UBI Piloters' Network
Newsletter 25, Feb, 2026
The Falling Cost of Basic Income in the United States, 1967–2024: Estimates for a Plan Large Enough to Eliminate Poverty
This article by Jack Rossbach and Karl Widerquist estimates the cost of Universal Basic Income (UBI) sufficient to eliminate poverty in the United States. It uses the most recent microdata available from the Census Bureau through its Current Population Survey (CPS) public-use microdata files and references historical income data from the Annual Social and Economic Supplements (ASEC) going back to 1967.
Improvements in stress and sleep following 24-months of Guaranteed Income, results from a randomized trial among Black women in Georgia
Sleep is a critical part of life. Increasing evidence shows how multiple dimensions of sleep health (e.g., quality, duration, efficiency, timing) have lasting impacts on health across the life course. Variation in sleep quality and duration is well-documented across geography, race, and socioeconomic strata. People residing in the Southeast report the worst sleep compared to other regions in the United States. Poor sleep quality and short sleep duration are more prevalent among racially and ethnically minoritized and low-income groups.
Location Update for the 2026 BIEN Congress
We would like to share an important update regarding the location of the 2026 BIEN Congress.
Following a review of international travel conditions and visa accessibility for participants, a decision has reluctantly been reached to relocate the 2026 BIEN Congress from University of Pennsylvania, USA, to Toronto Metropolitan University Toronto, Canada.
Doing Radical Things Right: Ethical Good Practice for Basic Income Experiments
Increasing calls for reform to welfare provision have seen growing support for basic income (BI) - the unconditional provision of cash transfers to all.
As a result, recent years have seen an exponential increase in the number of pilot experiments of BI, across all parts of the world. However, to date, there has been little discussion of the ethical considerations of such experiments. This paper is the outcome of a workshop whereby BI piloters came together to discuss such ethical considerations, share case studies, and begin to formulate general principles to guide ethical BI experiments.
Unconditional Basic Income and Sustainable Consumption: From Theory to Experimentation
This article by Nicholas Langridge and Jurgen De Wispelaere develops hypotheses to inform an experimental approach for investigating the impact of Unconditional Basic Income (UBI) on sustainable consumption. As the ecological crisis intensifies, UBI has been discussed as a possible eco-social policy solution. However, the empirical evidence to support UBI’s ecological benefits remains limited, particularly regarding consumption and aligning the freedom inherent to UBI with sustainable choices.
A call for papers
Please submit empirical articles to this World Development Perspectives Special Issue on Basic Income, Labour, and Exit
Please email: Neil Howard at n.p.howard@bath.ac.uk
The 1000S OF hours of sleep lost to financial stress in my lifetime has no doubt shortened my life and made it much worse
In the USA and spent over 50 years working at or near...even below...minimum wage.....a basic income would have taken stress away and allowed for more opportunities to try to get ahead
When someone without a college degree or savings wants to change jobs even....it's a risk and a hardship....
Every country should adopt a local university income....I think this would have a side effect of reducing desperate poverty related immigration...people could more easily attempt to be self employed....or move ...or grow food...
Nice roundup of recent UBI research. The ethics paper caught my attention because its rare to see pilot designers actually stop and think through the moral implications before jumping in. I worked on a small cash transfer project a few years back and we definitely should have thought more upfront about participant wellbeing. The part about formualting shared principles across different experiments seems crucial for building legitimacy.