Ric Edelman: Emotional and Financial Uplift

Ric Edelman: It's Friday, October 6th. Coming up on today's show, how to protect all of your documents safely and securely and incredibly easily, too, including sharing them with folks. And the question about correlation with crypto.

There are more than 3,100 counties in the United States. The fifth wealthiest county in America is Fairfax County in Virginia. Just across the river from Washington, DC, the average income in Fairfax is almost double the national average. But not everybody in Fairfax County is wealthy. 6% of the population is poor. That's 68,000 people. So now Fairfax County is distributing $750 a month for 15 months to 180 low income families. No strings attached. The recipients can spend the money on anything they want - drugs, booze, cigarettes, prostitutes. But more likely they'll really use the money for food, clothes, housing, health care and childcare. The local United Way is determining which families qualify for the money. 

And by the way, I was chair of that United Way for two years and on the Board for six. United Way says that although 6% of the county is defined as poor, according to federal guidelines, a third of the people in the county qualify for this program, but only 180 of them are going to get included. Fairfax is the latest local government that is experimenting with cash payments as a way to combat poverty and inequality. 118 mayors across the country have signed pledges to develop these programs in their communities. 

In other words, UBI, universal basic income, is getting guaranteed money without having to work for it, or do anything else for that matter, other than being a low-income household. Or to be specific, to qualify in the Fairfax program, you do have to be employed. You've got to be older than 18, you've got to have a child, at least one of them 16 or younger, living with you, and you can't be receiving any other form of government assistance like Social Security, disability or whatever. And your total household income has to be between 150 and 250% of the federal poverty level. In other words, we're talking a family of four who have an income of $45,000 to $75,000.

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