A European initiative invites us to crowdfund Basic Incomes of 800 euros for one year. The lucky ones will be chosen through a raffle and then will tell us their experience and the changes in their daily lives so that through these testimonies we can learn what it is like to live in the 21st century Europe with a basic income of 800 euros every month.

This initiative was launched to support the petition of the European Citizens Initiative for Unconditional Basic Incomes, which already has the 11% of the necessary signatures.

What would I change in my life if I had a basic income of eight hundred euros every month for a year?. This question appears just when you open the UBI4ALL website.

Creating different images for the future that we have not experienced before or have not been told to us has some difficulty, but it is not impossible. So, I tried to see myself in a different daily life, without the stress of bills or loans, but also, the future of my children. With the 800 euros that I would receive every month, my psychological mood would change, financial insecurity would not be present and I would see things around me with a new perspective. I would like to try, create a new cooperative creative work, play more sports, learn Spanish and travel with my friends and family.

To participate in the raffle you have to fill out a form with your personal details, you must reside in the European Union and be over 16 years old. Participation in the raffle is free, it is up to you if you want to financially support this effort. The process is simple by credit card, cash card, bank deposit or PayPal.

We asked Helwig Fenner, the initiator of the idea, to share with us how the initiative started:

“Let me tell you shortly of the initiation. On a cold day in January I sat together with other UBI activists in Hannover (Germany). It was the kick-off meeting for an EU- petition on Basic Income and we were planning the campaign. After working groups were built and tasks were distributed it seemed done. But surprisedly I came up with the idea of a European Basic Income raffle. 5 long seconds of silence. Okay, I thought by myself, maybe not a good brainchild, too much work. Then someone shouted: Brilliant idea! Enthusiasm broke out and suddenly there was no doubt that I would do it.

To raffle off Basic Income is actually not my idea as Mein Grundeinkommen in Germany has been doing this successfully since 2014 – with me as an employee for almost 6 years. But I felt that now was the big chance to lift it to the European level and not for German speaking people only.

Today, after 20 weeks, the raffle initiative has managed to raise 70% of the 9600 euros that is the goal for the first basic income. The funding mechanism through crowdfunding, is exclusively from citizens to citizens, a relationship of solidarity and at the same time self-organized to achieve a utopia *.

What would you change if you had a basic income of eight hundred euros per month?. Follow UBI4ALL social media for more information about Unconditional Basic Income and the lottery.

* Wikipedia – The word utopia was coined from Ancient Greek by Sir Thomas More in 1516. “Utopia” comes from Greek: οὐ (“not”) and τόπος (“place”) which translates as “no-place” and literally means any non-existent society, when ‘described in considerable detail’. However, in standard usage, the words meaning has shifted and now usually describes a non-existent society that is intended to be viewed as considerably better than contemporary society.