The United Kingdom is experiencing worrying trends in population health. Policy needs to shift ‘upstream’ to address fundamental causes. Universal Basic Income has emerged as one response to tackling these health issues. A Universal Basic Income would provide a new form of societal safety net through a regular, unconditional cash payment to all individuals in society. However, with scarce public resources and competing upstream income-based policies, such as a Minimum Income Guarantee, implementing transformative initiatives, such as Universal Basic Income, without a public mandate is unlikely. Currently, we do not know the extent to which the general public value different income-based policies, including when wider impacts, such as health outcomes, are explicitly stated.
