Family Finances

Building Financial Security: Newark’s Roadmap Toward a Guaranteed Income

June 25, 2020  • Rachel Black & Sheida Isabel Elmi

Can giving families cash effectively address their unmet financial need? If so, how should it be done? These were the questions animating Newark, NJ Mayor Ras J. Baraka’s announcement in his 2019 State of the City address that he was creating Newark’s Guaranteed Income Task Force. “We believe in universal basic income, especially in a time where studies have shown that families that have a crisis of needing just $400 in a month may experience a setback that may be difficult, even impossible to recover from.”

Newark is not alone in asking these questions. Stockton, California; Chicago, Illinois; Philadelphia, PA, and Jackson, Mississippi are among the locations where pilots are either being pursued, developed, or implemented…

The full report was originally posted on newarknj.gov. To view complete findings, visit here.