Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Policy Brief No. 10 - The Town With No Poverty: Health Effects Of Guaranteed Annual Income, Evelyn L. Forget

Population Change and Lifecourse Strategic Knowledge Cluster Research/Policy Brief

Guaranteed Annual Income (GAI) has been advocated and opposed in both the United States and Canada as a means to fight poverty since the 1960s, but how does GAI influence specific health and social outcomes? In examining data from a town involved in a Canadian GAI field experiment, we primarily found that a relatively modest GAI can improve population health at the community level. Considering the increasing burden of health care costs in Canada, it is possible that implementing GAI could amount to considerable savings.