Income Security and Public Safety: How Guaranteed Basic Income Could Reduce Systemic Inequities for Indigenous Peoples

Introduction

Income security — having reliable access to the resources needed to meet basic needs — is a foundational determinant of health and wellbeing. For many Indigenous peoples, poverty, housing insecurity, and underfunded social services are not individual circumstances but the results of ongoing colonial policies, economic exclusion, and inequitable jurisdictional arrangements. These conditions, combined with intergenerational trauma, adverse contact with child and family services, and systemic discrimination, shape exposure to the criminal justice system and contribute to significant overrepresentation of Indigenous peoples in policing and incarceration.

Strengthening income security, including through Guaranteed Basic Income (GBI) programs, represents a promising prerequisite to improving community safety and reducing reliance on carceral systems — especially when these approaches are Indigenous-led and rights-based.

Colonial Roots of Economic Insecurity

Indigenous communities have long maintained sophisticated systems of governance, economies based in land stewardship, and strong social safety networks grounded in kinship circles and culture. These strengths were systematically disrupted through colonial policies that continue to shape economic insecurity today, including:

Dispossession and the Disruption of Traditional Economies

The forced displacement of Indigenous peoples from their territories — through dishonoured Treaties, land theft, and resource extraction without consent — removed communities from the economic bases that sustained them. Imposed barriers such as the reserve system, mobility restrictions, and marginalization limited access to employment and markets, creating enduring wealth gaps that continue to heighten contact with the justice system.

Systemic Underfunding and Jurisdictional Fragmentation

Federal jurisdiction over “Indians and lands reserved for Indians” has resulted in chronic underfunding of essential services, particularly housing, infrastructure, health, education, and social supports. Underfunding in on-reserve housing alone has left First Nations without adequate, safe homes, with high incidences of overcrowding and repair or replacement needs. For example, the Assembly of First Nations estimates the urgent need for 157,453 new homes on reserve.

These deficits undermine community health, make economic participation difficult, and hinder intergenerational wealth accumulation. Housing insecurity and poverty increase the likelihood of interactions with police and child welfare systems — systems where Indigenous peoples are already disproportionately surveilled.

Criminalization of Culture and Family Systems

Colonial laws such as the Indian Act (1876) imposed drastic restrictions on Indigenous governance, mobility, land use, and social systems. The Indian Act imposed centralized control, erasing collective governance structures and banning ceremonies and cultural practices, and undermining customary land stewardship.

Educational and social policies — like forced attendance at Residential or Day Schools, the child welfare system, and the Sixties Scoop — further disrupted kinship systems, cultural continuity, and community cohesion.

As a result, behaviours rooted in survival or community care — such as informal economies, resource sharing, or re-establishing kinship networks — have often been criminalized. This criminalization is not accidental but deeply rooted in colonial efforts to suppress Indigenous autonomy, culture, and self-determination.

Labour Market Barriers and Wage Inequities

Because of structural and systemic barriers, many Indigenous people have been segregated into low-wage, precarious employment, with Statistics Canada noting Indigenous People earn less per hour than non-Indigenous people, and their unemployment rate is significantly higher (11.6% vs. 7.4% in 2021).

Outside the labour market, poverty is amplified by the lack of access to basic services and stable living conditions, making reliance on social assistance or informal economies more likely.

Intergenerational Barriers to Economic Participation

Colonial systems prohibited or limited property ownership, business development, and inheritance rights on reserves. Over generations, this meant many First Nations citizens could not accumulate assets, invest in economic opportunities, or build generational wealth.

Today, land-tenure systems, funding shortfalls, and regulatory barriers block equitable access to capital, entrepreneurship, and economic infrastructure. The enduring legacy is a structural wealth gap that persists across generations, reinforcing cycles of poverty, instability, and marginalization.

These colonial foundations did not merely create economic disadvantage — they were designed to maintain systems that push Indigenous peoples into poverty and, in turn, pull them into the justice system.

Criminalization and Overrepresentation in the Justice System

Indigenous communities and First Nations in Canada face disproportionately high rates of poverty, unemployment, intergenerational trauma, and systemic discrimination compared to non-Indigenous communities. These are all systemic factors that correlate with higher crime rates, especially in under-resourced communities.

Key examples:

• In 2023, 17.5% of Indigenous peoples in the provinces lived below the poverty line, almost twice the rate of the non-Indigenous population.

• One third (33%) of those accused of homicide in 2023 were identified by police as Indigenous. The rate of Indigenous people accused (9.60 per 100,000 Indigenous people) was nearly nine times higher than that of non-Indigenous people accused (0.98 per 100,000 non-Indigenous people).

• In 2015-2016, Indigenous people made up 25% of all accused (adults and youth), while representing only 5% of the Canadian population.

• In 2022–2023, Indigenous adults made up 30% of provincial/territorial custody admissions, despite being only 4% of the adult population.

• Indigenous women account for 42% of federally incarcerated women.

These inequities underscore that criminalization is deeply linked to systemic discrimination, jurisdictional fragmentation, and the chronic underfunding of essential services.

What is Guaranteed Basic Income (GBI)?

Guaranteed basic income (GBI) refers to regular, unconditional income supports provided to all or specific groups to ensure a stable standard of living. By guaranteeing that individuals have the financial resources to meet their basic needs, GBI aims to eliminate poverty and reduce the economic insecurity created by current income assistance systems.

Because poverty and material deprivation are tightly connected to criminalization and justice system involvement, GBI is increasingly recognized as a prevention-focused public safety approach.

Existing income security programs in Canada — such as the Canada Child Benefit, Old Age Security, and the Guaranteed Income Supplement — operate as partial forms of GBI and show the potential positive impacts of broader cash-transfer systems. For example, the CCB has helped lift more than 435,000 children out of poverty. A broader GBI could extend these outcomes — especially for Indigenous adults most impacted by current gaps.

How Income Supports Improve Community Safety

Research shows that poverty alleviation is crime prevention. For Indigenous communities facing systemic marginalization, the impact could be even greater. GBIs can:

• Reduce Economically-Driven Crime: Stable incomes reduce thefts, break-ins, and survival-driven offences. The Alaska Permanent Fund Dividend, which provides every resident with an annual cash dividend, has been shown to reduce property crime by 8% without increasing violent crime.

• Strengthen Families and Reduce Violence: Stable income eases stress associated with intimate partner violence and child welfare involvement — systems that overwhelmingly impact Indigenous women and children.

• Improve Youth Opportunities: Income supports paired with employment, mentorship, and education programs (e.g., under the Indigenous Justice Program) help divert youth from criminalization pathways shaped by poverty and systemic surveillance.

• Support Mental Health and Address Substance Use: Poverty is tightly linked to mental health and substance use. Cash supports, when combined with wraparound services — housing, healing programs, and land-based care — support safer communities and reduce harmful outcomes.

GBI Programs for Indigenous Peoples: Why Self-Determination Matters

For GBI programs to meaningfully support Indigenous wellbeing, they must be guided by Indigenous governance and distinctions-based approaches. However, current program design often faces barriers, which include:

• The colonial administration of benefits: Many programs are administered by federal and/or provincial/territorial governments. The lack of Indigenous governance of these programs has led to mistrust, bureaucratic barriers, and underutilization, dampening the potential positive impacts.

• Short-term or conditional supports: Programs that are inconsistent, stigmatized, or conditional may not provide sufficient stability to impact crime in the long term. GBI programs geared towards addressing the root causes of crime through recurring, long-term basic income supports could offer a comprehensive solution.

• Over-policing and systemic racism: Even with economic support, over-policing and racial profiling can perpetuate high incarceration rates of Indigenous peoples. Economic supports alone cannot solve over-policing unless they are paired with justice reform and culturally appropriate interventions.

• Lack of culturally grounded services: Income supports are often administered as siloed, individualized programs. The lack of wholistic, cultural integration means mental health and healing needs may remain unmet.

Moving Toward Justice and Wellbeing

Community safety is not simply the absence of crime — it is the presence of security, dignity, and opportunity. For Indigenous peoples, a Guaranteed Basic Income could be one essential tool within a broader transformation of social policy rooted in rights, equity, and self-determination.

Strengthening income security is not a replacement for justice reform — but it is a prerequisite for meaningful change. Safer Indigenous communities are not created through surveillance and punishment — they are built by eliminating poverty and restoring self-determined systems of care.