Giving Compass' Take:

• Philanthropy News Digest's PhilanTopic blog reviews Chris Hughes' book Fair Shot: Rethinking Inequality and How We Earn, which advocates for universal basic income (UBI) and a redistribution of wealth.

• Beyond the pages of Hughes' book, which policies along the lines of UBI are we seeing? How can we put more practices into place and help lower-income people expand their opportunities?

• Here's how one experiment in Finland is going.

More than fifty years after President Lyndon Johnson launched a War on Poverty in America, an estimated forty-five million Americans still live below the poverty line, and many critics of government have declared its efforts in this area an utter failure. At times, the scope and persistence of the problem can cause even the most committed anti-poverty activist to despair. But what if the solution to poverty was as straightforward as putting cash directly in the pockets of the people who need it?

That's what Chris Hughes, a co-founder of Facebook and an Obama campaign aide who in 2016 co-founded the Economic Security Project — a group committed to advancing the debate around unconditional cash transfers and guaranteed basic income in the United States — proposes in his new book, Fair Shot: Rethinking Inequality and How We Earn. Or as Hughes puts it boldly at one point: "Government should provide a guaranteed income of $500 a month to every adult who lives in a household making less than $50,000 per year and who is working in some way."

While many have proffered "solutions" to the problem of income inequality, few come to the issue with the kind of the perspective that Hughes, a co-founder of one the world's largest and most powerful companies, has. What makes Fair Shot so inspiring isn't its bold and straightforward approach to the problem of poverty in America. It's Hughes' open, honest, and refreshingly human exploration of how his own background, upbringing, and experience led him to advocate for a guaranteed income for low-income and working people, paid for by people like himself.

Read the full article about universal basic income and Chris Hughes' Fair Shot by Mitch Nauffts at PhilanTopic.