Finland gave 2,000 unemployed people 560 euros a month with no conditions attached.
In January 2017, Finland launched the first nationwide randomized controlled trial of a basic income. The Social Insurance Institution of Finland, known as Kela, selected 2,000 unemployed people between the ages of twenty-five and fifty-eight through random sampling and gave each of them 560 euros per month for two years.1
The payment was unconditional. Recipients could spend it however they wished, with no means testing, no job-search requirements, and no reduction if they earned other income. The basic income was not taxed.2
The experiment was designed to answer a specific question about the Finnish social security system. Prime Minister Juha Sipilä's centre-right government wanted to know whether removing conditions from unemployment benefits would encourage people to accept job offers they might otherwise refuse for fear of losing their benefits.3
The control group consisted of roughly 170,000 people who received standard unemployment benefits from Kela during the same period. Because participation in the treatment group was mandatory, the trial avoided the selection bias common in voluntary experiments.2
The final results, published in May 2020, showed small employment effects. Basic income recipients worked an average of six more days than the control group during the measurement period from November 2017 to October 2018.1 The employment impact was complicated by the government's introduction of a separate activation model in 2018 that partially cut benefits for people who did not meet work requirements.
The wellbeing effects were more pronounced. Recipients reported higher life satisfaction, less mental strain, less depression, and less loneliness than the control group. They also reported stronger trust in other people and in institutions such as politicians, police, and the courts.1
Finland did not extend the experiment after 2018. The government that took office in 2019 promised a negative income tax experiment but did not carry it out.3 The Finnish trial joined a growing body of evidence from basic income pilots in Kenya, Stockton, California, Barcelona, and several other locations, each testing variations of the same premise under different economic conditions.4