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The UBI Debate: What We Know – and Don’t Know – About Universal Basic Income
Policymakers from Nairobi to Silicon Valley have lately been considering the same approach to reducing poverty: universal basic income (UBI). Evidence from ongoing randomized evaluations will be key to understanding the impact of UBI, and how this disruptive concept might fit into a broader portfolio of social policies. In the meantime, there is much we already know from impact evaluations of related interventions that can help make sense of the debate. Alison Fahey at J-PAL provides an overview.
- Categories
- Financial Inclusion
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Going Cashless? Bad for Tax Cheats, Privacy, Poor
Could physical cash go away entirely? Economists see great payoffs in a cashless society: lower transaction costs, new tools to manage economic growth and an end to tax evasion and money laundering. Critics see an end to privacy, frightening new powers for tyrants and costs that would fall disproportionately on the poor.
- Categories
- Financial Inclusion, Technology
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Commentary: The Surprising Resilience of Cash Transactions
While Singapore, the Netherlands, France, Sweden and Switzerland are among the least cash reliant countries, in Malaysia, Saudi Arabia, Peru and Egypt, only 1 per cent of transactions are cashless. Even some highly advanced countries, such as Japan, are still highly reliant on cash.
- Categories
- Financial Inclusion
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Safaricom and mSurvey launch Consumer Wallet to map Africa’s cash economy
Kenya’s leading mobile provider, Safaricom, is teaming up with data collection startup mSurvey to launch Consumer Wallet ― an online platform using mobile and SMS to map Africa’s cash-based economy.
- Categories
- Financial Inclusion, Technology
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Social Business Roundup: A Defiant Asset Manager, Salty Doorknobs and Who Has it Worse?
This week in social business, the world's third-largest asset manager is pressuring companies to add more women to their boards; a Nobel Prize winner's ponderings on inequality within nations might make you rethink life in America; and salt earns a chance to be a hero – for a change.
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Unlocking the Power of Digital Financial Services for Humanitarian Response
More people worldwide are in crisis than ever before and the humanitarian sector is transforming how it responds to them; it's moving away from a commodities-based approach toward cash-based assistance. Digitizing these cash payments can help build bridges between the humanitarian and development sectors, but progress has been slow. What can speed it up? A new report by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation might help.
- Categories
- Financial Inclusion, Technology
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Somalia is a leader in mobile money but still wants to print its first cash notes in 25 years
The collapse of the Somali government in 1991 saw the rise of unique political, economic and social outfits, all clambering to fill the void of government institutions. After a few years of relative stability and successful elections, Somalia’s new government hopes to reverse all that. Buoyed by donors, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank, the country now wants to resume printing banknotes this year.
- Categories
- Financial Inclusion
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
- Tags
- cash, digital currency, mobile money
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Somalia Is a Leader in Mobile Money But Still Wants to Print Its First Cash Notes in 25 Years
The collapse of the Somali government in 1991 saw the rise of unique political, economic and social outfits, all clambering to fill the void of government institutions. One of them was the emergence of a nonconforming monetary system, controlled by warlords and rogue businessmen, who contracted foreign printers and imported counterfeit money. This left the Somali economy in shambles, largely dependent on dollars for trade, and effectively created a freewheeling “economy without state.”
- Categories
- Financial Inclusion, Technology
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
- Tags
- cash, fintech, mobile money
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