The Balance features JFI guaranteed income expertise

The Balance, a personal finance site dedicated to comprehensible resources on issues of personal financial health, interviewed JFI Policy Communications Lead Halah Ahmad for a discussion on rising national interest in guaranteed income policy emerging during the COVID-19 pandemic. The article explains the concept of a universal basic income and related income floor policy ideas, referencing JFI’s own FAQ section on guaranteed income, and tabulates cash transfer proposals that emerged in reaction to the pandemic. Diccon Hyatt of The Balance asked what motivated the rising public interest in cash relief. From the article:

“We already had a large portion of the population unable to pay if they had a sudden $400 bill,” said Halah Ahmad, policy lead for the Jain Family Institute, a research organization that studies UBI and other forms of basic income. “Suddenly you have 35 million people filing for unemployment and a massive uptick of people reaching desperation and food insecurity.”

Halah also discussed the over 10 different proposals that emerged within the legislature in advance of the CARES Act, all of which promised cash relief in the pandemic, and the dramatic poverty alleviation impacts the CARES Act had—impacts that are known effects of direct cash transfers. In addition, Halah discussed the broader appetite for further cash transfers based on polling data.

Read the full article here.

Thank you to Diccon Hyatt for this coverage and for an important article explaining the current momentum around guaranteed income.