Unconditional Cash Study
• 07.18.2024
Participant Stories
Stories: Location at Enrollment: Texas
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Anthony has a 9-month-old daughter who lives with his girlfriend on the other side of town at the start of the program. Their daughter was born three months premature and has specialized medical needs because of this. His biggest sources of stress at the time are his daughter’s health, and his finances. He has a job in customer service, but his real goal for the future is to get his side business–doing digital graphic design–to become profitable. When he learns about the $1,000 a month he sees this as the perfect opportunity to do just that. He tells us, “There's no way that I'm going to take this opportunity and not make some progress and not progress from it.” For Anthony, the money unlocked his potential. During the last three years, Anthony uses the $1,000 to save money and eventually rents an apartment for himself, his girlfriend, and their daughter in a neighborhood he prefers. He uses the money to buy a better computer that he needed for his digital art. He also used the money to pay for classes in an advanced technology program. The unconditional income helped him go back to school, and supported him investing more time and effort into his business. As a result, his graphic design business is now a primary source of income. …Belle
When Belle first learned she would be receiving $1,000 every month for three years, she knew that she wanted to use it to move. After her fiancé was murdered, she moved in with the grandparents of her two oldest children. “I knew my ultimate goal was I’m leaving here”. She took the unconditional cash and opened a security credit card to start building her credit. Every month, she put half of the money into her savings account. She was able to use the money to build her credit score, move out into her own apartment, and help pay for her children’s graduation and college expenses. “Both my kids started going to college, we didn't have a financial struggle, in a sense. We didn't have to struggle financially. With that extra $1,000 a month, it helped so much on just senior pictures, or hey mom, I wanna go so-and-so with my friends. It was the supplemental income, as if I had a helper. It really was my help mate.”The money gave her an opportunity to plan and budget, which she had never been able to before because she never had extra money. “To some people it was extra money, but to me, it was just a lifeline…realistically, when you start paying bills or you start doing this and this and this, once you break up $1,000, it's gone real fast. It made me be smarter about budgeting…I gotta make it stretch for all of these extra things that I can't afford from my check.” …Craig
After Craig started receiving $1,000 a month, he was in a car accident that broke his right femur and left him unable to work for two months. He was forced to move back in with his mother while he recovered. He relied on the unconditional income and support from his mother to carry him through this period of unemployment. Once he could start working again, he found he could no longer do physical labor because of his leg pain. The unconditional income gave him the agency to search for a job that was less physically demanding. Craig feels this allowed him time to heal and not experience chronic pain. He was able to be more selective and found a job as a sales representative. A year later, Craig faced another barrier to work when his truck broke down. He used the unconditional income that month to pay for a new battery. The money helped him weather these storms, find and maintain a stable job, and save money. As a result he was able to save $15,000 and now feels financially secure. He tells us, “I feel like I’m elevated, like I’m more wiser. Learning how to save the money has been really great for me. Just learning how to save it, how to manage money. I was able to save where I don't have to struggle.” …Debbie
Debbie, living in Fort Worth, Texas, had been married to her ex-husband since she was 19 years-old. He controlled both of their finances and over the years, became increasingly abusive. After he struck one of their children, she decided to live independently with her children. It was a big change, but with the unconditional cash, she was able to cover bills and set up her LLC. …Demarcus
Demarcus describes himself as a “simple guy from down South”. Like many, Covid lockdowns filled him with a new uncertainty, but the unconditional cash gave him a sense of stability and confidence that he would get through it. Beyond the stability the unconditional cash brought him, it gave him a new sense of financial understanding and ambition. …Desiree
Desiree is a mother to five, three of whom are in college and two younger children who live at home. At the start of the program, Desiree worked part-time as a photographer, though limited due to lack of childcare. Her husband’s paychecks were their primary source of income. Desiree described creatively prioritizing expenses each month, sometimes not turning the water back on or going without internet, to make ends meet. When she learned about the unconditional cash she thought to herself, “Oh my gosh, I might actually be able to pay some things without struggling every month.” Over the three years, Desiree was able to use the $1,000 per month to help her mother out with a grocery delivery service, so she didn’t have to leave her home during the pandemic. She used the money to access healthier foods for her family, help support her older children in college, and buy her younger kids clothes and books for school. She was able to put her youngest son in sports, which she could never afford before the cash assistance. At the end of the program, she reflected on the fact that between her work, her husband’s income, and the consistent unconditional cash, her credit score has improved, and they’ve been able to keep up with their mortgage, and provide support to family members. She feels her life is a 10/10 now, and she has aspirations to start a small charity to help others struggling. …Dominic
Like many young people, Dominic wanted to save money for retirement. But, when the pandemic hit and he lost his service industry job, he started to think differently about his relationship to work and money. He started working gig jobs, which gave him the flexibility to design his own life. With the unconditional cash, Dominic was also able to get top surgery as part of his transition. For Dominic, the unconditional cash afforded him the opportunity to explore what really mattered to him outside constant productivity. …Grace
Grace is a single-mother to three children. She grapples with multiple health conditions that make it hard for her to work. The $1,000 per month has “been a big blessing” in Grace and her children’s lives. She used the money on extracurriculars for her kids–sports, powerlifting, and band–as well as prom, school supplies, and field trips. Without the money, she could not have paid for a dual credit course for her daughter, which allowed her to graduate high school early and start college. Though the money helped, in many areas of Grace’s life it did not go far enough. Her goals were to use the money to improve her health, move out of her parent’s house, and secure transportation. Yet she continued to run into walls with her health, with misdiagnoses, botched surgeries, and trouble getting appointments. At one point she does get a car but can only afford an older car that breaks down after a time, and Grace cannot afford to fix it. Between her unreliable transportation, and living in a rural area removed from job opportunities, she struggles to find employment. Though there are still many “ups and downs”, she feels the program has helped make ends meet over the years, and her kids’ lives are better for it. …Jackie
At the beginning of the program, Jackie dedicated a lot of her time to taking care of her ailing husband, a relationship which she describes as abusive. Throughout the program, she experienced health challenges of her own, navigating her experience of trauma and depression.During the unconditional cash study, she used some of the money to leave for a halfway house. By the end of the program, she returned to supporting her husband as a full-time caretaker."I did use some of that money to make my way through the halfway house. I lived in another state for a year and I should have stayed. I should have stayed where my family and my kids were, but I didn't. I ended up coming back and falling back into his trap and it just started the whole cycle over again.” …Jeremiah
Jeremiah is living with his fiancée and their 6-month-old baby at the start of the program. He lost his security job during the pandemic and was working a low-wage job with unstable hours. Even with their joint income, they were not making ends meet. Moreover, he has sickle cell anemia which causes him to miss work at times. Yet his financial situation pushes him to work as much as he can, so he isn’t able to seek needed medical care. When he started receiving the $1,000 a month, the combined cash, his rental assistance, and the joint household income, is enough to keep them afloat for a time. Then, the lack of childcare causes him to lose his job. After the birth of their second child, they eventually lose their apartment, and end up in a hotel room. Though the $1,000 a month helped, ultimately it was not enough to overcome all the barriers in Jeremiah’s life. At the end of the program, he and his family are facing homelessness and often unable to afford food. …Jessie
Jessie, a single mother to two children, is a business analyst. During the three years of the program she was laid off from two jobs. The $1,000 a month gave her a financial cushion to be able to search for a new job each time. The first time, Jessie was able to spend months looking for a job until she found one she wanted. Her income from employment increased over the three years in the program. Now, Jessie finds herself unemployed again, but she has money saved up. Between her savings, unemployment insurance, and the unconditional cash, she is able to weather this period of unemployment. She feels because of the money she can be selective with her job search. Jessie has a number of “must haves,” including working 8am to 5pm Monday to Friday and not being on call. She is confident she will be able to find something and says that since the program started, each job she has taken has been better than the one she left. …Lisa
Lisa is a single mother to three living in Texas. At the start of program, she had no income. Lisa has lupus which kept her out of the workforce at the time, and her short-term disability had been cut off. At the time, her goal was to return to the workforce. Because of the $1,000 per month, Lisa is able to take a job making less money than at her previous job, but with a company that offered more opportunity for growth. Two years later, Lisa is in a salaried position, making over 75k, has gotten two promotions, and thinks she can get another within a year. She loves her job. “If I didn’t have that money from Every Dollar Counts, there is no way I could have taken that pay cut, but hearing about the growth opportunities, I was like, I have to give this a shot, but if I didn’t have the EDC money, there’s no way I would have been able to take this.” Lisa was also able to leave her abusive boyfriend and move into her own place, which wouldn’t be possible without the unconditional cash transfers. Her three sons are thriving. …Mallory
Mallory is a mother to two pre-teen daughters. Prior to being selected to receive $1,000 per month, Mallory tells us, “I was kind of stuck”. Mallory was in an abusive relationship with her husband. He refused to work, and she was the sole income for her household. Because of this, she wasn’t able to save money and didn’t feel she had financial security to make it on her own. Just before she started receiving the unconditional income, she had left her husband and moved her daughters into her parents’ house. She did not have stable employment at the time and was unsure how she was going to make ends meet. Her parents were helping as best they could, but they were not financially stable either. Everyone was struggling. Mallory recalls the first time she saw the $1,000 payment in her account. She describes she felt, “overwhelming relief”. “I was scared of the thought of having to support my children on my own without any kind of assistance. And once I got the money, it really helped me not feel like I was stuck”. Without the program, Mallory tells us, “I would probably still be in an abusive relationship.” Because of the $1,000 she was able to get her daughters away from an abusive home life, and expose them to new experiences like the skate park or going to their local splash pad, that she had been unable to do before. …Martha
With the unconditional cash transfers, Martha was able to move her and her children out of her sister's house where they were living with 7 other people, and into their own house where each of her kids had their own room. Throughout the past three years Martha experienced a job loss, as well as ended an abusive relationship. During these periods of time, she feels the $1,000 carried her through. There were times she had to depend entirely on the money. At the end of the program, she is working a stable job with excellent benefits that she loves. Though she feels like she is in the same financial situation as before the program started, the cash assistance allowed her to take on expenses she otherwise could not–such as renting her own house and buying a car. Martha explains, “It’s just like I’m back in the same spot that I was, but now I have more financial responsibility”. “But I tell you it helped me in so many ways, it really made a big change in my life. I feel a little more secure because I knew I had that money coming in every month. That was the money I was depending on to pay my car payments, I was depending on for my bills. I was able to get this house with that money. I was able to get a nice place for me and my kids.” …Nikisha
Nikisha lives with her husband and their three children in a small house owned by her in-laws. Before the program, she was unemployed, needing to stay home with her young children. Finances were strained, and they often paid bills late and went without. Though she feels like her situation would be worse without the money she tells us, “I was grateful to receive it, but I don't really feel like it made a major difference in my life because I still had to — I still paid bills late. I still struggled.”At the end of the program, her husband is the sole source of income. Nikisha feels if she had a job her life might be different, but she lives in a rural area and the jobs closeby do not pay enough to offset the cost of childcare. Better paying jobs are “an hour and a half commute one way.” Though she’s happy to have received the money she says “it would probably have to be double to make, to make what we receive in income, plus the gift, be enough to carry us possibly month-to-month.”For Nikisha, the money alone was not enough to overcome lack of childcare, low-paying job options, or her geographic barriers. …Paloma
Paloma was a new mother. She had just had her daughter and they were homeless, moving from shelter to shelter. “I was just trying to, you know, find jobs and, you know, I was homeless. I had nowhere to go, no family basically helping me, so I was pretty much on my own. Uh, so, I had to just figure it out little by little, you know.” Constantly moving created challenges for employment as well as childcare. Often when they moved she wouldn’t be able to keep her job, and she would move away from childcare. She tells us, “It was really hard. It was complicated”.She was shocked when she got the call about the $1,000. She had just gotten an apartment with the help of a shelter. She would have liked to save the money but, “the money was used just to survive.” Paloma had a lot of ups and downs throughout the three years, moving multiple times, losing jobs, and an unplanned pregnancy that she made the difficult decision to place in adoption for financial reasons. Nevertheless, Paloma feels optimistic about the future. At the end of the program she has stable housing for her and her daughter, is going to school again, and has a job lined up. …Willa
Willa is a mother of two daughters, both of whom have high medical needs so Willa doesn’t trust others to provide childcare. She tells us about times her diabetic daughter has gone into diabetic shock while under someone else’s care. So Willa quit her job and now stays home with the girls. They live in a house with nine other people relying on her husband’s income and food stamps. At the start of the program, she tells us stress was a 9/10. “I initially started receiving payments—I don't remember exactly when the start date was. It was right after my father had passed away. Then that following December, after my father had passed in 2020, my little brother was in a fatal car accident, and him and another driver were pronounced dead on the scene. I then ended up having to pay for his funeral expenses. It was really rough. The last couple years have been really hard.”When she first learned of the $1,000 her primary goal was to “catch up on bills, so that we could eventually move”. By the end of the program she had achieved her goal. “We were able to catch up on all of our existing bills, and we were able to move. We were able to move, and we currently live in a three-bedroom townhouse. Each of our girls have their own rooms. It's just us, and we have our own space, so it's very nice.” Willa feels without the money they would not be in as nice of a place as they are now, with a new vehicle, and reduced stress. …Zoe
When the program started, Zoe was at a pivotal moment in her life. After a domestic dispute with her husband, her kids were taken into Child Protective Services (CPS). She was struggling with addiction and living with her grandparents in a neighborhood that exacerbated the problem. Then, Zoe used the money to move into a women’s sober house, and while there, was able to get her children back. Now, Zoe has a much better relationship with her husband and children. She is living with her family in a new state, in a place she describes as safe and spacious and closer to family support and good schools for her children. …Audio Anthology Executive Producer
Rebecca Sananès
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