US government sends $20,000,000 to families as ‘No Strings Attached’ guaranteed income program grows

A program that provides direct, no-obligation payments to families struggling to make ends meet is soon rolling out across the state of Michigan.

The Rx Kids program originally launched in Flint and is expected to expand to five counties in the eastern Upper Peninsula after the state approved $20 million in funding, the Detroit Free Press reports.

The program gives mothers $1,500 midway through pregnancy for things like nutrition, prenatal care, cribs or anything else they deem necessary.

After the birth of their child, families receive $500 per month for the first year of their lives, totaling $7,500 in cash payments.

According to H. Luke Shaefer, co-president of Rx Kids, a similar initiative launched earlier in Michigan brought tremendous benefits to families, but then child poverty rose again.

“For that brief, shining moment, we lifted millions of children out of poverty. We saw food shortages among families with children fall to the lowest levels we have ever recorded. We saw family credit scores reach their highest point ever.

And then we turned it around and we couldn’t sustain that for more than a year and we saw child poverty increase — the highest single-year increase in history. We saw food shortages increase and just the financial security of families that were doing worse.”

According to the University of Michigan, 17.6% of children under the age of 18 live in a household below the federal poverty line.

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