I had this same thought. Even if the goal is to study how people act, it seems that actions would be very different depending on whether your community is isol

I had this same thought. Even if the goal is to study how people act, it seems that actions would be very different depending on whether your community is isolated or not. For example, if I'm part of a small study within a city, it's unlikely that most of my social sphere would also be part of the study. Thus I might be pressured to keep doing a job I hate to avoid the stigma of unemployment. On the other hand, if I were in a small island community where everyone had UBI I think there would be much less pressure to keep working undesirable jobs. Also, Oakland seems like a very expensive choice. Part of the reason I supported Give Directly's UBI experiment was because they are wisely choosing an area where funding can stretch to many more people. Obviously, there are some differences based on the country's level of development, but even choosing an isolated town in the USA would be cheaper and likely more informative.