Story Toolkit
Still not sure? Maybe one of these stories will do it for you. If you’re already on board, use the stories below to connect with different audiences—emotionally, morally, economically, and strategically. Each one highlights a different facet of Universal Basic Income. Think of them as lenses, not scripts. Choose the one that fits your moment, or remix them for deeper impact. Here is the message and fit for each:
1 Tug at the Heart: A System Out of Balance; When survival is a full-time job, no one wins; General public, people living it
2 Dreaming of a Better Life; UBI helps us chase meaningful work and joy, not just survival; Parents, educators, hopeful voters
3 Capitalism’s Fatal Flaw—and Why UBI Is the Fix; UBI fixes what capitalism breaks: market silence; Pro-business moderates, libertarians
4 Get Logical: A Brief History of Hacks; UBI is the next evolution in social systems; Technologists, policy thinkers
5 Wants, Unleashed; When needs are met, we unlock brilliance; Creatives, teens, progressives
6 The Asset We Lost: Time’s Priceless Twist; We built tools to save time—UBI lets us finally use it; Retirees, caregivers, reformers
7 Give Charity a Fighting Chance UBI lets nonprofits focus on thriving, not plugging holes; Nonprofit staff, funders
8 The Kindness That Isn’t Enough; We’re kind—but it’s not enough; without systems; Young professionals, donors
9 The Cost of the Wrong Tools; Conditional aid is wasteful, expensive, and broken; Policymakers, budget hawks
10 Use the Numbers; UBI works—in every trial, across contexts; Skeptics, city leaders, centrists
11 Freedom Makes Us Fierce; Security makes us sharper, freer, harder to manipulate; Civic leaders, democracy defenders
12 Nothing Is Fair; Life isn’t fair. UBI stops pretending it is; Teachers, social justice advocates
13 Lean Into Fairness (And Prepare for What’s Next); UBI is both a dividend on the past and a cushion for the future; Corporate leaders, futurists
1. Tug at the Heart: A System Out of Balance
Across party lines and income brackets, Americans agree the system isn’t working. Single moms toil through two jobs, still behind on rent. Factory workers watch retirements vanish. Teens skip meals so their siblings can eat. These millions of stories prove that “work hard and you’ll be fine” just isn’t true anymore.
Talent rots. Crime festers in empty pockets. And stress makes all of us worse at life. Stretched thin, small missteps, like missing a shift, a flat tire, a late bill, can spiral into chaos: eviction, job loss, or worse. It’s not weakness. It’s the edge, and far too many are living on it. And it’s not their fault. Nothing’s more random than where you start in life.
Now imagine if the floor were steady—no matter your zip code, no matter your luck. Imagine knowing, every month, that a baseline of support would show up—just enough cash to cover the essentials, to buy back your time, to breathe. No questions. No forms. No shame. Just trust.
UBI realigns our tools so no one has to prove their worth just to survive.
2. Dreaming of a Better Life
Don’t you want to live in a world where people get paid well to solve important problems, like getting food to the hungry or finding homes for the homeless? Where people can spend their free time playing and resting. Or doing something meaningful that requires a human touch, like teaching a kid how to slide into first base. Or solving interesting problems, like how to get us to Mars.
That’s the world we dream of—and the one we want for our kids. Every child hears the question: "What do you want to be when you grow up?" We delight in the answers: astronaut, artist, healer, hero. Even parents enjoy it, until it’s time for junior to get a job. We want a place where kids can aim high—like saving an endangered species or exploring distant lands—without being funneled into finance just to survive.
Instead, many of us get paid to do relatively trivial things. And our free time? A bit burdened, knowing we ought to do something to help solve society’s ills, while still trying to squeeze in the fun stuff.
How did this happen?
Well, first and foremost, we need to survive. There was a time when time was really all we needed. With effort, we could plow a field, build a house, start a fire, and live. Then a little money bought a little leisure, but time was still enough. Those days are gone. Progress has robbed time of its value. Now, money’s needed to survive.
To get money, we have to solve the problems of the people who already have it, better than they can themselves. That’s how capitalism works. We like to solve problems, and we like to compete, so we might get some enjoyment, and maybe even meaning, in solving the “silly” problems of the rich. But still, they’re relatively silly problems.
That’s it. That’s the whole reason. Markets run on signals. They tell problem solvers what to work on. Unfortunately, that means we need to figure out another way to get the important stuff done. Those problems are hard, so we better cooperate instead of compete. And they are really important, so it just wouldn’t be right to get paid to do them. And resources are scarce. (Well, food isn’t. And there are more vacant properties than homeless people, but still.) So right, scarcity, so we better make sure only the truly “deserving” get our attention.
But it’s all crazy. Markets were made to solve exactly these types of problems in the most effective way. They just need a signal to spring into action. Which means that the simple, yet powerful, method for solving problems, the market we love so much, could be employed to solve the important stuff, if we could just get cash into the hands of those who needed it. Think about it. If we could give the poor, those who don’t have food or homes, cash, no strings attached, what would happen? We’d begin competing, bringing our best to the game, to solve their problems. We’d be free to make money doing it, and a lot of money if we did it well. And we wouldn’t have to worry about wasting ridiculous amounts of time and money figuring out who deserved it. Who cares if they “deserve” it. They’d have the money, and we could profit by satisfying their needs.
And wealth would still accumulate, especially for those who solve important problems. And they could still get their “silly” problems solved. Getting their hedge funds optimized and having the luxury of scolding their server would just cost a little more, until the innovators do it better.
You see? We all level up. And all it takes is a simple transfer of cash.
3. Capitalism’s Fatal Flaw—and Why UBI Is the Fix
Capitalism is the best system we’ve built for creating wealth. It rewards problem-solving, drives innovation, and scales fast. But it’s got a flaw so deep that if we ignore it, prosperity turns to collapse.
Here’s the flaw:
Capitalism gives more chips to whoever wins—so the winners keep playing, and the losers get pushed off the board. It’s not evil. It’s math.
The more wealth you have, the easier it is to stack more—investments, assets, influence. Meanwhile, those without capital rent out their time just to scrape by. And when time can’t buy survival—because wages flatline while rents soar—they’re out.
Eventually, most people can’t signal what they need—food, shelter, medicine—because their wallets are empty. Markets only hear money, not desperation. So we get luxury condos and dopamine apps while hunger and housing go ignored.
This isn’t just inequality—it’s instability.
Demand vanishes. Businesses stall. Competition shrinks. Trust frays. The engine that once served us all starts serving itself. Patches like welfare don’t fix the rigging.
UBI is the core fix.
It doesn’t reject capitalism. It restores it.
It gives everyone just enough cash to signal their needs. A mom buys groceries. A kid gets tutoring. Local shops and teachers thrive. Markets respond, compete, innovate. Entrepreneurs rise. Problems get solved. Capitalism works again—from the bottom up.
Not a revolution. A reboot.
Not redistribution. A restoration.
We don’t need to burn it down.
We just need to deal everyone in—before the game breaks for good.
4. Get Logical: A Brief History of Hacks
Humanity evolves by hacking our own social systems. We started in small tribes built on trust; we scaled up by embracing competition; we supercharged it with capitalism. Each stage sparked new wealth but also introduced new imbalances.
Capitalism’s game engine: Solve a problem, get paid. Over time, money and power concentrate, and markets fail those with empty pockets. Capital then chases clicks and speculation instead of serving basic needs.
UBI: The next refinement. The problem isn’t capitalism itself, it’s the input signal. Giving everyone a baseline of cash rekindles demand and competition for essentials. It restores capitalism’s ability to allocate resources dynamically, giving everyone the means to participate. It’s the next upgrade in a centuries-long chain of social evolution.
Step back: hunger and homelessness aren’t personal failures—they’re system glitches. Capitalism’s engine hums on demand, but when labor can’t signal needs, it idles. Unconditional cash isn’t a gift—it’s a patch, rebooting the market to cut labor and free leisure. History shows we’ve hacked bigger bugs: tribes scaled to cities, markets outgrew bartering. This is simpler—everyone gets chips, competition sorts the rest. No gatekeepers, no moralizing—just a cleaner loop where time tilts to what we love.
5. Have Some Fun: Wants, Unleashed
Once gifts = needs, the left side of the equation—time + tools—is finally free to chase wants.
That’s the point.
For most of history, our time and tools went to survival. Plow the field. Fetch the water. Punch the clock. Build the safety net. But when the basics are covered—when gifts take care of needs—we unlock the rest of the equation.
We get to build what we want.
And that’s when the game gets good.
Capitalism is an incredible innovation engine. But right now, it’s misfiring—solving for clicks instead of clean water, dopamine apps instead of durable joy. Why? Because too many people can’t afford to want anymore. They're stuck trying to survive.
But once we set the floor, competition can finally chase our actual desires: music, meaning, murals, better diapers, and Mars. We start funding solutions that spark delight—not just desperation. The pressure’s off, so the energy flows. We get bold. Weird. Brilliant.
And guess what? You can enjoy the rewards guilt-free.
You’re not stepping on someone else’s neck to get there. You’re not exploiting cheap labor to chase a dream. You’re in a system that gives everyone chips to play.
Want to win? Solve real problems. Make something beautiful. Make someone laugh. Build the future we used to just sketch in notebooks.
This is what the equation unlocks:
time + tools = wants, once gifts = needs
Stop teaching people how to play poker. Pass out the chips.
Let’s play.
6. The Asset We Lost: Time’s Priceless Twist
We built machines to save time.
We scaled markets to do more with less.
We told time: “You’re not needed here.”
And it worked. Plows became tractors. Typists became apps. Groceries delivered themselves.
We spent centuries trying to work time out of a job—and we succeeded.
But then we failed to claim the prize.
Instead of freeing people, we just changed the rules. Time lost its value for survival, but we never gave it permission to thrive. We told people, “Your time isn’t enough to live”—and gave them nothing in return.
That’s where gifts = needs comes in.
We need a baseline—not to punish innovation, but to complete the promise of progress. We made time less essential for survival so it could be used for something better: parenting, inventing, learning, building, playing, resting, dreaming.
This was always the point.
Time didn’t lose its value.
It became invaluable.
Now it just needs room to move.
Universal Basic Income doesn’t “make up” for lost time.
It unlocks it.
7. Give Charity a Fighting Chance
Charities need top talent—smart, driven people who can solve hunger, house the homeless, and reimagine what’s possible. And some do step up, taking pay cuts to serve, because they believe. But too often, we make it a sacrifice. We balk at paying big salaries to “do good,” and that mismatch—between values and value—keeps charities limping along.
So the best minds—the ones who could rethink poverty—split their energy. Some grind away in corporate jobs, optimizing ad clicks to survive, saving their “A game” for nights and weekends. Others pour their whole “A game” into service—but at a cost: low pay, long hours, no cushion.
Even volunteers feel it. They show up—packing boxes at the food bank, building shelters at night—but they’re drained. Their best went to jobs they care less about. What’s left is the “B game,” given to what matters most.
UBI flips this.
Put cash in everyone’s pocket, and charities can compete. Real wages for real talent. No guilt trips. Volunteers arrive fresh, not fried—bringing their “A game” because survival’s off the table. It’s not just funding people—it’s funding purpose. For once, our values line up with value.
Now imagine how charity itself could evolve.
Today, helping a homeless person often means applying Band-Aids. Temporary shelter. A sandwich. A kind word. But what if a steady stream of cash awaited them? The charity—or even you—could pick them up, dust them off, and set them on solid ground. A place to live. A way to get food. And a bit of breathing room.
You could work with them in hope, not despair.
Sure, some still won’t make it. But so many more would. In fact, many were already making it—until something “small” derailed everything. A flat tire. A cold. The kind of thing most of us brush off. For them, it started the spiral.
All they need is a little time—and a steady stream of cash.
They don’t need a miracle. Just a real break. One with dignity.
Too expensive to sustain?
They’ll pay it back in spades.
8. The Kindness That Isn’t Enough
You sit down for dinner—maybe at a place that calls itself “farm to table,” where the lighting is soft and the prices steep. You tip 22%, because you know 15% is a joke, and 20% barely feels like enough. Still, the math doesn’t work. You leave knowing your server is juggling rent, maybe kids, maybe college debt. The stress isn’t yours, but you feel it anyway.
On the way out, someone asks you for money on the street. You want to help. Sometimes you do. Sometimes you look away. Either way, it doesn’t feel good.
You donate to food banks, sponsor a kid’s art class, maybe even cover someone’s rent once. But it all feels like buckets of water in a burning building. Generosity feels too small. The problems feel too big.
You want to live in a world where dignity is default—not something bought through tips or charity. A world where your kindness isn’t the last line of defense, but one piece of a larger system that already has people’s backs.
That’s what UBI is. It’s not about replacing kindness. It’s about scaling it. Instead of carrying the burden alone, you join millions in flipping the default. No more scrambling to guess who deserves help. No more helplessness in the face of a rigged game.
You’d pay to make the problem go away—because it’s your problem too. Not out of guilt. Out of a deeper sense that something isn’t right—and we finally have a way to fix it together.
9. The Cost of the Wrong Tools
We say we’re helping—but too often, we’re just spending more to get less.
We deliver food no one asked for. We fill shelters while ignoring the homes sitting empty. We design programs with forms, hoops, and judgment—then pay whole offices to manage the red tape. It feels like compassion, but it runs on waste.
And when that fails, we pick up the tab in other ways:
ER visits instead of checkups
Cops responding to poverty’s side effects
Mandated wages doing welfare’s job
Charities scrambling to catch who slipped through the cracks
All of it costs real money—just badly spent. We cover rent with bureaucracy. We chase crime with police instead of prevention. We flood the system with things people don’t need, while ignoring what they do.
And here’s the kicker: producing all that extra stuff raises prices on raw materials, shipping, and labor. So even when the gifts don’t match the need, the whole supply chain still feels the pressure. We end up paying more to deliver less.
If time + tools < needs, the gap doesn’t just disappear.
Society fills it. But it fills it badly.
Cash is simpler. It cuts through the noise.
No logistics. No middlemen. No guesswork.
Just people—signaling exactly what they need, and markets competing to meet them there.
We’re already spending the money.
UBI is how we stop wasting it.
10. Use the Numbers
When we use the right tools for the right tasks—money for basics, time for growth—the data follows:
Stockton, CA gave 125 people $500/month—full-time jobs jumped from 28% to 40% (but measure what matters!), ER visits dropped 20%, debt fell 30%.
Finland sent $600/month to 2,000 unemployed—crime dropped 10%, mental health rose 15%, and people kept working.
Alaska has sent $1,000–$2,000/year to every resident since 1982—poverty dropped 25%, small businesses grew 8%.
Canada’s Mincome trial gave $500/month in the 1970s—hospitalizations fell 8%, high school completion rose 20%.
Across countries, decades, and political climates, the results are consistent:
More work (paid and nonpaid).
Better health.
Stronger families.
It works. Not because people change. Because the system does.
11. Freedom Makes Us Fierce
We like to think we vote with our values. But too often, we vote with our stomachs—or worse, our fears.
When your needs aren’t met, every decision filters through survival. You don’t have time to think long-term. You don’t have energy to question stories that stir fear or promise quick relief. You go with the loudest voice, the easiest fix, the safest-sounding hand.
That’s not stupidity. That’s biology.
When time + tools < needs, the belly rules.
Universal Basic Income changes that.
With a steady floor—just enough to cover the basics—your belly quiets down. And when your body isn’t shouting, your mind can speak up. You start to pay attention. You ask better questions. You vote not just for comfort—but for vision.
This is more than financial security.
This is cognitive liberty.
You stop being easy to scare. You get harder to manipulate. You don’t buy the fear-mongering, the scapegoating, the empty promises wrapped in flags. You listen for substance. You align with truth.
UBI doesn’t just give people money.
It gives people bandwidth.
And that changes everything.
Because a full stomach is the foundation of a free mind.
And free minds make fierce citizens.
12. Nothing Is Fair
We tell kids to work hard, play fair, and everything will turn out okay.
Then life happens.
A flat tire at the wrong time. A sick parent. The wrong zip code. The wrong school. The wrong decade.
And suddenly, “hard work” doesn’t cut it.
We cling to the myth of meritocracy because it makes things feel earned. But the truth? Luck shapes more than grit ever could. And the gap between the two is wide enough to swallow lives.
We act like fairness means giving only to those who "deserve" it. But real fairness means setting the floor before the fall. It means giving everyone a shot, not judging who should even be in the game.
Universal Basic Income doesn’t pretend to make life fair.
It just stops pretending life is.
13. Lean into Fairness (And Prepare for What’s Next)
Every employer wants every employee to work themselves out of a job. Make it faster. Smarter. Cleaner. And if there were a simple way to share the benefits of that ingenuity, most leaders would take the deal. But it’s hard to know who made the breakthrough, and harder still to track all the value created over time. Progress compounds—quietly, collectively—and the prize ends up trapped at the top.
Universal Basic Income is how we pay it forward, and pay it back. It’s not charity. It’s a dividend on the gains we’ve built together—especially for those who’ve improved the system in ways we can’t easily measure.
And now, we face an even bigger shift.
AI and automation are accelerating change at a speed we’ve never seen. Entire industries—from retail to legal services—are being redefined. That’s not some distant future. It’s this year. This quarter. This résumé update. The link between effort and survival is snapping faster than we can rebuild it.
UBI isn’t just fair in hindsight—it’s essential foresight. It gives people the space to pivot, retrain, rest, and reimagine their role in a rapidly evolving world. It gives society breathing room—to adapt, to innovate, to stabilize before the ground shifts again.
It doesn’t punish innovation. It completes it. We’ve succeeded at making time less essential for survival—now we need a system that reflects that success.
We could waste effort sorting who sparked which leap—just like we waste it sorting ‘deserving’ from ‘undeserving’ in welfare’s maze. Both kill value chasing shadows. UBI stops the game, hands out the cash, and lets us build what’s next—because the future won’t wait for paperwork