Guaranteed Assistance

GUARANTEED ASSISTANCE programs seek to assure aid to the impoverished. Guaranteed assistance programs can take various forms as they seek to remedy poverty in diverse manners, ranging from guaranteed minimum income, guaranteed healthcare, guaranteed education to conception of a guarantee of minimum nutrition and so forth.

Most of these programs approach remedying various social problems affiliated with poverty by ensuring a minimum attainment level. The basis for these types of policies is an assertion of basic human rights and needs—that there should be minimum standards that all persons should be able to meet.

A guaranteed income is a type of policy that would ensure all citizens have an income above a set standard. This type of policy can be constructed as a basic income, wherein the government would pay a standard minimum income for the year to each citizen. This income would be substantially larger for adults than for children and this type of income would be supported by a high tax base, but a significant proportion of one's tax could be returned in the basic income, contingent upon a person's income from work. C. Clark (1997) suggested that a 36-percent flat-tax in the United States could support a system with a basic income of $8,000 per adult and $2,000 per child. Tied to the concept of a guaranteed income are the minimum-wage policies that exist in many countries around the world, particularly in developed nations. A minimum-wage policy differs from a minimum income in that it is often structured around a minimum value or wage paid per hour of work. While variations exist, minimum wage may not allow an individual to live above an established poverty line.

Guaranteed assistance programs are often thought of in purely economic terms. However, this concept can be expanded to be inclusive of policies that seek to ensure educational attainment, childcare, healthcare, adequate food resources, housing, and other essential needs. A guaranteed minimum income for a family does not ensure that all basic needs will be met. Guaranteeing education, or education loans perhaps, can enable individuals to attain higher-paying jobs and move out of poverty more readily than a minimum income.

When contrasting the policies in developed nations with those of lesser-developed nations, a stark contrast may be seen. In developed nations, such as in Europe and the United States, there are more policies that will guarantee education and healthcare. In lesser-developed nations, the basic needs of the people may indicate a more substantial need for a guarantee of nutrition. Clearly, developed nations are likely to ensure basic adequate nutrition, but in the impoverished cultures of south Asia and Africa where famines may be occurring, the need for education is less essential.

Guaranteed assistance programs in their various incarnations are essentially ensuring that all people of a society can reach a minimum standard of living. These programs have visible short-term effects, as they improve citizen lifestyle, but also have long-term effects, as people are able to maintain better health and nutrition and attain better education and healthcare, and they enable a society to reach for the ultimate goal of eradicating the most severe forms of poverty.

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