Finland has begun reporting on
its two-year experiment with the so-called basic income—guaranteed monthly cash for citizens. So how did it work out? The results so far are mixed.
The program involved a couple of thousand unemployed Finns between the ages of 25 and 58, who got €560 ($634) a month through 2017 and 2018 instead of basic unemployment benefits. The second year’s results will be reported in 2020, but as for the first year, it seems the basic income made the subjects feel healthier and less stressed.
However, it didn’t have any meaningful effect on the subjects’ employment—compared with a control group, the participants worked an average of 0.4 days more during 2017, and earned an average of €21 ($24) less over the same year.