The FGA however is clearly not interested in empirical evidence. One of its first "studies" contributed to Florida Governor Rick Scott's defense of his controversial welfare drug-testing law, requiring benefit recipients to take a drug test as a qualification for benefits. A Bush-appointed federal judge threw out that study as evidence, claiming it was "not competent expert opinion" and that "even a cursory review of certain assumptions in the pamphlet undermines its conclusions." Florida's law requiring drug tests for welfare applicants ended up identifying only 2.6% testing positive, significantly lower than the general population's rate of 8.13% in Florida. This directly contradicted justifications for the law, which also proved financially wasteful. Florida spent over $118,000 reimbursing those who tested negative, exceeding any program savings and resulting in a net cost exceeding $45,000. It cost more to apply the condition than it saved. It should also be noted that studies of unconditional cash programs tend to show a net reduction in drug use. In 2016, the FGA touted a study from Kansas of work requirements on SNAP which was panned by both liberal and conservative economists alike for cherry-picking data. Work requirements should be based on credible evidence and attention to policy details the exact opposite of what FGA produces, tweeted Peter Germanis, a conservative economist who served in the Reagan and Bush administrations who went on to tweet, Tarren Bragdon bases his arguments to support work requirements on the junk science produced by the FGA no serious researcher would accept their claims."
All the reports of the newer basic income pilots that have been published since that review have only further strengthened the review's conclusion. Over and over again, in city after city, work has either increased or not significantly decreased. The FGA anti-UBI paper also compares the boosted unemployment insurance payments during the pandemic to UBI, which anyone who understands UBI knows is quite different. Paying people on the condition they remain unemployed is not at all the same thing as paying people regardless of their employment status. One creates a work disincentive and the other doesn't. It is this difference that all the latest generation of pilots are testing. What happens when someone gets to keep a payment in addition to their paycheck, instead of losing it? The basic income pilots are answering that question using the scientific method to compare treatment groups to control groups. A week after FGA published its anti-UBI paper, it planted an op-ed in the Dallas Morning News, just as it and similar groups often do as part of their overall strategy. The op-ed made no mention of the positive results of the pilot in Texas that had just been published a month prior. Instead it made claims based on the pilots from the 1970s, which were quite different in design, and although do have something to tell us about basic income, need to be looked at in their full context, like for example the high marginal tax rates above and beyond 50% that they tested, and the fact that self-reporting working less meant a larger payment. From now going forward, if you make a point of looking, you'll find quotes from the FGA in articles about bills to ban basic income pilots at the state level. What you won't find is any mention of Alaska's UBI which it has had since 1982. You won't find any mention of how studies have shown it has increased employment there, or how it has improved the health of mothers and babies, or how it has reduced obesity and child abuse. And most importantly of all, something else you won't find in FGA's anti-UBI hit pieces, is the names of FGA's funders.
Who is Funding the FGA? According to the Center for Media and Democracy's SourceWatch, the largest single donor to FGA has been the Ed Uihlein Family Foundation, with a total contribution from 2014-2021 of $17.85 million. Both in their 70s, the Uihleins (pronounced YOU-line) are a husband and wife team, Richard and Liz, worth around $5 billion. Together, the couple is the fourth biggest donor to political campaigns in the U.S., having reported giving over $190 million. The New York Times described them in 2018 as the most powerful couple you've never heard of. In 2023 as reported by The Guardian, the Uihleins were "one of the key funders of election denial," having poured "tens of millions into the 'Restoration of America' network that promotes ludicrous election conspiracy theories," and "in the 2022 cycle, were also top donors to election-denying candidates." The Uihleins were also one of the biggest contributors to the "March To Save America" rally that preceded the violent insurrection on January 6. The second biggest donor to the FGA is Donors Trust and its affiliate organization Donors Capital Fund, with a total contribution of $17.2 million from 2014 to 2022. Founded by a pair of activist libertarians, the combo are two of the most influential conservative organizations around. In 2013, Mother Jones dubbed them the dark-money ATM of the right. Donors Trust allows wealthy contributors who want to donate millions to do so anonymously, essentially scrubbing the identity of those underwriting organizations like the FGA. If you're a rich person who doesn't like the idea of UBI and how it will likely raise your taxes, you can give to Donors Trust and let them give the FGA your money for you, protecting your identity from those who would like to know you're fighting against boosting their incomes with a basic income floor.