Dissertation on Basic Income as a Means to Promote Mental Health

Sergi Raventós (Autonomous University of Barcelona) recently completed a doctoral thesis on the topic of basic income and mental health.

In the dissertation, Raventós — who also works in a mental health foundation in Barcelona and is a member of the board of the Red Renta Básica — examines empirical evidence concerning the effects of direct cash payments (in India, Namibia, North Carolina, Kenya, and Alaska, for example) and concludes that, among other benefits, unconditional cash payments tend to lead to improved mental health in communities where they are instituted.

Plausibly, a basic income could ameliorate the social and economic inequality and insecurity that Raventós demonstrates to have a destructive effect on mental health.

Raventós, Sergi (2016) Socioeconomic Inequality and Mental Health: The Proposal of a Basic Income as a Means to Protect and Promote Mental Health, Barcelona: Autonomous University of Barcelona (Doctoral Thesis).

Abstract

The aim of this thesis is to provide a theoretical approximation to mental health and several related concepts. The social determinants of (mental) health have shown in recent years that human beings are susceptible to economic uncertainty, precariousness of their living conditions and social inequality.

This study considers social and especially income inequalities, and how they affect mental health, drawing attention to the extraordinary importance of policies aiming at social and economic protection, which are seen as essential for offering stability and security in people’s lives and health. The political orientations of a range of health-oriented institutions and agencies working to promote mental health and to reduce social inequality are considered, while critical evaluation is made of some policies being implemented by the Spanish and Catalan governments at a time of serious economic crisis and a concomitant rise of mental health problems deriving from poverty, unemployment and job insecurity. In this situation of severe economic recession and drastically increased poverty, and with everything it entails in terms of psychological suffering and mental health problems, the Spanish and Catalan governments have resorted to the same measures they have used in periods of economic growth, obsolete strategies which have proven ineffective in the long, unabating crisis. All of this has contributed towards worsening economic insecurity which, as a range of research projects have demonstrated, has serious consequences for mental health.

The study concludes with a discussion of Basic Income, a social protection measure offering economic security which has been tested in several countries. Experiments whereby unconditional cash payments made over different periods to target populations in India, Namibia, North Carolina, Kenya, Alaska, for example, have provided empirical evidence of improvement in different aspects of health and mental health in particular, together with a reduction of social inequalities and poverty, advances in education, human relations, and in the economic sphere, inter alia.