With the coronavirus pandemic exacerbating the most vulnerable people's financial struggles, the Spanish government has decided to implement what it's calling a national minimum income, ensuring that people in the nation's 850,000 lowest-income households receive at least roughly $500 a month in income. The plan aims to reach 2.3 million people and is expected to cost the government about 3 billion a year. Spain's government first floated the idea of a version of a universal basic income back in December ... in a deal that the country's Socialist Party and left-wing Unidas Podemos agreed on to create a general mechanism to guarantee earnings for families with no or low income." The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated that plan. People between 23 and 65 years old with "assets of less than 16,614 euros," not including house and discounted loans, will be eligible for the basic income plan, according to Reuters, and will include incentives for finding "a formal job". Though the minimum amount the government is guaranteeing is 462 a month, that amount will increase with the number of family members. A family is defined as "vulnerable" and eligible for the plan if its monthly income is 10 or more below the minimum income. At the point, the government will give them enough cash to meet the thresholds. Spain has a "considerable" gap between its richest and poorest, with the top 20% of the population earning nearly seven times as much as the bottom 20%.