Filling the Social Welfare Gap: The Impact of a Nonprofit’s Guaranteed Income Program for Artists

Young theorized that nonprofits can serve a supplementary role by addressing unmet demands that fall outside the scope of existing government programs. However, empirical evidence testing the supplementary role of nonprofits is limited, and even less is known about how field-specific and regional contexts influence this role. To address this gap, this paper uses a case of a guaranteed income (GI) program for artists designed and implemented by a nonprofit based in New York State to examine the supplementary role of nonprofits in an urban setting serving artists. We compare a population of artists served by a nonprofit’s GI program with those receiving support through government social assistance programs. Through regression and simulation analysis, we assess the extent to which the GI program addresses a significant void, both in terms of the number and diversity of artists being served by existing social assistance mechanisms. This analysis provides evidence that nonprofits can serve a supplementary role of filling gaps left by social welfare programs by reaching new and diverse recipients and underscores the importance of field-specific and regional contexts in understanding the supplementary role of nonprofits.