The Town That Stopped Worrying: The Forgotten Experiment That Proved Poverty Is Just a Lack of Cash

The incredible true story of the "Mincome" experiment in Dauphin, Manitoba, where a guaranteed basic income in the 1970s led to better health and education, only to have the data hidden for 30 years.

In the endless expanse of the Canadian prairies, there is a town called Dauphin. In 1974, it looked like any other farming community in Manitoba—grain elevators, pickup trucks, and hardworking people trying to make ends meet. But for five years, Dauphin was the most radical place in North America.

It was the site of a social experiment that, had it been fully understood at the time, might have changed the way the entire world thinks about poverty.

The project was called Mincome (Minimum Income).

The premise was breathtakingly simple. The government decided that if a family's income fell below a certain level, they would simply be given a check to make up the difference.

There were no drug tests. No work requirements. No "moral character" assessments. No shame.

It was based on a question that economists and politicians had been debating for centuries: If you give poor people money without forcing them to work for it, what will they do?

The cynical view—held by many politicians then and now—was that they would become lazy. They would stop working. They would spend the money on alcohol. The social fabric would unravel because "hunger is the best motivator."

Dauphin was the petri dish designed to test if the cynics were right.

Part I: The Cheque in the Mail

For five years, the checks came. A family of four received the equivalent of about $18,000 a year in today’s money. It wasn't a fortune. It wasn't enough to buy a Cadillac. But it was enough to buy a floor.

It was a floor under their feet that meant they wouldn't fall into the abyss if the crop failed, or if the breadwinner got sick.

Life in Dauphin went on. The farmers farmed. The shopkeepers opened their shops. To the casual observer, nothing had changed.

But inside the homes, the temperature was dropping. The frantic heat of survival mode was cooling down.

Then, in 1979, the political winds shifted. A new conservative government came into power. They looked at the Mincome project and saw a waste of tax dollars. They saw a handout.

They canceled the program instantly.

But they did something worse than canceling it. They ignored the results.

The researchers had collected millions of data points. They had filled 1,800 cardboard boxes with surveys, health records, and interviews. But the new government refused to pay the money to analyze them.

The boxes were taped shut. They were moved to a warehouse in Winnipeg, and then to another warehouse. They gathered dust. The families of Dauphin went back to struggling, and the world went back to assuming that the only cure for poverty is punishment.

For thirty years, the truth sat in the dark.

Part II: The Detective in the Archives

Enter Dr. Evelyn Forget.

She was a health economist at the University of Manitoba. In the early 2000s, she heard rumors about the "Mincome" data. She described it as a "legend" in Canadian academic circles—the lost treasure of social science.

She went looking for the boxes. She found them, rotting away in a government archive. The families were just numbers on paper.

But Evelyn Forget realized that she didn't just need the surveys. She needed the outcome. She realized that in Canada, with its universal healthcare system, the government keeps records of every doctor visit and hospital admission.

She hatched a brilliant plan. She compared the health records of the people in Dauphin during the experiment (1974–1979) with the health records of similar towns that didn't get the free money.

What she found when she crunched the numbers was shocking.

Part III: The Hospital Miracle

The cynics had predicted that people would stop working.

The data showed that primary earners (men with full-time jobs) did not quit. They barely reduced their hours at all. They used the money exactly as intended: as a safety net, not a hammock.

Only two groups worked significantly less:

* New mothers: They used the money to stay home longer with their babies.

* Teenagers: They stopped taking after-school jobs to support their families.

And because the teenagers weren't forced to work to put food on the table, something incredible happened. High school graduation rates in Dauphin skyrocketed. In a farming town where boys often dropped out at 16 to work in the fields, they were suddenly finishing Grade 12.

But the biggest shock was in the hospital.

Dr. Forget found that during the Mincome years, hospitalizations in Dauphin dropped by 8.5%.

In the world of public health, an 8.5% drop is massive. It’s the kind of number you usually only see when you cure a major disease.

She dug deeper. Why were fewer people going to the hospital?

Was it better nutrition? Maybe. But the real drop came from two specific categories:

* Accidents and injuries: Farm accidents, car crashes, domestic accidents.

* Mental health issues: Anxiety, depression, domestic violence.

The conclusion was undeniable. Poverty causes stress.

When you don't know where your next meal is coming from, your brain is in a constant state of "fight or flight." You make bad decisions. You are clumsy. You are angry. You drink to cope. Your blood pressure stays high.

The "Mincome" checks didn't just buy food; they bought peace of mind.

When the financial floor was put under the town, the collective cortisol levels dropped. People slept better. They argued less. They were more careful with their farm machinery.

The doctors in the 1970s hadn't noticed it because it happened slowly. But the data proved it: Money acted like a vaccine against the physical symptoms of poverty.

Part IV: The Lesson We Forgot

The tragedy of the Dauphin experiment isn't that it failed. It’s that it succeeded, and we pretended it didn't happen.

For forty years, policymakers have argued that we can't afford to help the poor because it costs too much. They design complex welfare systems with caseworkers, drug tests, and bureaucracy to ensure no one is "cheating."

But Evelyn Forget’s analysis showed that the Mincome program actually saved money in other areas. The 8.5% drop in hospital visits saved the government millions in healthcare costs. The increased graduation rates likely boosted the economy for decades afterward.

We spent decades treating the symptoms of poverty—building more jails, more hospitals, more shelters—when the cure was sitting in a dusty box in Winnipeg.

Conclusion: The Trust Dividend

The story of Dauphin challenges a deep-seated moral belief that many of us hold, even unconsciously: that people must suffer to deserve help. We believe that if you make life too easy for the poor, they will rot.

Dauphin proved that the opposite is true. When you remove the boot of survival from people's necks, they don't collapse. They stand up straighter.

Teenagers don't become lazy; they become students. Mothers don't become leeches; they become parents. Farmers don't stop farming; they farm more safely.

The experiment proved that poverty is not a lack of character. It is not a moral failure. It is simply a lack of cash. And when you fix the cash problem, the "character" problems tend to fix themselves.

The 1,800 boxes are no longer lost. The data is out. The question is no longer "what would happen?" We know what would happen.

The question is why we are still afraid to do it.