Universal Basic Income: eBay Founder Gives $500,000 To Project In Kenya

The American workforce is going to change dramatically as robots and automation continue to take the place of humans. To combat that, eBay founder Pierre Omidyar has pledged nearly half a million dollars to test a universal basic income program. The cash will come from the Omidyar Network, the tech mogul's philanthropic investment firm and be doled out to people living in Kenya through a program called GiveDirectly. The money will be used to run a 12-year pilot program to test the feasibility of universal basic income. Through the program, a group of 6,000 Kenyan citizens will be granted regular stipends for the duration of the experiment. About 20,000 more people will also receive some form of cash to supplement their income.