IN 1967, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was called a radical for preaching about a guaranteed basic income. Now, in 2024, the concept is being tested and evaluated as a potential solution to ending the poverty cycle.
Advocates for guaranteed basic income gathered at the WBUR CitySpace on Wednesday for a United Way-sponsored event to discuss pilot programs across the Greater Boston area, the challenges in implementing them, and what the future holds.
Jesús Gerena, CEO of the national social justice organization Up Together, said guaranteed basic income works. “Poverty is a policy choice,” he said. “We are continuously creating these barriers and these challenges to the individuals who suffer from financial hardships. It’s time to move from pilot to permanence.”
Guaranteed basic income is direct cash assistance to low-income people, usually families, who need it the most, according to Doug Howgate, president of the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation.
The idea for direct assistance is not new, but it is picking up momentum, according to Josh Waxman, chief operating officer of Camp Harborview, a nonprofit focused on providing affordable resources for Boston teens and families.
Camp Harborview’s guaranteed income program does not force families to spend on anything specific. Instead, it provides people with the cash to fund what they know they need the most. The open-ended approach raises concerns money might go for nonessentials, but Waxman said nearly 100 percent of the time families choose to use their funds to make investments in themselves and their children that they could not afford otherwise.
“I think we have a trust problem. Do we trust people to move their families forward? Our answer to that is absolutely,” said Waxman.
Camp Harborview’s 2021 guaranteed income program provided $583 a month to 50 families from the Camp Harborview community selected via a lottery. According to data gathered on the program, participating families saw a 43 percent decrease in psychological distress during the two-year program, while families not participating experienced a 17 percent increase.
While most neighborhood and city-guaranteed basic income programs are small with participants selected via lottery, Cambridge has the only citywide program.
Geeta Pradhan, president of Cambridge Community Foundation, is trying to flip the narrative on guaranteed basic income by suggesting the funding is similar to financial incentives given to middle- and upper-class families.
“When we give people with wealth or assets mortgage interest deductions, it is an incentive. When we give someone public benefits, it is a benefit.” said Pradhan.
In addition to mental and financial relief, there is evidence that medical needs are directly tied to economic mobility, according to Dr. Megan Sandel, a pediatrician at Boston Medical Center, citing research from the Boston Public Health commission that shows a 23-year life expectancy gap between Nubian Square and Back Bay.
“Fundamentally, you look at the median income in that neighborhood of Roxbury, it’s $44,000. In the Back Bay, it’s $140,000,” said Sandel.
Public-private partnership is at the core of the issue for guaranteed basic income programming. There’s no one organization or structure that should implement a change, but a team effort from all directions to stop poverty before needing to cure it, according to Pradhan.
“We cannot ever in this city talk about economic opportunity and all of its glory if we are not focused on inclusion and making sure that, especially communities that for a long time were not allowed at the table, are actually thought of first,” said Mayor Wu’s Chief of Economic Opportunity and Inclusion Segun Idowu.
It has been difficult for policymakers to see the big picture rather than a quick return on their investments through their budgets or bills, according to Howgate.
“Working together with policymakers about those longer-term creative solutions to those types of challenges, which are not new for the government, has got to be a part of the conversation,” said Howgate.
Maya Shavit is an intern working with CommonWealth Beacon as part of the Boston University State House program.