Universal basic income experiments

The modern wave of UBI experiments began with Finland's two-year pilot, which ran from January 2017 through December 2018. Kela, the Finnish social insurance agency, randomly selected two thousand unemployed individuals between the ages of twenty-five and fifty-eight and paid them 560 euros per month regardless of whether they found work. The control group consisted of people who remained in the standard unemployment benefits system. Results published by the Finnish government showed that recipients worked slightly more days than the control group, experienced fewer problems related to bureaucracy, and reported significantly higher levels of well-being and life satisfaction.

Kenya's GiveDirectly experiment, launched in 2017, enrolled over twenty thousand people in a twelve-year study, one of the longest and largest UBI trials in history. Participants in rural Kenya receive roughly twenty-two dollars per month, an amount calibrated to local living costs. Early results published in peer-reviewed journals found increased consumption, business investment, and food security among recipients, with no evidence of increased spending on alcohol or tobacco.

Stockton, California, ran the Stockton Economic Empowerment Demonstration from February 2019 through January 2021, providing five hundred dollars per month to 125 residents earning below the city's median household income. Researchers at the University of Tennessee and the University of Pennsylvania found that full-time employment among recipients increased by twelve percentage points compared to a control group, and that recipients reported reduced income volatility and improved mental health.

Canada ran a large-scale experiment called Mincome in Dauphin, Manitoba, from 1974 to 1979, guaranteeing a minimum income to every resident. Economist Evelyn Forget's analysis of the data, published decades later, found reductions in hospitalization rates, particularly for mental health diagnoses and accidents, and higher rates of high school completion among adolescents. The program was discontinued when a new government took office, and the data sat unanalyzed for nearly thirty years.