What would a basic income cost in the United Arab Emirates?
Pick a country, who gets it and how much a month. Everything is calculated on this device; nothing is sent anywhere.
Total cost per year
31.8 billion UAE dirhams
about 8.65 billion US dollars
11.5 million people × 230 UAE dirhams a month × 12 months
Compared with
- Government expense (central) (2023)41.6%
- Government revenue (central, excl. grants) (2024)51.7%
- Tax revenue (central government) (2024)242%
- GDP (nominal) (2024)1.6%
The United Arab Emirates in numbers
The United Arab Emirates has a population of 11.5 million (2025) and a GDP of 2.03 trillion UAE dirhams (about 552 billion US dollars) in 2024.
Paying everyone 230 UAE dirhams a month would cost 31.8 billion UAE dirhams a year (about 8.65 billion US dollars), or 1.6% of GDP. That equals 41.6% of central government expense (2023), 51.7% of its revenue (2024), and 242% of its tax revenue (2024).
Children only (under 18: 2.1 million) would cost 5.79 billion UAE dirhams a year (0.29% of GDP); adults only (18 and over: 9.41 million), 26 billion UAE dirhams (1.3%).
Default amount: 230 UAE dirhams a month is the World Bank's international poverty line of $3.00 a day (2021 PPP), converted into UAE dirhams with the World Bank's PPP conversion factor for household consumption (2025) and rounded to two significant figures. It is a reference point, not a policy proposal; change it above.
How to read this
This is the gross cost: the total paid out. The real net cost depends on which taxes fund it, which benefits or tax breaks it replaces and whether the payment is taxed. The population, budget and GDP figures are not all from the same year (see the sources).
Sources for the figures
- Population
- World Bank: population, total (SP.POP.TOTL), and population by single year of age 0 to 17 (SP.POP.AG00.FE.IN … SP.POP.AG17.MA.IN), 2025
- SP.POP.AG00.FE.IN … SP.POP.AG17.MA.IN
- Government expense and tax revenue
- World Bank: central government expense, revenue excluding grants and tax revenue, % of GDP (GC.XPN.TOTL.GD.ZS, GC.REV.XGRT.GD.ZS, GC.TAX.TOTL.GD.ZS), 2023, 2024
- Default amount
- World Bank: international poverty line of $3.00 a day (2021 PPP), June 2025 update
- World Bank: PPP conversion factor, household final consumption (PA.NUS.PRVT.PP), 2025
- Retrieved from the World Bank API on November 9, 2026 (CC BY 4.0). Government figures are central government, as a share of GDP in their own year, applied to the latest GDP.