What did we learn from the world's largest basic income experiment?

The non-profit charity organization GiveDirectly has been conducting the world's largest basic income experiment in Kenya since 2016, involving tens of thousands of people. Tavneet Suri, an economist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Abhijit Banerjee, who is also an economist and won the Nobel Prize in Economics in 2019, are using the content of this experiment to determine what form basic income should take. This reveals the knowledge that

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The first results from the world's biggest basic income experiment in Kenya are in - Vox

GiveDirectly provides a basic income of 2,280 shillings (approximately 2,200 yen) per month to all adults in a small village in southwestern Kenya for 12 years from 2016 to 2028. There are approximately 6,000 beneficiaries, and tens of thousands of others are receiving basic income through different payment methods, such as ``receiving a lump sum of approximately 70,000 yen'' and ``receiving a total of approximately 70,000 yen over two years.'' There are people.

Mr. Suri and Mr. Banerjee divided basic income recipients into long-term recipients who received benefits over 12 years, short-term recipients who received benefits over two years, and lump-sum recipients who received the full amount at once. I looked into it.

They found that those in the lump-sum benefit group had the greatest effect by starting the most businesses and spending the most on education. The effect seen in the short-term benefit group was half that.

The long-term benefit group had similar results to the lump-sum benefit group. Suri and Banerjee found that members of the long-term beneficiary group created and used rotating savings and credit associations (ROSCAs) that allowed them to periodically pay small amounts into a common fund and withdraw larger sums when needed. It became clear.

Edwine Odongo Anyango, who created ROSCA with 10 friends, was one of them and had been saving money for investment. Mr. Anyang'o expressed his opinion, ``Monthly payments are not bad, but I think it would be better to receive a lump sum payment.That way, we can carry out large projects all at once.''

As Mr. Anyango said, running a business requires a large amount of money, so a lump-sum payment is more convenient, but on the other hand, those who received basic income every month are the same as those who received it in a lump sum. They also found that they were generally happier and had better mental health than women. In particular, in the case of the long-term recipient group, the mental health benefits of ``benefits lasting 12 years'' were significant. Mr. Suri speculates, ``The group that received the lump sum benefit may have felt stressed about having to invest in something.''

In addition, in the discussion of basic income, there are skeptical opinions such as ``Won't providing money reduce motivation to work'' and ``Wouldn't it just be used to buy alcohol etc.'', but at least in Kenya In this case, no such cases were observed. In many cases, people who worked for wages started businesses instead, reducing competition for wage labor and increasing the wages earned by the village as a whole.

Based on the results so far, the news site Vox says that if a basic income is to be introduced, ideally it should be done by asking people how they want to make money, and making a large amount of money in a short period of time. They suggest that people should be given the option of receiving the money or receiving a small amount over a long period of time.

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