Universal basic income to be trialled in Oakland, Y Combinator announces
Around 100 families will be given between $1,000 and $2,000 each month to test how a basic income will affect their lives
Oakland, California, will host what may be the first universal basic income experiment in the United States.
Around 100 families will be given a minimum wage as part of a pilot experiment by startup accelerator Y Combinator.
They will be given between $1,000 and $2,000 each month to see how the basic income affects their happiness, well-being and how they spend their time.
Oakland was chosen for its social and economic diversity and the fact it has areas of concentrated wealth and considerable inequality. Participants were selected randomly across the economic spectrum and include both the employed and jobless.
This is interesting. One of the ideas behind Basic Income is using it to replace other government handouts, so I'm not sure how this experiment will handle that part of things. I predict that the participants will call this program a great success: free money tends to be a popular idea.
Especially if the robots come to take our jobs
Thanks for posting the source. I'm interested in how this experiment works out.
I think there's a problem. 100 families is not universal. For universal, or even global basic income to work it must actually be universal, or global. Giving 100 families free money is just wealth reallocation.
However they might find some interesting data about how free money changes peoples lives, which of course is important to know.