Bringing guaranteed income to the rural US

A conversation between Rural Guaranteed Minimum Income Initiative founders Jeff Atwood and Betsy Burton with Michael Tubbs

While the popular conception of poverty in the United States tends to conjure images of dilapidated urban centers, millions of families in small towns and counties across rural America struggle to make ends meet.

Rural counties have higher average rates of poverty than metro areas, often because of a dearth of well-paying employment opportunities. Almost 90 percent of high poverty US counties (those with more than 20 percent of the population living in poverty) are rural.

It’s against this backdrop that Jeff Atwood and Betsy Burton launched the Rural Guaranteed Minimum Income Initiative (RGMII).

RGMII launched this year with three pilots in rural counties across the US, with funding from Atwood and Burton’s commitment to give away half their wealth in five years.

Jeff and Betsy discuss their nascent program with Michael Tubbs, who implemented the first city-run pilot in Stockton, CA, and founded Mayors for a Guaranteed Income. They discuss what brought them to this work, the vision for their initiative, and how guaranteed income is a crucial policy for every community in the US.

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Michael: Jeff and Betsy, it’s great to see you. I’m excited about the Rural Guaranteed Income Initiative. Could you help me understand why you chose rural America, what the initiative aims to accomplish, and if this connects to any of your personal stories?

Jeff: In my blog post, I committed that we were going to give away half of our wealth within the next five years. When we sat down to determine how to address pervasive problems like healthcare, housing, and education costs, we came to guaranteed income. I would say that was largely inspired by the work you did in Stockton. I remember hearing about the SEED program years ago when it started, and it just made sense to me. It’s simple: it’s giving people the trust to know what to do with their money, and that always appealed to me. When considering how to address all these issues, the answer was clear: give people money.

Betsy: The focus on rural areas came about partly because it may be easier to address some of these issues where the money goes further. More importantly, rural parts of America have been ignored for a long time. I’m from Iowa and am very familiar with these areas; people there feel abandoned. We wanted to bring them up and show that the American dream still exists, even in places that feel forgotten.

Michael: Have you started in certain rural communities, and what have you learned from that work?

Jeff: We started in two places tied directly to our personal history. While Betsy is from Iowa, I grew up moving around a lot, largely in the American South, because my dad was in the Air Force. My mother is from North Carolina, and my father is from West Virginia. The counties where they were born and raised are right in the middle of poverty rates, if you look at all counties in the state, and often its generational poverty. So, I decided: Why not start at the beginning, where we came from?

Having these experiences back in my parents’ home counties is profound. I’m seeing people look at me and say, “I feel hope for the first time in a long time.” That is powerful. This is work that’s worth doing.

The first three counties were Mercer County, West Virginia, Warren County, MS and my mom’s county, Beaufort County in North Carolina. The people there were magnificent; they just lacked the tools they needed to succeed, so we’re giving it to them.

Michael: As we await federal action, what is the ultimate vision for your initiative? Are you focused on informing state policy with data from these pilots, or changing how counties run their general relief programs? What do you think about leveraging this pilot work?

Jeff: My personal life goal is to reach all 50 states—to do a study in one county in every state. Beyond that, we are focused on the science. These are studies designed to be repeatable and prove that this actually works. The stories and outcomes generate a lot of solid scientific data, which we are contributing to ubidata.io, a global repository for all basic income experiments across the world. We want this data to benefit everyone.

Betsy: And we are also using what we learn from previous studies to improve and iterate in the next round.

Jeff: It’s about building something that matters to people and improves the world. I don’t care about money; I care about leaving a better world for my children, your children, and everyone else listening right now. I just want the world to be better than I found it.

Michael: As people who saw a need and chose guaranteed income as the response, what would you say to those who are apprehensive, who believe there is a better way to spend down wealth or help those who are struggling? How do your experiences setting up pilots and research inform your answer to skeptics?

Betsy: I would tell them to look at the data. When we researched guaranteed income programs, we looked at the study Open Research conducted from 2020 to 2023. The effects of that study on people’s physical and mental well-being were amazing, including decreasing alcohol and opioid use. The automatic reaction people often have is that participants will waste the money. However, when you look at the data, you see that is not true. Giving people a sense of hope and the trust to know what is best to do with the money is incredibly empowering. Once you look at that data, it’s hard to think otherwise.

Jeff: The two data points Betsy and I loved the most were the significant reduction in alcohol and opioid use. This happens because you’ve created a trust system where someone actually cares about you, and you no longer have to worry about survival. That’s profound.

Michael: Jeff and Betsy, as we look at the widespread use of AI and the displacement that may happen, the story of guaranteed income in this country will include your contribution. Thank you for your focus on rural communities, and for highlighting how even Appalachian white people and white people in the South can benefit from cash.

Jeff: How about we help everyone in poverty, Michael? Everyone in poverty.

Michael: No, but I appreciate that, because part of the opposition to this idea is often that it is racialized, and some people don’t see how it benefits them. For a lot of people, the resentment is that they think, “They’ll get that, but I won’t.” We are talking about guaranteed income being for everyone to have ownership, a piece, and a stake in our society.

Jeff: That is tremendous. It’s an honor to be on your team with the Stockton study. We reference that all the time, and it was truly one of the first things you looked at.

Michael: We are now working with over 80 pilots across the country, documented at guaranteedincomeworks.com. From Mount Vernon, NY to Rochester, NY, what we are seeing is true no matter where you are in this country: if you’re struggling with affordability, groceries, or just struggling to breathe, $500 or $1,000 is enough for a foundation to build upon. It’s enough money to buy some boots and bootstraps so that you can pull yourself up. I’ll end with this: I’m not saying there shouldn’t be rich people, but if there are so many rich people, there shouldn’t be poor people.

Jeff: Hard agree.

Betsy: Agree.

Jeff: You tell them, Michael Tubbs!

Betsy: Part of our role, beyond just running the programs, is educating people about guaranteed income. When we tell people what we’re doing, they often ask, “What is that?” There is a lot of education to be done out there about what these programs truly are and telling the stories about them. Hopefully, we can be a part of that too.

Jeff: We have many miles to go before we sleep.

Betsy: Absolutely.