Eleven mayors have signed on to the “Mayors for Guaranteed Income” initiative. The group is working with the Economic Security Project, which has funded basic income experiments in Stockton and elsewhere, and is co-chaired by Chris Hughes, a multimillionaire guaranteed income advocate and one of the founders of Facebook.
The cities that have joined the initiative also include St Paul, Minnesota; Jackson, Mississippi; Newark, New Jersey; Oakland and Compton, California; Shreveport, Louisiana; Columbia, South Carolina; and Tacoma, Washington.
It’s not yet clear how much money the cities might hand out, or how many residents might actually receive a check in the near future. The mayors are still working on fundraising for the effort and exploring what experiments in their cities might look like, including how to generate more data that shows the effects of the direct cash payments. But Tubbs said that he hoped cities would be able to take some action on guaranteed income by early next year.
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