Ann Arbor Guaranteed Income Pilot Project

The city made several decisions around this guaranteed income pilot that set it apart from similar programs implemented nationally. Ann Arbor chose to design the program so that academically rigorous social science concerning the nature of poverty and the impacts of guaranteed income would be one of the results of this investment. In service of that goal, RFP respondents were asked to propose a novel research question or questions for study to expand the understanding of the utility and importance of these projects. In addition, the city wanted an outside agency to serve as the fiscal agent for the disbursement of funds, to facilitate a more cost-efficient program, that is easier for program participants to use.

The University of Michigan Poverty Solutions Program will administer the funds directly to program recipients through a partnership with Steady, a company that specializes in the disbursement of funds to both banked and unbanked populations as inexpensively as possible.

Poverty Solutions has also proposed an interesting set of research questions that they will pursue with a high-quality mixed-methods study, a novel approach to the guaranteed income pilot. The program targets individuals who live in low- and moderate-income households and are also engaged in some form of entrepreneurship, whether it be gig work, an informal business run out of their home or in their neighborhood, or some other more formal business activity. The research questions that will be explored include:

•  Whether the monthly payments from the guaranteed income pilot program positively contribute to participants’ social determinants of health, specifically through increased housing, food, and transportation security, improvements in physical and mental health and access to care, and improvements in access and quality of child care.

•  Whether the monthly payments help small businesses and entrepreneurs stabilize and/or grow their businesses or not;

• Whether the monthly payments allow entrepreneurs the time and resources to focus on their business or not; and

• Whether the monthly payments contribute to the positive economic growth of the community.

Payments to participants in the program are planned to last two years.  Payments will be roughly $528 per month for 100 participants. Details on how individuals may be selected for participation in the program will be announced after the contract is executed. This program will be funded entirely by federal ARPA dollars.