. Fitch is the author of several books and novels including Shmexperts: How Power Politics and Ideology are Disguised as Science and Paranormal Nation: Why America Needs Ghosts, UFOs and Bigfoot. Marc was a 2014 Robert Novak Journalism Fellow and his work has appeared in The Federalist, American Thinker, The Skeptical Inquirer, World Net Daily and Real Clear Policy. Marc has a Master of Fine Arts degree from Western Connecticut State University. Marc can be reached at Marc@YankeeInstitute.org.

    To see original article please visit: https://yankeeinstitute.org/2021/04/08/hartford-to-consider-a-universal-basic-income-pilot-program/

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  • ‘Expedition Basic Income’ launches grassroots campaign for large UBI experiment in Germany

    By Sarah Delahaye

    More and more people feel that universal basic income (UBI) could change our society for the better. But how can we make that happen? In Germany, Berlin-based association ‘Expedition Basic Income’ (Expedition Grundeinkommen) recently launched a large country-wide campaign to start a UBI experiment with 10,000 participants – financed by the state and academically companied. So far, more than 50,000 people have registered on the campaign website.

    The initiative ‘Bring Basic Income To The State’ was launched by Expedition Basic Income (Expedition Grundeinkommen) at the end of February with a question to all German citizens, spread via the association’s website, mailings, partners within the German UBI community, social media, and the press:

    Do you want your city or municipality to participate in a nation-wide UBI experiment?

    Every German citizen can answer this question by registering on the association’s website. Wherever at least 1% of the population express their interest, the Expedition Basic Income is going to start local referenda to enable the cities and municipalities to participate. The totality of all ‘test cities’ can be thought of as a globally unique research laboratory on basic income.

    Valuable insights on UBI via a scientific approach

    According to the plans, 10,000 people in Germany are supposed to receive a monthly basic income of about 1,200 euros for three years, starting in 2023. For this experiment, the association is working with renowned research partners in Germany, including the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW) and the Freiburg Institute for Basic Income Studies (FRIBIS), to analyse the effect, acceptance and feasibility of different variants of unconditional basic income, whereby also exploring empirical findings on UBI financing. 

    With the scientific findings and insights from the study, it will be much easier in the future to discuss the impacts of universal basic income on people and the community:

    Ideally, the question will no longer be if a basic income can be financed at all, but how this could be possible.

    People power is the campaign’s key

    The Expedition Basic Income was founded in 2019 by UBI advocates Joy Ponader and Laura Brämswig. Their mission is to initiate Germany’s first publicly financed UBI experiment together with all the people who are enthusiastic about or interested in basic income. The country-wide campaign is not their first endeavour; previously, Expedition Basic Income has launched similar initiatives in several federal states, including the country’s capital Berlin, where more than 30,000 people signed for a regional experiment in autumn 2020.

    The citizens in Germany’s cities and municipalities are the campaign’s front and centre: In addition to the online call, local teams of volunteers will be formed in the cities and municipalities to autonomously organize the referenda.

    In co-creative participation processes, German citizens will also be involved in the experiment’s design.

    This approach is unparalleled: So far, most experiments have been initiated by the government or private institutions. The campaign of Expedition Basic Income is the first to initiate a publicly financed experiment using referenda.

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    To see original article please visit: https://basicincome.org/news/2021/04/expedition-basic-income-launches-grassroots-campaign-for-large-ubi-experiment-in-germany/

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  • Buffalo, NY considering basic income program, funded by marijuana tax

    In the meantime, there are concerns by some in law enforcement officials that the marijuana law will make it tougher to get illegal guns off the streets.

    By Jeff Preval

    It is now officially, official: New York state has become the 16th state to legalize recreational marijuana.

    This now impacts numerous parts of the state’s marijuana laws and puts in motion a system to regulate and tax the drug. There are also concerns about the final draft of the bill that was approved by Governor Andrew Cuomo.

    “What they did, though, was they eliminated the ability to use the smell of marijuana, or smoking marijuana, or possessing marijuana (which is legal now) for a probable cause search of a car, and that is extremely problematic,” Erie County District Attorney John Flynn said.

    While many have celebrated the new marijuana law as a big victory, Flynn has some deep concerns, especially how the law will play out in areas of high crime.

    “I can’t tell you how many illegal weapons that we confiscate out of vehicles especially in the City of Buffalo,” Flynn said.

    He also has concerns about drivers getting behind the wheel after ingesting odorless forms of marijuana.

    “If I can’t identify what the substance is, I cannot prosecute that,” Flynn said.

    The district attorney and advocates for safe driving want to see this language put into the law prohibiting “any substance or combination of substances that impair, to any extent, physical or mental abilities.”

    “Hopefully we do see language and if for some reason there was not any language regarding to that we still make sure and advocate for the fact that there needs to be changes made,” said Isai Fuentes, the program manager of Mothers Against Drunk Driving.

    With revenue from marijuana sales, the City of Buffalo is eyeing long-term plans of possibly implementing a universal basic income program.

    “We’d be looking at potentially providing some income checks to low-income residents in the City of Buffalo, potentially looking at certain zip codes that have been impacted,” Brown said. “It’s just an idea that we’re kicking around. We have made no permanent determination about that.” 

    There are other models nationally of universal basic income having some success.

    “At some point, we will submit some ideas that we have for the community to consider,” Brown said.

    The plan would need Common Council approval.

    “We have a number of people doing research now we’re looking at plans and proposals in other cities across the country,” Brown said.

    Mayor Brown says Buffalo has no plans on opting out of allowing marijuana retail stores in the city.

    On roadway safety, the Governor’s Office says the state Health Department will do a study researching ways to detect marijuana-impaired driving.

    Flynn says he supports aspects of the marijuana law that include keeping driving while impaired by marijuana a misdemeanor.

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    To see original article please visit: https://www.wgrz.com/amp/article/news/local/mayor-brown-city-of-buffalo-considers-universal-basic-income-program-funded-by-marijuana-tax/71-fa63d700-031d-4854-91b0-bcb747a33da2

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  • 125 mothers in Marin County will begin receiving $1000 a month in basic income for two years

    The Marin program will provide $1,000 monthly grants to 125 low wage-earning women of color who are raising at least one child in Marin County.

    By Joshua Sabatini

    Marin County will become the second Bay Area community experimenting with a guaranteed income program designed to improve the fortunes of lower-income residents.

    The Marin program will provide $1,000 monthly grants to 125 low wage-earning women of color who are raising at least one child in Marin County.

    It is being run not by the county but by the non-profit Marin Community Foundation. However, the Marin County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously Tuesday to contribute $400,000 to the program. The foundation will contribute $3 million as well as operating and evaluating the two-year program.

    The Oakland and Marin County programs, which offer unrestricted monthly cash payments, follow on the success of a Stockton program that was one of the nation’s first. Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf announced Tuesday that the city would launch one of the nation’s largest guaranteed income programs — giving $500 a month to 600 low-income families — this spring or summer. The Oakland program will last 18 months. The Stockton program, which provided $500 every month to 125 people for 24 months, was widely considered a success.

    The Marin Community Foundation is a 30-year-old philanthropic group largely funded by the Buck Family Fund with a stated goal to “improve the human condition, embrace diversity, promote a humane and democratic society, and enhance the community’s quality of life, now and for future generations.”

    Johnathan Logan, vice president of community engagement, said the foundation decided to try a guaranteed income program after spending two years talking to 93 low-income mothers struggling to get by and improve their lives in costly Marin County.

    “We heard stories of resilience, we heard stories of hope and optimism, especially for their children but we also heard about the challenges they’re facing,” he said.

    “We decided to do something about it. Unrestricted cash came up several times as a possible approach to supporting these moms.”

    Those selected for the program will be mothers of at least one child younger than 17, and women of color, Logan said, and they’ll be chosen randomly from across the county. The foundation plans to start the program in May. While most of the previous universal guaranteed income programs made monthly payments of $500, the Marin program will pay twice as much.

    The program will also offer supportive services like job training and counseling, which is what Marin County’s contribution will pay for. Other Marin organizations will also contribute, Logan said.

    “Marin County is an expensive county to live in and to make ends meet,” he said. “We felt $1,000 would be an appropriate amount given the high cost of living and especially housing.”

    _____

    Michael Cabanatuan is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: mcabanatuan@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @ctuan

    To see original article please visit: https://www.sfchronicle.com/local/article/1-000-a-month-guaranteed-income-program-coming-16051268.php

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  • San Francisco will provide $1000 a month in basic income to 130 artists for six months

    Eligible artists must be aged 18 and over, have suffered loss of income due to the pandemic and have an artistic practice “rooted in a historically marginalized community.”

    By Joshua Sabatini

    San Francisco on Thursday launched a six-month guaranteed income pilot program that will give 130 local artists affected by the COVID-19 pandemic $1,000 monthly.

    Artists in neighborhoods hardest hit by the pandemic can start applying today to participate and payments to those selected will begin in May, Mayor London Breed announced.

    The initiative, Breed said, is meant to “help our creative sector get through this challenging time.”

    “The arts are truly critical to our local economy and are an essential part of our long-term recovery,” Breed said in a statement.

    “If we help the arts recover, the arts will help San Francisco recover.”

    The Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (YBCA) is administering the program through a $870,000 city grant approved by the Arts Commission in December. The nonprofit will accept applications from eligible artists until April 15.

    “Artists must be given adequate resources to focus on creative output and reinvest in their communities as they navigate the ongoing challenges of living and working through a pandemic,” Deborah Cullinan, YBCA’s CEO, said in a statement.

    “Our learnings from the pilot will be used to advance the wider movement advocating for unrestricted cash payments that provide financial stability to those who need it most, including artists.”

    It is the latest guaranteed income project, also known as universal basic income (UBI), to launch in the nation. The model is growing in popularity for its potential to lift people out of a cycle of poverty, address income inequality and improve health outcomes.

    Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf on Tuesday announced a program where $500 per month will be given to 600 low-income families of color for at least 18 months. Schaaf called the model “one of the most promising tools for systems change, racial equity, and economic mobility we’ve seen in decades.”

    Next month, San Francisco’s newly-formed Guaranteed Income Advisory Group will begin to convene to advise The City on launching a pilot for up to 1,000 participants to receive at least $500 per month without restrictions.

    A final report from the body is due by Dec. 1. The group was formed under legislation introduced by Supervisor Matt Haney and approved by the Board of Supervisors.

    San Francisco is already trying other types of guaranteed income pilots. Last September Breed announced the Abundant Birth Project, where about 150 Black and Pacific Islander women in San Francisco would receive $1,000 monthly income without conditions for the duration of their pregnancy and for the first six months of their baby’s life .

    Last month, Breed and Board President Shamann Walton announced a plan to use an initial $60 million in repurposed law enforcement funding on programs to help the Black community which included $7 million for a guaranteed income pilot program. The detail for this effort have yet to be released.

    The City has talked about a guaranteed income program at least as far back as 2016 as the tech boom exacerbated San Francisco’s income inequality.

    At that time, the Office of the Treasurer and Tax Collector submitted an application for a $100 million grant to the MacArthur Foundation, in partnership with New Haven and Detroit, to pilot a universal basic income project where select low-income families with toddlers would receive $1,000 or $2,000 a month for two years, as previously reported by the San Francisco Examiner. The application was unsuccessful.

    YBCA intends to notify selected applicants by April 20 and they must confirm their participation by May 4.

    Eligible artists must be aged 18 and over, have suffered loss of income due to the pandemic and have an artistic practice “rooted in a historically marginalized community.”

    Artists are broadly defined to include music, dance, creative writing, visual art, performance art, installation, photography, theater, or film. Teaching artists are also eligible.

    There are both income and residency requirements. For a single household an artist could not earn more than $60,900 a year to qualify, while for a household of four the household’s income could not exceed $87,000 a year.

    Artists must be living in 13 of San Francisco’s 27 zip codes, which were selected based on factors including COVID-19 case counts. This includes neighborhoods like the Bayview and the Mission.

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    To see original article please visit: https://www.sfexaminer.com/news/sf-launches-guaranteed-income-pilot-program-for-130-artists/

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  • Eighteen-month basic income pilot for 600 people of color to be launched in Oakland, California

    By Sarah Ravani

    Oakland plans to start a guaranteed income program this spring for 600 residents — one of the largest such programs in the country, city officials said — as Bay Area leaders search for solutions to rising poverty and inequality in the wake of the pandemic.

    Through the pilot program, residents will receive $500 a month for at least 18 months with no strings attached, Mayor Libby Schaaf said at a Tuesday news conference. Checks could be in residents’ hands by this spring or summer. Low-income families — with at least one child under 18 — who are Black, indigenous or people of color will be randomly selected through an application process to vet eligibility, Schaaf said. Officials said those groups suffer from the greatest wealth disparity, according to data on Oakland’s population.

    More than 70,000 people — or 16.7% of Oakland’s population — live in poverty, according to the U.S. Census.

    “Our vision is an Oakland that has closed the racial wealth gap and where all families thrive,” Schaaf said of the Oakland Resilient Families program.

    “We believe that guaranteed income is the most transformative policy that can achieve this vision and whose time has come.”

    In the wake of devastating job losses during the pandemic that have exacerbated housing and food insecurity, guaranteed income is gaining momentum. San Francisco is considering a similar program and voted in December to begin studying a pilot program for between 500 and 1,000 residents.

    Supporters say that guaranteed income, which provides cash payments with no strings attached, can lift people out of poverty, address income inequality, alleviate stress and improve health. Critics say the programs are expensive and could discourage people from working. They also worry that if it replaces other federal programs, as some supporters advocate, it would hurt — rather than help — low-income people.

    Oakland’s program is different than some other cities because it’s focused on people of color.

    In Oakland, residents — regardless of immigration status —who are at or below 50% of area median income — about $59,000 per year for a family of three — are eligible. Half of the spots are reserved for very-low-income families earning below 138% of the federal poverty level — about $30,000 per year for a family of three.

    “The program sounds very promising,” said Candice Elder, executive director of East Oakland Collective, a community organization that helps homeless and low-income people.

    “What we learned from the COVID-19 pandemic is how the community needs universal income… with no strings attached. And I’m glad Oakland is following in the footsteps of Stockton.”

    Oakland is paying for the program with private donations from Blue Meridian Partners, a philanthropic organization focused on poverty. So far, it’s raised more than $6.7 million and about 80% of those funds are going into the hands of residents. The Family Independence Initiative, a national nonprofit based in Oakland focused on fighting poverty, will run the program and it will begin with East Oakland residents before opening applications to other parts of the city.

    Jesús Gerena, the CEO of Family Independence Initiative, said the program will first target East Oakland because it has the “highest concentration of eligible families” and is one of the worst COVID-19 hot spots in the Bay Area.

    Prospective participants can apply now by filling out a multilingual online form with eligibility screening questions. The city’s goal is to get checks into the hands of 300 residents this spring and 300 more by the summer.

    The initiative is modeled after Stockton’s program, which provided $500 every month to 125 people for 24 months. Launched by former Mayor Michael Tubbs, Stockton led one of the first guaranteed income programs in the U.S.

    Tubbs, who lost re-election in 2020, said Tuesday when the program was first launched, opponents said people would stop working and would instead spend their money on drugs and alcohol. That didn’t happen, he said.

    “Civil rights has always been about protection — not just from police brutality but also from the brutality of poverty, the brutality of economic insecurity, the brutality of not being able to know if your bills will be paid every month and not because you’re not working hard,” Tubbs said.

    “We found that people were healthier. People were able to show up as parents, as partners and as neighbors,” he added.

    Jesse Rothstein, a professor of public policy and economics at UC Berkeley, said there is no doubt that giving people money helps. Rothstein, who co-authored a study called Universal Basic Income in the U.S. and Advanced Countries, said studies show that programs like basic income or food stamps help families and result in better outcomes for kids.

    While pilot programs are a critical first step, permanent programs are needed, Rothstein said. And that’s dependent on the federal government getting involved because it requires an “enormous amount of money.”

    “As you think about going beyond the pilot to something more general, you can’t ignore the question of how we are going to come up with the resources,” Rothstein said.

    Schaaf said she hopes that Oakland’s pilot program, as well as others throughout the country, will prove why the federal government needs to invest in guaranteed income.

    Surisa King, a 53-year-old mother who lives in East Oakland, is a disabled veteran who served in the Navy for four years. She receives $1,000 a month for disability and has been struggling financially. She has racked up parking tickets because there’s no available free parking near her apartment and a nearby garage costs $240 a month — which she can’t afford.

    King, who expressed interest in the city’s program, said it’s “very difficult living on a limited income, especially when you factor in food, car insurance, AAA and rent.”

    Phillip DeVaughn, a 66-year-old Oakland resident, said he lost his job as a track and field coach for high school students due to the pandemic. His only income is a $1,700 social security check every month.

    DeVaughn said having that extra $500 a month would help.

    “When I saw the guaranteed income program, it looked like something that could be of benefit to a retiree,” he said before asking how to apply.

    Guaranteed income has gained interest among city leaders in recent years and even some tech leaders, including Mark Zuckerberg. Former presidential candidate Andrew Yang ran his campaign on the idea and announced last May that his nonprofit, Humanity Forward, will issue $500 a month for five years to 20 residents in Hudson, New York.

    Last year, Tubbs formed Mayors for a Guaranteed Income Coalition — which includes mayors from Los Angeles, Pittsburgh, Atlanta and Oakland — to advocate for these programs.

    Councilman Loren Taylor said Oakland’s program has the “benefit” of learning from other similar initiatives.

    “There is a network of public entities, institutions that are doing guaranteed income — we are building on that as opposed to starting from ground zero with a blank slate,” he said.

    Taylor said guaranteed income will most help those struggling the most.

    “It’s definitely exciting,” he said. “It’s huge for Oakland.”

    _____

    Sarah Ravani is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: sravani@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @SarRavani

    To see original article please visit: https://www.sfchronicle.com/local/article/Oakland-to-launch-one-of-the-largest-universal-16045456.php

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  • Two-year basic income pilot for at least 3,000 rural residents to be launched in South Korea

    “The results of this experiment will demonstrate whether basic income is a fleeting issue or a means by which to solve problems such as future income inequality.”

    By Sarah Wray

    Gyeonggi Province is set to launch a publicly funded trial of basic income for rural residents, with a view to providing evidence for local and national expansion. It is understood to be the first universal basic income (UBI) experiment of its type in South Korea.

    The initiative, led by Gyeonggi Province Governor Lee Jaemyung, aims to address challenges such as an ageing society, declining population, job losses and falls in income, as well as the broader threat of job automation.

    Dong-kwang Ahn, a spokesperson for Gyeonggi Provincial Government, told Cities Today:

    “We deem the sustainability crisis of rural areas to be comparable to the national problem that is expected to emerge with the Fourth Industrial Revolution.”

    The details of the pilot are still being finalised but by the second half of this year, between 3,000 and 7,000 rural Gyeonggi residents will begin receiving a payment of between KRW 100,000 (US$89) and KRW 500,000 (US$443) per month. The installments will last for at least two years, regardless of the recipients’ income, assets or employment status. Data will be collected and compared to that of a control group living in a similar area.

    The pilot will study the impact of the basic income on psychological wellbeing, the economy, employment and inequality.

    In a bid to stimulate the local economy, the payments will be provided in a form of regional currency, rather than cash, with a set period in which the funds must be used.

    “We believe that this community-level rural basic income social experiment will provide an opportunity to form a national consensus on basic income, advancing it to the national level,” Ahn said.

    International trend

    The programme highlights the growing international interest in guaranteed income schemes in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic and other societal shifts. As many as 25 US cities plan to launch guaranteed income pilots this year, inspired by the Stockton Economic Empowerment Demonstration (SEED), which recently released positive preliminary results. However, these programmes are mainly on a smaller scale, privately funded and constrained to low-income residents.

    Gyeonggi Province, which is the most populous region in South Korea, has committed KRW 2.7 billion (US$2.4 million) for the pilot and new legislation is underway to support it.

    “Unlike cases in other countries, Gyeonggi Province is considering policies with sustainability in mind…rather than one-time experiments through donation or charity or unstable experiments that do not guarantee regularity,” Ahn said.

    The initiative builds on existing programmes in the province. Under Gyeonggi’s Youth Basic Income programme, all 24-year-old residents receive KRW 250,000 every quarter, totalling KRW 1 million over one year. The policy was launched in 2016 when Governor Lee was Mayor of Seongnam City and has since been expanded throughout the whole province.

    Ahn said recipients have shown “increased levels of social interest, such as greater satisfaction and positivity in life as well as more favourable views of the role of local government.”

    In addition, the Gyeonggi Provincial Government made two rounds of COVID-19 relief payments via local currency to residents and said that through this, “the economic and income distribution effects of basic income have been affirmed”.

    Ahn said: “There is an apparent limitation in determining the effectiveness of universal basic income based only on the examples given above or as one-time payments. So, we have designed an experiment to pinpoint the changes that the basic income policy will bring, as well as problems and complementary aspects, before pursuing a universal basic income policy in the future.”

    “The results of this experiment will demonstrate whether basic income is a fleeting issue or a means by which to solve problems such as future income inequality,” he added.

    Scepticism

    UBI has plenty of detractors, though, many of who question both the premise and its practicality.

    “What proponents of basic income overlook is that individuals need money and public services. And the state must provide those services. But they’ll collapse if UBI is adopted,” Woo Seok-jin, economic professor at Seoul’s Myongji University told Voice of America earlier this month.

    He argued that while he is in favour of more targeted government assistance programmes, de-linking employment and income is too drastic.

    “Pre-empting future risks is good, but changing the system because of a future that hasn’t even arrived yet is just not realistic,” he is quoted as saying.

    _____

    To see original article please visit: https://cities-today.com/korean-local-government-to-pilot-basic-income/

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  • Paterson’s basic income pilot program — 110 families will get $400 a month — moves forward

    Families will not get cash or checks, but debit cards they can use to make purchases. 110 Paterson families will receive $400 per month for one year with no restrictions on how they spend the money.

    By Joe Malinconico

    The City Council seems set to sign off on a program launched by the mayor that would provide 110 Paterson families with $400 per month for one year with no restrictions on how they spend the money.

    Residents later this month will be able to submit applications to participate in a lottery for the 110 slots, a drawing that will be conducted by the Center for Guaranteed Income Research at the University of Pennsylvania’s School of Social Policy and Practice, officials said.

    Those selected to get the monthly installments of $400 would be part of a study being conducted by Penn to examine the impact of the extra money on the recipients’ lives, officials said.

    Another 44 individuals and families would be picked to be part of “a control group” that would not get the added income and would be used by the school as a basis for comparison. Those in the control group would receive things like gift cards in return for their participation, officials said.

    Paterson will be one of about 14 cities around the country participating in the Penn study.

    The money given to participants will come from a $15 million donation that Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey made to a group called Mayors for Guaranteed Income, officials said.

    The City Council discussed the program Tuesday night and is scheduled to vote on whether to approve Paterson’s participation at its meeting next week. Mayor Andre Sayegh has been talking about the initiative for about a year and recently has been holding virtual community and town hall meetings about it. Sayegh said families will not get cash or checks, but debit cards they can use to make purchases.

    Councilman Shahin Khalique said some city residents have been confused about who will pick the people getting the money for the study. Sayegh administration officials said applications will go directly to Penn and that the lottery will be conducted by the university.

    “The council is not choosing; the mayor is not choosing,” said Business Administrator Kathleen Long.

    The income limits for participants are $30,000 for individuals and $88,000 for families, officials said. Applicants must be Paterson residents and ages 18 and above.

    Councilman Luis Velez expressed concern about public perception of the guaranteed income program because the city has a mayoral election next year.

    “We don’t want to send a wrong message,” Velez said. “We’re in an election cycle. It can be used for political gain.”

    Velez suggested the city should run the program through its human services department instead of the mayor’s office. But Councilman Al Abdelaziz said his colleague should focus on the positive aspects of the program and not worry about which city office is handling it.

    “It could come out of the chief custodian’s office as long as the checks get to the families,” Abdelaziz said.

    Councilman Michael Jackson questioned the income limits for the program, saying someone making about $25,000 per year would have much greater need for the extra money than families with annual incomes around $75,000.

    Sayegh administration officials said the income restrictions were based on “living wage” guidelines for New Jersey.

    City officials said residents with questions about the program should text them to 973-531-7301.

    _____

    Joe Malinconico is editor of Paterson Press.

    To see original article please visit: https://www.northjersey.com/story/news/paterson-press/2021/03/04/paterson-nj-guaranteed-income-program-moves-forward/6908037002/

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  • The Biggest Payoff From Stockton’s Basic Income Program: Jobs

    A new report on the California’s city’s no-strings-attached money experiment shows that the $500 monthly stipend did more than improve recipients’ well-being: It helped them find work.

    By Sarah Holder

    In 2019, 125 people in Stockton, California, started receiving $500 a month, no strings attached. The privately funded program, known as the Stockton Economic Empowerment Demonstration (SEED), was designed not only to boost a handful of low-income residents in this struggling city of 300,000 in the Central Valley. It was a rigorous, randomized-control study, meant to evaluate whether, and how, doling out a localized basic income could work, and what happens to those who receive free money.

    This week, a report on the first year of the two-year study was released. Some results document the experiment’s physical and emotional effects:

    People who received the cash reported less pain, anxiety and fatigue, and spent more time with their kids.

    But perhaps the most significant change associated with the program was its effect on their work status:

    Among recipients, the rate of full-time employment leaped 12 percentage points over the course of just one year.

    “The last year has shown us that far too many people were living on the financial edge, and were pushed over it by Covid-19,” said former Stockton Mayor Michael Tubbs, in a statement. “SEED gave people the dignity to make their own choices, the ability to live up to their potential and improved economic stability going into the turmoil of the pandemic.”

    The report released this week was authored by Stacia West, an assistant professor at the University of Tennessee College of Social Work, and Amy Castro Baker, an assistant professor at the University of Pennsylvania in the School of Social Policy and Practice. It draws from data spanning November 2018 through February 2020.

    Given that the pandemic had not yet started, this first report chronicles the effects of “one year of guaranteed income when the economy was somewhat normal but not working” for people, said West, in a Clubhouse conversation on Wednesday evening.

    A second report, due in 2022, will explore how the program fared in a very different economic environment. 

    In an interview with Bloomberg Businessweek last year, Martin and Baker both stressed that the point of an experiment like this wasn’t to magically cure the other social problems that create barriers to housing stability or economic mobility. Their goal wasn’t to get more people working nor let more people quit. And though they tracked how recipients spent their money (mostly on food and necessities, and less than 1% on alcohol or tobacco) they didn’t restrict that spending the way other welfare programs do. The main question they wanted to answer, Baker said, was:

    “To what degree does guaranteed income serve as a financial vaccine?” 

    Based on qualitative and quantitative data pulled from a control group and the treatment group, the researchers found that the $500 a month had a profound impact on the people who received it. Unsurprisingly, income volatility, already above the average baseline for many participants in the study, was 1.5 times higher in the control group than the treatment group. The monthly payments allowed people to absorb unplanned economic shocks, like a car repair or an unpaid sick day. Using the Kessler Psychological Distress scale, which measures anxiety and depression, researchers found that the mood of the cash recipients improved more than that of the control group; fatigue and physical pain dropped, too. 

    Rather than discourage work, the $500 bought the recipients more time to find better work.

    People’s feelings of agency and control over their lives also improved. 

    Participants like Tomas Vargas and Zohna Everett shared stories of finding new employment opportunities and re-opening bank accounts. Lorrine Paradela started sleeping better. In the report, one woman described acquiring a new sense of “chosen vulnerability,” which “included the ability to reduce asking for money or resources from friends and family that people had strained or difficult relationships with, and to limit time in and with relationships they remained in under duress.”

    Such findings won’t surprise anyone following basic income experiments in the U.S. or elsewhere.

    (In a tweet about the report, West characterized the study results, via a paraphrase from her mentor, as “piercing insights into the obvious.”) Results from a trial in Manitoba designed to address rural poverty in the 1970s took years to be analyzed, but eventually a researcher found that recipients were less likely to be hospitalized, and teens who got the cash were more likely to complete high school. Finland’s short-lived UBI program determined that participants reported a happier life. In 2019, Ontario canceled a three-year trial after only two years but found that doctors’ office visits decreased and social relationships were strengthened. The U.S. ran a series of negative income tax experiments in the late 1960s and early ’70s that were also phased out when political tides shifted.

    Still, results on employment effects have tended to be considered inconclusive, or too small to indicate a difference one way or the other. That’s where Stockton’s program breaks new ground: The results show a statistically significant shift in employment prospects for those who participated in the study compared to the control group.

    When the experiment started, in February 2019, 28% of recipients reported having full-time employment. By the next year, that percentage had jumped to 40%.

    The control group, meanwhile, only saw their employment rates rise 5% over that same period, from 32% to 37%. 

    Rather than discourage work, as critics of cash programs like it fear, the $500 bought the recipients more time to find better work, West said: time to apply for a new job, to buy a nice suit for the job interview, to find childcare and transportation. And the statistics don’t account for the recipients who have long been doing work that doesn’t get counted as income, like care work in the home — or the people who got the benefit of freedom to quit a job with volatile hours and poor pay. Cities are changing fast. Keep up with the CityLab Daily newsletter.

    Matt Zwolinski, the director of the Center for Ethics, Economics and Public Policy at the University of San Diego, sounded a more cautionary note about the results, telling the Associated Press that “Tubbs’ claim that this experiment proves that a basic income doesn’t negatively affect employment is overstated,” because of the limited duration of the study: Knowing that the $500 payments were finite could deter people from exiting the labor market entirely. 

    Stockton’s experiment ended in January 2021,and so did Tubbs’ time in City Hall — he lost his reelection bid in November.

    But the organization he started in 2020, Mayors for a Guaranteed Income, now has 40 mayors on board, half of whom have committed to starting pilots in their communities and to advocating for federal action.

    SEED has already been eclipsed in duration and scope by the Magnolia Mothers’ Fund, which is starting its third cycle, giving a new group of Black mothers in Jackson, Mississippi $1,000 a month. 

    Advocates hope that the other findings that will trickle out of these basic income-piloting cities over the coming months will push the idea further into the national conversation. Tubbs definitely sees a role for it now, as Congress argues over minimum wage and considers a pared-down Covid aid bill that narrows eligibility requirements. 

    “The data proves that, particularly in a pandemic, it’s not wise policy to make less people eligible for what we know is necessary and needed,” Tubbs said in a press conference. 

    _____

    To see original article please visit: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-03-05/what-did-500-a-month-buy-in-stockton-jobs

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  • Cash Is Turning Out to Be the Most Effective Welfare

    For too long people in need have been stereotyped as lazy and dependent. Cash payments give them the breathing room to chart a better life course.

    Opinion by Noah Smith

    Biden’s $1.9 trillion Covid-19 relief bill has passed the Senate, clearing the way for it to become law. Much of the legislation is dedicated to handing out cash to individual Americans. This is a sign post for a tectonic shift that’s underway in U.S. policy thinking toward unconditional money transfers as the optimal way to help people in need.

    When I was a kid in the 1980s and 1990s, everyone was talking about “a hand up, not a handout.” This was the mantra of workfare—the idea of using government programs to incentivize labor and self-betterment.

    In 1996, President Bill Clinton signed the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act, which turned the old Aid to Families with Dependent Children welfare program into a state-administered block grant with work requirements. Meanwhile, the flagship next-generation welfare programs touted by economists and so-called “third way” reformers were the Earned Income Tax Credit and the Child Tax Credit, which only give people money if they also manage to earn some income for themselves.

    A quarter century later, America is reevaluating this approach. One reason is that workfare just didn’t seem to be that effective. Mothers were the main group who were supposed to be pushed toward work by welfare reform and the EITC-style programs.

    But more than two decades later, the prime-age employment-to-population ratio for women is basically the same as in 1996:

    Not Working Out So Well

    Job-focused welfare reform hasn’t done much to improve women’s participation in the workforce.

    Source: Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis

    In a recent paper, economist Henrik Kleven reviewed the evidence that EITC encourages work, and found it was pretty shaky. It seems that the old saw that welfare recipients choose to live off of government benefits instead of getting a job was never particularly accurate, and instead the number of people who work is mainly limited by the available job opportunities.

    In fact, evidence is starting to pile up in favor of cash transfers. A 2018 literature review by Ioana Marinescu finds that various unconditional transfer programs tend to boost incomes, as well as health and education. And despite the widespread belief that welfare benefits encourage people not to work, that outcome appears small. For programs that give out cash unconditionally — like the payouts from the Alaska Permanent Fund, which distributes natural resource revenues to the people of Alaska — the reduction in employment is negligible.

    In fact, some new evidence shows that unconditional cash handouts might even encourage work. In a recent experiment, some philanthropists randomly selected 125 residents of poor neighborhoods in the city of Stockton, California, to receive $500 a month in cash. Instead of working less, the people who got the cash actually worked more!

    This result dovetails with a new understanding of how poverty keeps people down. The old theory that poverty is caused by a culture of dependency just doesn’t seem to hold water. Instead, poor people seem to be weighed down by a whole host of small risks and hassles. Those day-to-day difficulties make it very hard for poor people to better their situations; to go to school to become a nurse instead of a cashier, to move to a better neighborhood, to look for a better job. Instead of working on their futures, poor people are trapped by the need to pay the bills of the moment. 

    In this theory, cash helps boost people out of poverty by helping them fend off daily troubles; by greasing the wheels of life and giving them a cushion against risks. Helping them afford the essentials provides more breathing room to think about the next step in life.

    Interviews with the Stockton residents who received the $500 a month spent it almost entirely on necessities like food and utilities. In interviews, they reported feeling more confident, engaged and entrepreneurial — which fits with the observation that they were more likely to go get full-time jobs. It also fits with the substantial body of evidence that a strong social safety net encourages people to start more businesses.Opinion. Data. More Data.Get the most important Bloomberg Opinion pieces in one email.EmailSign UpBy submitting my information, I agree to the Privacy Policy and Terms of Service and to receive offers and promotions from Bloomberg.

    In other words, a handout, more often than not, is actually a hand up. This realization is fueling a growing consensus that cash benefits are the way forward for the U.S. Popular books and political campaigns are starting to advocate universal basic incomes. Think tanks like the Washington Center for Equitable Growth, with strong ties to the Biden administration, are advocating more cash benefits as the first line of defense against poverty.

    And the Biden administration is listening. The new Covid relief bill — poised to be the administration’s first major legislative success — has no less than five major cash-transfer programs.

    These include $1,400 checks to Americans making up to $75,000, an additional $300 a week in unemployment benefits through Sept. 6, and assistance for rent and health care.

    But most importantly, the bill includes a child allowance of $250 to $300 a month per child (depending on age). That adds up to $6,000 a year for a family with two kids older than age 6 — a very substantial boost to income. And it comes with no work requirements. If the benefit becomes permanent after this year, as many expect, it will transform the U.S. welfare system.

    That’s a good thing.

    For too long, low-income Americans have been forced to scrabble constantly just to stay afloat, denied cash by politicians who stereotype them as lazy and dependent.

    The new child allowance will give them the breathing room they need to work for a better tomorrow. And it will serve as a test run for even more unconditional cash programs, like a universal basic income. When it comes to boosting people out of poverty, it seems that cash really is king.

    _____

    Noah Smith is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist. He was an assistant professor of finance at Stony Brook University, and he blogs at Noahpinion.

    To see original article please visit: https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-03-09/covid-relief-cash-may-be-the-welfare-of-the-future

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  • What a Modest Basic Income Might Have Done for My Mom

    A guaranteed income gives people the mental, physical and economic benefits that come with a basic level of financial security — including the ability to go back to school and invest in the future. We need to summon the political will to make this reality.

    By Sukhi Samra

    At 53 years old, my mom began studying for the GED. She had enrolled in GED courses twice before, but dropped out because there just weren’t enough hours in the day to juggle school, work, three daughters and a disabled husband. This time, however, was going to be different. In her own words: “I’m not stopping. I want to prove to myself that I can do this, even if I reach retirement age before I finish.”

    After 25 years working multiple minimum-wage jobs to make ends meet, my mom was determined to break the cycle of economic insecurity and find a job with benefits.

    Since coming to the United States from Punjab, India, in 1995, my mom had been a gas station clerk, a Subway cashier and a house cleaner; in her “free time,” she was an unpaid caretaker for my dad.

    The trauma of poverty was etched in her life in small ways and big. She battled high blood pressure and arthritis; she suffered depression and anxiety, her mind perpetually racing because we didn’t have the savings to weather an emergency.

    My mom’s GED dream never came true — she passed away unexpectedly in June.

    But she might have had a better shot earlier in her life had she received a small financial assist to give her enough stability to seek a better future.

    The two-year guaranteed income experiment in Stockton shows what a difference monthly cash payments can make for people struggling to stay afloat — people like my mom. Begun in February 2019, the Stockton Economic Empowerment Demonstration (SEED), the nation’s first such mayor-led project, paid $500 per month for 24 months to 125 randomly selected residents living in neighborhoods that are at or below Stockton’s median household income. The cash was unconditional, with no strings attached and no work requirements.

    New data from the first year of SEED show that the effects were profound. The payments made recipients more financially stable, with reduced fluctuations in monthly household income. The guaranteed income also enabled them to make payments on their debt and provided more liquidity to pay for unexpected expenses. The recipients were also healthier and happier.

    Financial stability alleviated anxiety and depression, and they experienced statistically significant improvements in emotional health, energy levels and emotional well-being.

    These results reflect the outcomes in other guaranteed income projects. A three-year experiment in Manitoba, Canada, saw an 8.5% decrease in hospitalizations for mental health, accidents and injuries. In Finland’s guaranteed income experiment, recipients reported a 37% decrease in depression levels and a 22% improvement in confidence for the future, as compared with the control group.

    And contrary to the popular criticism that giving people money will reduce the incentive to work, employment data from SEED shows that recipients pursued and were able to find full-time work.

    Recipients found full-time employment at more than twice the rate of those in the control group. In February 2019, 28% of recipients had full-time employment. One year later, 40% of recipients were employed full time.

    Why? Because an income floor of just $500 a month gave recipients the emotional and financial capacity for risk-taking. A growing body of research suggests that poverty fundamentally changes one’s brain, activating a person’s fight-or-flight response.

    Typically, the response is triggered by a frightening or dangerous event; when the event is over, the stress response switches off.

    For those experiencing chronic poverty or economic insecurity, the switch stays on, overloading one’s ability to set goals, solve problems or complete tasks. When brain capacity is used worrying about how to keep the lights on, make rent or feed one’s family, there’s simply no bandwidth for anything else.

    SEED alleviated some of this stress, offering the breathing room needed to plan for the future. Take for example Tomas, a SEED recipient who started the program working multiple unstable jobs to provide for his family. The $500 allowed him to take time off of work to interview for a better position, and he now has a full-time job as a youth mentor at a local nonprofit. Or Zohna, who shifted from participating in the gig economy as a DoorDash driver to gaining full-time employment at Tesla.

    At first glance, many of these findings feel intuitive. Who wouldn’t be less stressed and anxious with more money? Yet, somehow, policy choices in this country defy this simple logic.

    Instead, government policies penalize poverty and codify the false narrative that people are poor because of their own bad choices and moral shortcomings. The public benefits system has been gutted even as corporations and the wealthy are given enormous tax giveaways. This is not a coincidence.

    My mom was the hardest worker I’ve ever known, and she did not deserve to be poor. No one does.

    A guaranteed income gives people the mental, physical and economic benefits that come with a basic level of financial security — including the ability to go back to school and invest in the future. We need to summon the political will to make this reality.

    _____

    Sukhi Samra is director of the Stockton Economic Empowerment Demonstration project and the director of Mayors for a Guaranteed Income.

    To see original article please visit: https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2021-03-09/guaranteed-income-universal-basic-stockton-program

    The post What a Modest Basic Income Might Have Done for My Mom appeared first on Basic Income Today.

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  • New book, The Case for Basic Income, explores current challenges in todays climate

    “Although there is now a little library of books on Basic Income, we believe that our effort is unique in that it tells detailed, personal stories of people in Lindsay and Hamilton who received BI from 2017 to 2019 when the Ontario BI Pilot was in operation,” says Swift.

    By Jessica Foley

    The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed many discrepancies in our society. One of these inequalities, the idea of a liveable and obligation-free basic income (BI), is the subject of a new book by authors Jamie Swift and Elaine Power.

    The Case for Basic Income distills decades of research, in order to present the history of basic income and examine the issue in the context of current challenges to the job market, including precarious employment, automation, the climate crisis, and COVID-19, according to a press release from ZG Stories, who are promoting the book.

    Power came to Kingston in 2004 to begin a faculty position in what is now the School of Kinesiology and Health Studies at Queen’s University. Soon after her arrival, she sought out local anti-poverty activists and met Swift. A longtime social justice advocate, Swift took part in a weekly social justice vigil that started in 1995, standing in front of Kingston City Hall on Fridays.

    “That’s when a poor-bashing provincial government slashed social assistance by 22 per cent,” Swift said. “Those rates have never recovered. Many people live in poverty, obliged to wonder every single day about paying for food, shelter, and other basics.

    “Poverty produces uncertainty and insecurity, generating anxiety that, in a perverse cascade effect, produces stress-related disease. Millions of our fellow citizens – especially racialized people and newcomers who aspire to citizenship – are colonized by stress and uncertainty.”

    At Queen’s, Power developed and taught HLTH 101, The Social Determinants of Health, which examines the impacts of social factors, including income and education, on health. “Income is one of the most important determinants of health, operating through multiple pathways,” Swift shared with Kingstonist. “After guest speaker Rob Rainer came to Elaine’s class to discuss the idea of Basic Income to eliminate poverty, Rob joined a gathering of interested Kingstonians, including the authors, to discuss the development of an advocacy campaign to promote Basic Income.”

    Within two years the Kingston Action Group for a Basic Income Guarantee had succeeded in getting City Council to pass, unanimously, a motion in support of Basic Income.

    Kingston was the first city in Canada to do so, and many other municipalities have followed suit.

    After the Ontario Basic Income Pilot was announced (2016), the pair discussed the idea of writing a book using stories of Pilot participants. Swift was looking for a new project, having finished a book on how Canada commemorates First World War, titled The Vimy Trap. “Elaine had become a Basic Income advocate, travelling around, making presentations of the need for a BI, while amassing a fat bibliography of academic material that supported the policy proposal,” Swift said.

    “At the same time, interest in an idea that went back to the 16th century had been growing. The time seemed right.”

    They were in the midst of doing interviews for the book when the Ontario Basic Income Pilot was cancelled by the Doug Ford government (Aug, 1, 2018) after less than half of its committed three-year time span.

    “The lives of 4,000 low-income Ontarians enrolled in the Pilot in Hamilton, Lindsay and Thunder Bay were thrown into turmoil,” Swift said. “The rigourous scientific data collection plan was cancelled, a huge blow to social science- and evidence-based public policy decision making. The Pilot had attracted attention from media, social scientists, and basic income advocates around the world. Its loss was also felt globally.”

    “Our book’s dedication reads: To the 4,000 courageous people who took a chance on the Ontario Basic Income Pilot — and whose good faith hopes were shattered when a Progressive Conservative government arbitrarily and prematurely cancelled it,” he said.

    “Although there is now a little library of books on BI (sign of the spreading interest), we believe that our effort is unique in that it tells detailed, personal stories of people in Lindsay and Hamilton who received BI from 2017 to 2019 when the Ontario BI Pilot was in operation,” shared Swift.

    “So it’s the time-tested, journalistic device of using people (and place, as well) as prisms though which issues are reflected — Humanizing, personalizing.

    “We really hope these stories can help personalize issues around BI, although the book is surely chockablock with data and analysis.”

    The Case for Basic Income will be available on May 3, 2021 at book retailers everywhere.

    _____

    To see original article please visit: https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2021/03/08/new-book-the-case-for-basic-income-explores-current-challenges-in-todays-climate.html

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  • Moderate Democrats Strip Stimulus Checks From 12 Million Voters for No Reason

    Opinion by Eric Levitz

    For weeks, a handful of moderate Democrats in the Senate have been fighting to prevent $1,400 COVID-relief checks from reaching their own upper-middle-class constituents. It has never been all that clear to the public — or, by all appearances, to the senators themselves — why they wanted to restrict eligibility for these relief payments so badly. It is not as though Joe Manchin or Jeanne Shaheen are opposed to welfare for the affluent in all forms. To the contrary, Shaheen has lambasted Republicans for restricting the state-and-local-income (SALT) deduction, a tax subsidy that primarily benefits well-off homeowners.

    Nor could the moderates’ opposition be chalked up to (superstitious) fears of high deficits:

    Every Democratic senator has already tacitly agreed to support a $1.9 trillion stimulus package, and eligibility restrictions under discussion were always too minor to significantly impact the legislation’s bottom line.

    Nor could moderates claim to have the public on their side; the relief checks were overwhelmingly popular in their initially proposed form. And on this issue, one can’t attribute the moderates’ resistance to fealty to corporate interests; large retailers love stimulus checks.

    Nevertheless, despite the fact that Senate moderates had no coherent political or substantive argument for their position, the Democratic leadership caved to their demand Wednesday. As the Washington Post reports:

    Under the plan passed by the House, individuals earning up to $75,000 per year and couples making up to $150,000 per year would qualify for the full $1,400 stimulus payment. The size of the payments then begins to scale down before zeroing out for individuals making $100,000 per year and couples making $200,000.

    Under the changes agreed to by Biden and Senate Democratic leadership, individuals earning $75,000 per year and couples earning $150,000 would still receive the full $1,400-per-person benefit. However, the benefit would disappear for individuals earning more than $80,000 annually and couples earning more than $160,000.

    That means singles making between $80,000 and $100,000 and couples earning between $160,000 and $200,000 would be newly excluded from a partial benefit under the revised structure Biden agreed to.

    Here are the two big downsides to this measure:

    • It means that 12 million fewer adults and 5 million fewer kids will receive relief checks from the bill. Whereas 91 percent of U.S. households would have received a check under the previous proposal, now only 86 percent will. That’s not a huge difference. But these days, elections are often won in the margins. And Joe Biden’s Electoral College win in 2020 was contingent on the support of affluent, longtime Republicans who decided to cross the aisle.

    Now, a bunch of these voters will end up receiving less in direct cash assistance from Joe Biden than they did from Donald Trump.

    • Since Democrats chose to narrow eligibility by accelerating the phase down in the value of the checks, they effectively engineered a confiscatory marginal tax rate for a small band of workers: A single taxpayer who earned $80,000 in 2020 will effectively pay a 70 percent tax rate on their last $5,000 of income. And since Americans have the option to claim a relief check on the basis of their 2021 incomes, Democrats have now actually given some workers a strong incentive to work fewer hours, so as to avoid a radically higher tax rate. That isn’t a huge concern for progressives. But “discouraging work” is typically the sort of thing moderate Democrats don’t want fiscal policy to do. Meanwhile, those who took on extra hours last year — assuming that they would not pay a 70 percent rate on income above $75,000 — are not happy!

    So, what do Democrats gain at the cost of denying checks to 12 million potential 2022 voters? How much money did Joe Manchin “save” the U.S. Treasury?

    According to a Democratic who spoke with the Washington Post’s Jeff Stein: $12 billion.

    Which is to say, it makes the relief package 0.63 percent cheaper.

    Slate’s Jordan Weissmann reports that the move is partially motivated by the byzantine rules of the budget-reconciliation process, which imposes a cap on how much money each committee is allowed to spend. One reason the Democratic leadership decided to cave to moderates on checks was that they wanted to make sure that the Senate Finance Committee’s appropriations remain under its assigned limit once the Congressional Budget Office scores the bill. Twelve billion dollars isn’t much in the context of the entire bill, but could be enough to keep the Finance Committee’s section under its ceiling.

    But this still doesn’t constitute a rational basis for creating a 70 percent tax rate on income above $75,000 — while giving 12 million voters a reason to resent your party.

    The Finance Committee has jurisdiction over the $350 billion pool of fiscal aid to state and local governments. That is more than six times larger than the revenue shortfall these governments are expected to collectively face this fiscal year. There are sound reasons for providing state and local governments with more fiscal space than they require to meet existing obligations; in many parts of the country, municipal governments have been hollowed out in recent decades. But from a political and substantive perspective, shaving $12 billion off a pile of money that many red states are probably going to spend on tax cuts makes more sense than canceling relief checks to a significant minority of the Democratic base.

    Moderates must stop putting their fringe obsessions ahead of the Democratic Party’s best interests. Now is not the time to put centrist ideological purity above political pragmatism.

    _____

    To see original article please visit: https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/03/1400-stimulus-checks-eligibility-democrats-covid-relief-bill.html

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  • Stockton, California gave some residents $500 a month for two years. After a year, the group wound up with more full-time jobs and less depression

    By Aria Bendix

    • In Stockton, California, 125 residents got $500 per month, no strings attached, for two years.
    • After a year, full-time employment among them had increased, and depression and anxiety had decreased.
    • The experiment ended in January but has inspired other mayors to launch more basic-income pilots.

    Michael Tubbs didn’t see much risk in giving money to his city’s poorest residents, no strings attached. The former mayor of Stockton, a city in California’s Central Valley, is a strong proponent of universal basic income, a policy that essentially pays people for being alive as a way to alleviate poverty.

    “My belief in it came from being raised by three amazing women, including my single mom,” Tubbs told Insider.

    “The issue wasn’t that they couldn’t manage money. The issue was they never had enough money to manage.”

    As mayor, Tubbs spearheaded the Stockton Economic Empowerment Demonstration, a pilot program that gave 125 residents debit cards loaded with $500 each month. The program launched in February 2019 and ended in January.

    Its critics argued that cash stipends would reduce the incentive for people to find jobs. But the SEED program met its goal of improving the quality of life of 125 residents struggling to make ends meet. To qualify for the pilot, residents had to live in a neighborhood where the median household income was the same as or lower than the city’s overall, about $46,000.

    A new report from a team of independent researchers found that Stockton’s program reduced unemployment among participants during its first year and helped many of them pay off debt. The report studied the effects of the payments from February 2019 through February 2020. SEED participants also reported improvements in their emotional well-being and decreases in anxiety or depression.

    “It’s really made a huge impact on my quality of life and being able to go do just normal things that a lot of people take for granted,” one participant said in the report.

    “Whether it’s go out to eat once every two weeks and sit down for a nice dinner, or whether it’s, you know, my mom’s birthday and I just want to get her a birthday present.”

    Tubbs said it was likely that the $500 monthly payments helped in other ways during the pandemic, such as tiding people over until their stimulus checks arrived or allowing them to take days off work if they got COVID-19.

    “We know anecdotally that the $500 allowed some members of the program to stay at home and not go to work because they don’t have paid time off,” Tubbs said.

    “They were able to listen to the doctor because they knew that the two weeks off work wouldn’t be catastrophic.”

    Michael Tubbs
    Mayor Michael Tubbs discussing basic income in Stockton. 

    Most of the money went toward food and merchandise

    Participants in Stockton’s basic-income program spent most of their stipends on essential items.

    Nearly 37% of the recipients’ payments went toward food, while 22% went toward sales and merchandise, such as trips to Walmart or dollar stores. Another 11% was spent on utilities, and 10% was spent on auto costs. Less than 1% of the money went toward alcohol or tobacco.

    By February 2020, more than half of the participants said they had enough cash to cover an unexpected expense, compared with 25% of participants at the start of the program. The portion of participants who were making payments on their debts rose to 62% from 52% during the program’s first year.

    Unemployment among basic-income recipients dropped to 8% in February 2020 from 12% in February 2019. In the experiment’s control group — those who didn’t receive monthly stipends — unemployment rose to 15% from 14%.

    Lorrine Paradela, a 45-year-old single mother, participated in Stockton’s basic-income pilot. Nick Otto/AFP/Getty Images

    Full-time employment among basic-income recipients rose to 40% from 28% during the program’s first year. In the control group, full-time employment increased as well, though less dramatically: to 37% from 32%.

    “Everything I thought would happen, I said would happen — I argued with Sarah Palin and Chuck Woolery and talked to ‘CBS This Morning’ and Bill Maher about — actually happened,” Tubbs said.

    “I remember telling people, ‘I think that $500 will allow people to work more if they choose to do so.’ And that playing out in the data, it makes me so proud.”

    The researchers also found that decreases in anxiety, depression, and extreme financial stress encouraged participants to set goals and helped them better cope with unexpected financial setbacks.

    “I had panic attacks and anxiety,” one participant said in the report. “I was at the point where I had to take a pill for it, and I haven’t even touched them in a while.”

    Basic income faces an uphill political battle

    Tubbs lost his reelection bid in November, but his departure didn’t affect the SEED program, since it was always designed to be temporary.

    stockton california
    A pedestrian walks through downtown Stockton on February 7, 2020. 

    Tubbs’ vision is to make basic income a national policy. In June, he launched Mayors for a Guaranteed Income, a coalition of mayors interested in starting similar basic-income pilots across the US. At least 40 mayors, including Eric Garcetti of Los Angeles, Keisha Lance Bottoms of Atlanta, and Jenny Durkan of Seattle, have joined the group. Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey donated $18 million to the cause.

    Inspired by Stockton’s trial, Saint Paul, Minnesota, started a basic-income pilot in the fall, giving $500 a month to 150 low-income families for up to 18 months.

    Richmond, Virginia, is distributing $500 per month to 18 working families. And Compton, California, is giving 800 residents a guaranteed income of $300 to $600 a month for two years.

    No Republican mayor has joined Mayors for a Guaranteed Income — and interest in a basic-income policy skews heavily Democratic. Andrew Yang, a 2020 Democratic presidential candidate, made basic income a prominent part of his campaign platform, pledging to give $1,000 a month to every US citizen over 18.

    Tubbs said there was more than enough research to suggest that a federal basic-income policy would improve Americans’ quality of life.

    “I am so proud of all the pilots, but I’m ready for policy,” Tubbs said. “I’ve got all the evidence I need.”

    _____

    To see original article please visit: https://www.businessinsider.com/stockton-basic-income-experiment-success-employment-wellbeing-2021-3

    The post Stockton, California gave some residents $500 a month for two years. After a year, the group wound up with more full-time jobs and less depression appeared first on Basic Income Today.

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  • The pros and cons of universal basic income

    Unconditional cash payments to residents are more of a floor to stand on than a safety net, say these Carolina scholars in light of a proposed pilot project to give $500 per month to formerly incarcerated Durham, North Carolina, residents.

    By Logan Ward

    The idea of governments giving residents no-strings-attached cash payments is picking up steam, due in part to the economic impact of the coronavirus pandemic. Last June, Mayor Michael Tubbs of Stockton, California, created Mayors for a Guaranteed Income, a coalition to “advocate for a guaranteed income — direct, recurring cash payments — that lifts all of our communities, building a resilient, just America.”

    Durham Mayor Steve Schewel joined the group. In January, Schewel announced that Durham was one of 30 U.S. cities being considered to receive a $500,000 slice of a $15 million gift from Twitter co-founder and CEO Jack Dorsey. The money would fund Universal Basic Income pilot projects, such as the Stockton Economic Empowerment Demonstration.

    Durham council member Mark-Anthony Middleton announced that Durham’s proposed project would guarantee $500 per month to 55 formerly incarcerated residents until the pandemic ends and the city’s economy recovers.

    Before the pandemic hit, 2020 Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang put UBI, also known as guaranteed basic income, on the map by making it his signature policy. His proposed “Freedom Dividend” — $1,000 per month payments to every American adult — was a response to job displacement by automation.

    For a deeper understanding of this issue, The Well spoke with two Carolina faculty members who have studied UBI. Fabian Wendt, a teaching assistant professor in the College of Arts & Sciences’ philosophy department and the philosophy, politics & economics program, first came across UBI while studying theories of distributive justice. Doug MacKay, associate professor in the College’s public policy department, grew interested in UBI through research into paternalism in the U.S. social safety net.

    What is universal basic income?

    Wendt: It is a regular cash payment by the government that is given on a monthly or annual basis. It’s unconditional in several respects. In contrast to many other welfare programs that you only get when you prove your willingness to work, a UBI would be unconditional in that respect. It would also be unconditional on what money you make, what you have in general and on what contribution you made to finance the UBI.

    Finally, it would be unconditional on your family situation, on whether you’re married or not.

    UBI is probably best conceived as a floor to stand on, not as a safety net.

    A safety net is only meant to catch you when you need it, which requires some institution to test whether you really need it, and that opens up all these worries about paternalism, bureaucracy and so on, whereas the UBI would be a floor to stand on for everybody.

    MacKay: I completely agree with Fabian’s description. UBI is a platform to stand on and to build a life on. But it’s not something that’s going to allow you to live a great life. The sort of numbers that we’re talking about are, at most, $1,000 a month per person. People will still have a strong motivation to work.

    What are the goals of UBI?

    MacKay: The goals really differ, depending on the policymaker but also on who’s proposing it. I think for a lot of folks on the left, they see it as more a platform to build your life on. So it’s going to be there for you when you when you need it. If you think about the pandemic, when people are losing their jobs, it takes a long time for government to react.

    Had we had a basic income in place, that would have been a way of ensuring people are secure, have the ability to meet their basic needs and live a dignified human life. They don’t need to appeal to various agencies. They have consistency in terms of being able to afford housing, food and so on. It’s an anti-poverty measure.

    You also see from people on the left the idea of UBI as promoting freedom. Oftentimes we talk about freedom as being freedom from constraints.

    Some folks on the right, libertarians in particular, emphasize the need for government to stay out of our lives. And thinkers on the left often point out that if people are just leaving you alone, you might be unlimited in terms of choices, but you’re not actually going to be able to do anything unless you have resources. So the idea is that if people have a platform to build their lives off, they have resources every month. They can actually do things. They can meet their needs. They can pursue various projects.

    On the right side of the political spectrum, people see UBI as potentially realizing a number of goals. One, they emphasize this is anti-paternalistic in nature. There’s an element of government not interfering with the lives of individuals by imposing all these conditionalities on them, but rather just letting them be free to live their lives as they see fit with the income.

    The other thing that folks on the right emphasize is the way UBI might allow you to shrink the size of government. People on the left often think of basic income as something we’re going to add to the safety net and keep much of the safety net intact. People on the right often see it as a replacement:

    We’re going to give people a guaranteed income, and we’re going to get rid of a whole host of social safety net programs that cost a lot of money and require a lot of people to administer.

    Wendt: One thing I found interesting about Andrew Yang’s proposal was his idea to let people choose whether they either take the UBI or keep the benefits from current programs.

    Another thing different proponents will disagree upon is how high UBI should be. A thousand dollars a month was Yang’s proposal, but you could also go much lower or much higher. Maybe even “as high as is sustainable,” as [Belgian philosopher and economist and chief UBI proponent Philippe] Van Parijs would say.

    Its sustainability will depend on how high it is pitched, but also on how it’s financed. It seems very natural to think that it would be financed through the income tax. That would make it a close relative to a negative income tax proposal, which was popular in the 1960s and ’70s. [The influential American economist] Milton Friedman was a famous advocate of that. But Andrew Yang and others propose a mix in terms of how it’s financed. It could also be a sales tax or capital income tax or some other way.

    Andrew Yang put UBI on the map, but what’s driving it and why now?

    Wendt: 

    UBI has often been seen as a response to the challenge of automation — the worry that many people are going to become unemployed and replaced by machines.

    For example, truck drivers will lose their jobs once there are automated trucks. In the end, that’s not a new concern, though. People have worried that machines would replace jobs at least since the 19th century, but usually new types of jobs were always created elsewhere.

    The idea of a UBI was brought up last spring as a response to the pandemic — an emergency UBI. The coronavirus hit so hard. Many people felt like this was a chance to get some serious reform of the welfare state going. In the end we got the stimulus checks instead, which were not completely different, but a one-time thing, and not unconditional. The checks depended on how much you earned.

    One thing to emphasize is also how UBI would empower women. It gives working mothers cash to pay for childcare, for example, or it makes it easier to leave an abusive husband if you have something to rely on that is independent from the family situation.

    MacKay: The other thing I would point to are concerns about income inequality. I don’t think this is necessarily a great solution to the problem of income inequality, but I think the economic anxiety leads people to UBI.

    Is there evidence that UBI works?

    MacKay: There’s been a variety of studies. There were a couple of really famous experiments in the ’70s in Canada and here in the United States. There was a really interesting study in Manitoba in the late ’70s, where they had a whole town that was subject to a guaranteed income policy — a floor that families would not fall below. A lot of randomized controlled trials in low-income countries have been using cash transfers since the late ’80s, early ’90s. Some of these are conditional cash transfers.

    In Mexico, for example, you might get a cash transfer from the government if you send your kids to school and take them for yearly doctor visits. And there was one recently in Finland, where they gave $500 per month to unemployed folks.

    These are high-quality studies.

    The evidence has shown that the UBI programs are pretty effective in a number of different ways.

    The caveat I would give is that they happen in different contexts, and the interventions are very different.

    Wendt: An experiment in Kenya is the largest. It involves around 20,000 people and unconditional cash payments that cover basic needs. It started in 2017 and will last 12 years. There are four different groups. One group gets the cash for the whole 12 years. Another group gets paid up front rather than on a monthly basis, I believe. Another group receives payments for a shorter period of time. And then there’s a control group that doesn’t get any cash. Some people reported that it has changed how women see their role in the household, because they felt entitled to have a say over how to spend the money.

    What are the main points of criticism against UBI?

    MacKay: A big one is a reciprocity worry — that in order to get access to public benefits, you should be at least willing to participate in the labor market.

    Think of the earned-income tax credit. That’s a cash transfer that goes to low-income Americans. But to get access to it, you need to be participating in the labor force. A lot of programs like SNAP [the federal government’s Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, also known as the Food Stamp Program] and TANF [Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, another federal program] have work requirements attached to them. The Trump administration was trying to attach a work requirement to Medicaid programs, as well. The thought is, you should only get access to public benefits if you are participating in the formal labor market and earning an income.

    The question they ask is: Why should some group of individuals be participating in the labor force and paying taxes to fund a UBI for other people who aren’t participating in the labor market?

    One of the responses to this is that UBI recognizes all those forms of contribution to society that aren’t remunerated. Think about parents taking care of their children or poor people taking care of elderly family members.

    There’s lots of ways in which people contribute to society. And you can think of a UBI as reciprocating in that sense, remunerating people for those contributions.

    Wendt: Another common worry is that UBI is a waste of money on the wealthy. Why should all of those wealthy people get a monthly check? If the goal is to do something about poverty, then why UBI, since the rich by definition are not poor? That’s an understandable concern for sure. But the reply there is that depending on how the UBI is financed, the rich will not be net beneficiaries. They will contribute more to finance the UBI than what they get as their monthly check.

    What do you think about the Durham proposal?

    MacKay: This is the first time I’ve heard of a guaranteed income program that’s aimed at people coming out of prison. I think it makes perfect sense. Part of the justification here is that people with a felony record face a lot of difficulty in terms of accessing other public programs. I think they’re actually banned for at least some period of time from federal housing programs and from receiving SNAP benefits. Felons face a lot of difficulty getting jobs. Employers can legitimately ask if they have a record and deny them employment on that basis. So it makes a lot of sense that you would target this type of pilot project at those folks.

    If you think about who needs a platform in American society, it’s going to be people who don’t have access to these other programs and are economically vulnerable in terms of not being able to get a job.

    And so I think it makes a lot of sense that you would target the program this way.

    Oftentimes we discuss UBI as a major transformation to society, as a sort of utopian policy. That draws a lot of attention.

    But I think the discussion might lead to a simpler idea — just using cash payments in more of our social safety net programs. That might be more sustainable, more cost effective, than trying to try to implement a full UBI type policy.

    For that reason, what’s happening in Durham — a guaranteed income for a very narrow group of individuals — is really interesting.

    One thing the pandemic has shown us is that the government got a little bit more comfortable with giving cash payments to people. Another thing I’m really excited about are these proposals to expand the child tax credit, both coming from [Mitt] Romney and also coming from the Democrats, which you might think of as a basic income for kids. Every month, they would get a certain amount of money, maybe a few hundred dollars. The parents decide how to spend it, but the thought is it’s kind of like a baseline for kids.

    We don’t want to spend too much time focusing on the big UBI utopian policy proposals and miss that there’s a lot of interesting and potentially really important, cost-effective policy proposals around using cash payments in very targeted ways.

    _____

    To see original article please visit: https://thewell.unc.edu/2021/02/23/the-pros-and-cons-of-universal-basic-income/

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  • Santa Clara County Pilot Program Providing UBI to Foster Youth May Be Expanded to All of California

    Sen. Dave Cortese proposes statewide basic income pilot; a pilot that includes foster care youth as they leave the child welfare system.

    By Laurence Du Sault

    Borrowing from a Santa Clara County program he proposed, state Sen. Dave Cortese has introduced legislation to provide $1,000 monthly cash payments for California’s foster care youth as they leave the child welfare system.

    “I can’t think of a more urgent time to roll out this kind of assistance,” Cortese said during an online press conference Monday. “Especially as they enter the adult world during an economic decline caused by COVID-19.”

    The bill — SB 739 — would create a pilot basic income program offering the roughly 2,500 California youth transitioning out of the foster care system this year at age 21 unconditional direct monthly payments for three years. Cortese, D-San Jose, estimates that would cost the state approximately $30 million. It’s not clear whether the money would come from the state’s general fund. Cortese said his team is still determining “where the best bucket is” in terms of state funding.

    “There’s a hole in our social safety net relative to transitioning foster youth, and I believe it’s one of many,” said Cortese, who added that basic income programs like this one could prove a “lifeline” for California’s most vulnerable populations.

    The pandemic recession has boosted interest in basic income programs throughout the state, with Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf pledging to start that city’s own guaranteed income pilot program based on former Stockton Mayor Michael Tubbs’ experiment.

    Only about half of California’s young people in foster care graduate high school, and 40 percent experience homelessness within a year and a half of leaving the system, according to the California Court Appointed Special Advocates.

    Cortese said a significant number are children and youth of color.

    “Children in our foster care system are the responsibility of the state and we should take care of their basic needs,” said Sharon M. Lawrence, CEO of CASA in an emailed statement, adding that she is looking forward to seeing more details of Cortese’s proposal. The bill is awaiting referral to a committee and a first hearing date.

    The proposal mirrors a first-in-the-nation pilot program spearheaded last year by Cortese when he was a Santa Clara County supervisor.

    That program provided the county’s 72 young adults transitioning out of the child welfare system in 2020 with similar thousand-dollar payments. It is set to expire in May.

    Results from quarterly evaluations of the Santa Clara experiment have yet to be reported. It’s unclear whether the board of supervisors will choose to extend it, but Cortese said he was “extremely confident”and that county administrators are working on proposals to expand the program.

    _____

    To see original article please visit: https://www.mercurynews.com/2021/02/22/santa-clara-county-is-model-for-plan-to-give-1000-a-month-to-california-foster-youth/

    The post Santa Clara County Pilot Program Providing UBI to Foster Youth May Be Expanded to All of California appeared first on Basic Income Today.

    This post was originally published on Basic Income Today.

  • A bill has been introduced in Canada to establish national strategy for a guaranteed basic income

    Bill C-273 is focused on framing, testing and validating different models of UBI implementation to get to real answers and data.

    By Roderick Benns 

    Julie Dzerowicz, Member of Parliament for Davenport, has introduced legislation in the House of Commons that would enable a national strategy for a guaranteed basic income in Canada. 

    This is the first time a bill has been introduced in the House of Commons on guaranteed basic income.    

    If passed, this bill would enable the federal government to establish pilot projects in one or more provinces to test models of implementation of a guaranteed basic income program; create a framework of national standards to guide the implementation of a guaranteed basic income program in any province, and collect data on the impact on government (including responsiveness, cost and reducing the complexity of and/or replacing existing social programs), on recipients, and on recipient communities (including entrepreneurship, job creation and civic action).

    Canada’s current social welfare system was created in the 1970s. No matter how many times it is adjusted still too many people fall through the cracks, says a media release.

    “Canada needs a robust social welfare system that meets the needs of the 21st century worker, that is more flexible and adaptive while being less complex and better at tackling inequality,” says Dzerowicz.

    “It is also important to provide Canadians stability with full and equal access to opportunities so they can be more innovative. I believe that guaranteed basic income could be the key tool that helps deliver on all that and this bill enables us to test it,” she adds.

    The world of work is under constant change with many shifting to the gig economy of temporary and short-term contracts and others are being impacted by the effect of automation and AI. It is important for our social welfare system to better reflect the needs of Canadians for today and tomorrow and to be much more flexible at managing labour changes, disruptions and transitions. Bill C-273 proposes that guaranteed basic income is tested as a model that may deliver more flexibility for the new world of workers.

    Sheila Regehr, Chair, Basic Income Canada Network, says “This bill takes the building blocks of better income security for all Canadians—the experience, evidence, expertise and know-how we possess—and puts the gears in motion to make it happen.”

    BICN is a non-partisan organization that has been working with all parties. This bill, calling for a national strategy, is in line with recommendations in BICN’s brief to the 2021 Pre-Budget Consultations.

    Floyd Marinescu, Executive Director, UBI Works, says “Basic Income could create 300,000-600,000 jobs and add $80B/yr to Canada’s GDP while ensuring we have abolished working poverty.

    “In this period of rapid disruption of work and declining social mobility, basic income defends equality of opportunity and unlocks our ability to take risks: a key factor for improving Canada’s innovation and labour market productivity.”

    As Canada moves its way through this pandemic, it is planning for post- COVID with the intention to spend $70-$100 billion over three years to jumpstart the Canadian economy, it’s the perfect time to fix structural issues, to test innovative ideas, and to build our economic and social foundations back better.

    Canada has been criticized for lagging on innovation and productivity. Strong policies, mechanisms and programs are needed to fully focus on improving our innovative potential including ensuring Canadians have the stability they need in order to innovate and take risks, which guaranteed basic income can provide.

    Basic income experts, academics and thought leaders have made it clear that there is already strong existing information that supports the effectiveness of guaranteed basic income but less so on the best ways or models to implement and deliver it.

    Bill C-273 is focused on enabling the capacity to frame, test and validate different models of implementation to get to those answers and that data.

    This legislation comes as provinces like Newfoundland and Labrador and Prince Edward Island consider their own basic income pilots.

    “A Guaranteed Basic Income has been bandied about for years and this Bill could provide for the implementation of pilot projects that would allow the collection of data; therefore, decisions could be made on real facts rather than assumptions. I would welcome such a pilot for PEI,” says Wayne Easter, Member of Parliament, Malpeque, Prince Edward Island.

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    To see original article please visit: https://www.basicincomecanada.org/mp_julie_dzerowicz_introduces_private_members_bill_to_establish_national_strategy_for_a_guaranteed_basic_income

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  • Durham Council Member Says City Residents Who Were Formerly Incarcerated Should Receive Guaranteed Incomes

    Durham’s proposal to experiment with a type of universal basic income is moving forward.

    By Thomasi McDonald

    Councilman Mark-Anthony Middleton recently announced a plan to implement a pilot program that will give select residents a guaranteed monthly income. The pilot could include providing 55 formerly incarcerated residents with a guaranteed income of at least $500 a month until the pandemic ends and the city’s economy recovers.

    “After consulting with Durham community stakeholders, other American cities that have embarked on guaranteed income pilots, academic thought leaders, consultants, and city staff, we have made a determination to submit a proposal focusing on individuals that have been justice-involved and are returning to their community post incarceration,” Middleton wrote in an email to the INDY last week.

    “These sisters and brothers very often face dual challenges in employment and housing due to stigma,” he added.

    “Focusing on this population will allow us to help some of our most vulnerable residents and also provide insight into the efficacy of guaranteed income initiatives on targeted populations.”

    Middleton attended virtual meetings with officials from Mayors for a Guaranteed Income and the Stockton Demonstration Project, groups with the goal of encouraging federal legislation for a universal basic income, as well as a meeting with scholars from the University of Pennsylvania. These meetings informed the council’s decision to include those recently released from incarceration; the scholars noted that the “55 participants could potentially have more informational value on the efficacy of the guaranteed income initiatives rather than a randomly selected universe.”

    In January, Mayor Steve Schewel, a member of Mayors for a Guaranteed Income, announced that the Bull City was among 30 cities across the country under consideration for a guaranteed basic income for some residents.

    Schewel asked Middleton and Councilman Pierce Freelon to lead Durham’s effort to develop a guaranteed income plan. The first phase of the pilot would likely run for one year. Middleton would like to see the project extend beyond a core group of 55 individuals.

    “I plan to continue my engagement with corporate and philanthropic partners to supplement our expected $500,000 grant in the hope of conducting a pilot that will involve no less than 100 people,” said Middleton.

    “As in all things, the amount of funding will determine the breadth of our reach.”

    Last year, before the city council learned of the grant opportunity, Middleton said, he proposed a $2 million guaranteed basic income trial for Durham “as part of a multi-faceted comprehensive plan to address poverty, policing, and the root causes of our city’s gun violence issue.”

    The proposal was derailed in part due to the economic toll the pandemic has had on the City’s coffers.

     “It was gratifying to learn that what we talk about in our public square here in Durham was being noticed around the country and Mayors for Guaranteed Income came looking for us,” he said.

    “Although we won’t get $2 million, the prospect of being able to put somebody else’s money where our municipal mouth is in the midst of a pandemic is beyond fortuitous.”

    Middleton said on February 5 that the council had unanimously approved a resolution supporting Durham’s efforts to secure funds from Mayors for a Guaranteed Income, made possible by Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, who announced in December that he had donated $15 million to the group. The funds could provide each of the organization’s 30 partner cities, including Durham, with up to $500,000.

    The resolution states that Durham signed on to the Mayors for a Guaranteed Income pledge and is actively working with community partners.

    City council members went on record in support of a guaranteed income, and the council concluded that it “supports ongoing, direct cash payments throughout the campaign and until our economy recovers.”

    The resolution notes that even before the pandemic, nearly 40 percent of American households could not afford a $400 emergency.

    Moreover, an already growing wealth gap that disproportionately impairs quality of life for women and people of color has been “dramatically exacerbated” by the pandemic.

    The resolution notes that “American cities are laboratories of democracy,” and that mayors across the country have banded together “to address these inequities” and advocate “in favor of cashed-based guaranteed incomes.”

    It also notes that the guaranteed payments have been more effective than unemployment benefits for families of color.

    “The data show that another direct payment would increase Native American, Latinx/Hispanic, and Black family income by 4.1 percent, 3.9 percent, and 3.6 percent respectively, compared to 2 percent of household income for white families,” the resolution states.

    The resolution refutes the idea that a guaranteed income is an incentive for hard-hit citizens to not work—“as demonstrated by the large number of poor people that work every day to provide for their families.”

    Instead, the resolution explains, the intent is to codify “a national value that declares that there exists a floor beneath which we will allow no person to fall simply by virtue of their humanity.”

    Middleton said the council intends to submit its application for the funding within the next two weeks, and that he anticipates launching the pilot by the end of March.

    “I’m very, very, very confident of our chances to get the money to Durham,” Middleton added.

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    Follow Durham Writer Thomasi McDonald on Twitter or send an email to tmcdonald@indyweek.com.

    To see original article please visit: https://indyweek.com/news/durham/durham-city-council-member-mark-anthony-middleton-on-tuesday/

    The post Durham Council Member Says City Residents Who Were Formerly Incarcerated Should Receive Guaranteed Incomes appeared first on Basic Income Today.

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  • Opinion: It’s time to transform our society with a basic income guarantee

    The more distant someone is from mainstream culture, the more they need money to address their unique needs in their own way.

    By: Evelyn Forget

    The term basic income, in Canada, has come to mean an income-tested benefit – a guaranteed income close to the poverty line for those with no other income, and a reduced benefit for low-income workers.

    Basic income does not replace public services like healthcare and supports for people with disabilities. It streamlines and enhances cash transfers.

    The benefits of basic income have been documented in multiple studies. Mental and physical health improves. People invest in education.

    There is no evidence that overall work effort declines when a basic income is offered, and there is some evidence that basic income helps people move from precarious work to long-term employment.

    Studies remind us that when low-income people have money, they spend it in local communities and create jobs for their neighbours and families, which jumpstarts recovery from pandemic-induced job losses. Basic income allows people to stand up for their rights as workers and tenants without fear of retribution.

    Ironically, the strongest arguments in support of basic income appear in a recent report of the B.C. Basic Income Panel that recommends targeted basic incomes for people with disabilities, survivors of domestic violence, and kids aging out of foster care but stops short of recommending a basic income for everyone now living in poverty.

    There are no fewer than 194 uncoordinated programs offered by federal, provincial, and municipal authorities that offer support, in cash and in kind, to low-income people in B.C. alone, and B.C. is not unique. Programs have different entry points, eligibility requirements, and regulations designed by “experts” who believe they know best, requiring desperate people to navigate complex bureaucracies.

    Consequently, many people do not receive the benefits to which they are entitled. This system is so ineffective that tent cities and food banks proliferate, and we treat the consequences of poverty in our emergency departments and jails.

    The promise of ever more “wrap-around care,” coupled with administrative tweaks, must send shivers up the spines of people who know that public services rarely meet their needs: Indigenous mothers with kids in care, Black youths encountering racism at school, women incarcerated for poverty-related crimes, and trans and racialized people deprived of culturally appropriate medical care.

    The more distant someone is from mainstream culture, the more they need money to address their unique needs in their own way – and the more problematic the advice of “experts” becomes.

    Indigenous people have been victimized by coercive and ineffective bureaucracies for generations; consequently, the Report of the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women recommends a basic income for all Canadians. Basic income was the first call of the Black Lives Matter movement. 

    Critics point to the implementation challenges of basic income, but the recent CERB delivered a responsive benefit quickly, respectfully, and efficiently by relying on individual income reports and verifying afterwards. The glitches in roll-out occurred because applicants required $5,000 of (poorly defined) income in the previous twelve months.

    A basic income would not be conditional on past earnings, and defining income is surely within the capacity of policymakers. Up-to-date tax returns are not required, and people without Internet access can reach administrators directly.

    Critics exaggerate the costs of a basic income by breathlessly telling us how much it would cost to send a cheque to everyone, rich or poor, each month – an approach that virtually no one advocates – but costing exercises on well-designed programs show much lower costs.

    Taxpayers are already paying for the hundreds of failing programs that currently exist; is it too much to ask that their contributions be spent effectively?

    Basic income requires federal leadership, but Canada has a long tradition of allowing provinces to opt out, with compensation, to establish their own programs as long as they meet federal standards.

    A half-century ago, ordinary Canadians of diverse backgrounds came together to challenge entrenched interests and the status quo; they demanded universal healthcare, which transformed our society forever. As Tommy Douglas reminded us, “It’s not too late to build a better world.”

    ___________________________________________________________

    Evelyn L. Forget is an economist, professor at the University of Manitoba, and author of Basic Income For Canadians: From The COVID-19 Emergency To Financial Security For All.

    The post Opinion: It’s time to transform our society with a basic income guarantee appeared first on Basic Income Today.

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  • P.E.I. Senators: Basic income is an idea whose time has come

    By Diane Griffin, Brian Francis, and Mike Duffy

    Last spring more than 50 members of the Senate of Canada urged the federal government to implement a guaranteed basic livable income program. At the same time, a special committee of the Prince Edward Island legislature called on Ottawa to join the province in creating a guaranteed livable basic income (GLBI).

    Doubters suggested a GLBI would be too costly, and too complicated. They’d prefer tinkering with the status quo. The GLBI idea seemed stalled.

    Faced with this hurdle, a group of Island Senators has written Premier Dennis King and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to suggest a way to end the stalemate. Why not start with a small pilot project in Prince Edward Island?

    In our letter we reminded Mr. Trudeau that Prince Edward Island’s modern economy is a result of an innovative 1969 federal-provincial program called the “P.E.I. Comprehensive Development Plan.” Ever since, successive governments have used P.E.I. (population ~150,000) as a “test bed” for important innovations in agriculture, fisheries, energy from waste, wind energy and so on.

    Now out of the economic disruption caused by COVID-19, P.E.I. and the federal government have another historic opportunity for social innovation. The arguments for a GLBI are well-known and are persuasive, especially in an economy like PEI’s with an ageing demographic.

    Last week the British Columbia government stepped away from the GLBI idea because of the plan’s perceived potential shortcomings. A pilot project in P.E.I. would test those concerns and allow the program to be adjusted as needed.

    Critics may argue against an incremental approach, but we should not forget that medicare, our most successful social program, began incrementally, one province at a time starting with Saskatchewan.

    In 1984, the Macdonald Royal Commission recommended a GLBI as a counterbalance to the negative effects of free trade with the United States. The Mulroney government passed free trade, but ignored the rest of Macdonald’s report.

    Mr. Trudeau now has an opportunity to finish that work and, in so doing, turn the page on the economic devastation caused by COVID-19 and build a brighter future for P.E.I., and one hopes, eventually for millions of Canadians.

    The government response to the economic disruption caused by the pandemic was a scramble, with some covered and others not. Had a Guaranteed Livable Basic Income been in place, Canadians would have been automatically protected.

    We closed our letter by urging Mr. Trudeau to begin Canada’s post-pandemic recovery with a pilot GLBI program in Prince Edward Island, the birthplace of Confederation.

    A guaranteed livable basic income truly is – an idea whose time has come!

    _____

    Diane Griffin, Brian Francis and Mike Duffy are Senators for Prince Edward Island.

    To see original article please visit: https://www.thetelegram.com/opinion/regional-perspectives/pei-senators-basic-income-is-an-idea-whose-time-has-come-550641/

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  • California’s Yolo County Considering Small Basic Income Pilot Funded by Marijuana Revenue

    By Anne Ternus-Bellamy

    Families with young children currently living in deep poverty in Yolo County would receive monthly cash assistance under a universal basic income pilot project that county supervisors will consider on Tuesday.

    A total of 31 families in the CalWORKS Housing Support Program with children under the age of two would receive monthly payments for a year, up to a maximum of $12,155 annually per family.

    That cash assistance, combined with the CalWORKS grant they already receive to help with housing costs, would bring these families’ incomes up to a minimum poverty threshold ($25,658 for a family of four).

    The total cost of the pilot project — $400,000 — would include $100,000 from the county’s cannabis tax revenue if county supervisors agree.

    Another $100,000 has already been pledged by First 5 Yolo and a grant of $75,000 has been secured from the state’s Office of Child Abuse Prevention.

    Fundraising would bring in the remaining $125,000.

    Universal basic income — also known as UBI — essentially provides individuals with a monthly cash payment without a means test or work requirement.

    The goal often is to alleviate poverty while replacing bureaucratic, need-based assistance programs, but also to supplement some of those programs.

    Former Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang (now a candidate for New York City mayor) touted UBI during his 2020 campaign.

    But small jurisdictions have also implemented UBI in different forms, including the city of Stockton.

    The Stockton Economic Empowerment Demonstration began in early 2019, providing about 130 residents making less than the city’s median income with $500 a month with no strings attached.

    University researchers who evaluated the program found that nearly 40 percent of tracked spending went to food, but the money also covered transportation, utilities, healthcare, debt and more.

    Meanwhile, the city of Compton is home to Compton Pledge, which is providing around 800 residents with between $300 and $600 per month with no strings attached.

    No public funds are being used in that program; rather private donors are financing the program.

    In proposing a pilot project for Yolo County, staff note in a presentation prepared for Tuesday’s Board of Supervisors meeting that Yolo has the third highest poverty rate in the state at 20.6 percent. Only Los Angeles and Santa Barbara counties have higher rates.

    “Through a UBI pilot program, (the Health and Human Services Agency) seeks to combat this problem in our community by providing financial assistance to the poorest families with young children in the county so that they can afford basic needs and be placed on a path to longterm financial empowerment,” the staff report said.

    The board will consider the proposal during its Tuesday meeting.

    The meeting begins at 9 a.m. and can be access by the public via Zoom at https://yolocounty.zoom.us/j/112072974 or by phone at 1-408-638-0968, meeting ID 112 072 974.

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    To see original article please visit: https://www.davisenterprise.com/news/local/pilot-project-would-provide-ubi-to-some-of-countys-poorest-families/

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  • Pressure Mounts in Canada to Launch a Basic Income Pilot in Prince Edward Island

    By Jolson Lim

    Support for a basic income may be shifting from one end of the country to the other.

    Four senators are the latest leaders to say they’re in favour of a guaranteed, livable basic income on Prince Edward Island, with Ottawa’s help.

    A special all-party committee of the P.E.I. legislature urged the provincial government late last year to begin negotiating with Ottawa for money to test-drive a guaranteed basic income.

    Three senators from P.E.I. — Sens. Diane Griffin, Brian Francis, and Mike Duffy, as well as Ontario Sen. Kim Pate — sent a letter to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and P.E.I. Premier Dennis King last week calling not just for a pilot program, but a nationwide guaranteed basic income, starting on the island.

    The letter says P.E.I. would be an appropriate place to begin because of its small and aging population, and because it’s been used before as a “test bed” for innovations in everything from agriculture to wind energy.

    The committee’s report suggests how it might work. A single adult would be guaranteed an annual income of $18,260, while a family of two would get $25,747, at a cost to taxpayers of $270 million a year. Earnings in addition to the basic income would be clawed back by 50 cents for every dollar earned.

    “There are a number of people there who certainly could use the support and assistance,” said Pate, one of the loudest advocates in the Senate for a basic income.

    “Given the political will, it seems like a great spot to start implementation.”

    As she understands it, Pate said the P.E.I. government will support it, and has written to Ottawa about it. She’s meeting with King next week before his speech from the throne on Feb. 25.

    There’ve been “ongoing conversations” about a basic income among MLAs, ministers, senators, MPs, King, and government officials since the committee released its report, Adam Ross, a spokesperson for King, said in a statement.

    The idea of paying Canadians a basic income has picked up momentum during the pandemic, which has exposed large holes in the country’s social safety net. 

    Proponents see basic income as a way to reduce poverty, protect Canadians from financial ruin, and not force workers to take on dangerous jobs. It would also be simpler to administer, and more naturally responsive to economic crises like the one we’re in now.

    Last April, more than 50 senators signed a letter asking that the Canada Emergency Response Benefit evolve into a guaranteed basic-income program that would prevent Canadians from falling through the cracks of government relief, as had occurred with the employment insurance system. 

    Not everyone’s on board, though. In a 500-page report, an expert panel appointed by the B.C. government recently concluded that “moving to a system (with) a basic income for all as its main pillar is not the most just policy option.” It would be too costly, and wouldn’t necessarily help the non-financial problems that cause people to need money in the first place, the report said.

    “The needs of people in this society are too diverse to be effectively answered simply with a cheque from the government,” it reads.

    Instead, the panel says the B.C. government should bring in improvements and targeted actions, including a basic income for certain vulnerable groups.

    Pate agreed with some of the report’s conclusions, saying poverty won’t be solved by a basic income without other policies in place.

    “Nobody who is credible, and recommending basic income, is saying a cheque from a government alone will solve it,” she said. “But nobody who is credible, (and) who’s looking at poverty, says (social) programs alone can solve it.”

    But the report doesn’t say that a basic income in any form is a bad idea, she added.

    The B.C. panel also concluded that a basic-income pilot would be ineffective as a case study, because many of the potential benefits would be realized only if the program were permanent. 

    While NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh has expressed support for a pilot program in P.E.I., the Liberal government doesn’t plan to proceed with basic income. 

    “I think it’s a very important conversation to have,” Trudeau told a virtual town hall last December. “But, as (Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland) might point out, it’s not something (we’re considering) right now.”

    A statement from Freeland’s office provided to iPolitics on Wednesday said Ottawa already helps Islanders with programs that support their income and businesses.

    Freeland’s mandate letter also asked her to “avoid creating new permanent spending.”

    On the other hand, a basic income would ensure a “recovery for all,” said Pate.

    _____

    With files from Janet Silver.

    To see original article please visit: https://ipolitics.ca/2021/02/03/pressure-mounts-on-ottawa-to-fund-basic-income-pilot-in-p-e-i/

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