Is a Cryptocurrency Basic Income Possible?

An obvious hope here is to eliminate the layers of bureaucracy and middlemen that plague traditional charity. Almost everybody has heard the horror stories about professional charity administrators drawing huge salaries and living lavish lifestyles while little or no money reaches the poor.

The idea behind Basic Income Tokens like those that Horizon.NGO is planning to create a conduit that moves money straight from donors to recipients. The system is similar to the donations that GiveDirectly has been testing in Kenya and elsewhere for some time.

Unlike traditional aid organizations, GiveDirectly simply sends money to people in certain locations via the M-Pesa payment app. The thinking behind GiveDirectly is that most people are smart enough to run their own lives without direction from an aid bureaucrat.