Poverty is a pressing issue in the United States, with 46.5 million people living in poverty and over 500,000 people homeless. Although poverty is an issue throughout the world, countries like Switzerland are taking a progressive approach to lower the number of citizens living in poor conditions. Switzerland’s government has already scheduled a vote on the issue planned for the referendum election on June 5, 2016. The vote plans to pay all Swiss citizens whether they work or not, 2,500 Swiss Francs (2,515.88 USD) per month and 625 Francs (628.27 USD) per month to children.

The plan will cost the government around 208 billion Francs a year (209.29 billion USD), where 150 billion Francs (150.93 billion USD) would need to be levied from taxes and a further 55 billion Francs (55.34 billion USD) would be transferred from social insurance and social assistance spending. While Switzerland, an extremely economically stable country known for being quite rich, some people believe they cannot afford it.

The discussion about basic income in Switzerland had started in the 1980’s, but by October 2013, 130,00 citizens had signed a petition calling for a referendum on basic income as a constitutional right. If the law gets passed, it will be the first law in history to guarantee unconditional income, and it is already the first law like it to be voted on. The main reason why this law is yet to be passed is the thought that people would want to stop working, which is a widely accepted conclusion from both the left and the right side politicians.

Surprisingly, according to a survey done by the Demoscope Institute only 10 percent of Swiss citizens would stop working or even consider to stop working. According to the same survey, the majority of Swiss residents would carry on working, or still look for a job even if they were guaranteed income. Although these statistics prove the idea that people would stop working wrong, 56 percent of those surveyed said they believe the proposal will never see the light of day in Swiss society.”If the new income law gets passed, it’s going to help a lot of poor Swiss citizens get into better living conditions.” said Freshman Brian Peschel who hopes this leads as an example to U.S. politicians.