GiveDirectly (RxKids)

A while back, I watched a harrowing documentary about the water crisis in Flint, Michigan (which I think was just called Flint, by Anthony Baxter). It detailed the public health crisis in 2014 caused by levels of lead in the water 25x higher than the recommended amount. A number of people died from lead poisoning and many others were seriously ill. There's a lot of blame placed on US authorities - particularly the Michigan gov. Rick Snyder - about how they prioritised cost-saving measures over people's lives. I believe Snyder has been charged with manslaughter and neglect of duty, and a number of other officials have been charged with similar crimes. To this day, water in Flint is still not fully safe to drink and many have concerns about the long-lasting health consequences on the lives of Flint residents. I highly recommend reading more about the crisis if you aren't already aware. 

This is not, however, what Tithe's donation this month is going towards. I'm mentioning this because it seems symbolic of the decline of a once-thriving industrial middle America. Flint was the heartland of General Motors, with multiple factories producing more automotive parts than anywhere else in America. In the 80s and 90s, it was an affluent city and a place people flocked to to live out the American dream. 

Fast forward to today, and many of the factories have closed and job opportunities are low. A combination of deindustrialisation and the lingering water crisis that has proven to be a lethal blow for Flint. Almost 70 percent of children there grow up in poverty, five times the US average, and it is one of the poorest cities in the country. The concept of poverty in the US seems hard to believe given the image the country portrays, and yet these families suffer from unequal access to healthcare and significant food insecurity. 

The RxKids program has partnered with GiveDirectly to address this. They simply prescribe cash payments to every pregnant person (or guardian) and infant in the city. The program gives a one-time $1,500 payment after 20 weeks of pregnancy, and $500 a month during the infant’s first year. 

There are no income requirements or restrictions on how participants spend the money. The goal of the program is to improve infant and maternal health outcomes and economic stability for the city’s youngest residents and their families.

There's a lot of evidence which points to the effectiveness of cash-in-hand programs like this - I won't go into it but you can read more here or here - however a line that stuck with me was this. Having a program for every child born in the city with no income requirements and with no strings attached is “sharing a message of trust in a city where there is no trust.”  

The programme has raised $43m of $55m needed to run for five years, and although small, I feel proud to have us contribute to this. Our donation was £275 and you can read more about it here.