#Basic Income

[reasonsforhope]

Flint, Michigan, has one of the [United States]'s highest rates of child poverty — something that got a lot of attention during the city's lead water crisis a decade ago. And a pediatrician who helped expose that lead problem has now launched a first-of-its-kind move to tackle poverty: giving every new mother $7,500 in cash aid over a year.

A baby's first year is crucial for development. It's also a time of peak poverty.

Flint's new cash transfer program, Rx Kids, starts during pregnancy. The first payment is $1,500 to encourage prenatal care. After delivery, mothers will get $500 a month over the baby's first year.

"What happens in that first year of life can really portend your entire life course trajectory. Your brain literally doubles in size in the first 12 months," says Hanna-Attisha, who's also a public health professor at Michigan State University.

A baby's birth is also a peak time for poverty. Being pregnant can force women to cut back hours or even lose a job. Then comes the double whammy cost of child care.

Research has found that stress from childhood poverty can harm a person's physical and mental health, brain development and performance in school. Infants and toddlers are more likely than older children to be put into foster care, for reasons that advocates say conflate neglect with poverty.

In Flint, where the child poverty rate is more than 50%, Hanna-Attisha says new moms are in a bind. "We just had a baby miss their 4-day-old appointment because mom had to go back to work at four days," she says...

Benefits of Cash Aid

Studies have found such payments reduce financial hardship and food insecurity and improve mental and physical health for both mothers and children.

The U.S. got a short-lived taste of that in 2021. Congress temporarily expanded the child tax credit, boosting payments and also sending them to the poorest families who had been excluded because they didn't make enough to qualify for the credit. Research found that families mostly spent the money on basic needs. The bigger tax credit improved families' finances and briefly cut the country's child poverty rate nearly in half.

"We saw food hardship dropped to the lowest level ever," Shaefer says. "And we saw credit scores actually go to the highest that they'd ever been in at the end of 2021."

Critics worried that the expanded credit would lead people to work less, but there was little evidence of that. Some said they used the extra money for child care so they could go to work.

As cash assistance in Flint ramps up, Shaefer will be tracking not just its impact on financial well-being, but how it affects the roughly 1,200 babies born in the city each year.

"We're going to see if expectant moms route into prenatal care earlier," he says. "Are they able to go more? And then we'll be able to look at birth outcomes," including birth weight and neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) admissions.

Since the pandemic, dozens of cash aid pilots have popped up across the nation. But unlike them, Rx Kids is not limited to lower-income households. It's universal, which means every new mom will get the same amount of money. "You pit people against each other when you draw that line in the sand and say, 'You don't need this, and you do,' " Shaefer says. It can also stigmatize families who get the aid, he says, as happened with traditional welfare...

So far, there's more than $43 million to keep the program going for three years. Funders include foundations, health insurance companies and the state of Michigan, which allocated a small part of its federal cash aid, known as Temporary Assistance for Needy Families.

Money can buy more time for bonding with a baby

Alana Turner can't believe her luck with Flint's new cash benefits. "I was just shocked because of the timing of it all," she says.

Turner is due soon with her second child, a girl. She lives with her aunt and her 4-year-old son, Ace. After he was born, her car broke down and she was seriously cash-strapped, negotiating over bill payments. This time, she hopes she won't have to choose between basic needs.

"Like, I shouldn't have to think about choosing between are the lights going to be on or am I going to make sure the car brakes are good," she says...

But since she'll be getting an unexpected $7,500 over the next year, Turner has a new goal. With her first child, she was back on the job in less than six weeks. Now, she hopes she'll be able to slow down and spend more time with her daughter.

"I don't want to sacrifice the time with my newborn like I had to for my son, if I don't have to," she says."

-via NPR, March 12, 2024

[allthecanadianpolitics]

As the number of Canadians finding themselves unable to make ends meet grows, the calls for a basic income are intensifying. Currently, there are two bills, S-233 and C-223, whose passing could open the door to the creation of a livable basic income program for which any low-income Canadian can qualify. Like the Canada Child Benefit or Old Age Security, a livable basic income should be available to anyone whose earnings fall below the poverty line. No means testing. No questions asked. No shame nor stigma. “It’s just basic justice that people have enough money to survive” and to ensure “that people aren’t living in poverty in a wealthy country,” says Evelyn Forget, a professor of economics and community health sciences at the University of Manitoba. Instead, now, Canadians whose yearly gross income falls below the low-income cut-off — which ranges between $18,941 and $72,814 depending on location and household size — are consistently stripped of their agency, autonomy and dignity when they apply for income supports.

Continue Reading.

Tagging: @politicsofcanada @abpoli

[iwrotesomeofitdown]

Liebe Fischköppe und andere Nordlichter,

es gibt ein Volksbegehren zum Grundeinkommen. Das ist eine große Chance für Hamburg.

Tragt Euch für die Briefwahl ein:

All studies for basic income have come back with very good results. Let’s make this project happen for Hamburg and get this off the ground.

[feministdragon]

Concluding reflections

We initially feared that the actual level of the basic income would be too low to have a major series of effects on work and labour. However, we soon realized that the liquidity effect was likely to mean that the real value of the money was greater than it seemed and that it could unlock constraints to create mini- multiplier or transformative effects through the influence on work and labour.

Overall, the effects were positive, reducing the extent of short-term labour migration, changing the nature of child work, raising economic opportunities for women, curbing naukar labour, and leading to a shift from casual wage labour to own-account farming and non-farm economic activity. The money helped households to buy more productive assets, which helped to increase economic security as well as raise incomes.

There are also indirect effects to bear in mind, such as the impact of improved health and nutrition that make work and labour more feasible and less onerous. And one should not ignore the possibility that by providing a steadier, more predictable income, basic incomes reduce the adverse shock of temporary periods of unemployment. Households are also less likely to default on debt repayments and thus are less likely to fall into an asset loss cycle.

We believe the effects of the basic income on the pattern of work and labour were positive. Overall, there was an increase in economic activity and thus a beneficial effect on economic growth and incomes. 

p154

what's crazy about this for me is that the basic income given was only one third of their normal yearly income

[dandelionsresilience]

Good News - June 1-7

Like these weekly compilations? Support me on Ko-fi or $Kaybarr1735! Also, if you tip me on Ko-fi or CashApp (and give me some way to contact you if it doesn’t automatically), at the end of the month I'll send you a link to all of the articles I found but didn't use each week!

1. Hundreds of Mayors, City Leaders Commit to Protecting Monarch Butterflies in Annual Pledge

“The 300 participating communities are taking a record number of actions to advance monarch conservation by planting or maintaining pollinator gardens at prominent locations, supporting native plant sales and giveaways, and partnering with local gardening organizations and experts to advance monarch conservation and community engagement.”

2. Basic income can double global GDP while reducing carbon emissions, analysis suggests

“Researchers suggest that charging carbon emitters with an emission tax could help fund such basic income programs while reducing environmental degradation. [… G]iving basic income to the entire world population could boost the global GDP by $163 trillion, which is about 130% of the current GDP. Every dollar spent on implementing basic income can generate as much as $7 in economic impacts, the analysis shows.”

3. Los Angeles-area wildlife crossing over freeway expected to be ready in 2026

“The crossing will be a vegetated overpass that will help isolated animals safely cross U.S. 101. […] Officials said the Wallis Annenberg Wildlife Crossing will "reconnect habitats and improve the health of the environment for many species in Southern California." They added that currently, U.S. 101 is a huge barrier that disconnects Southern California wildlife. […] “We need to move beyond mere conservation, toward a kind of environmental rejuvenation," [Annenberg] said in a statement. "Wildlife crossings are powerfully effective at doing just that — restoring ecosystems that have been fractured and disrupted.””

4. ‘Many waterfowl are very gay’: Elliot Page set to narrate LGBTQ+ animal documentary Second Nature

“According to Deadline, Second Nature will be executive produced by Page, who will also narrate the documentary set to explore instances of same-sex attraction in species other than humans. And, spoiler alert, they’re everywhere. [… Page said,] “Second Nature reveals the full spectrum of life and how when it comes to gender and sexuality in nature, the diversity is endless. I learned so much and am thrilled others will too.””

5. McKenzie River Restoration Benefiting Threatened Upper Willamette River Chinook

“Salmon have successfully reproduced at the Finn Rock restoration site in Oregon’s McKenzie River watershed. Another project aims to bring salmon back to lower Quartz Creek. […] Historical accounts document the presence of Chinook salmon and bull trout in Quartz Creek, but neither species has been seen there for decades. Project partners have replaced an aging bridge that constricted Quartz Creek. Previously, the stream constriction forced the water to gush like a fire hose, blasting salmon and sediment downriver. […] The restoration work will increase groundwater and expand the amount of wetlands, which can reduce the impact of forest fires.”

6. Leading Scholars Call for Global Treaty on Free Education

“According to the experts, well-established scientific evidence shows “unequivocally” that education is foundational to children’s healthy development and lifelong prospects[…. Seventy scholars from thirty countries] call on all governments to support a new optional protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child to ensure recognition of the right to free early childhood education and free secondary education, alongside the existing explicit right to free and compulsory primary education.”

7. Water is key as study shows restoration of drained tropical peat is possible

“Rewetting of tropical peatland that was drained for agriculture can lead to the recovery of the native ecosystem, a long-term study of a former pulpwood plantation in Indonesia shows. Researchers studying the 4,800-hectare (11,900-acre) plot that was retired in 2015 by Asia Pulp & Paper (APP) found the water table had risen, soil carbon emissions had gone down, and native trees were springing up and replacing the planted acacia pulpwoods.”

8. Antioxidant gel preserves islet function after pancreas removal: New approach could reduce diabetes complications

“Before surgeons remove the pancreas from patients with severe, painful chronic pancreatitis, they first harvest insulin-producing tissue clusters, called islets, and transplant them into the vasculature of the liver. […] Unfortunately, the process inadvertently destroys 50–80% of islets, and one-third of patients become diabetic after surgery. [… To] create a healthier microenvironment for the islets, the researchers adhered the islets to the omentum with an inherently antioxidant and anti-inflammatory biomaterial[…,] significantly improving survival and preserving function of transplanted islets.”

9. Restoring Indigenous aquaculture heals both ecosystems and communities in Hawai‘i

“The loko i’a system of native fishponds in Hawai‘i has for generations provided sustenance to Indigenous communities[….] Unlike commercial fish farms, loko i‘a thrive without feed input and need little management once established[….] “We are using science to translate ‘ike kupuna, or Indigenous knowledge, into policy,” said study co-author Kawika Winter […] “Loko i’a are really built to work with the ecosystem, whereas not all forms of aquaculture are made to do that.””

10. Meet Neo Px: the super plant that attacks air pollution

“Neo Px is a bioengineered plant capable of purifying indoor air at an unprecedented scale[….] "It's the equivalent of up to 30 regular houseplants in terms of air purification," said Lionel Mora, co-founder of startup Neoplants. "It will not only capture, but also remove and recycle, some of the most harmful pollutants you can find indoors." [… The plant comes] with packets of powder that contain a microbiome, essentially a bacterial strain. "This bacteria colonizes the plant's roots, soil and leaves [… and] absorbs the VOCs to grow and reproduce. The plant is there to create this ecosystem for the bacteria. So we have a symbiotic system between plants and bacteria.””

May 22-28 news here | (all credit for images and written material can be found at the source linked; I don’t claim credit for anything but curating.)

[theworldthrukaleidoscope-eyes]

To fast food workers: "It's only meant for young people in college! Not to support a family!"

To retail workers: "The job isn't that hard. Why do they need to be paid so much?"

To CEOs: "They had to work hard to get where they are!" - Let's talk about this. A CEO of a small business (I'm using an example of someone I know personally, just so you know I'm not inflating or spewing secondhand facts) makes 350k/year. Minimum wage makes 15k/year. Do you honestly think any people/persons are capable of working over 20x harder than anyone else?? Retail workers have customers screaming at them for 8+ hours a day; fast food workers must prepare your food in a boiling hot kitchen (with customers screaming at them!) for 8+ hours a day. I could go on about waitresses, firemen, childcare, teachers! (oh but those jobs should be fulfilling enough without the paycheck...right?? Tell that to the CEO) My CEO friend doesn't work every day. She works MAYBE 15 hours a week, and complains about the days she has to drive to work to handle things in person. She absolutely does not work harder than minimum wage workers. Don't get me wrong--she used to. Before she made 350k a year. Before she made even 200k a year. Did she work hard to 'earn' a position where she makes so much and doesn't work? No. That's what we call 'retiring'. What she is doing is earning money she don't need off the labor of others. Because that's the kicker--she doesn't need this much money. She owns three houses. She travels at least 3 times a year overseas or on yachts/cruises. She buys expensive furniture (I'm talking 2 thousand dollar lamps, 400 dollar chairs) on a WHIM. She eats out for nearly every meal. She does not need this much money. People in poverty don't want to have a free ride. They don't want rich people to pay their way. They want this kind of financial imbalance to stop. Because when your friend who just spent more than you make in a year on her monthly travel expenses, and then complains that her taxes are just too high, and she has to pay way too much for health insurance, to someone who literally cannot afford health insurance (and some days, actual food)...it starts to get ridiculous.

This is a real person I know in real life. Not a billionaire. Not a famous actor, artist, or anyone you would have heard of. This is income inequality right on your doorstep.

[iplaywithstring]

This bill is going for its second reading. I honestly doubt it will pass, but it is important for the public to show support. MPs are elected to represent their constituents, let yours know that you support basic income.

[murderandnoir]

Purgatory 18/12/2023

Basic Income for the Arts has had a huge effect on my life, and I’m doing my best to prove it’s worthwhile.

[commiepinkofag]

Fresh basic income pilot results, this time from Arlington, Virginia where 200 people got $500 a month for 2 years. The findings: Employment INCREASED by 16%, and their incomes from paid work INCREASED by 37%. The control group saw no such gains. Nearly three-quarters of the treatment group also reported improved mental and physical well-being and an increased sense of control, compared to the control group. Scott Santens Income To Support All Foundation Founder and President / Basic Income Policy Advisor

[nando161mando]

Billionaire backlash shows the power of basic income

[allthecanadianpolitics]

Hamilton, ON, wants to be the best place to raise a child and age successfully. These days, that’s a tall order to fulfill.

But on June 7, Hamilton city council took a major step towards making that vision a reality by voting unanimously to support a Guaranteed Livable Basic Income (GLBI).

The motion, put forward by Ward 15 Councillor Ted McMeekin and seconded by Ward 1 Councillor Maureen Wilson, is proof non-partisan agreement exists for a GLBI.

Full article

Tagging: @politicsofcanada

[clwhowrites]

The Best Argument for Universal Basic Income is Capitalism.

A universal basic income (UBI) is a program in which every citizen of a country, or even every documented person in the country, receives a monthly income from the government. This income is given regardless of income and job status. For example: each person receives $1000 dollars a month to all people over 18-years-old. This idea has a pretty long history. In his work Utopia, Thomas More…

[teledyn]

In India when there was a great and worrisome surge of populism gathered in one party, the other, seeking to woo some of those supporters, introduced a non-trivial basic income.

[scottsantens]

Don't sleep on this project called Comingle that aims to make sure no one goes a week without income. If you support UBI, consider supporting this project to create a small UBI right now.